may be, that cannot increase in enjoyment, usefulness, and power. Pull the weeds
sisters! "By floods and flames surrounded," you must "still your way pursue." If you keep believing you will not be confounded; God will deliver you.
3. By a Pure Heart we do not mean a Heart that cannot sin. The Devil was once a beautiful, sinless creature. But he yielded to temptation. The sinless crown fell from his beautiful brow, and from a pure archangel he was changed into a foul fiend, and hurled all the way from his bright and sinless Heaven to his dark and gloomy hell. Adam was pure when he came from the hands of his Maker. God pronounced him to be good; but, led away by Satan, he lost his Purity, and was cast out of Eden into a world of sin and sorrow and death.
Alas! alas! we have the unspeakable sorrow of too frequently seeing Saints and Soldiers fall from Holiness into sin. Some of the many miserable Backsliders around us once walked closely with God, kept their garments unspotted from the world, and were examples of all that is pure and good. But they have gone back to the beggarly elements of the world, and, like the sow that was washed, they are again wallowing in the mire.
So, my Comrades, you will see that no matter however pure you may become, it will be possible for you to sin. Though you wash your garments white, and for a season walk with God in holy communion, and have Faith so that you can remove mountains and save multitudes, you must remember that while you are in this life it is possible for you to fall from Grace. Nay, you must remember that unless you take heed to yourselves, and watch and pray, the probabilities are that you will be overtaken by some besetting sin, and, after having saved others, become yourself a castaway. Therefore, "let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall."
4. By a Pure Heart, we do not mean any experience of Purity, however blessed it may be, that cannot increase in enjoyment, usefulness, and power. Pull the weeds out of your garden, and the flowers and plants and trees will grow faster, flourish more abundantly, and become more fruitful.
Just so, this very moment, let Jesus Christ purge the garden of your souls of envy and pride, and remove the poisonous plants of malice and selfishness and every other evil thing, and Faith and peace, and hope and love, and humility and courage, and all the other beautiful flowers of Paradise will flourish in more charming beauty and more abundant fruitfulness.
Oh, will you not go down now before God, and give yourselves fully over into the hands of your precious Saviour'? He is waiting to sanctify you. Cast overboard all that hinders. It is God that purifies the Heart. Will you let Him do the work? Now cry out in Faith: "Anger and sloth, desire and pride, This moment be subdued; Be cast into the crimson tide Of my Redeemer's Blood."
But you must go a little further, my Comrades, and, boldly and believingly, sing that song of triumph:
'Tis done, Thou dost this moment save,
With full Salvation bless; Redemption through Thy Blood I have,
And spotless love and peace."
Yours affectionately,
William Booth "Come, Holy Ghost, all Sacred Fire, Come, fill Thy earthly temples now;
Emptied of every base desire, Reign Thou within, and only Thou. "Thy sovereign right, Thy gracious claim
To every thought and every power;
Our lives to glorify Thy name, We yield Thee in this sacred hour.
"Fill every chamber of the soul; Fill all our thoughts, our passions fill,
Till under Thy supreme control Submissive rests our cheerful will. 'Tis done! Thou dost this moment come,
My longing soul is all Thine own;
My heart is Thy abiding home. Henceforth I live for Thee alone."
Chapter 3 PURITY MEANS DELIVERANCE
Luke 1:74-75 That -- He would grant unto us, that we ... might serve Him without fears in holiness and righteousness before Him, all the days of our life.
My Dear Comrades,
I hope that I shall not weary you by returning again to the question of "A Pure Heart." The subject is so important to the whole Christian Church, to the entire Salvation Army, nay, to the wide, wide world, that it must be lifted up. Holiness has been so great a blessing to us in the past, and will, I am sure, be so much greater a blessing to us in the future, that I feel that it must be brought to the front. You must see its value, and understand its meaning. If you are not living in the enjoyment of the peace, power, and gladness of Holiness, it is, possibly, because you entertain some mistaken notions respecting it. The ability of the Devil to lead people astray on this, as on many other questions, is largely in proportion to his power to deceive them. Can I better make you understand what is meant by Purity of Heart?
You will remember that in my last Letter I tried to show you that by a Pure Heart we did not mean a heart that could not, or would not, be tempted, or that could not, or would not, be called to suffer; nor that the Soldier out of whose heart all impurity had been expelled could not sin, or would have reached such a state of experience beyond which he would not be able to grow in faith, and hope, and charity, and in all the Graces of the Holy Spirit.
What, then, is a Pure Heart? I reply that a Pure Heart is a heart that has been cleansed by the Holy Spirit from all sin, and enabled to please God in all it does; to love Him with all its powers, and its neighbor as itself. Where this experience is enjoyed by anyone it may be said that God has made the heart Pure, even as He is Pure.
But here I may be asked the question, "Does not God bestow this wonderful deliverance from sin on the soul at conversion? Does He not sanctify and make it good and holy at the same time that He pardons its sins?" No, I reply; although a great work is done for the soul at conversion, its deliverance from sin at that time is not complete. It is true, that He does a great deal for a man when He makes that remarkable change. He destroys the bondage in which sin holds the transgressor; but the destruction of sin out of the heart and out of the life is not entire. Here let me try and show you the difference in the purification that comes to a man when he is fully cleansed. I will do this by setting forth the three different states into which the soul can come with respect to sin: