MY SPIRITUAL STRUGGLES
I can not now recall that I ever heard a sermon on heart-purity or victory over the power of sin. No person in the congregation where our family attended meetings professed holiness, nor do I remember that the experience was talked about. The people did speak of "having religion" and "more religion." There were people in the congregation whom I still believe lived holy lives, and the testimony of their lives convicted me, for I knew that they had an abiding joy and peace in their religion that I had not. I therefore became very much dissatisfied with my inner life and was struggling all the time for an experience such as I knew others enjoyed.
The weekly testimony of a man who attended our prayer-meetings was, "I have just enough religion to make me miserable." That is, he had too much religion to get his pleasure out of the world and not enough to get it out of his religion. I always felt that that man told the experience I then had. For three years I endured that exceedingly unsatisfactory religious experience. I then attended a revival and went forward for prayer night after night, but no relief came to my poor burdened heart. As my case became more desperate, I recalled the story of Jacob. He prayed until the morning, and at the rising of the sun the angel appeared and blessed him. I spent several nights in prayer, but found no relief.