First: The sins which we have encouraged. It may be in the beginning very small, but Satan is perfectly satisfied if he can have the least hold upon the life of the one whom he wishes to wrong. I read in a Chicago paper the story of a woman who was making a heroic struggle against an awful curse. She had become addicted to the use of morphine. For fourteen years she was a consumer of the drug. Apparently she could not shake off the habit. Building up a resistance to the action of the drug, her system became accustomed to enormous quantities of it. She could not eat, nor sleep, nor work without it. Most of her scanty earnings went to purchase it. She was a seamstress, and by toiling many hours a day managed to get enough money to buy it. Some years back she had been a happy wife and mother. Her husband loved her; she was devoted to him and to their two children. She lost him; she lost the care of her children; rapidly she drifted away from them. The powerful narcotic helped to deaden her pain. When her anguish became unbearable a double dose of it would enable her to drowse away the hours.
"I will never again touch or taste morphine, so help me God!" she said. Immediately she discontinued the use of the drug wholly. She could get no sleep; she could not swallow food half the time or retain it. She was beset by horrible visions. She was racked by an inexpressible longing. But she held on. Those who knew her and watched her agonizing battle with astonishment and sympathy told her that she was killing herself. "It may be," she would answer, "but I shall die true to my oath." "But," they would urge, "a habit like yours, which has obtained for years, should be broken gradually." "I will master it. I have blotted it from my life," she would answer. "I shall quit it this way even if I go into the grave. It has mastered me; it has cost me my home, husband and children; now I will master it." She started at shadows, her nights were nights of horror; she would bury her nails in the palms of her hands and compress her lips to keep from screaming. There was no rest for her. Still she tried to work and grew weaker. "You cannot give me that," she said, "I remember my oath. Give me any medicine you choose save opium. God would forsake me now if I forsook my promise to him." The physician remonstrated with her, but in vain, so he gave her a substitute which failed of its effect, as he knew it would, and she died. Even when the hand of death had clutched her grimly, though her terrific sufferings would have been allayed by the poison, she refused to take it. Any person in the room would have bought it for her and administered it gladly, so that she might pass away in peace, but she would not prove traitor to herself. She was a friendless woman except for acquaintances recently made. Her life had been sad and hard. Held in the grip of an enemy that set its mark upon her, she was shunned and went her downward way alone. Those who were with her say that just before the end came she smiled, knowing that she had won her fight; and yet years ago she began to trifle with sin, and it had mastered her.
Again, we have against us sins which not only have been encouraged but have been committed again and again until they have become a habit of our lives, and he who has such a sin as this finds himself in the grip of one who is a tyrant.
In a city paper the other day I came across the story of a man who once had some prominence in the world but began to go wrong, naturally drifted towards the evil and finally found himself surrounded by the lowest of companions. Because of his natural ability he easily assumed leadership.
The particular form of crime they practiced was administering chloral to those who sat at the bar in the saloon to drink. They did this by attracting the attention of the man who was to drink to something else in the room and then the deadly knock-out drops would be administered and they would rob the man. One night the dose was too strong and the victim died. The one who caused his death came before the city authorities recently to give himself up and pitifully ask that he might be quickly sent to death to pay the penalty of his crime for, said he, "From that moment my mind has never been at rest. I wandered about town for two or three days trying to get rid of the sight of that fellow's face; but at night was when I suffered. The moment I dozed off I could see him in my dreams beckoning and laughing as he dragged me over some cliff, and I waked up cold with fear. No one knows what I suffered. I left the city. I went to Denver. I went to Butte. I traveled everywhere, but wherever I went night and day that dead man was hovering around me. I couldn't sleep and my mind began to weaken. One night I went into a gambling den. I thought the excitement might drive that vision out of my head. I played roulette. I bet on the black; the red won. And right before me I saw that printer's face just like I see you now, grinning as the dealer dragged in my money. I ran out of that club like a crazy man and wandered about town till I saw a freight train pulling out of the yards. I climbed into an empty box car and lay down in the corner to rest. For a few moments the face was gone. Suddenly a flash of lightning lit up that car as bright as this cell, and there, just a couple of feet from me, I saw that man I'd killed plainer than I see you. He reached out and caught me by the arm. I screamed and jumped out of the car. They found me next day lying beside the track; and when they got me to a hospital, as I hope for pardon, that thing's black and blue finger marks showed on my shoulder. I've been in a lot of places since that but I never got over it. Finally it got so bad I couldn't stand it and I came back to Chicago to confess." And just as we have all these things against us so the children of Israel had the Amorites against them and the five kings were unitedly arrayed to fight them.
II
But there was a sure deliverance for Israel and there is a sure deliverance for us. God promised to be with Joshua and his people. Joshua 1:5, "There shall not any man be able to stand before thee all the days of thy life: as I was with Moses, so I will be with thee: I will not fail thee, nor forsake thee." Even the things that were impossible he helped them to accomplish. Joshua 6:1-2, "Now Jericho was straitly shut up because of the children of Israel: none went out, and none came in. And the Lord said unto Joshua, See, I have given unto thine hand Jericho, and the king thereof, and the mighty men of valor." Even where men had failed him he gave them victory. Joshua 8:1-2, "And the Lord said unto Joshua, Fear not, neither be thou dismayed: take all the people of war with thee, and arise, go up to Ai: see, I have given into thy hand the king of Ai, and his people, and his city, and his land; and thou shalt do to Ai and her king as thou didst unto Jericho and her king: only the spoil thereof, and the cattle thereof, shall ye take for a prey unto yourselves: lay thee an ambush for the city behind it." Even where the forces were combined against them it made no difference. Joshua 10:8, "And the Lord said unto Joshua, Fear them not: for I have delivered them into thine hand; there shall not a man of them stand before thee." So it is with us. God has promised to deliver us, and over our sinful nature, the atmosphere of the world, sins encouraged and sins committed, we may expect a complete victory. Everything is at man's disposal if only God is with him. In connection with the children of Israel even the day was made longer that they might fight their battles. Joshua 10:12-14, "Then spake Joshua to the Lord in the day when the Lord delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon. And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day. And there was no day like that before it, or after it, that the Lord hearkened unto the voice of a man: for the Lord fought for Israel." The weak were made strong that the enemy might not triumph over them. "If God be for us who can be against us?" In this struggle with the Amorites Israel won the day.
III
The victory of the Israelites over the Amorites was like the general deliverance which God has given us from the power of sin, but there are certain sins which may pursue us, and from these we ought to be set free. When the children of Israel started from Egypt and had passed through the Red Sea certain of the Egyptians started after them, the waters of the Sea came together and they were put to death. The next day the Israelites camped upon the shore and they could easily go back. Doubtless more than one could say as he turned over the body of a dead man to see his face, "Why, this is my old tax master who used to beat me. He will never have power over me again." Is such a deliverance as this from individual sins possible? I think it is. I can think of five sins which stand in the way of men and which maybe likened to the five kings shut up in the cave.
First: Sinful imagination or secret sins. I doubt not but that almost every one whose eyes may light upon this sentence has been guilty at this point. He may have said again and again, "I will never do this thing again," and he has put the king into the cave and rolled the stone against the door.