He spoke with increasing warmth, and in a curiously injured tone, almost as if he thought he had been deceived.
Mrs. Leslie laid her hand gently on his, saying,—
“Dear Jim, God never asks impossibilities. The new birth is the giving ourselves wholly to Him, the full surrender, keeping back nothing from His service. The other part, the making into His likeness, is always the work of a lifetime. And He knows that; He knows all we have to contend with. Don’t you remember—‘He knoweth whereof we are made, He remembereth that we are but dust’—so, while we must not make excuses for ourselves, beforehand, we may be very sure that, after every unwilling fall, He will help us up again, and freely forgive us.”
“But there’s something else”—and Jim’s face still looked cloudy—“I don’t see how it is, anyhow, that after we say we’ll be His, and try to do what we think He would like, He lets us fall. Couldn’t He keep us up, and keep us going, in spite of ourselves?”
“My dear,” said Mrs. Leslie, very solemnly, “that is the question which has puzzled and staggered God’s people for ages, or rather, the people who are only partly His. And there is no answer for it. All we know is just this, that there are two great powers abroad in the world, the power of God, and that of the devil; that if we choose God’s service and protection, He will join His mighty will to our weak ones, and that then we can be ‘more than conquerors,’ but that if we let go this stronghold, we are at the mercy of every sinful impulse and wicked desire. With His help, we may attain to strength, and victory, and peace, and if we do not, it is simply because we refuse this ‘ever-present help.’ And when we turn away from Him, when we withhold our allegiance, we never know how many others will be turned away by our example, nor how terribly we may be hindering the coming of God’s kingdom. Questioning and doubting are worse than useless; we are told that we shall ‘know hereafter,’ and where we place our love we may well place our trust. Now, I wish you to do something for me. I wish you to notice how those who are really, with heart and soul, following the Master are held above the things which other people count troubles and trials. There are too many who are only half-heartedly following, and how can these expect more than half a blessing? And one more thing; you have not yet confessed your allegiance. If you wished to be a soldier in your country’s army, what would be the very first thing for you to do?”
“Go to headquarters, and say so, and have my name put down,” said Jim, slowly and reluctantly.
“Yes. And that is the first thing, now. Own to the world that you are His, that you mean, with his help, to ‘fight manfully under his banner,’ and then He will ‘surely fulfil’ His part of the contract. Will you do this, dear?”
There was a breathless pause. Tiny’s hand stole into Jim’s on one side, Johnny’s on the other; Mrs. Leslie’s motherly hand was pressed lightly on his head. With a sudden burst of tears, he said, brokenly,—
“I will! I will! I knew I ought to, but the devil’s been putting me off with all this—this—” he stopped as suddenly as he had begun.