NO PROGRESS WITHOUT SEPARATION

NO PROGRESS WITHOUT SEPARATION

I believe that all divine progress begins with separation. When one can, because of change of circumstances, increase in the things of this world, the beginning is lost, and there must be decline, however demonstrative one may be in works or ways as to service; you have no power beyond the measure of your separation. “If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them” (John 13: 17). The truest love is that which seeks to remove whatever interferes with your communion with Christ, whatever hinders you from knowing what it is to have “part with me”. You might be in every way commendable to your fellow Christians, and all the time not in unclouded communion with Christ in His circle of things, and if you are not, however apparently useful you are, you are not truly for Him. You may be greatly valued by your fellows, but you are not absolutely for Him, because you are not in communion with Him. You may, like Peter, go a-fishing — seek a service; but it will be one which is not in the current of the Lord’s mind. I say this not in any wise to check your prayerful interest in others, but my desire is that your interest may be in the current of the Spirit. The Lord give you to be of real use to His people, but your power to influence any one never goes beyond the measure in which you are yourself a body of light; so that it is not all that you see and appreciate that affects another, but what you are personally. With true desires for your blessing.