134
The Desire of Ages
“who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? not one.”
Job 14:4
.
No human invention can find a remedy for the sinning soul. “The
carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of
God, neither indeed can be.” “Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts,
murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies.”
Romans 8:7
;
Matthew 15:19
. The fountain of the heart must be purified
before the streams can become pure. He who is trying to reach heaven
by his own works in keeping the law is attempting an impossibility.
There is no safety for one who has merely a legal religion, a form of
godliness. The Christian’s life is not a modification or improvement
of the old, but a transformation of nature. There is a death to self and
sin, and a new life altogether. This change can be brought about only
by the effectual working of the Holy Spirit.
Nicodemus was still perplexed, and Jesus used the wind to illustrate
His meaning: “The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest
the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it
goeth: so is everyone that is born of the Spirit.”
The wind is heard among the branches of the trees, rustling the
leaves and flowers; yet it is invisible, and no man knows whence it
comes or whither it goes. So with the work of the Holy Spirit upon
the heart. It can no more be explained than can the movements of the
wind. A person may not be able to tell the exact time or place, or to
trace all the circumstances in the process of conversion; but this does
not prove him to be unconverted. By an agency as unseen as the wind,
Christ is constantly working upon the heart. Little by little, perhaps
unconsciously to the receiver, impressions are made that tend to draw
the soul to Christ. These may be received through meditating upon
Him, through reading the Scriptures, or through hearing the word from
the living preacher. Suddenly, as the Spirit comes with more direct
appeal, the soul gladly surrenders itself to Jesus. By many this is called
sudden conversion; but it is the result of long wooing by the Spirit of
God,—a patient, protracted process.
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While the wind is itself invisible, it produces effects that are seen
and felt. So the work of the Spirit upon the soul will reveal itself in
every act of him who has felt its saving power. When the Spirit of God
takes possession of the heart, it transforms the life. Sinful thoughts are
put away, evil deeds are renounced; love, humility, and peace take the
place of anger, envy, and strife. Joy takes the place of sadness, and the