Holy Spirit in the Schools
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his high sphere of action, so man may be perfect in his human sphere.
The ideal of Christian character is Christlikeness. There is opened
before us a path of continual advancement. We have an object to reach,
a standard to gain, which includes everything good and pure and noble
and elevated. There should be continual striving and constant progress
onward and upward toward perfection of character. (See
2 Timothy
3:14-17
;
Romans 15:4
;
Colossians 2:8-10
.)
This is the will of God concerning every human being, even your
sanctification. In urging our way upward, heavenward, every faculty
must be kept in the most healthy condition, to do the most faithful
service. The powers with which God has endowed men are to be put
to the stretch. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,
and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind;
and thy neighbor as thyself.” Man cannot possibly do this of himself;
he must have divine power. What shall the human agent do in the
great work?—“Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.
For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good
pleasure.”
Without the divine working, man could do no good thing. God
calls every man to repentance, yet man cannot even repent unless the
Holy Spirit works upon his heart. But the Lord wants no man to wait
until he thinks he has repented before he takes his steps toward Jesus.
The Saviour is continually drawing men to repentance; they need only
to submit to be drawn, and their hearts will be melted in penitence.
Man is allotted a part in this great struggle for everlasting life;
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he must respond to the working of the Holy Spirit. It will require a
struggle to break through the powers of darkness, and the Spirit works
in him to accomplish this. But man is no passive being, to be saved in
indolence. He is called upon to strain every muscle and exercise every
faculty in the struggle for immortality; yet it is God that supplies the
efficiency. No human being can be saved in indolence. The Lord bids
us, “Strive to enter in at the strait gate; for many, I say unto you, will
seek to enter in, and shall not be able,” “Wide is the gate, and broad
is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in
thereat: because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth
unto life, and few there be that find it.”
I entreat the students in our schools to be sober-minded. The
frivolity of the young is not pleasing to God. Their sports and games