August 3

Read: Luke 11:11-13

If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him? (Luke 11:13)

God Is Loath To Leave Us

We saw yesterday that it is possible to backslide even after we have been sanctified wholly. With this solemn fact before us there is another word that must be said. God is more willing to give us His Holy Spirit than earthly parents are to give good gifts to their children. And God is more loath to take that Gift from us than the best earthly parent would be to take back a present given to a child. Jesus prayed that we might have a Comforter who would abide with us forever.

The Holy Spirit comes to us when we really want Him more than we want anything else in the world. He will remain with us as long as that desire is in our hearts. He will not leave us even though because of human frailty we sometimes act as if we did not love Him supremely. He gives us time to regain spiritual perspective, time to consider our attitudes and actions, time to evaluate them in terms of our consecration. If we deviate from perfect love toward Him, He yet has perfect love for us and will not leave us unless forced out by our willful refusal to respond to that love.

Very rarely then should we allow ourselves to believe that the Holy Spirit has left us after He has once come in His fullness. If we walk in the light as it comes to us, very rarely should it be necessary for us to return to the altar, having given up our faith and abandoned what God has done for us. We are far more prone to abandon God than He is to abandon us.

Ever present, truest Friend, Ever near, Thine aid to lend, Leave us not to doubt and fear, Groping on in darkness drear.

— Marcus M. Wells