December 11

Read: Hebrews 9:13-14

We are his witnesses of these things; and so is also the Holy Ghost, whom God hath given to them that obey him (Acts 5:32).

I Have Called Thee

In his book, Samoa Diary, Missionary Jarrell W. Garsee testifies: “Service in Samoa would never have been a possibility if I had not yielded my heart completely to the Holy Spirit earlier in my ministry. Once I heard Dr. Vanderpool say… ‘Unsanctified service is treason against God.’ My then carnal heart could not understand this… Now I know it is true.

“In the fall of 1957 I received a testimony in a letter, from a trusted friend, telling of a new work of God in his life. A hunger started in my own heart for an experience I had never known. I cannot yet fully understand how the years of life in a Nazarene parsonage, college, Seminary, and my own pastorate could pass by while I gave mental assent to the truth of heart holiness but had never surrendered the central citadel of my being. As the Spirit… probed my mind and heart, I covenanted to seek God through intensified Bible reading and prayer… I could not foresee that the combination of heart hunger, continual frustration because of inner weakness… penetrating messages from some stirring devotional books, plus the ever-present, ever-patient pull of God’s Spirit would bring me to the point of complete abandonment of myself to God, but it did!

“After preaching in the closing service of a revival I was holding, God called me to seek Him at the altar. Overcoming fear of what people would think… I bowed: to consecrate. In prayer, God gave me two promises to stand on — Hebrews 9:13-14 and Acts 5:32. By faith He was mine and I was His.

“The witness came hours later, during a sleepless night, while I tried to tell my wife what God’s Spirit had done within me. As I bore witness to His work, He bore witness by His sweet, infilling, emotion-evoking presence. For the first time I was ready to serve Him, not in my own strength, but in His.”