GEORGE MULLER
GEORGE MULLER
[It would appear that George Muller may have received the experience of second-blessing
holiness in spite of certain doctrinal prejudices. Perhaps this has been the case with numbers of Christians who were born again, but who for various reasons did not accept the doctrine of a second work of grace. They were walking in the light; they were seeking to have all of the grace that God had available for them; and in spite of their mistaken views they were Divinely cleansed from all unrighteousness. –D.V.M.]
In the life of George Muller of Bristol there was an epoch four years after his conversion,
to which he ever after looked back, and of which he often spoke…
In an address given to ministers and workers after his ninetieth birthday, he spoke thus of it
himself: “That leads to another thought — the full surrender of the heart to God. I was converted in November 1825, but I only came into the full surrender of the heart four years later in July 1829. The love of money was gone, the love of place was gone, the love of position was gone the love of worldly pleasure and engagements was gone. God, God, God alone became my portion. I found my all in Him; I wanted nothing else. And by the grace of God this has remained, and has made me a happy man, an exceedingly happy man, and it led me to care only about the things of God.
“I ask, affectionately, my beloved brethren, have you fully surrendered the heart to God, or
is there this thing or that thing with which you are take up irrespective of God? I read a little of the Scriptures before, but preferred other books, but since that time the revelation He has made of himself has become unspeakably blessed to me, and I can say from my heart, God is a infinitely lovely Being. Oh! be not satisfied until in your inmost soul you can say, God is an infinitely lovely Being!”
The account he gives of this change in his journal is as follows. He speaks of one whom he
had heard preach at Teignmouth, where he had gone for the sake of his health. “Though I did not like all he said, yet I saw a gravity and solemnity in him different from the rest. Through the instrumentality of this brother the Lord bestowed a great blessing upon me, for which I shall have
cause to thank Him throughout eternity. God then began to show me that the Word of God alone is to be our standard of judgment in spiritual things; that can only be explained by the Holy Spirit, and that in our day, as well as in former times, He is the Teacher of His people. The office of the Holy Spirit I had not experimentally understood before that time. I had not before seen that the Holy Spirit alone can teach us about our state by nature, show us our need of a Saviour, help us in preaching, etc.
“It was my beginning to understand this point in particular which had great effect on me: for
the Lord enabled me to put it to the test of experience by laying aside commentaries and almost every other book, and simply reading the Word of God and studying it. The result of this was that the first evening that I shut myself into my room to give myself to prayer and meditation over the Scriptures, I learned more in a few hours than I had done during a period of several months previously. But the particular difference was that I received real strength in my soul in doing so.
“In addition to this, it pleased the Lord to lead me to see a higher standard of devotedness
than I had seen before. He led me, in a measure, to see what is my glory in this world, even to be despised, to be poor and mean with Christ…I returned to London much better in body. And as to my soul, the change was so great that it was like a second conversion.”…
A careful perusal of this testimony will show us how the chief points usually insisted upon
in connection with the second blessing are all found here. There is the full surrender of the heart to be taught and led alone by the Spirit of God. There is the higher standard of holiness which is at once set up. There is the tender desire in nothing to offend God, but to have at all times a good conscience, that testifies that we are pleasing to God. And there is the faith that where the Holy Spirit reveals to us in the Word the will of God, He give the sufficient strength for the doing of it. ”The particular difference,” he says of reading with faith of the Holy Spirit’s teaching, “was that I received real strength in my soul in doing so.” No wonder that he said: “The change was so great, that it was like a second conversion.”
Source: “George Muller’s “Second Conversion” by Andrew Murray in
“And They Shall Prophesy” by George E. Failing
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HOW THEY ENTERED CANAAN (A Collection of Holiness Experience Accounts) Compiled by Duane V. Maxey
Vol. I — Named Accounts