The Christian's Secret of a Happy Life

Bridge-Logos Publishers

Chapter One

Is It Scriptural?

No thoughtful person can question the fact that, for themost part, the Christian life, as it is generally lived, is not entirely ahappy life. A keen observer once said to me, "You Christians seemto have a religion that makes you miserable. You are like a manwith a headache. He does not want to get rid of his head, but ithurts him to keep it. You cannot expect outsiders to seek very earnestlyfor anything so uncomfortable." Then for the first time I saw,as in a flash, that the religion of Christ ought to be, and was meantto be, to its possessors, not something to make them miserable, butsomething to make them happy; and I began then and there to askthe Lord to show me the secret of a happy Christian life.

    It is this secret, so far as I have learned it, that I shall try to tell inthe following pages.

    All of God's children, I am convinced, feel instinctively, in theirmoments of divine illumination, that a life of inward rest and outwardvictory is their inalienable birthright. Can you remember,some of you, the shout of triumph your souls gave when you firstbecame acquainted with the Lord Jesus, and had a glimpse of Hismighty saving power? How sure you were of victory, then! Howeasy it seemed to be more than conquerors, through Him that lovedyou! Under the leadership of a Captain who had never been foiledin battle, how could you dream of defeat!

    And yet, to many of you, how different has been your real experience!Your victories have been few and fleeting, your defeatsmany and disastrous. You have not lived as you feel children ofGod ought to live. You have had perhaps a clear understanding ofdoctrinal truths, but you have not come into possession of their lifeand power. You have rejoiced in your knowledge of the things revealedin the Scriptures, but have not had a living realization of thethings themselves, consciously felt in the soul. Christ is believed in,talked about, and served, but He is not known as the soul's actualand very life, abiding there forever, and revealing Himself therecontinually in His beauty. You have found Jesus as your Saviorfrom the penalty of sin, but you have not found Him as your Savoirfrom its power. You have carefully studied the Holy Scriptures, andhave gathered much precious truth therefrom, which you havetrusted would feed and nourish your spiritual life, but in spite of itall, your souls are starving and dying within you, and you cry out insecret, again and again, for that bread and water of life which yousee promised in the Scriptures to all believers.

    In the very depths of your hearts, you know that your experienceis not a scriptural experience; that, as an old writer said, your religionis "but a talk to what the early Christians enjoyed, possessed,and lived in." And your hearts have sunk within you, as, day afterday, and year after year, your early visions of triumph have seemedto grow more and more dim, and you have been forced to settledown to the conviction, that the best you can expect from yourreligion is a life of alternate failure and victory, one hour sinning,and the next repenting, and then beginning again, only to fail again,and again to repent.

    But is this all? Had the Lord Jesus only this in His mind when Helaid down His precious life to deliver you from your sore and cruelbondage to sin? Did He propose to Himself only this partial deliverance?Did He intend to leave you thus struggling under a wearyconsciousness of defeat and discouragement? Did He fear that acontinuous victory would dishonor Him, and bring reproach on Hisname? When all those declarations were made concerning His coming,and the work He was to accomplish, did they mean only thisthat you have experienced? Was there a hidden reserve in eachpromise, that was meant to deprive it of its complete fulfillment?Did "delivering us out of the hand of our enemies" mean that theyshould still have dominion over us? Did "enabling us always totriumph" mean that we were only to triumph sometimes? Did beingmade "more than conquerors through Him that loved us" meanconstant defeat and failure? Does being "saved to the uttermost"mean the meager salvation we see manifested among us now? Canwe dream that the Savior, who was wounded for our transgressionsand bruised for our iniquities, could possibly see of the travail ofHis soul and be satisfied in such Christian lives as fill the Churchtoday? The Bible tells us that "for this purpose the Son of God wasmanifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil"; and canwe imagine for a moment that this is beyond His power, and thatHe finds Himself unable to accomplish the thing He was manifestedto do?

    In the very outset, then, settle down on this one thing, that Jesuscame to save you, now, in this life, from the power and dominion ofsin, and to make you more than conquerors through His power. Ifyou doubt this, search your Bible, and collect together every announcementor declaration concerning the purposes and object ofHis death on the cross. You will be astonished to find how full theyare. Everywhere and always, His work is said to be to deliver usfrom our sins, from our bondage, from our defilement; and not ahint is given, anywhere, that this deliverance was to be only thelimited and partial one with which Christians so continually try tobe satisfied.

    Let me give you the teaching of Scripture on this subject. Whenthe angel of the Lord appeared unto Joseph in a dream, and announcedthe coming birth of the Savior, he said, "And thou shaltcall His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins."

    When Zacharias was "filled with the Holy Ghost" at the birth ofhis son, and "prophesied," he declared that God had visited hispeople in order to fulfill the promise and the oath He had madethem; which promise was, "that He would grant unto us, that we,being delivered out of the hand of our enemies, might serve Himwithout fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him, all the daysof our life."

    When Peter was preaching in the porch of the temple to the wonderingJews, he said, "Unto you first, God, having raised up His SonJesus, sent Him to bless you in turning away every one of you fromhis iniquities."

    When Paul was telling to the Ephesian church the wondroustruth, that Christ had so loved them as to give Himself for them, hewent on to declare that His purpose in thus doing was, "that Hemight sanctify and cleanse it by the washing of water by the word,that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not havingspot or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy andwithout blemish."

    When Paul was seeking to instruct Titus, his own son after thecommon faith, concerning the grace of God, he declared that theobject of that grace was to teach us "that, denying ungodliness andworldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in thispresent world"; and adds, as the reason of this, that Christ "gaveHimself for us that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purifyus unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works."

    When Peter was urging upon the Christians, to whom he waswriting, a holy and Christ-like walk, he tells them that "even hereuntowere ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving usan example that ye should follow His steps: who did no sin, neitherwas guile found in His mouth"; and adds, "Who His own self bareour sins in His own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins,should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed."

    When Paul was contrasting in the Ephesians the walk suitable fora Christian with the walk of an unbeliever, he sets before them thetruth in Jesus as being this. "That ye put off concerning the formerconversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitfullusts; and be renewed in the spirit of your mind; and that ye puton the new man, which after God is created in righteousness andtrue holiness."

    And when, in Romans 6, he was answering forever the questionas to a child of God continuing in sin, and showing how utterlyforeign it was to the whole spirit and aim of the salvation of Jesus,he brings up the fact of our judicial death and resurrection withChrist, as an unanswerable argument for our practical deliverancefrom it, and says, "God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin,live any longer therein? Know ye not, that so many of us as werebaptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death? Thereforewe are buried with Him by baptism into death: that like as Christwas raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so wealso should walk in newness of life," and adds, "Knowing this, thatour old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might bedestroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin."

    It is a fact sometimes overlooked, that, in the declarations concerningthe object of the death of Christ, far more mention is madeof a present salvation from sin, than of a future salvation in aheaven beyond, showing plainly God's estimate of the relative importanceof these two things.

    Dear Christians, will you receive the testimony of the Scriptureon this matter? The same crucial questions that troubled the Churchin Paul's day are troubling it now: first, "Shall we continue in sinthat grace may abound?" and second, "Do we then make void thelaw through faith?" Shall our answer to these be Paul's emphatic"God forbid," and his triumphant assertions that, instead of makingit void, "we establish the law"; and that "what the law could notdo, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own Sonin the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in theflesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, whowalk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit."

    Can we, for a moment, suppose that the holy God, who hates sinin the sinner, is willing to tolerate it in the Christian, and that Hehas even arranged the plan of salvation in such a way as to make itimpossible for those who are saved from the guilt of sin, to finddeliverance from its power?

    As Dr. Chalmers well says, "Sin is that scandal which must berooted out from the great spiritual household over which the Divinityrejoices.... Strange administration, indeed, for sin to be sohateful to God as to lay all who had incurred it under death, andyet, when readmitted into life, that sin should be permitted; andthat what was before the object of destroying vengeance should nowbecome the object of an upheld and protected toleration. Now thatthe penalty is taken off, think you it is possible that the unchangeableGod has so given up His antipathy to sin as that man, ruinedand redeemed man, may now perseveringly indulge, under the newarrangement, in that which under the old destroyed him? Does notthe God who loved righteousness and hated iniquity six thousandyears ago, bear the same love to righteousness and hatred to iniquitystill? ... I now breathe the air of loving-kindness from Heaven,and can walk before God in peace and graciousness; shall I againattempt the incompatible alliance of two principles so adverse asthat of an approving God and a persevering sinner? How shall we,recovered from so awful a catastrophe, continue that which firstinvolved us in it? The cross of Christ, by the same mighty anddecisive stroke wherewith it moved the curse of sin away from us,also surely moves away the power and the love of it from over us."

    And not Dr. Chalmers only, but many other holy men of hisgeneration, and of our own, as well as of generations long past, haveunited in declaring that the redemption accomplished for us by ourLord Jesus Christ on the cross at Calvary, is a redemption from thepower of sin as well as from its guilt, and that He is able to save tothe uttermost all who come unto God by Him.

    A quaint old Quaker divine of the seventeenth century says:"There is nothing so contrary to God as sin, and God will not suffersin always to rule His masterpiece, man. When we consider theinfiniteness of God's power for destroying that which is contrary toHim, who can believe that the devil must always stand and prevail?I believe it is inconsistent and disagreeable with true faith for peopleto be Christians and yet to believe that Christ, the eternal Son ofGod, to whom all power in heaven and earth is given, will suffer sinand the devil to have dominion over them.

    "But you will say no man by all the power he hath can redeemhimself, and no man can live without sin. We will say Amen to it.But if men tell us that when God's power comes to help us and toredeem us out of sin, it cannot be effected, then this doctrine wecannot away with; nor I hope you neither.

    "Would you approve of it if I should tell you that God puts forthHis power to do such a thing, but the devil hinders Him? That it isimpossible for God to do it, because the devil does not like it? Thatit is impossible that any one should be free from sin, because thedevil hath got such a power in them that God cannot cast him out?This is lamentable doctrine, yet hath not this been preached? Itdoth in plain terms say, though God doth interpose His power, it isimpossible, because the devil hath so rooted sin in the nature ofman. Is not man God's creature, and cannot He new make him, andcast sin out of him? If you say sin is deeply rooted in man, I say so,too; yet not so deeply rooted but Christ Jesus hath entered sodeeply into the root of the nature of man, that He hath receivedpower to destroy the devil and his works, and to recover and redeemman into righteousness and holiness. Or else it is false that `He isable to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by Him.' Wemust throw away the Bible if we say that it is impossible for God todeliver man out of sin.

    "We know," he continues, "when our friends are in captivity, asin Turkey or elsewhere, we pay our money for their redemption; butwe will not pay our money if they be kept in their fetters still.Would not any one think himself cheated to pay so much money fortheir redemption, and the bargain be made so that he shall be saidto be redeemed, and be called a redeemed captive, but he must wearhis fetters still? How long? As long as he hath a day to live. This isfor bodies, but now I am speaking of souls. Christ must be made tome redemption, and rescue me from captivity. Am I a prisoneranywhere? Yes, verily, verily, he that committeth sin, saith Christ,he is a servant of sin, he is a slave of sin. If thou hast sinned, thouart a slave, a captive that must be redeemed out of captivity. Whowill pay a price for me? I am poor; I have nothing; I cannot redeemmyself: who will pay a price for me? There is One come who hathpaid a price for me. That is well; that is good news; then I hope Ishall come out of my captivity. What is His name? Is He called aRedeemer? So, then, I do expect the benefit of my redemption, andthat I shall go out of my captivity. No, say they, you must abide insin as long as you live. What! must we never be delivered? Must thiscrooked heart and perverse will always remain? Must I be a believer,and yet have no faith that reacheth to sanctification and holyliving? Is there no mastery to be had, no getting victory over sin?Must it prevail over me as long as I live? What sort of a Redeemer,then, is this, or what benefit have I in this life, of my redemption?"

    Similar extracts might be quoted from Marshall and Romaine,and many others, to show that this doctrine is no new one in thechurch, however much it may have been lost sight of by the presentgeneration of believers. It is the same old story that has filled withsongs of triumph the daily lives of many saints of God, both Catholicand Protestant, throughout all ages; and it is now being soundedforth afresh to the unspeakable joy of weary and burdened souls.

    Do not reject it, then, dear reader, until you have prayerfullysearched the Scriptures to see whether these things be indeed so.Ask God to open the eyes of your understanding by His Spirit, thatyou may know "what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward uswho believe, according to the working of His mighty power,which He wrought in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead,and set Him at His own right hand in the heavenly places." Andwhen you have begun to have some faint glimpses of this power,learn to look away utterly from your own weakness, and, puttingyour case into His hands, trust Him to deliver you.

    "When thou goest out to battle against thine enemies, and seesthorses, and chariots, and a people more than thou, be not afraid ofthem: for the Lord thy God is with thee, which brought thee up outof the land of Egypt. And it shall be, when ye are come nigh untothe battle, that the priest shall approach and speak unto the people,and shall say unto them, Hear, O Israel, ye approach this day untobattle against your enemies: let not your hearts faint, fear not, anddo not tremble, neither be ye terrified because of them; for the Lordyour God is He that goeth with you, to fight for you against yourenemies to save you."



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Excerpted from The Christian's Secret of a Happy Lifeby Hannah Whitall Smith Copyright © 1998 by Hannah Whitall Smith. Excerpted by permission.
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