|
A canker into the very core of your spirituality!
(Octavius Winslow "Evening Thoughts")
"Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this
world, but be transformed by the renewing of your
mind." Romans 12:2
Heavenly-mindedness can only be maintained by
the strictest vigilance. It is a delicate and fragile
flower, susceptible of every variation of the spiritual
atmosphere. Guard against that which checks its
growth.
Many are not aware how much . . . .
great joviality,
light conversation,
foolish jesting,
novel reading,
carnal music,
unfit the heart for communion with God,
and lessen the tone of its spirituality.
Close communion with mere nominal religious
professors is particularly to be avoided. Much
more injury to spiritual-mindedness accrues
from intimate friendship with such, than from
those who assert no pretensions to a religious
character; as with the one we are apt to be
less on our guard than the other.
Avoid the world's amusements; they will eat as
a canker into the very core of your spirituality!
"Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this
world" is a prohibition which should never be absent
from the eye of a traveler to the heavenly city.
Are not heaven's attractions many and powerful?
How rich is heaven! Why, then, should not our
thoughts be there? Oh! shall not our hearts be
more where our most precious treasure is, where
our holiest and dearest hopes center, and where
we ourselves shall shortly be?
|