Do not think it is an easy thing to get rid of self.  At a consecration meeting, it is easy to make a vow, and to offer a prayer, and to perform an act of surrender, but as solemn as the death of Christ was on Calvary—­His giving up of His unsinning self life to God,—­just as solemn must it be between us and our God—­the giving up of self to death.  The power of the death of Christ must come to work in us every day.  Oh, think what a contrast between that self-willed Peter, and Jesus giving up His will to God!  What a contrast between that self-exaltation of Peter, and the deep humility of the Lamb of God, meek and lowly in heart before God and man!  What a contrast between that self-confidence of Peter, and that deep dependence of Jesus upon the Father, when He said:  “I can do nothing of myself.”  We are called upon to live the life of Christ, and Christ comes to live His life in us; but one thing must first take place; we must learn to hate this self, and to deny it.  As Peter said, when he denied Christ, “I have nothing to do with him,” so we must say, “I have nothing to do with self,” that Christ Jesus may be all in all.  Let us humble ourselves at the thought of what this self has done to us and how it has dishonored Jesus; and let us pray very fervently:  “Lord, by Thy light discover this self; we beseech Thee to discover it to us.  Open our eyes, that we may see what it has done, and that it is the only hindrance that has been keeping us back.”  Let us pray that fervently, and then let us wait upon God until we get away from all our religious exercises, and from all our religious experience, and from all our blessings, until we get close to God, with this one prayer:  “Lord God, self changed an archangel into a devil, and self ruined my first parents, and brought them out of Paradise into darkness and misery, and self has been the ruin of my life and the cause of every failure; oh, discover it to me.”  And then comes the blessed exchange, that a man is made willing and able to say:  “Another will live the life for me, another will live with me, another will do all for me,” Nothing else will do.  Deny self; take up the cross, to die with Jesus; follow Him only.  May He give us the grace to understand, and to receive, and to live the Christ life.

WAITING ON GOD

III.

Psalms 62:  5.—­My soul, wait thou only upon God, for my expectation is from Him.

The solemn question comes to us, “Is the God I have, a God that is to me above all circumstances, nearer to me than any circumstance can be?” Brother, have you learned to live your life having God so really with you every moment, that in circumstances the most difficult He is always more present and nearer than anything around you?  All our knowledge of God’s Word will help us very little, unless that comes to be the question to which we get an answer.