D.L. Moody
Chapter II
Penance for Sin
There is no merit in taking a gift. If a beggar comes to my house, and asks for bread to eat, and I give him a loaf of bread, there is no merit in his taking the bread. So if you experience the favor of God, you have to take it as a beggar. Some one has said: “If you come to God as a prince, you go away as a beggar: if you come as a beggar, you go away as a prince.” It is to the needy that God opens the wardrobe of heaven, and brings out the robe of righteousness.
Chapter III
Possessing, and “Working Out”
The religion of Christ is not man working his way up to God; it is God coming down to man.
Chapter V
The Softening Power of Grace
I was one of the first to break the rules of the school. We had a lady teacher, and she asked me to stay behind. I thought the cane was coming out again; and I was going to protest against it. I was quite in a fighting mood. She took me alone. She sat down and began to talk to me kindly. I thought that was worse than the cane; I did not like it. I saw that she had not got any cane. She said: "I have made up my mind that if I cannot control the school by love, I will give it up. I will have no punishment; and if you love me, try and keep the rules of the school." I felt something right here in my throat. I was not one to shed many tears; but they would come - I could not keep them back. I said to her, "You will have no more trouble with me;" and she did not. I learned more that winter than in the other three put together.
That was the difference between law and grace. Christ says, "If you love me, keep My commandments."
Chapter VI
Grace for Living
So many people are living on their past experience—thinking of the grand times they had twenty
years ago, perhaps when they were converted. It is a sure sign that we are out of communion with God if we are talking more of the joy, and peace, and power, we had in the past, than of what we have to-day. We are told to “grow in grace;” but a great many are growing the wrong way.
You remember the Israelites used to gather the manna fresh every day: they were not allowed to store it up. There is a lesson here for us Christians. If we would be strong and vigorous, we must go to God daily and get grace. A man can no more take in a supply of grace for the future than he can eat enough to-day to last him for the next six months; or take sufficient air into his lungs at once to sustain life for a week to come. We must draw upon God’s boundless stores of grace from day to day, as we need it.
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