Subdued

Subdued
By George D. Watson

"Before God can launch us out into the breadth
and sweetness of His service, and entrust to
us great things for Himself, we must be perfectly
subdued in every part of our nature to His will
and the disposition of His mind. We must be subdued
in our hearts, in our wills, in our words, in our
tempers, in our manners; subdued through and through
so thoroughly that we will be flexible to all His
purposes and plans. We must be so subdued that harshness,
severity, criticism, sluggishness, laziness, impetuosity,
and all wanting our way, even in religious matters,
will be subdued out of us.

Conversion will not finish this work, and perhaps not
in one case out of a thousand will the second work of
grace produce this complete condition of teachable
subjugation to God’s Spirit. Being able to preach
strong sermons on sanctification will not do it,
and neither camp meetings, conventions, Bible schools,
nor the writing of books and editing of papers on
Christian holiness will prove adaquate for this.

We must be subdued, not merely in our own opinion,
not merely think ourselves subdued, not only subdued
in the esteem of our friends and fellow workers, but
subdued so perfectly that the all-seeing eye of God
can look us through, and the omniscient One knows
that we are subdued. God must conquer the man that
He can trust with His great thoughts and plans. The
Holy Ghost must saturate us with a divine conquest
before He can use us to conquer other souls.

The Lord will begin to subdue us with gentle means;
and if we sink lovingly and promptly into His mind,
the work will be done; but if we have flint or iron
in our nature, and it is necessary, He will use heroic
means to put us between the millstones and grind us
to powder, until He can mold us without any resistance
to His purpose. The greatest difficulty in the way of
God’s using His servants, even His zealous and ofttimes
sanctified servants, is that they are not perfectly,
universally, and constantly subdued under the power of God.

We must be so subdued as to stop meddling with other
people’s matters that God has not entrusted us with,
so subdued as not to be calling God’s servants hard
names, and thrusting at Christians who are doing what
they can in their various fields for the Master; so
subdued that we can hold our tongues, and walk softly
with God, keep our eyes upon Jesus, attend to our
own work, and do God’s will promptly and lovingly,
glad to have a place in His Kingdom and to do a
little service for Him.

Oh! it is grand to be absolutely conquered by the
Holy Ghost, and swing out a thousand miles from
everybody and everything into the ocean of God’s
presence, and work with Him in humility, without
stumbling over others, without religious pevishness,
and to bend with every plan God gives us.

When we are subdued in the sight of God, He will work
miracles in us, and power in experience, in healing,
in finance, in service, in gentleness, and in sweetness
of the inner heart life; miracles of grace that will
astonish us and surprise our friends, and utterly amaze
our enemies, when they come to know the magnitude of
what God has wrought.

Let us get subdued in every way, in everything; so subdued
that we can keep still in God and see Him work out the
great bright thoughts of His eternal mind in our lives.

George D. Watson