It is
just as natural and easy for a Christian to live the
Christian life as it is for a sinner to live a sinful
life. The sinner needs make no effort to live a sinful
life; he lives it naturally and easily. Life proceeds from
the heart. The heart is the fountain, and the life is the
stream. As the fountain is, so the stream will be. It is
not difficult to live a Christian life when our hearts are
pure. This is the secret of purity of life.
The important question, then is,
"How can I have a pure heart?" Hearts are made
pure by the blood of Jesus. Then comes the command,
"Keep thyself pure." That the heart may be kept
pure, it must be kept filled with that which is pure. To
keep darkness out of a room, we need only to keep it
filled with light. Carefully closing up every crevice will
not suffice if the light goes out. Darkness will be
present. But simply keep the room filled with light, and
no effort is required to keep darkness out. In like manner
no effort need to be made to keep impurity out of the
heart and keep the heart filled with that which is pure.
But what is pure ? "The word
of God is pure, as silver tried in a furnace of fire,
purified seven times."
"Thy word is very pure;
therefore thy servant loveth it." "Let the words
of Christ dwell in you richly," and your heart will
be kept pure. The Psalm writer said, "Thy word have I
hid in my heart, that I may not sin against thee."
Here is the only way to a sinless life. Keep the heart
filled with the Word of God. It is the way to live as the
Bible reads. To have a nicely bound volume of the
Scriptures lying on the center table will not keep the
life sinless. We must have the Word in our heart. One
night while I was waiting for a train in one of our large
Eastern cities, I went into a mission. A man arose and
said he had read the Bible through forty-two times and
could quote whole books of it from memory. Later in his
talk he said he committed sin more or less every day. The
Word of God did not keep him from sinning, for he had it
in his head instead of his heart.
To live a Bible life is the only
true and right way to live, and in order to live such a
life, we need to have the Word written in the heart.
"I will put my laws into their mind, and write them
in their hearts." Heb. 8:10. Let us illustrate this
by taking a single text: "Having food and raiment let
us be therewith content." When we have these words in
the heart, they will be true in the life. All fret and
worry and murmurings will be banished out of the life when
the heart is full of the truth.
