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This ungodly world!
(from Winslow's "The Church of God a Garden")
"Therefore, come out from them and separate
yourselves from them, says the Lord. Don't
touch their filthy things, and I will welcome you."
2 Cor. 6:17
The question is not, how far you may go into
the world and not be worldly; nor is it to be
decided by the immediate and sensible effect
of worldly amusements upon your feelings.
A professing Christian may indulge in certain
worldly gaieties, or employments of questionable
propriety, without being conscious of any
immediate injury received, and then vainly
imagine that he has derived no hurt to himself,
whatever it may be with others.
But, has no injury in reality been received?
Has no evil influence been exerted upon the
spirituality of an easily susceptible and finely
fibered soul? Has not the spirit of devotion
been killed, the heart estranged from God,
the mind secularized, and all the sweet, holy
impressions of religion seriously impaired?
The question can only be determined by inquiry
into the nature, tendencies, and results of scenes
enacted at a theater; of sentiments promulgated
in an romance novel; of frivolities indulged in at
a ball, upon a soul on whom the solemn vows of
holy consecration to God are sealed.
Thus the spiritual injury of worldly conformity to
a professing Christian is often in a way of which
he is the least conscious.
His only safe and consistent path is one of marked
and decided separation; combating with the faith
that overcomes the world, and crucifying it by the
cross upon which it crucified his Lord and Master.
Can we be said to "Come out from among them,
touching not the unclean thing," and yet give our
personal and practical countenance to the sinful
pleasures, frivolous gaieties and vain recreations
essentially and professedly of the world?
Love to Christ, attachment to His truth, loyalty
to His cause, binds us to obedience, devotion,
and consecration to our Savior.
Let our holy living, let our Christlike spirit,
be a daily, hourly, solemn protest against the
wickedness, heartlessness, and emptiness of
this ungodly world!
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