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He gave the power to become the children of God ; the margin suggests
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or
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Theologically this seems a high calling; but we are not to deny things because they are high.
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The devil's darling sin is the pride that apes humility, and this affectation of humility is one of the ways in which souls are constantly kept out of blessing; it has been so throughout the history of the Church. In the matter of the forgiveness of sins, it is not so long since people said that if a man knew his sins were forgiven, it would make him conceited; and some people still hold it to be a presumption; at other times that eternal life, which consists in the knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ whom He has sent, is denied; because it is presumptuous for a man to say that he knows God in the same simple matter-of-fact way that he is acquainted with a friend. And nowadays this spiritual affectation takes the form of the denial of holiness, because, if you were kept from sin, you would be sure to be proud of it; as if God were likely to humble a man and make his heart a temple of His own, and then suffer him to be lifted up over the fact. They do not seem to see the contradiction. The Lord is pretty sure to humble us a good deal before He gives us anything to be proud of. People say it is presumptuous to be
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and more humble--to be something else. Humility is one of those things that lie right in the line of our obedience; or, as a dear friend once said to me,--
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I shall go and take the lowest place ; but the affected humility says,
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Oh! it's too good for me; I shall sit down outside ; and so, practically, it becomes numbered amongst those of whom it is said,
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They shall not taste of My supper.