13 -- PRIVATE WORDS
Mr. Edison, sometimes, has been called a wizard. He has given to the public many
wonderful inventions, none of which is greater than the phonograph. We stand in front of it and
sing or speak and in a few moments, lo and behold, out from the machine come our words just as
we uttered them, with all the particulars of our articulation. He makes a record of them so that,
long after the one speaking them is dead, he can still reproduce his words. Wonderful mechanism,
but is it more wonderful than what God can perform? Can Mr. Edison bring to pass what He who
rules the universe cannot? As we examine the phonograph and notice the little contrivance they call
a "receiver," we wonder what kind of a receiver must God have. We speak into the big blue tube
which collects our words, carrying them to the "receiver," and by it they are transmitted to the
recorder that makes and retains a record of them to be reproduced at will. And we are often led to
wonder what kind of a big blue tube it is that stretches above our heads from east to west, from
north to south; from one horizon to the opposite. And we wonder what sort of a receiver God has
by which all our words are heard and written down in the books -- books, we are told, that will be
opened on the great Judgment Day, and from which we are to be judged by the things written
therein.
If Mr. Edison can reproduce our words, what does the reader think God can and will do?
Men forget that God hears all their words. Of Sodom and Gomorrah He said, "Because the cry of
Sodom and Gomorrah is very great, and because their sin is very grievous, I will go down now
and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry that is come unto Me." Moses said
to the children of Israel, "God heard your murmurings in your tents." To those false spies, he said,
"And the Lord heard the voice of your words, and was wroth."
We wonder what kind of a report you have brought back of God's salvation by your words,
spoken in private, out of sound of the public and behind the threshold of your own home? Words
spoken in derision of God's great salvation that He planned and brought to poor, sin-cursed
humanity by and through the blood of His Son? How often have you sneered at or spoken against
the doctrine and experience of heart purity that comes by having the heart cleansed from all inbred
sin and sanctified wholly ? How many times have you spoken adversely of some one who
professed to have found the experience and was doing his best to make others see and seek it?
Come on, don't try to evade the question, for if you are guilty, it will be ten thousand times
better for you to confess it now than to wait until, like Achan, you are pointed out. How many do
you suppose have been kept back by what you have said?
God told the children of Israel they could possess the land. He was with them, and as He
had delivered them from the Egyptians, so He could deliver them from the Canaanites; and as He
pardons all our transgressions when we obey and come to Him as He commands, just so He has
the power to cleanse and sanctify us wholly, and who are you that dare speak contrary to His
written Word? Just as certainly as those false spies brought back an evil report by their talking
contrary to what God had commanded. so the person who has spoken in a trifling manner or against
the blessed truth of heart purity, has spoken directly against the written Word of God, and as God
heard and punished them according to their own words, so has He heard, and so will He punish
those who speak against His Word now.
The children of Israel had the promise of the "goodly land" before they left Egyptian
slavery and they knew where they were headed for just so, God promises full deliverance from all
sin to the sinner if he will turn and do as God commands. "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and
just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." One great reason that God
pardons and regenerates a soul is that, being regenerated back to life, that soul might then be made
free from sin by having that evil nature, that "proneness to wander," that "bent to sinning," utterly
removed from his heart. Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil and the devil has succeeded
in impregnating sin into the human heart, and the work of Jesus is not accomplished in any heart
until the sin has all been destroyed and removed. The individual who dares to speak against it,
whether preacher in the pulpit or some one in his own home, must answer to God for so basely
misrepresenting His truth.
With these things in mind, allow us now to ask, If you were dying, would you pray as
Hezekiah did? Do you think you would beseech God to remember how you had walked and had
done thus, with a perfect heart? It might be a good thing for us to call up that husband again and in
his presence ask that wife: "How about this man's words about home? Does he talk for or against
this great salvation, or what is the character of his language anyway? Is there anything about his
words that reminds you of Jesus? Is he as choice in his language about the home as he is abroad?
By his words, who does he remind you most of, a godly, god-fearing man, or a worldly, godless
individual? Does he get angry and say harsh and unjust things that he would be ashamed to hear at
the Judgment?"
"Well, suppose you sit down and we ask him to arise and answer those questions
concerning you, or if you are both so loth to speak concerning the other, we will ask that son or
daughter to come up and tell us how you each talk in your home. What about your private words?
"If you would not be willing for your son or daughter to testify as to your private words in
the home, pray, what good is your profession of religion anyway? And if they do not tell of your
words, they will be told at the Judgment when God opens the books wherein they are kept."
So long as carnality remains in the heart, the tongue will go wrong. You may make and
form resolutions not to talk so much or not to say such and such things, but in a little while it breaks
loose and words are spoken that blast, blight, and blacken records, character and reputations, and
Sometimes attacks and breaks up homes, creating havoc and destruction that result in damning
souls forever. Sometimes, in order to further their own ends, or to attract to themselves, or to draw
others to their personal ideas, words are spoken that cast reflection and reproach upon some of
God's little ones who are working, toiling and living sacrificial lives in order to bring souls to
God. How will those who do such things meet their words at the judgment?
Someone has said that words are but the echo of what lies in the heart, and if that be so,
what a carnal heart some must have! Paul wrote that "to be carnally minded is death, and they that
are carnally minded (Eng. flesh, Greek sarx) cannot please God." (Rom. 8:8; Gal. 5:17) A heart
that has the carnal mind in it is not perfect toward God, and Hezekiah called God to remember
how he had walked before Him in truth and with a perfect heart; consequently when he was on
what he supposed was his deathbed, he was not afraid to ask God to remember how he had
walked.
Reader, how about it? How would it be with thee? Go back over thy life and remember,
before it is too late. Is there carnality in thy heart? Does it not show itself in thy words? How many
times has it made you say things that you would give worlds, had you them to give, if you could
take them back?
We look back to our boyhood days and so many things come up before us. Oh, what would
we not give if we could take back things we have said? How well we remember our dear old
saintly father, and his kindness to us, and his many, many pleadings. What would we not give were
we able to unsay some things we said to him! As it is, we will never get through thanking God that
He let father live until we could ask forgiveness of him; live to hear his youngest son preach a
Gospel that saves from all sin. But every boy has not had the opportunity to do that. Father has
gone and the words spoken so hastily are still in his memory, and, so far as that father is
concerned, unconfessed.
We remember of hearing a brother tell how he had quarreled with his father. He said, "I
had been converted and did not know that God could cleanse the heart from all sin. My preacher,
though sworn to preach it, it being the doctrine of our church, did not preach it; and I was in
ignorance concerning the possibility of having a clean heart. I had a bad temper and one day
quarreled with my father, and in the heat of anger left home. I was sent for to return, but before I
arrived home my father had died. And now there hangs in memory's gallery the picture of my
father's face, and the fact that the last words I, his son professing to be a Christian, ever spoke to
him, were in anger.
"If my preacher had only been true to his vows, I would have heard that Jesus could take
the carnality out of my heart, and would no doubt have sought for and obtained the experience, for I
was earnest and honest and willing. I would not have had to go on down through life with it ever in
my memory. Those last angry words to my father I know God has forgiven, but I cannot lose the
memory of them."
That preacher did not bring a good report, even if he did not bring back an evil one; but in
his negligence, something was brought to pass that can never be undone, and the hasty words
spoken by that brother will go down through life with him.
The Bible say, "The tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity ... and it is set on fire of Hell; for
every kind of beasts and of birds and of serpents and of things in the Sea, is tamed and hath been
tamed of mankind. But the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil full of deadly poison." By it
reputations are blasted, characters are defamed, men and women disgraced, and souls turned back
from following God and damned in Hell at last.
Oh, brother, what about your words? Sister, are you ready to go to the Judgment Bar with
your words? Were you dying at this hour, could you, would you, pray as Hezekiah did: "O Lord, I
beseech Thee, remember how I have walked before Thee in truth and with a perfect heart, and
have done that which was right in Thy sight"?
