This is one of the marks of our modern time—that many are guilty of merely “nibbling” at the truth of the Christian gospel.
I wonder if you realize that in many ways the preaching of the Word of God is being pulled down to the level of the ignorant and spiritually obtuse; that we must tell stories and jokes and entertain and amuse in order to have a few people in the audience? We do these things that we may have some reputation and that there may be money in the treasury to meet the church bills.
I believe in being honest about it—let’s admit that we have to pull down the application of the gospel not to the standard of the one who is really thirsting after God, but to the one who is the most carnal, the cheapest saintling hanging on by the teeth anywhere in the kingdom of God!
In many churches Christianity has been watered down until the solution is so weak that if it were poison it would not hurt anyone, and if it were medicine it would not cure anyone!
Now I want to bring you to my postulate that most present-day Christians live sub-Christian lives.
I repeat: Most modern Christians live sub-Christian lives!
Most Christians are not joyful persons because they are not holy persons, and they are not holy persons because they are not filled with the Holy Spirit, and they are not filled with the Holy Spirit because they are not separated persons.
The Spirit cannot fill whom He cannot separate, and whom He cannot fill, He cannot make holy, and whom He cannot make holy, He cannot make happy!
There you have it—my postulate that the modern Christian, even though he has accepted Christ and has been born again, is not a joyful person because he is not a holy person.
Tozer, A. W., & Smith, G. B. (1990). I talk back to the devil : Straightforward appeals for Christlike living (pp. 30–31). WingSpread.
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