an influx of light and strength...

In this second part of WEC's sermon, "Life a Divine Gift" is such a rich and vital message.  If we seek "the perfect life," we must ask, look to our fellow-beings and understand the "spirituality of religion"-prayer, worship, and revelation...Have a blessed sabbath.

"How may we combine the feeling of accountableness with the conviction that we have no Goodness, and can have none, but as a Divine Gift?...

"1. The first is this. Our Power over our character and conduct is the result of our Nature, of the Constitution of our minds. We are capable of virtue, because we are gifted with Reason, with Conscience, and with what may be called the Self-determining Principle, through which we may adopt conscience and reason as our rule...

2. But this does not exhaust the subject. It is plain that Scripture reveals a profounder doctrine of Dependence than this. It not only teaches that God gives sustenance to the Nature which He for ever recreates, but it affirms that He imparts Influence additional to this Indwelling Energy in our nature. It declares that Our Father gives His Spirit to them that ask. And by this we are to understand not merely that He endows us with rational and moral faculties, and the natural means of improving them, for these we enjoy whether we ask or not. But the meaning is, that He imparts an influx of Light and Strength in answer to Prayer, and that, without this Spiritual Aid, we cannot grow to Perfection. According to this doctrine, our dependence for moral and religious excellence is constant and complete. But I maintain that such dependence in no way encroaches on human power, and that it still leaves the formation of our character to our own choice and will.. Am I asked how I reconcile man's Moral Power with Spiritual Influence ? The answer is not difficult. Man needs and depends on the Divine Energy for his development. But this Energy he can gain, if he will seek for it. God liberally places it within his reach. Without it he cannot fulfil his destiny; but he is endowed with Power to aspire after it, and the Father welcomes him to its amplest use...

The same truth is illustrated, in a higher form, in the realm of duty and religion. When I resolve on seeking spiritual improvement, do I accomplish my end by lonely efforts of my own will, however often renewed ? Certainly not! I avail myself of incentives, guidance, encouragement, aid, from fellow-beings. I read what saints and sages have written, and strive to infuse their thoughts and spirit into my own soul. I recall the examples of the devout and disinterested, the heroic and humane. I associate with the excellent and wise, who live around me. I add to private intercourse and friendship the public means of religious and moral culture, worship with the congregation, communion at Christ's table, concert in deeds of charity. In a word, I strive to grow in goodness, by absorbing and assimilating, and so making my own, the goodness, and wisdom of my race...

 The good man, the true saint, the real Christian,—he who seems most spiritually self-subsistent,—will be the last to question and deny his need of Almighty Aid. He feels his dependence ever more deeply. When heavenly aspirations enter the soul, they are like a light suddenly kindled in the dark...

I close this discourse with observing, that our Dependence upon God, the Giver, will be felt by us just in proportion as we comprehend the Spirituality of religion,—' as we rise above professions and dogmas, rites and creeds, and learn that holiness and goodness consist in Love, in pure and disinterested affections and acts towards our Heavenly Father and our fellow-beings."

Blessings