eetings. At the close of the last meeting where I had
spoken upon the conditions of receiving the baptism with the Holy Spirit,
I found this man awaiting me in the vestibule. He said, "I did not stand
up on your invitation to-day." I replied, "I saw you did not." "I thought
you said," he continued, "that you only wanted those to stand who could
say they had absolutely surrendered to God?" "That is what I did say," I
replied. "Well, I could not say that." "Then you did perfectly right not
to stand. I did not want you to lie to God." "Say," he continued, "you hit
me pretty hard to-day. You said if there was anything that always comes up
when you get nearest to God, that is the thing to deal with. Now there is
something that always comes up when I get nearest to God. I am not going
to tell you what it is. I think you know." "Yes," I replied. (I could
smell it.) "Well, I simply wanted to say this to you." This was on Friday
afternoon. I had occasion to go to another city, and returning through
that city the following Tuesday morning, the minister who had presided at
the meeting was at the station. "I wish you could have been in our Baptist
ministers' meeting yesterday morning," he said; "that man I pointed out to
you from the north part of the state was present. He got up in our meeting
and said, 'Brethren, we have been all wrong about this matter,' and then
he told what he had done. He had settled his controversy with God, had
given up the thing which had always come up when he got nearest to God,
then he continued and said, 'Brethren, I have received a more definite
experience than I had when I was converted.' " Just such an experience is
waiting many another, both minister and layman, just as soon as he will
judge his sin, just as soon as he will put away the thing that is a matter
of controversy between him and God, no matter how small the thing may
seem. If any one sincerely desires the baptism with the Holy Spirit, he
should go alone with God and ask God to search him and bring to light
anything in his heart or life that is displeasing to Him, and when He
brings it to light, he should put it away. If after sincerely waiting on
God, nothing is brought to light, then we may proceed to take the other
steps. But there is no use praying, no use going to conventions, no use in
reading books about the baptism with the Holy Spirit, no use in doing
anything else, until we judge our sins.

3. The third step is _an open confession