und in a circle of
unsatisfactorinesses, but a life that has found its true and entirely
satisfactory centre, and set itself towards a shining and entirely
satisfactory goal, whose brightness is cast over every step of the way.
Will you not seek it?

Do not shrink, and suspect, and hang back from what it may involve, with
selfish and unconfiding and ungenerous half-heartedness. Take the word of
any who have willingly offered themselves unto the Lord, that the life of
consecration is 'a deal better than they thought!' Choose this day whom
you will serve with real, thorough-going, whole-hearted service, and He
will receive you; and you will find, as we have found, that He is such a
good Master that you are satisfied with His goodness, and that you will
never want to go out free. Nay, rather take His own word for it; see what
He says: 'If they obey and serve Him, they shall spend their days in
prosperity, and their years in pleasures.' You cannot possibly understand
that till you are really _in_ His service! For He does not give, nor even
show, His wages before you enter it. And He says, 'My servants shall sing
for joy of heart.' But you cannot try over that song to see what it is
like, you cannot even read one bar of it, till your nominal or even
promised service is exchanged for real and undivided consecration. But
when He can call you 'My servant,' then you will find yourself singing
for joy of heart, because He says you shall.

'And who, then, is willing to consecrate his service this day unto the
Lord?'

'Do not startle at the term, or think, because you do not understand all
it may include, you are therefore not qualified for it. I dare say it
comprehends a great deal more than either you or I understand, but we can
both enter into the spirit of it, and the detail will unfold itself as
long as our probation shall last. Christ demands a hearty consecration in
_will_, and He will teach us what that involves in _act_.'

This explains the paradox that 'full consecration' may be in one sense
the act of a moment, and in another the work of a lifetime. It must be
complete to be real, and yet if real, it is always incomplete; a point of
rest, and yet a perpetual progression.

Suppose you make over a piece of ground to another person. You give it
up, then and there, entirely to that other; it is no longer in your own
possession; you no longer dig and sow, plant and reap, at your discretion
or for your own profit. His occ