Freedom From Sin

 The following is from Samuel Logan Brengle's book Heart Talks on Holiness:

"The most startling thing about sin is its power to enslave. Jesus said, 'Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin' (John viii. 34), and everyday life and experience prove the saying to be true.

"Let a boy or a man tell a lie and he is henceforth the servant of falsehood unless freed by a higher power. Let the bank clerk misappropriate funds, let the business man yield to a trick in trade, let the  young  man surrender  to  the  clamor  of  lust,  let  the  youth  take  an  intoxicating  glass,  and henceforth  he  is  a  slave.  The  cord  that  holds  him  may  be  light  and  silken,  and  he  may  boast himself free, but he deceives himself; he is no longer free, he is a bondman.

"We may choose the path in life we will take; the course of conduct; the friends with whom we will associate; the habits we will form, whether good or bad. But, having chosen the ways of sin, we are then swept on without further choice with a swiftness and certainty down to hell, just as a man who chooses to go on board a ship is surely taken to the destined harbor, however much he may wish to go elsewhere. We choose and then we are chosen.

"We grasp and then we are grasped by a power stronger than ourselves--like the man who takes hold of the poles of an electric battery; he grasps, but he cannot let go at his will; like the man who took the baby boa-constrictor and trained it to coil about him, but when grown it crushed him; like the lion trainer, who put his head in the lion's mouth, but one day the lion closed its mouth and crushed his head as he might an egg-shell.

"Just  so  the  sinner  is  in  the  grasp  of  a  higher  power  than  his  own.  He  chooses  drink,  dancing, gambling,  worldly  pleasure,  or  human  wisdom  and  fame  and  power,  but  soon  finds  himself captive, only to be surely crushed and ruined for ever, unless delivered by some power outside himself.

"What shall he do? Is there hope? Is there a deliverer? Yes, thank God, there is. Jesus said:'If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed' (John viii. 36)."