Christian Living

by Florence Crawford
(October 11, 1931)

Psalms 15:1-5 reads, “Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle? Who shall dwell in thy holy hill? He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart. He that backbiteth not with his tongue, nor doeth evil to his neighbor, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour. In whose eyes a vile person is contemned; but he honoureth them that fear the Lord. He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not. He that putteth not out his money to usury, nor taketh reward against the innocent. He that doeth these things shall never be moved.”

In this Psalm God asks the question, “Who shall abide in thy tabernacle? Who shall dwell in thy holy hill?” He answers the question.

How this question should search out our hearts! This is speaking of everyday living. Some have said, “How may I know that I am right with God?” All one needs to do is to read this fifteenth Psalm. When one is born again the Spirit bears witness that he has become a child of God; and there is no question about it. We know by the witness first. Then we begin to walk in this new life and we find God has created a change in our soul.

When Adam committed the sin in the Garden, disobedience went into every fibre and tissue of the human race; and it is there today in the natural heart. Even when one is born again that old stubborn nature is in the heart. It is subdued, it is true, and brought under the regenerating power of God that has come into the heart at justification; but that old serpent nature is there, and would assert itself, but the new birth holds it in subjection. At sanctification the Blood of Jesus Christ eradicates that inbred nature, and destroys it. It is then that the rest, which can only be told by those who have received it, comes into the heart.

A battle with self

But there remains the self-life to battle with, and that is the thing we are dealing with today. The self-life will assert itself, and it will be hard to distinguish between that self-life and the carnal nature you had to battle with before you were sanctified. Paul the Apostle said, “I die daily.” It was the self in him that was being put to death. Many times instead of dying daily to self and to everything great or small, people will lose the Word of God out of the heart – many times it will be through pressure – and that Adamic nature will come back into the heart.

The love of God has gone, and yet they will sit as the children of God, and as sanctified and baptized with the Holy Ghost; but they will be filled with that resistance. Perhaps they do not want to resist the things of the Spirit, and they cannot understand it. What is the trouble? They have lost the thing out of their heart. They have not the tender melted spirit. When something happens that goes against them, they have no endurance or that which can stand and bear it in the Spirit, and thank God for the privilege.

Let us read those words again: “He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart.”

That is one of the greatest virtues mentioned in this Bible. There are people whose countenance witnesses against them that they have not the truth in one’s heart – not slipping or twisting or changing it around, not trying to evade this or that, but meeting the situation with an open heart. The one who speaks the truth in his heart, is open and free. There is nothing he cares to cover up, but he stands with his heart open to high Heaven and to the inspection of those about him.

Search your heart!

God is speaking to each one of us. It is necessary to let the Word search our heart. The one who will not do it is the loser. There never was a time when we needed to have our minds stirred by the Word more than now. The enemy seeks to rob the truth out of the heart. He will try to put into the heart just a little resistance to the Word. If we who are giving out the Word day after day and night after night are continually searching our hearts by the Word of God, that we might be “first partakers of the fruits” before giving it out to the people, how much more ought everyone who receives it search his heart? For the Word is given for the perfecting of the saints.

These are days of deception. These are days when men’s hearts are prone to be deceitful, but the child of God can bare his breast to the searching of the Lord God, because there is truth in the innermost part. He knows whereof He speaks. There is the consciousness that there is no deception in his life.         

“He that backbiteth not with his tongue,  . . . ” How many can stand the Word of God laid on their heart and know that they measure up to that Scripture? There is no backbiting, nor evil speaking; there is no criticizing or murmuring or faultfinding in the heart of the one who is going to dwell in the house of the Lord or in His Holy Hill. We might better face that truth today than to miss the Rapture at the day of the resurrection.

“Nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour.” Many people will try to lower someone in the estimation of another. That is not to be found in a true child of God. But there is something in his heart that will do just the opposite. He may see and know that a wrong has been committed, but he is not whispering it about. He will go to the ones who have authority and who are the proper ones to take care of it.

“He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not.” There must be that steadfastness in the heart that will not change. Some stand for the truth for a little while, and then someone comes and lowers the standard. The moment the standard is lowered, it brings a change into the heart – the moment the standard is lowered in any way, whether on dress or doctrine, the heart has changed. It is a straight and narrow way that God has mapped out for us.

Straighten things out

How many times we come in contact with people, and we find they have changed. They were fine, and now they are altogether different. What is the trouble? Perhaps something has gone wrong and it needs straightening out. He that sweareth to his own hurt is not seeking to lay blame on another or get another into trouble. Even if he cannot understand it, he would rather suffer himself than cause another to suffer. "Changeth not" – I love that Scripture. There is something about the fellowship of God’s people that is sweeter than honey in the honeycomb – that sweet fellowship in the heart that loves God and changes not.

“He that putteth not out his money to usury, nor taketh reward against the innocent. He that doeth these things shall never be moved.” A clear conscience is the softest pillow that one can lay his head on. And what is it that gives a clear conscience? It is obedience to God’s Word. It means everything to come under the protecting hand of God that one will not be moved when fear and destruction come upon the world. We remember that the World War closed so suddenly. Even those who were working to bring the armistice about, were almost shocked themselves, when it came. We were all laboring – the old shipyards with their clank and noise were turning out the battleships – and suddenly the news came – “The war is over!”

Right on the eve of the time when the war closed, there were tremendous strides made in inventions of gases, explosives, and instruments of war. It was said that planes could be operated without a pilot, and whole cities could be annihilated without one moment’s notice. Those things would have been brought into action in a few more days, but God saw to it that they were not brought into play. They were reserved for the next war. We do not want to be here when it takes place. But the essential thing is that we be ready; that through our being ready, the influence of our lives will bring hundreds of people to knowledge of what they must do to be ready. It is not a selfish purpose that we be ready first, ourselves.

Our constant prayer

When you think of what God is doing in the earth, what manner of men ought we to be in all holy conversation? The constant prayer of our heart is that God will keep the Headquarters of this Gospel work in such an attitude before Him that their prayers will reach the Throne of God in behalf of souls the world over. Yesterday I received a letter from a lighthouse keeper who told how his life was hid away – shut away alone, he and his family, from the rest of the world. He said, “Send us literature.” They were calling for help. Another wrote that he was keeping the light burning to guide the ships on their courses. He was piloting ships in the service of his government. Our business is to pilot individuals to the land above – by our testimony, our prayers, and our manner of life.         

Let us turn to Isaiah, chapter 24, beginning with verse 1: “Behold, the Lord maketh the earth empty, and maketh it waste, and turneth it upside down, and scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof. And it shall be, as with the people, so with the priest; as with the servant, so with his master; as with the maid, so with her mistress; as with the buyer, so with the seller; as with the lender, so with the borrower; as with the taker of usury, so with the giver of usury to him. The land shall be utterly emptied, and utterly spoiled: for the Lord hath spoken this word. The earth mourneth and fadeth away, the world languisheth and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth do languish.”

People walk in their glory and in their power today. They walk haughtily with wanton steps and wanton eyes. They have their “tinkling ornaments” and the things which Isaiah said they would have. The manner in which some women dress is shameful and disgraceful. It would be hard for me to believe that anyone who professed to being a Christian would dress in the immodest low-necked dresses of today. We who walk in the blazing light of this Gospel have much to be responsible for. God help us to hold the standard where it belongs!

Verse 5: “The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant.” Are they or are they not transgressing God’s laws today? changing His ordinances? breaking His everlasting covenants? Our answer is that pollution has entered into the whole land. People can drink alcohol, they can gamble, and even smoke their cigarettes, then enter the church choir and sing the songs of God. If their ministers believe it to be wrong, they do not say a word.   

“Therefore hath the curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate: therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men left.” Isaiah was speaking prophetically of a time when judgment was to be visited upon the inhabitants of this earth for their sins. However we today are considering the spiritual wickedness into which the world is sinking. There has never been a time since the Dark Ages when there was less of the real power of God, and when the Spirit of God has been so rejected as in the nominal church today. It is truly a deplorable condition!

A personal search

One day I stood on the corner of Fifth and Main Streets, in Los Angeles, California. God had saved me. I was doing my rescue work to keep, it seemed, the little fire in my heart fanned to a flame. I had been in this church and that one. I stood there that day, my heart aching. I said, “Is there no place where they believe the whole Word?” I would not exchange for anything in the whole world that hunger that God planted in my heart which searched and sought until at last I found them.

Let us read a few verses from Isaiah 25, beginning with verse 1: “O Lord, thou art my God, I will exalt thee, I will praise thy name; for thou hast done wonderful things.” Who would have believed that God would do all these wonderful things that have taken place in these twenty-five years!

God will reward our faithfulness and not only make us to stand, but He will also put in our heart a fortress of strength that we might help others. Many have come into this place in the past twenty-five years, bent, sickly, about to die, discouraged, broken-hearted – helpless wrecks and derelicts – and have knelt at these altars. God’s people surrounded them with their prayers; fortified them with their courage and their faith; and God did marvelous things for them. He healed them and saved them, and they have grown to be pillars in the house of the Lord. The blasts may blow against them, but only the sweet spices flow out from the soul that has been redeemed and fortified by the truth.

Obedience is imperative

It is obedience to His Word that God wants to see. If Israel had obeyed God and followed Him with all their hearts they could have gone directly into the Promised Land, and not have had to wander forty years in the wilderness. God is warning us against disobedience, and against failing to receive the Word into our hearts as it is preached and read. If one fails to receive the Word of God, he will go backward instead of forward.

Many people think that God is a weakling like themselves – that He will slide over things as they slide over them, and say things in His Word that He does not mean. But God is not such an one as theyself. God is righteous, just, and true; and when He speaks it will come to pass. People, we cannot afford to slip over the least thing in the Bible.

Isaiah 25:7: “And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people, and the vail that is spread over all nations.” Sin has cast a vail over the nations and they have hid themselves from the Truth. The vail is over Israel, and they are groping in darkness. But God will remove the vail of unbelief from every heart that will turn to God, and will cause him to believe. Do not wait until God rises up in His judgment to take the vail from the earth – the earth that is growing in sin – but turn while God’s love is calling sinners to repentance, that He might gather them under the banner of His love and wash away their sin and pollution.

Let us see to it that the vail is not over our heart today, but that the Spirit of God has a free course into the deepest recesses of our life. Get the faith channels clear by removing every thing that hinders. Read again Psalm 15, Psalm 24, and Psalm 50. They will search out your heart through His Word. Above everything else in the world, we want that Word wrought out in our hearts and lives.

Florence Crawford was the founder of the Apostolic Faith work with headquarters in Portland, Oregon. After being saved and then receiving her  sanctification and the baptism of the Holy Ghost  in the Azusa Street revival at the turn of the century, she became an undaunted leader whose message and ministry reached hearts and lives the world over. She led the Apostolic Faith work from 1907 until her passing on
June 20, 1936.