THE WILL.

Among the different faculties which God gave to man in his creation is one called the will.  It is because you have this faculty that you become a responsible being.  Before the first man and woman in the garden of Eden God placed two laws—­one was the law of obedience, and the other, the law of disobedience.  These were subject to their choice.  They could will to obey God and live forever, or will to disobey and die.  Before all men are placed two ways—­one is called the way of life, and the other, the way of death.  These are subject to their choice.  Therefore, the will is called that faculty of the soul by which we choose or refuse things.

The will is capable of cultivation.  By the exercise of your will you can refuse to do wrong things, and thus strengthen your will-power.  Men have attained extraordinary heights of morality by the exercise of the will in right-doing and refusing to do wrong.  This is noble and beautiful, but there is something more noble still and more beautiful.  The moral man wills to do right because it is right, while the Christian wills to do right because it is the will of God and pleases him.

Although man can not by the exercise of his will-power in right-doing evolve into a Christian, the will plays an important part in the formation of Christian character.  It is true, the will is most usually led by the affections of the heart; therefore the writer of Proverbs said, “Out of the heart are the issues of life.”  The heart must, however, get consent of the will before its desires are fulfilled.  Here is a truth of vast importance to the Christian.

Many people’s wills have become so in bondage to the impure affections and desires of their depraved hearts that they have no will to do right and shun the wrong.  The desires of the heart sway their scepter of power over the will, and it acts to the granting the heart its wishes.  This is a sad picture.  A human being created to be free, but now a wretched slave.  When he wills to do good evil is present with him; the good he would do, he does not do; and the evil he would not do, that is what he does.  O miserable man!  A person who has rejected the mercy of God and has yielded to the inclinations of an unholy heart until he has no power to accept the offers of mercy and shun the ways of sin, is an object of the greatest pity.  To him there is no hope of escaping the damnation of hell.

There is a time in the life of every rational young man and woman when they can accept the blessed offers of salvation which God extends through his Son, if they will.  God gives the Holy Spirit to operate upon the depraved heart, making it to feel something of the realities of a Savior’s love and goodness, and something of the awfulness of sin.  The Holy Spirit does not take hold upon the will and compel it to serve God, or force it into right action.  He just takes hold upon the heart, suppressing its