At once she began to count her blessings and thank the Lord for
each one, and rejoice in Him for all the way He had led her, and
the gifts He had bestowed, and in a very few minutes the Lord
stood revealed to her spiritual consciousness.
She had not committed sin, nor resisted the Spirit, but a failure
to rejoice in Him who had daily loaded her with benefits (Psalm
lxviii. 19) had in a measure quenched the Spirit. She had not
turned the main, and so her soul was not flooded with living
waters. She had not remembered the command: "Thou shalt rejoice
before the Lord thy God in all that thou puttest thine hand
unto." But that morning she learned a lifelong lesson, and she
has ever since safeguarded her soul by obeying the many commands
to "Rejoice in the Lord."
Grieving and quenching the Spirit will not only leave barren and
desolate an individual soul, but it will do so for a Corps, a
church, a community, a whole nation or continent. We see this
illustrated on a large scale by the long and weary Dark Ages,
when the light of the Gospel was almost extinguished, and only
here and there was the darkness broken by the torch of truth held
aloft by some humble, suffering soul that had wept and prayed,
and through painful struggles had found the light.
We see it also in those Corps, churches, communities, and
countries where revivals are unknown, or are a thing of the past,
where souls are not born into the Kingdom, and where there is no
joyous shout of victory among the people of God.
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