tward life to wait for a Divine wisdom,
that I may know to witness, for Thy glory and for what Thy people need,
to the blessedness of an entire giving up of everything for God, a
separation that holds back nothing, to be His and His alone.

Holy Lord God! visit Thy people. Oh, withdraw Thou them from the world
and conformity to it. Separate, Lord, separate Thine own for Thyself.
Separate, Lord, the wheat from the chaff; separate, as by fire, the gold
from the dross; that it may be seen who are the Lord's, even His holy
ones. Amen.

1. Love separates effectually. With what jealousy a husband claims
his wife, a mother her children, a miser his possessions! Pray that
the Holy Spirit may show how God brought you to Himself, that you
should be His. 'He is a holy God; He is a Jealous God.' God's love
shed abroad in the heart makes separation easy.

2. Death separates effectually. If I reckon myself to be indeed
dead in Christ, I am separated from self by the power of Christ's
death. Life separates still more mightily. As I say, 'Not I, but
Christ liveth in me,' I am lifted up out of the life of self.

3. Separation must be manifest; it is meant as a witness to others
and ourselves; it must find expression in the external, if
internally it is to be real and strong. It is the characteristic of
a symbolic action that it not merely expresses a feeling, but
nourishes and strengthens the feeling to which it corresponds. When
the soul enters the fellowship of God, it feels the need of
external separation, sometimes even from what appears to others
harmless. If animated by the spirit of lowly consecration to God,
the external may be a great strengthening of the true separateness.

4. Separation to God and appropriation by Him go together. This has
been the blessing that has come to martyrs, confessors,
missionaries,--all who have given distinct expression to the
forsaking all.

5. Separation begins in love, and ends in love. The spirit of
separation is the spirit of self-sacrifice, of surrender to the
love of God; the truly separate one will be the most loving and
love-winning, given up to serve God and man. Is not what separates,
what distinguishes Jesus from all others, His self-sacrificing
love? This is His separateness, in which we are to be made like
Him.

6. God's holiness is His separate