,
through a mighty outpouring of his Spirit, then we shall never
comprehend his ways. Why is it that he does not give us one general
outpouring, one grand revival all over our country, and bring about the
long prayed for millennial day? Answer.--Conversion is a commandment of
God. It must be obeyed or the country lie, in direct opposition to the
will of God, in sin. His will is expressed in the words, "Let the wicked
forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him
return, _reconvert_, unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him, and
to our God, for he will abundantly pardon."

"To Israel he saith, all the day long have I stretched forth my hands
unto a gainsaying and disobedient people." Ro. x, 21. "The Lord strove
with them by his Spirit in the prophets, and bore with them many years,
yet they would not hear." Nehe. ix, 30. "They made their hearts as an
adamant stone lest they should hear the law, and the words which the
Lord of hosts hath sent in his spirit by the former prophets." Zech.
vii, 12. Jesus wept over them when he stood upon Mount Olivet and
expressed the greatness of his great heart in these words: "How often
would I have gathered thy children together as a hen doth gather her
brood under her wings, and ye would not." Lu. xiii, 34. Their failure
was not because the Spirit did not strive with them as it did with
others who were saved. "God is no respecter of persons." Neither was it
on account of inborn depravity. For if any were corrupted in their moral
nature by Adam's sin, all were corrupted alike. So that each one would
be in this respect equally hard to overcome. But why bring up inborn
corruption and helplessness? Is not the Spirit of God able for any task
which is in its own line of work? Jesus gave the true solution of the
question. He said: "Their hearts have waxed gross, and their ears are
dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed, lest at _any time_
they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and
understand with their hearts and be converted, and I should heal them."
The words "at any time" deserve particular attention, for the Lord's
time is _all the time_. He is unchangeable. "He is not willing that any
should perish, but that all should come to repentance." 2 Pet. iii, 9.

Many people talk and act as though the Lord was the most changeable
being in the universe. They seem to think that the unchangeableness of
the Lord is in the idea that he is everl