*25 In the Salvation Army and in every place where he was known, Commissioner Samuel Logan Brengle was loved...
*26 ..for two years he was a circuit preacher of the Northwest Indiana Methodist conference, after which he went to Boston for his seminary training.
there were humbling experiences in his first years of ministry and as a result there came to his heart a hunger for complete consecration to the Savior and for holiness of life. he saw that he himself was his greatest enemy in effective service for the Lord. as he sought the truth of God in the Scriptures and searched his own heart, he found that consecration meant emptying of all that he was in himself before he could be filled with the spirit. of that heart searching he wrote:
'I saw the humility of Jesus and my pride;
the meekness of Jesus and my temper;
the lowliness of Jesus and my ambition;
the purity of Jesus and my unclean heart;
the faithfulness of Jesus and the deceitfulness of my heart;
the unselfishness of Jesus and my selfishness;
the trust and faith of Jesus and my doubts and unbelief;
the holiness of Jesus and my unholiness.
I got my eyes off everybody but Jesus and myself and I came to loathe myself.
his ambition was to be a great preacher and he sought the power of the Holy Spirit to that end. he rationalized that a great preacher would do more for the glory of God than one who was mediocre. finally, in utter desperation, he prayed , 'Lord, I wanted to be an eloquent preacher, but if by stammering and stuttering I can bring greater glory to Thee than by eloquence, then let me stammer and stutter!'
with the problem of pride settled, there remained the matter of cleansing from sin. his heart was hungry. though emptied of self and self-seeking, he was not filled with God. then it was that i John 1.9 became clear to him: 'if we confess our
*27 sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness'.
years later he recorded his experience in the little volume, When The Holy Ghost Is Come, in these words:
I shall never forget my joy, mingled with awe and wonder when this dawned upon my consciousness. for several weeks I had been searching the Scriptures, ransacking my heart, humbling my soul and crying to God almost day and night for a pure heart and the baptism with the Holy Ghost, when one glad, sweet day (it was Jan 9, 1885) this text suddenly opened to my understanding: 'If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness' and I was enabled to believe without any doubt that the precious Blood cleansed my heart, even mine, from all sin. shortly after that, while reading these words of Jesus to Martha: 'I am the resurrection and the life; he that believeth on me, though he were dead, yet shall he live and he that liveth and believeth on Me shall never die', instantly my heart was melted like wax before fire; Jesus Christ was revealed to my spiritual consciousness, revealed in me, and my soul was filled with unutterable love. I walked in a heaven of love. then one day, with amazement, I said to a friend: 'this is the perfect love about which the Apostle John wrote, but it is beyond all I dreamed of; in it is personality; this love thinks, wills, talks with me, corrects me, instructs and teaches me'. and then I knew that God the Holy Ghost was in this love and this love was God, for 'God is love'.
*28 ...all danger will be avoided by meekness and lowliness of heart; by humble, faithful service; by esteeming others better than ourselves and in honor preferring them before ourselves; by keeping an open, teachable spirit; in a word, by looking steadily unto Jesus, to whom the Holy Spirit continually points us; for he would not have us fix our attention exclusively upon Himself and His work In us, but also upon the Crucified One and His work For us, that we may walk in the steps of Him whose blood purchases our pardon and makes and keeps us clean...
'2 mornings after his sanctification the honey pots were spilled into is heart. he had honored god; he had stood the test of bearing faithful witness. and since his man has exercised fullness of faith, God would now vouchsafe to him fullness of feeling. he has mirrored this experience for us in the following:
*29 'I awoke that morning hungering and thirsting just to live this life of fellowship with God, never again to sin in thought or word or deed against Him, with an unmeasurable desire to be a holy man, acceptable unto God. getting out of bed about 6 o'clock with that desire, I opened my Bible and, while reading some of the words of Jesus, he gave me such a blessing as i never had dreamed a man could have this side of heaven. it was an unutterable revelation. it was a heaven of love that came into my heart, my soul melted like wax before fire. I sobbed and sobbed. I loathed myself that i had ever sinned against Him or doubted Him or lived for myself and not for His glory. every ambition for self was now gone ...
'I walked out over Boston Commons before breakfast weeping for joy and praising God, Oh, how I loved!...
I have never doubted this experience since. I have sometimes wondered whether I might not have lost it, but I have never doubted the experience any more than I could doubt that i had seen my mother, or looked at the sun or had my breakfast. it is a living experience.
In time, God withdrew something of the tremendous emotional feelings. He taught me I had to live by my faith and
*30 not by my emotions. I walked in a blaze of glory for weeks, but the glory gradually subsided and He made me see that I must walk and run, instead of mounting up with wings. He showed me that i must learn to trust Him, to have confidence in His unfailing love and devotion, regardless of how i felt. '
and what resulted from the continuance of that crisis experience of cleansing and the filling of God's Spirit? Brengle's preaching changed perceptibly. before this he had preached for human appreciation, now alone for the exaltation of the Savior. he preached to disturb and not to please. the reaction of his audiences was conviction of sin rather than commendation of the preacher.
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