Gathered Around the Fire

As for the simple and unlearned, it is not true that they are incapable of this inner relationship to Christ. The reverse is true. They are actually more suited to it. The Lord loves who walk simply. (Proverbs 12:22) Their humility, their simple trust in God, make it easier for them to turn within and follow the Lord’s Spirit. They are more qualified than most! You see, these simple believers are not accustomed to analyzing; they do not have the habit of discussing the issues of everything; and they are quick to let go of their own opinions. Yes, they do lack a great deal of education and religious training; therefore they are freer and quicker to follow the leading of the Spirit. Other people—more gifted, better educated, trained in theology—are often cramped and even blinded by their spiritual wealth! Such a person very often offers greater resistance to the inner anointing and to the leading of the Lord’s Spirit. The psalmist tells us, “Unto the simple God gives the unders...

Download QuickTime Player Download Chapter Audio file (HQ MP3) "Experiencing the Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon As we draw near to the close of this little book, I would like to address a word of exhortation to those Christian workers who are in charge of new converts. Let us consider the present situation. All around us, Christians are seeking to convert the lost to Jesus Christ. What is the best way to do this? And once men have been converted, what is the best way to aid them in attaining full perfection in Christ? The way to reach the lost is to reach them by the heart. If the new convert were introduced to real prayer and to true inward experience of Christ as soon as he became converted, you would see countless numbers of convert go on to become true disciples. On the other hand, you can see that the present way of dealing only with the external matters of life of the new convert brings little fruit. Burdening the new Christian with countless rules and a...

Download QuickTime Player Download Chapter Audio file (HQ MP3) "Experiencing the Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon Now In this state of rest, is your soul active or passive? It is active! You are not in a passive state, even if you are resting. By what activity could there be resting? You are resting in the act of abiding in His love/ Can that be activity? Yes! Inside your spirit there is an act going on. It is a sweet sinking into Deity. The inward attraction—the magnetic pull—becomes more and more powerful. Your soul, dwelling in love, is drawn by this powerful attraction and sinks continually deeper into that love. So you see, this inward activity has become far greater than it was when your soul first began to turn inward. Under the powerful attraction of God drawing you into Himself, the inward activity has increased. The difference is that at the outset the activity was more outward; now the activity has moved inside; it has become deep, inward, hidden and ...

Download QuickTime Player Download the Audio file (HQ MP3) "Experiencing the Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon We will begin this chapter with this simple point: Your Spiritual experiences fall into two categories—those that are external (surface) and those that take place internally, deep within your being. There are activities or actions that you form: some are surface; some are deeper. Your external activities are those which can be seen outwardly. They have to do with, more or less, physical things. Now this you must see: There is no real goodness in them, no spiritual growth in them, and very little experience of Christ! Of course, there is an exception: If your outward actions are as result (a by-product) of something that has taken place deep within you, then these outward actions do receive spiritual value and they do possess real goodness. But outward activities have only as much spiritual value as they receive from their source. Our way therefore, is cl...

Download QuickTime Player Prayer Requests...(Download mp3 Audio) Psalm 23 “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want”. As you continue in this venture with Christ—this venture that began as a simple way of prayer—yet another experience may await you. It is this: Do not be too surprised if you find you are no longer able to offer up prayers of petition. You may find that prayers of request become more difficult. Yes it is true that in the past you offered up petitions and requests with complete ease. Until now, praying this way was never difficult. But in this new relationship with your Lord, it is the Spirit who prays! And as the Spirit prays, He helps your weakness. He is making intercession for you. And He is praying according to the will of God. For we do not know how to pray as we should; but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. (Romans 8:28) There is your will; there is God’s will. There is your plan; there is God’s plan. There is your prayer; th...

Download QuickTime Player The Scripture...(Download mp3 Audio) For the last few chapters we have been discussing a deeper experience of Christ, and in the last chapter we looked at how to deal with sins and confession. Let us now go on to consider what other experiences with Him go deeper still. Let us take the Scripture first. Is there a deeper use you can make of the Scripture than has been mentioned up until now? Remember please, from an earlier chapter that reading the Scripture is a way into prayer. Remember, too, that what you read may become prayer. Is there yet more scripture can provide? Yes you can use the Scripture in yet a more refined manner than has been mentioned before. Let us consider that way. I will give you a brief, practical description. First come before the Lord and begin to read. Stop reading just as soon as you feel yourself being drawn inwardly. Stop reading when you feel the Lord drawing you in your inward parts to Himself. Now simply remain in stillness. St...

Download QuickTime Player A New Look At Confession of Sin...(Download mp3 Audio) "Experiencing The Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon Let us go on a little farther now and consider confession of sin There is awaiting you a higher understanding and a higher experience of confession and repentance. Should you truly desire to walk these paths, you should be aware of something about confession of sin which is generally misunderstood. In the past when you have confessed your sins to your Lord, you have most likely felt regret for those sins, have you not? There is a higher experience of repentance, and there is a deeper experience of confession of sin, than the feeling of regret. In fact, you will find those feelings of regret replaced by something else—replaced by a love and tranquility. That love, that tranquility sweetly saturates your soul and, having saturated it thoroughly, takes full possession of it. Repentance that is sweet? Confession of sin th...

Download QuickTime Player A New look At Self Examination ...(Download mp3 Audio) "Experiencing The Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon Where does confession of sin and examination of your life concerning sin fit into the life of a Christian following this path? How does he deal with these important matters? Let us take this chapter to open up a clearer, higher view of self-examination and of confession of sin. It is commonly taught that self-examination is something that should always precede confession of sin. Though this may be correct, the manner of the self-examination is dictated by the level of your Christian experience. I would recommend for a Christian whose spiritual state has actually advanced to the stage which was described in the preceding chapters that when you come to the Lord concerning sin and confession, you do this: Lay your entire soul open before God. You can be certain that the Lord will not will not fail to enlighten you concerning your...

Download QuickTime Player Silence ...(Download mp3 Audio) "Experiencing The Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon The point to which this venture has led us is a state of silence and continuous prayer. Let us go back a little a take a closer look at this matter of silence. Why, for instance, is being silent before the Lord when you first come to Him so important? First of all it is because of your fallen nature is opposed to God’s nature. The two of you are not at all alike. Secondly, Jesus Christ is the Word, the speaking Word. He can be heard! But for the Word (Jesus Christ) to be received by you, your nature must be made to correspond to His nature. Let me illustrate further. Consider the act of hearing. Listening is a passive sense. If you ever want to hear anything, you must yield a passive ear. Jesus Christ is the eternal Word. He and He alone, is the source of new life to you. For you to have new life, He must be communicated to you....

Download QuickTime Player Abundance ...(Download mp3 Audio) "Experiencing The Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon In the last chapter, we spoke of entering into a deeper level of experience with Jesus Christ. At the very outset of this journey, you found that the only preparation you needed was a quiet waiting before God. The same is true in this new level of experience. This is no longer a rare experience, nor an occasional experience; gradually it becomes your daily experience. The presence of God begins to be poured forth within you. Eventually it will become yours almost without intermission. In the beginning, you were led into His presence by prayer; but now, as prayer continues, the prayer actually becomes His presence. In fact, we can no longer say that it is prayer that continues. It is actually His presence that continues with you. This is beyond prayer. Now a heavenly blessedness is yours. You begin to discover That God is more intimately present to you t...

Download QuickTime Player Continual Prayer 12b...(Download mp3 Audio) "Experiencing The Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon Chapter 12b – “Continual Prayer” This experience with Christ has its beginning in a simply way to pray. Gradually, though it goes on from there. The experience deepens until the fullness of grace completely stills the activity of the self. Therefore, you see why it is of the greatest importance that you remain as quieted as possible. May I illustrate this again? When a baby is born, it draws milk from its mother’s breast by moving its lips. However once the milk begins to flow, the child simply swallows without any further effort. If the baby continued any effort, it would hurt itself, spill the milk, and have to quit nursing. This must be your attitude in prayer. You must act this same way, especially in the beginning. Draw ever so gently. But as the Lord flows out of your spirit into your soul, cease all activity. How do you begin? By moving...

Download QuickTime Player Continual Prayer ...(Download mp3 Audio) "Experiencing The Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon If you remain faithful on the things touched on up until now, you will be astonished to feel the Lord gradually taking possession of your whole being. I would like to remind you that this book was not written for your enjoyment. Neither is it presenting just some method of prayer. The purpose of this book is to offer a way in which the Lord Jesus can take full possession of you. As the Lord gradually begins to do this, to take full possession of you, it is true that you will begin to enjoy a sense of His presence. You will find that this sense of the Lord’s Presence will become very natural to you. Both the prayer with which you first began and a sense of His presence which comes with that prayer, will eventually become a normal part of your daily experience. An unusual serenity and peacefulness will gradually spread over your soul. Your whole pr...

Download QuickTime Player Toward the Center...(Download mp3 Audio) "Experiencing The Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon In the last chapter we discussed dealing with the outward senses. Here was our conclusion: If at any time you find your desires stirred up, those senses can best be deadened by a gentle retreat inward to a present God. Any other way of opposing your restless senses will merely stimulate them further. As you come into this deeper level of knowing the Lord, you will eventually come ot discover a principle I will call the law of central tendency. What do I mean by the law of central tendency? As you continue holding your soul deep in your inward parts, you will discover that God has a magnetic attracting quality! Your God is like a magnet! The Lord naturally draws you more and more toward Himself. The next thing you notice is this: As you move toward the center, the Lord purifies you of all the things that are not of Him. This is illustrated in natu...

Download QuickTime Player Living Indoors...(Download mp3 Audio) "Experiencing The Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon In the last chapter we concluded by saying that the believer who is utterly in love with the Lord will not even desire the things that might offend the object of his affection. I will go on to say it is only by abandonment that it is possible to reach that total victory in subduing your senses and your desires. Why is this so? Actually, the reason is very obvious. First of all, you must understand the workings of your innermost parts. Where do your five senses draw their life and energy? From your soul. It is your soul that gives life and energy to your five senses; and when your senses become aroused, they in turn stimulate your desires. How can we speak of total victory over the five senses and over the passions and desire that becomes aroused through them? If your body were dead, you would not be able to feel, and you certainly would have no desi...

Download QuickTime Player Abandonment and A Holy Life...(Download mp3 Audio) "Experiencing The Depths of Jesus Christ" by Madame Jeanne Guyon Recap & Intro: Chapter 6: Abandonment To penetrate deeper in the experience of Jesus Christ, it is required that you begin to abandon your whole existence, giving it up to God. Let us take the daily occurrences of life as an illustration. You must utterly believe that the circumstances of your life, that is every minute of your life, as well as the whole course of your life--anything, yes, everything that happens--have all come to you by His will and by His permission. You must utterly believe that everything that has happened to you is from God and is exactly what you need. Chapter 7: Abandonment & Suffering You must be patient in all the suffering that God sends you. If your love for the Lord is pure, you will love Him as much on Calvary as on Mount Tabor. The Lord Jesus loved His father on Mount Tabor where He was transfigure...