© 19 Colin Melbourne, Transcribed and annotated from The Latter Rain publication of the Stone Church 1923
The Nearest Help
When I was in Norway, God was mightily moving there, though I had to talk by interpretation. However, God always worked in a wonderful way.
One day as we were going up a hill, we met a man coming down who stopped the three men I was with, one being the interpreter.
1920’s scene of Oslo, Norway.
I was walking on, but I saw he was in a dilemma, so I turned back, and said to the interpreter, “What’s’up?”
“This man” he said, “is so full of neuralgia that he is almost blind, and he’s in a terrible state. He is asking us if we know the nearest help.”
As soon as ever they finished the conversation, I said to the spirit that was afflicting him, “Come out of him in the Name of Jesus!”
And the man said, “It is all gone! It is all gone! I am free.”
Ah Brothers, we have no conception of what God has for us in the world!
Compassion in Action
I will tell you what happened in Sydney, Australia the other day.
A man with a stick passed a friend and me. He had to get down, and then twist over, and the tortures of his face made a deep impression on my soul.
I asked myself, “Is it right to pass this man?” So I said to my friend, “There is a man in a terrible state, he is in awful distress and I cannot go further, I must speak to him.”
I went over to this man and said to him, “You seem to be in great trouble.”
“Yes,” he said, “I am no good and never will be.”
I said, “You see that hotel. Be in front of that door in five minutes, and I will pray for you, and you shall be as straight as any man in this place.”
This is on the line of activity in the faith of Jesus.
I came back after paying a bill, and he was there.
It wasn’t a stick but an umbrella that he had. I will never forget him, wondering if he was going to be trapped, or what was up that a man should stop him in the street and tell him he should be made straight.
I had said it, so it must be
If you say anything, you must stand with God to make it so. Never say anything for bravado, without you have the right to say it. Always be sure of your ground, and that you are honouring God. If there is anything about it to make you anything, it will bring you sorrow. Your whole ministry will have to be on such a line of grace and blessing, it will turn the whole thing.
We helped him up the two steps, passed him through to the hoist [ie. the hotel lift. Ed.] and took him upstairs. It seemed difficult to get him from the hoist to my bedroom, as though Satan was making the last stroke for his life, but we got him there.
Then in five minutes’ time this man walked out of that bedroom as straight as any man in this place. He walked perfectly and declared he hadn’t a pain in his body.
Oh Brothers, it is ministration, it is operation, it is manifestation!
Those are three of the greatest leading principles of the Baptism of the Holy Ghost. And we must see to it that God is producing through us these three.
Continue reading:
Smith Wigglesworth on The Active Life of the Spirit-filled believer
© 19 Colin Melbourne, Transcribed and annotated from The Latter Rain publication of the Stone Church 1923
