I Belong to Jesus

And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven … for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony. REVELATION 12:10–11

No reader of Amanda Smith’s Autobiography can miss how often the devil appears in it. He argues with her in the kitchen, whispers in her right ear in church, and turns up on Sixth Avenue to ask where all her holiness has gone. Modern readers may find this strange. But it is one of the most practical parts of her teaching. She knew she had an enemy, she learned to recognise his voice, and she learned how to send him running.

Let down after the mountain

For about three weeks after her sanctification, she says, God let her walk above the world. Then He began, by degrees, to let her down, and the tempter seemed to be let loose upon her. She described it as a man turning a hose on a pavement: temptation came at her in every direction and with such force that she could not pray or do anything; she could only say, Fire away, but I will trust in God, though He slay me. It was dark. Then light broke in.

Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you. 1 PETER 4:12

Why does God permit such seasons? She gave two sound reasons: first, to develop the strength and muscle of the soul for greater service, and second, to bring the believer into sympathy with others who are tempted, so that she can help them. Not long after, at a camp meeting, she met a young Sunday-school teacher who had lived in the joy of holiness for a year and then fallen under a black cloud for three months; the accuser told her she must be a hypocrite. Everyone gave her advice. Amanda, a Black woman who did not like to push herself forward, waited three days, then leaned over and whispered to her that it was a temptation of the devil, and she should praise the Lord. The woman asked through her tears whether Amanda had ever been so since she was sanctified. Yes, she said; she had been shut up in prison for three weeks. The young woman sprang to her feet free.

For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted. HEBREWS 2:18

Tell the other side

The young woman’s torment came largely from a lie: that sanctified people never have a cloud. Amanda had believed it herself. In one long darkness after a painful estrangement from her closest friend, she went to a holiness meeting and asked the sisters whether sanctified people ever had such an experience. They shook their heads and looked solemn, and one after another joined the accuser in condemning her for small neglects. Only one English lady by the window said something different: “The Lord has a controversy with Amanda Smith, and it must be settled between her and Him alone.” In a flash she saw that she had been leaning on her friend more than on God, and she was set free.

Looking back, she wrote: “I think sanctified people ought to tell the other side, for it is no sign that you are backsliding when there comes a shadow over your Spirit, even after you are wholly sanctified.”

Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted in me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet praise him. PSALM 42:5

That is a word every Christian tradition needs. Wherever testimony is expected to be all sunshine, the believer in darkness hides it and suffers alone; she herself confesses that she talked only of the bright side, for fear people would think she had backslidden. The remedy is honesty. The saints of Scripture — David, Job, Jeremiah, Paul — told the other side, and so should we.

Learning his voice

How did she know when it was the accuser? He argued that God would not hear. He told her she had said all that before. He pointed at her circumstances as proof that God had done nothing. He dug up small neglects — a night she fell asleep on her knees, a day she went out without her tracts — and made them the explanation of everything. And he spoke, often, in the voice of reasonableness and even of piety: she should not make her husband angry; she should look after her child; she should not cast pearls before swine. Satan, she wrote more than once, can transform himself into an angel of light.

Lest Satan should get an advantage of us: for we are not ignorant of his devices. 2 CORINTHIANS 2:11

Her most useful test was this. When she confessed the little sins the accuser raised, she would feel a voice say, No, that is not it. The Spirit’s conviction is specific, and leads to confession and peace. The accuser’s condemnation is vague and endless, and leads only to despair. When confession brings no peace, it is often because the charge was never from God in the first place.

Happiness or no happiness

The climax of that dark season came on the street. She had just been freed from her dependence on her friend, and was full of joy, when she saw the friend across the road turn her head away. A pang went through her, and the old voice said at once: You have no joy now. You are not happy either. Where is all your sanctification and holiness? And for the first time, she says, she clearly realised that it was Satan himself. Her answer is one of the best things in her book: “Ah! Ah! Mr. Satan, it is you, is it? Well, now look here, happiness or no happiness, joy or no joy, sanctification or no sanctification, I belong to Jesus!”

Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. ROMANS 8:37

Then she sang, quietly, a hymn about the cleansing blood of Christ, and felt the hateful influence break. From that day, she says, she seemed able to know him whenever he approached. Her counsel: if you keep close to the blood he soon leaves, and nothing will put him to flight so quickly as a song or a testimony of the power of the blood.

Where to be careful

She saw the devil’s hand in many things, and a modern reader may think she saw it too readily. Not every dark mood is an assault; some are illness, grief or exhaustion. Nor is every inner voice that argues against a plan the devil’s; sometimes it is good sense. The reader should not learn from her to blame Satan for what calls for rest, a doctor, or repentance. But neither should the reader learn from modern scepticism to forget that the New Testament takes the adversary seriously, and tells us to resist him steadfast in the faith. On that she was entirely scriptural.

Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. JAMES 4:7

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. Are you in a season of darkness now? Say aloud, as she did: happiness or no happiness, joy or no joy, I belong to Jesus.

2. Learn to distinguish specific conviction from vague condemnation. If you have confessed and there is still no peace, ask whether the charge is from God at all.

3. Tell someone the other side of your Christian life this week — honestly, not dramatically — so that they know they are not alone in theirs.

4. Keep a song or a Scripture about the blood of Christ ready for the next time the accuser speaks. Use it.

5. Think of someone who is under a cloud. Do not heap advice on them; tell them quietly that you have been there too.

A PRAYER

Lord Jesus, the accuser has spoken to me in my own voice and in the voice of reason, and I have believed him.

Teach me to know his tones, and to answer him not with my feelings or my record, but with Your blood and Your word.

Happiness or no happiness, joy or no joy, I belong to You.

And use my dark seasons to make me tender with others in theirs. Amen.