If a housewife turns out a good cake, it is the result of a sound
receipt, carefully applied. She cannot mix the assigned ingredients
and fire them for the appropriate time without producing the
result. It is not she who has made the cake; it is nature. She
brings related things together; sets causes at work; these causes
bring about the result. she is not a creator, but an intermediary.
She does not expect random causes to produce specific effects--random
ingredients would only produce random cakes. So it is in the making
of Christian experiences. Certain lines are followed; certain
effects are the result. These effects cannot but be the result.
But the result can never take place without the previous cause.
To expect results without antecedents is to expect cakes without
ingredients. That impossibility is precisely
The almost universal expectation.
Now what I mainly wish to do is to help you firmly to grasp this
simple principle of Cause and Effect in the spiritual world. And
instead of applying the principle generally to each of the Christian
experiences in turn, I shall examine its application to one in
some little detail. The one I shall select is Rest. And I think
any one who follows the application in this single instance will
be able to apply it for himself to the others.
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