Building a Wall Between You and Sin
by Kenneth Copeland
“These things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate...Jesus Christ.”
1 John 2:1
One of my heroes of faith is Smith Wigglesworth, an early 20th-century healing evangelist from England.
Mr. Wigglesworth was perhaps one of the boldest men of faith ever to walk this earth. But he wasn’t always that way.
Because he was raised in a poor family and forced to work hard-labor jobs from the time he was 6 years old, Mr. Wigglesworth had no formal education and didn’t learn to read until he was an adult.
He became a plumber by trade—a successful one. But when he married a woman who was called to preach, Mr. Wigglesworth soon came face to face with the call of God that was on his life as well—a calling he did everything he could to avoid.
You see, Smith Wigglesworth was extremely introverted, and very embarrassed at his lack of education.
When he first entered public ministry with his wife, Mr. Wigglesworth was scared out of his wits just to stand on a platform and say his name. When he read Scripture out loud, he would stutter and stumble through the reading. Afterward he would say, “If anyone has anything to say, let them say it now—I’m done.” Then he would walk off the platform and sit down. His wife usually ended up doing the preaching.
Well, Mrs. Wigglesworth passed away and left her husband after having done all she knew to do to get him to yield to the call of God on his life. But he just would not give in to it—at least not while she was around to do the preaching. So before she died, she made an agreement with The LORD that she would go on to heaven in order to get Smith to do His will.
However, on the day his wife died, Mr. Wigglesworth prayed for her to be raised from the dead...and she was!
“You’re not leaving me!” he told her when she came back to life. “What will I do?”
“Smith, you are going to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ!” she said. “I’m leaving—now do the will of God!”
Then she laid her head down on the pillow and left.
Once she was gone, Mr. Wigglesworth repented and repented and repented and repented, and finally accepted his call. But that was only the beginning. The real change in Smith Wigglesworth did not come until he started getting up every day at 4 a.m. to take Communion.
Like clockwork, he would begin each day by remembering his covenant with Almighty God by taking the bread and the cup. Every day he lived under the influence of that covenant. And every day he became more and more bold—until finally, he became one of the boldest men of God in history.
JAN '14 : BVOV : 13
