6 Marks of Personal Spiritual Decay
Octavius Winslow (1808-1878) was a British nonconformist minister and contemporary of Charles Spurgeon. Winslow lived a life of faithful ministry, leading congregations in Warwickshire, Bath, and Brighton.
In addition to his work as a minister, Winslow authored multiple books and hymns. In Personal Declension and Revival of Religion in the Soul, Winslow writes,
When a professing man can proceed with his accustomed religious duties, strictly, regularly, formally, and yet experience no enjoyment of God in them, no filial nearness, no brokenness and tenderness, and no consciousness of sweet return, he may suspect that his soul is in a state of secret and incipient backsliding from God.
When a professing man can read his Bible with no spiritual taste, or when he searches it, not with a sincere desire to know the mind of the Spirit in order to a holy and obedient walk, but with a merely curious, or literary taste and aim, it is a sure evidence that his soul is making but a retrograde movement in real spirituality. Nothing perhaps more strongly indicates the tone of a believer's spirituality, than the light in which the Scriptures are regarded by him. They may be read, and yet read as any other book, without the deep and solemn conviction that "all scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works (2 Tim 3:16,17)." They may be read without a spiritual relish, without being turned into prayer, without treasuring up in the heart and reducing to daily practice its holy precepts, its precious promises, its sweet consolations, its faithful warnings, its affectionate admonitions, its tender rebukes.
When a professing Christian can pray, and yet acknowledge that he has no nearness to the throne, no touching of the scepter, no fellowship with God, - calls him "Father," without the sense of adoption, - confesses sin in a general way, without any looking up to God through the cross, - has no consciousness of possessing the ear and the heart of God, the evidence is undoubted of a declining state of religion in the soul.
And when too, he can find no sweetness in a spiritual ministry, - when he is restless and dissatisfied under a searching and practical unfolding of truth, - when the doctrines are preferred to the precepts, the promises to the commands, the consolations to the admonitions of the gospel, incipient declension is marked.
When the believer has but few dealings with Christ - his blood but seldom traveled to, - his fullness but little lived upon, - his love and glory scarcely mentioned, the symptoms of declension in the soul are palpable. Perhaps nothing forms a more certain criterion of the state of the soul than this. We would be willing to test a man's religion, both as to its nature and its growth, by his reply to the question, "What think you of Christ?" Does his blood daily moisten the root of your profession? Is his righteousness that which exalts you out of and above yourself, and daily gives you free and near access to God? Is the sweetness of his love much in your heart, and the fragrance of his name much on your lips? Are your corruptions daily carried to his grace, your guilt to his blood, your trials to his heart? In a word, is Jesus the substance of your life, the source of your sanctification, the one glorious object on which your eye is ever resting, the mark towards which you are ever pressing?
An uncharitable walk towards other Christians, marks a low state of grace in the soul. The more entirely the heart is occupied with the love of Christ, the less room there will be for uncharitableness towards his saints. It is because there is so little love to Jesus, that there is so little towards his followers.