Works of John Bunyan: The Greatness of The Soul, And Unspeakableness of the Loss Thereof; What Is It To Come To Christ, 252.

 

Take two or three things to make this plainer; to wit, That coming to Christ flowed from a sound sense of the absolute need that a man hath of him, as afore.

1. “They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead them; I will cause them to walk by the rivers of waters in a straight way wherein they shall not stumble” (Jer 31:9). Mind it; they come with weeping and supplication; they come with prayers and tears. Now prayers and tears are the effects of a righteous sense of the need for mercy. Thus, a senseless sinner cannot come, he cannot pray, he cannot cry, and he cannot become sensible of what he sees or feels. “In those days, and in that time—the children of Israel shall come; they and the children of Judah together, going and weeping: they shall go and seek the Lord their God. They shall ask the way to Zion with their faces thitherward, saying, Come and let us join ourselves to the Lord in a perpetual covenant that shall not be forgotten” (Jer 1:4,5).

2. This coming to Christ, is called a running to him, as flying to him; a flying to him from wrath to come. By all which terms is set forth the sense of the man that comes; to wit, That he is affected with the sense of his sin, and the death due thereto; that he is sensible that the avenger of blood pursues him, and that, therefore, he is thus off, if he does not speed to the Son of God for life (Matt 3:7; Psa 143:9). Flying is the last work of a danger man; all that are in danger do not fly; no, not all that see themselves in danger; flying is the last work of a danger man; all that hear of danger will not fly. Men will consider if there is no other way of escaping before they fly. Therefore, as I said, flying is the last thing. When all refuge fails, and a man is made to see that there is nothing left but sin, death, and damnation, unless he flies to Christ for life; then he flies, and not till then.

3. That the true coming is from a sense of an absolute need of Jesus Christ to save, &c., is evident by the outcry that is made by them to come, even as they are coming to him, “Lord, save me,” or I perish; “Men and brethren, what shall we do?” “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” and the like (Matt 14:30; Acts 2:37; 16:30). This language doth sufficiently discover that the truly-coming souls are souls sensible of their need of salvation by Jesus Christ; and, moreover, that there is nothing else that can help them but Christ.

4. It is yet further evident by the few things that follow: It is said that such are “pricked in their hearts,” that is, with the sentence of death by the law; and the least prick in the heart kills a man (Acts 2:37). Such is said, as I said before, to weep, to tremble, and to be astonished in themselves at the evident and unavoidable danger that attends them unless they fly to Jesus Christ (Acts 9:16).

5. Coming to Christ is attended with an honest and sincere forsaking of all for him. “If any man comes to me, and hates not his father and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:26–27).

By these and the like expressions elsewhere, Christ described the true comer or the man that indeed is coming to him; he casts all behind his back; he leaves all, he forsakes all, and he hates all things that would stand in his way to hinder his coming to Jesus Christ. There are many pretended comers to Jesus Christ in the world, and they are much like the man you read of in Matthew 21:30, who said to his father’s bidding, “I go, sir, and went not.” There are many such comers to Jesus Christ; they say, when Christ calls by his gospel, I come, Sir; but still, they abide by their pleasures and carnal delights. They come not at all, only they give him a courtly compliment; but he takes notice of it, and will not let it pass for any more than a lie. He said, “I go, sir, and I went not,” and he dissembled and lied. Take heed of this, you that flatter yourselves with your own deceiving. Words will not do with Jesus Christ. Coming is coming, and nothing else will go for coming with him.

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Works of John Bunyan: The Greatness of The Soul, And Unspeakableness of the Loss Thereof; What Is It To Come To Christ, 251.

 

Second, it is a moving of the mind towards him, from a sound sense of the absolute want that a man has of him for his justification and salvation. Indeed, without this sense of a lost condition, there will be no moving of the mind towards him. “With their mouths, they show much love” (Eze 33:31). Such a people as this will come as the true people cometh; that is, in the show and outward appearance. And they will sit before God’s ministers, as his people sit before them; and they will hear his words too, but they will not do them; that is, they will not come inwardly with their minds. 

“For with their mouth they shed much love, but their heart,” or mind, “goes after their covetousness.” Now, all this is because they want an effectual sense of the misery of their state by nature; for not till they have that will they, in their mind, move after him. Therefore, it is said concerning the true comers, “That day the great trumpet shall be blown, and they shall come which were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and the outcasts in the land of Egypt, and shall worship the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem” (Isa 27:13). They are then, as you see, the outcasts, and those that are ready to perish, who, indeed, have their minds effectively moved to come to Jesus Christ. This sense of things was that which made the three thousand come, that made Saul come, that made the jailer come, and that, indeed, makes all others come, that come effectually (Acts 2:8,18).

Of the true coming to Christ, the four lepers were a famous semblance, of whom you read, (2 Kings 7:3), &c. The famine in those days was sore in the land, there was no bread for the people; and as for that sustenance that was, which was asses’ flesh and doves’ dung, that was only in Samaria, and of these the lepers had no share, for they were thrust without the city. Well, now they sat in the gate of the city, and hunger was, as I may say, making his last meal of them; and being, therefore, half dead already, what do they think of doing? Why, first they display the dismal colors of death before each other’s faces, and then resolve what to do, saying, “If we say we will enter into the city, then the famine is in the city, and we shall die there: if we sit still here, we die also. 

Now, therefore, come, let us fall unto the host of the Syrians: if they save us alive, we shall live; if they kill us, we shall but die.” Here, now, was a necessity at work, and this necessity drove them to go thither for life, whither else they would never have gone for it. Thus it is with them that in truth come to Jesus Christ. Death is before them, they see it and feel it; he is feeding upon them, and will eat them quite up if they come not to Jesus Christ; and therefore they come, even of necessity, being forced thereto by that sense they have of their being utterly and everlastingly undone, if they find not safety in him. These are those that will come. Indeed, these are those that are invited to come. “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavily laden, and I will give you rest” (Matt 11:28).

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Works of John Bunyan: The Greatness of The Soul, And Unspeakableness of the Loss Thereof; What Is It To Come To Christ, 250.

 

FIRST, I will show you WHAT IT IS TO COME TO CHRIST. This word must be understood spiritually, not carnally; for many came to him carnally, or bodily, that had no saving advantage for him. Multitudes did thus come unto him in the days of his flesh; yea, innumerable companies. There is also at this day a formal customary coming to his ordinances and ways of worship, which availed not anything; but with them, I shall not now meddle, for they are not intended in the text. The coming, then, intended in the text is to be understood as the coming of the mind to him, even the moving of the heart towards him. I say the moving of the heart towards him, from a sound sense of the absolute want that a man has of him for his justification and salvation.

This description of coming to Christ divides itself into two heads: First, coming to Christ is a moving of the mind towards him. Second, That it is a moving of the mind towards him, from a sound sense of the absolute want that a man has of him for his justification and salvation.

[First.] To speak to the first is a moving of the mind towards him. This is evident; because coming hither or thither, if it be voluntary, is by an act of the mind or will; so coming to Christ is through the inclining of the will. “Thy people shall be willing” (Psa 110:3). This willingness of the heart is what sets the mind moving after or towards him. The church expressed this moving of her mind towards Christ by the moving of her bowels. “My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him” (Can 5:4). “My bowels;” the passions of my mind and affections; which passions of the affections are expressed by the yearning and sounding of the bowels, the yearning or passionate working of them, the sounding of them, or their making a noise for him (Gen 43:30; 1 Kings 3:26; Isa 16:11).

This, then, is the coming to Christ, even moving towards him with the mind. 4 “And it shall come to pass, that everything that lived, which moved, whithersoever the rivers shall come, shall live” (Eze 47:9). The water in this text is the grace of God in the doctrine of it. The living things are the children of men, to whom the grace of God, by the gospel, is preached. Now, saith he, every living thing that moves, whither the water shall come, shall live. And see how this word moved is expounded by Christ himself, in the book of Revelations: “The Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him who is eager come. And whosoever will,” that is, willing, “let him take the water of life freely” (Rev 22:17).

So that to move in thy mind and will after Christ, is to be coming to him. There are many poor souls that are coming to Christ, but cannot tell how to believe it, because they think that coming to him is some strange and wonderful thing; and, indeed, so it is. But I mean, they overlook the inclination of their will, the moving of their mind, and the sounding of their bowels after him; and count these none of this strange and wonderful thing; when, indeed, it is a work of greatest wonder in this world, to see a man who was sometimes dead in sin possessed of the devil, an enemy to Christ and to all things spiritually good; I say, to see this man moving with his mind after the Lord Jesus Christ, is one of the highest wonders in the world.