My Dear Brother in our Precious Lord,

 

My Dear Brother in our Precious Lord,

Oh, I am confounded at my own vileness while He thus displays the riches of His abundant goodness; and my heart breaks within me that God should love me so much and I love Him so little! Wonder at His grace! Praise Him for His infinite, free, distinguishing grace to such an unworthy, ungrateful, hell-deserving sinner. And you, my lethargic soul, afresh touched with divine kindness, join the praise with your feeble hallelujahs until sin and time are gone; and then with louder voice, in higher notes, you shall shout the praises of Jehovah's grace in His kindness towards you through Christ Jesus unto ages without end!

Oh, infinite condescension! That the Lord of all should speak thus to such a vile, worthless, nothing worm! Oh, free love! oh, behold, wonder and praise, the Prince of Love has said unto me, even to me, the least and last of all, 'How fair is your love, my sister, my spouse!' And this astonishing language of His grace at once humbles and exalts me, fills me with heart-melting wonder and joy in Christ, and with the deepest, sweetest mourning and self-loathing; makes me forget the things which are behind, and press forward with an eager desire. Oh, for a soul, all-enkindled and inflamed with love, to my lovely loving Jesus!

It is a great thing to know ourselves in our nothingness and vileness; and to know Christ as ours in His all-sufficient fullness!

Really a work of grace or not?

 

My Dear Brother in the Lord,

The account you gave me of the Lord's work upon your soul refreshes my spirit, and that He was pleased to make my printed account of His gracious dealings with me a comfort unto you, as you found so great a part of it to answer to your own experience, for which I rejoice, and bless the Lord. And in answer to your request, "to give you my thoughts if the work of God upon your soul be really a work of grace or not?" I can with gladness assure you that I am fully satisfied that it is, and it appears clear to me from the following particulars, in that—

1. The Lord has hedged up your way with thorns, and weaned you from all sinful delights.

2. In that you have been convinced of your lost and perishing condition as a sinner, both by nature and practice.

3. Of the spirituality of the law as in force against you, and that flaming justice barred up mercy from you that way.

4. In that you have been brought off from dependence upon the perishing sands of your own duties.

5. In that God has revealed His Son in you, as your only and all-sufficient help—in the glory of His perfect righteousness and all-atoning blood, and in the glory of His infinite fullness—to save you to the uttermost, and to satisfy all your desires through time and to eternity.

6. In that hence, seeing Jesus to be such a suitable Savior to your case as a lost sinner, you have embraced Him as your Savior, and fled unto Him for refuge as the only, the glorious hope set before you in the gospel. Wherever these things are experienced, my brother, the work of God on that soul is saving—a special work of supernatural grace—by which the man is brought out of darkness into God's marvelous light, or made a new creature in Christ Jesus. As a believer in the Son of God, that soul is passed from death unto life, and shall not come into condemnation.

As to what you further mention, of your being drawn of late closer unto blessed Jesus than ever; that He is now become your spiritual rock, whence all your consolation flows; that as you said (which was sweet to me), "Take away Christ, and you take away all the comfort of my soul"; that if you had all the treasures that this world can afford, you would count all but loss and rubbish for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, your Lord; that you desire so to be with Christ, which is far better, that if you had heaven for your portion, and all the joy and happiness it could afford, yet, if you had not the presence of precious Jesus there the desires of your soul would never be satisfied; that your desire not to be saved, not just barely for happiness' sake, but that God and the Lamb might be thereby glorified; and that now, all the delight you have on earth is in the delightful service of blessed Jesus, so that it would be a hell to you to go back to your natural state, and your desire is to praise free grace, victorious grace, in life and death, and to reign in its triumphant praises to all eternity. These things, my brother, are further evidences that the work of God upon your soul is saving. But I take these to belong rather to some good degree of growth in grace than to the truth, or first being of it in your heart.

I would next attempt a short answer to those objections which arise in your mind and make you fear that the Lord's work on your soul is not saving, or whether it be any more than the fruit of a religious education.

But before I consider your objections in particular, let me say, a religious education is a great privilege, as a means to restrain from vice and immorality, and to train up youth in a doctrinal knowledge of the truths of the gospel; and is often blessed for conviction, and may be for conversion. But the most religious education that ever any person was favored with, as in and of itself, never did nor can give such a spiritual conviction of sin, of heart-sin, as to make the soul cry out in the views of the uncleanness of its nature, in the light of the law's spirituality, and of its own inability to help or save itself, Woe is me, for I am undone! Nor yet did the most religious education, as in and of itself, ever make Christ precious as the only and all-sufficient Savior unto any one soul.

No! these are, as I may say, the two main hinges upon which the soul turns from a state of nature to a state of grace. They are the two great characters whereby a new creature, a man that is in Christ, may be known, and the undeniable evidences of a real spiritual gracious change upon the heart, or of the soul's being brought out of nature's darkness into God's marvelous light. Such a man is new-made, has true, precious faith, the faith of God's elect, wrought in his heart, unto which the everlasting salvation of the soul is annexed. And the power that produced it was not the natural force of a religious education, but the supernatural power and almighty energy of the Holy Spirit in regeneration.

The most religious education is a tree of too low a nature to bear such high and precious fruits as a sight of a sin-ruined, law-pursuing, and perishing state, and a flight unto Christ for refuge, as beheld Mighty to save and altogether lovely. It is impossible it should be found on any soul before it is engrafted into Christ and partakes of the spirit of grace from Him, or of His fullness as the root of grace and fatness, as the glorious olive-tree to His Church.

But I must come to your objections. And you fear the work of God upon your soul is not saving, and say:

Objection 1. Because I have not felt those terrors of conscience for sin that others have.

Answer. The same degree of terror is not necessary to be felt by every soul that is truly convinced of sin; nor is it usual for those who have had a pious education, and been restrained from outward immoralities, to feel the same degree of terror as those who have run great lengths in wicked courses. If a moralized person, who has been religiously educated, has had so much terror for sin, for his heart and life-sin, that he dare not trust in himself or in his own doings for life, but being warned of God by His holy law of the wrath which is to come, and by His gospel of fleeing unto Christ as the only hiding place from it, and being moved with fear (of being found out of Christ) runs unto Him for safety—it is sufficient to prove a saving conviction of sin. And as great a display of the power of the Holy Spirit in His work of convincing of sin is this, where the soul has less terror, as where the same work in other souls, that have been openly immoral, is attended with great terrors. I humbly think that the display of power in the former is the greatest. But, however, the glories of Omnipotence in various rays shine in both. The soul that has passed under the greatest terrors, which have been over-ruled to bring him to Christ, has cause to bless God forever for His kind dealings with him, in that, though He led him by a rough way, He brought him to such a glorious place of rest and safety. And the soul that has had less terror, that is not left to rest short of Christ, is equally safe with the other, and has reason in a particular manner to bless God that He gave him such an easy passage from his soul-pursuers into Christ, the city of refuge, and brought him through the straits of the new-birth without those pangs and throes which some souls feel. Which way however the Lord deals with us in conviction of sin, He leads us by a right way, that is and shall be most for His glory and our joy if we are brought thereby unto Christ, that city of habitation. But again, you fear the reality of the work, and say,

Objection 2. Because I have not experienced those overflowing joys in believing which other saints have.

Answer. The Holy Spirit, as the Comforter of believers, is a Sovereign, and divides unto every new-born soul individually as He will. The least comfort, the least beam of infinite favor, upon fleeing unto Christ for refuge, is an unspeakable blessing, a ray of light that is the dawn of eternal day. What though as to some souls who have been covered with the thick darkness of amazing terror, the light of God's salvation unto ravishing joy has arisen upon their spirits, and presently made day, yes, high noon, as it were, at once with them; perhaps they may be called hereafter to walk by faith in darkness, and as seeing no light, to trust in the name of the Lord, and to stay themselves upon their God.

And you, whose night has not been so dark, and upon whom the light has gradually arisen, may shortly have the clear shine of the Sun of righteousness, and walk in the light of God's countenance all the day long. Those earnest desires which are wrought in your soul, after the clear witness of the Spirit and the full sealing of the Holy Spirit, foretell a morning of joy unspeakable and full of glory at hand. Wait awhile, and you shall have joy enough to fill every corner of your soul to the brimful. The joy of faith, the joy of spiritual sense, the joy of the Holy Spirit in His witness to your interest in the three-one God, your exceeding joy, shall enter into you here; and hereafter you shall enter into joy, into your Master's joy, and be immersed in pleasures for evermore, while as a vessel of mercy you are cast into Him, the ocean of joy and glory, to take your fill of God in Christ unto bliss unknown, to the days of eternity. But further, you fear the work of God upon your soul is not saving, and say,

Objection 3. Because I have not those inward troubles and temptations from Satan which other Christians have.

Answer. You may have much of these hereafter; and let your present freedom be esteemed by you as your great privilege, and be the matter of your thanksgiving. It was well you said that you "have not been wholly free from inward temptations," for among the rest, I must tell you that this is an inward temptation, in that you are put upon questioning the work of grace on your soul because you have no more inward troubles. Oh, my brother, do not covet temptations, but go on to pray that you may not be led into temptation, but delivered from evil. Once more, you fear, and say,

Objection 4. Because the work of God has been so gradual upon my soul.

Answer. The gradation of the work is no argument against the truth of it, but is rather an evidence of the same. The kingdom of God, or the work of grace in the souls of His people, is progressive. The word of the gospel, as a living seed, being cast into the heart, and received by faith of the operation of God in its blessed effects upon the soul, springs up, first in a small, tender blade, then advances to the ear, and last of all, to the full ripe corn in the ear, as grace ripens for and hastens apace unto glory. This is true concerning the good work of God, begun in the souls of all the saints. But yet it must be confessed that in some the first work, as well as its after-progress, is much more speedy than in others. The Lord acts herein, as I hinted under another head, as a Sovereign; and in His various dealings with all His children abounds towards them according to the exceeding riches of His grace and the infinity of His wisdom. And as far greater display of the glory of divine grace is it to that there is such a vast variety in the particular experiences of particular souls, while the same blessed work in the general is carried on in all, than if every one in particular did particularly experience the same thing at the same time and in the same degree.

Our God is a great Being! Great in His love, grace, and mercy, great in His wisdom and power, and in all His immense perfections; and He delights to act like Himself, to cast abroad His infinite glory in a thousand various rays, in a thousand various ways of working, upon the vessels of mercy, in His time—preparing them for glory, for that glory He ordained them to and prepared for them before time began, which shall be to His exalted praise in a thousand various notes among the saved of the Lord, while they all join the song, "Salvation unto God and to the Lamb!" unto ages without end.

As to these objections, my brother, which arise in your mind, and many more of a like nature which at times perplex the hearts of God's people, there is no just ground for them, inasmuch as the things objected as lacking in some particular souls, which are to be found in others truly gracious, belong not to the essentials of a state of grace, but to the 'circumstantials' which with much difference in different persons attend gracious souls. If we would judge of our state of grace by comparing our experience with that of others whom we look upon to be truly gracious, let us do it in those generals wherein all agree, and not in particulars, in which there is so much difference. See the two I mentioned before I came particularly to answer your objections.

It appears to me, my brother, that you were a regenerate soul when what the world calls innocent diversions became so disagreeable to you, that what was your former chief delight became your greatest burden. The cause, as I conceive, was this, the new nature was wrought in your soul, a holy, spiritual appetite, that could find no delight in natural sinful pleasures, but still sought pleasures of a higher kind, of a heavenly extraction, agreeable to itself and its heavenly descent and taste, with which alone it could be satisfied. This is evidenced to me by that pleasure which you then found in heart-mourning for sin; by that fear which you then had lest convictions should wear off without any saving effect; by your desire after deeper convictions of sin; and by your earnest prayer for grace to live a holy life here, even if you might never enjoy happiness hereafter. These things, together with what you have experienced since, make the work of God upon your soul appear to me very clear and full, that it is, indeed, a real supernatural work of divine grace, which is wrought in none but those who are prepared for glory, or "made meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light."

But oh, rest not in present experiences. You are to see greater things than these. Follow hard after the sealing of the Spirit. He can open such clear, satisfying, soul-ravishing views of your interest in Christ to you in a moment as will far transcend all that the creatures by discourse or argument can give you in an age. Oh, when the Holy Spirit comes in; the great power of God to seal upon your heart your eternal interest in Jesus, unbelieving fears and carnal reasonings shall fly before Him as the shades of night or glooms of day before the rising morn, the out-breaking sun, in his clear meridian-shine. And immediately, in full assurance of faith and raptures of joyful spiritual sense, you will cry out with Thomas, "My Lord, and my God."

Oh, my brother, is this the joy you long for? This is the joy that is reserved for you. This is the joy with which you shall be satisfied. Your Beloved is yours, and you are His, and you shall know it. Enfolded in His arms, and leaning on His bosom, your love-sick soul with love shall be solaced, feasted, filled. Your Beloved shall bring you into His banqueting house, and His banner over you shall be love. He will bid you eat, as His friend, that heavenly bread, that bread of life. His body broken for you, for you in particular; and call you to drink, give you to drink as His beloved of the wine of His love that flowed in His blood, shed for you, for you as distinctly as if it was poured out for never another in the world. "Drink," He will say, "O! beloved, O infinitely beloved soul! Come, open your thirsty mouth, open it wide, I will fill it—take your fill, you can never drink my love dry. Drink, yes, drink abundantly, be inebriated with my love, with all my immense glories as yours in love! View Me, handle Me, possess Me as your own, for I Myself, in whom all the fullness of the Godhead dwells, and yours in love—to satisfy and solace you with bliss ineffable, with pleasures new to surround you, to ravish you through time and to eternity's abounded space."

Thus familiar, my dear brother, will your lovely, loving a Lord be with you; thus gracious will He be to you in whom His soul delights. Your Maker is your husband, and as a bridegroom rejoices over his bride, so will your God rejoice over you in renewed displays of His old, everlasting love, that knows neither bound, change, nor end! Oh happy, thrice happy are you! Jesus is yours forever! Drawn then by His love-cords, do you likewise be His, and give up yourself to His service in love, to glorify Him both now and for evermore.

The times look dark, the heavens are black with clouds, the Church, like a ship in a tremendous sea, may be tossed with the waves; but, since our Lord is with us in the ship, we shall not sink, we shall have blessed company in trouble, safely out-ride the storm, and be brought at last to our desired haven. Jesus being at the helm, the Church need not fear; well He will steer her through danger, and bring her soon into her promised rest and glory.

Grace be with you. In the arms of Christ I leave you.

While He seems to slay you

 

Dear Sir,

Surely our good God does all well, and governs the world and all things in it aright, and for the special advantage of His own people. You know how long my trial lasted. But sweetly the Lord enabled me to bow to His dear will, to hope in His mercy, to patiently to wait for His delivering kindness, and to think the many months of my trial, but a few days, for the love I had to His glory. Nature thought the time long, but grace said it was short. I was ashamed to think the trial long, as I had brought so little glory to God under it, and nothing I desire so much as to glorify God while it lasted, for I was persuaded that His affections would soon yearn upon me and turn my night into day. The Lord enabled me, in His strength, to trust in the infinite grace of His heart and His faithfulness, when a frown was on His face, and His customary loving-kindness was veiled with the darkness of providence.

And for yourself, continue to trust in the Lord while He seems to slay you, and covet to give Him glory in dark dispensations, as you will not have an opportunity to do when He brings you forth to the light. We have but a little time allotted us to glorify God in the dark; our night of weeping will soon be turned into a joyous morning, since the anger of our heavenly Father, in the frowns of providence, endures for a moment, but in His favor is life!

We are cold and frozen

 

My Dear Sister in the Lord,

All our times of refreshing, my dear sister, come from the presence of the Lord. If God is present with our souls, by the special gracious influence of His Holy Spirit, we are refreshed; if God is absent, as to His sensible influence, we find no refreshment in reading, hearing, or praying. We are dry and barren if the Lord does not sensibly water us. We are cold and frozen if His sun-like face does not shine to thaw, warm, and comfort us. All the refreshment that new-born souls enjoy, does and must come down from heaven. Nothing that this earth affords can refresh and solace the spiritual part of a heaven-born soul. No, such a soul is prepared for a higher glory, than any that is to be seen and enjoyed among the creatures and things of this lower world. Such a soul opens its mouth wide after God, and His gracious influence, to refresh and comfort it, as the earth in a time of drought opens its mouth for the dew and rain to descend for its refreshment. "Give me Christ," says the new-born soul, "or I die. God is my life, my exceeding joy, and without His gracious, comforting presence, my spirit dies, and I sink in sorrow."

When the Sun of righteousness withdraws His glorious rays, and it is night with our souls, then, in an especial manner, the corruptions of the heart, and Satan with his temptations, like the devouring beasts of prey, creep forth from their dens, and with their hideous roars, afflict and terrify us. But our compassionate Jesus, whose eyes are as the eyes of doves—pure, piercing, mild, loving towards his own mate—clearly sees, with infinite delight, the dove-like nature of His spouse, and looks upon her with boundless compassion under her present affliction by the serpentine poison and gall of every sin which remains in her, and the cunning and power of every temptation that besets her; and from these her enemies—from these grieving thorns which scratch and tear His beloved lily—He does and will, in His own way and time, deliver her.

Again, beware of thinking—from what I have said of the nature of new-born souls to thirst after God, to see His power and His glory as they have seen Him, when He withdraws the brightness of His face—that if at such seasons you do not always find such a thirst in you, you are not therefore a regenerate person, or that you do not love the Lord above all; for when Christ withdraws from His spouse, as she loses sight of His glory, which drew her graces into exercise, these shutting up, like the flowers at the sun's withdrawal, the corruptions of her unrenewed part, excited by diverse temptations from Satan and the world, begin to exert themselves, and after foolish vanities and vile iniquities the heart for a time may run, and even the spouse of Christ may play the harlot with other, with many lovers—and, thoughtless as it were of her Beloved, lie down in sinful ease on her bed of carnal security without Him; yes, she may sink so low as to be unwilling to be raised up by repeated intimations of His mind unto her duty of seeking Him in good earnest, as (Jer. 3:1; Song 3:1, with 5:2, 3), Until her beloved puts His hand in by the hole of the door, until His power afresh touches her heart, renews her grace, and gives her a quick remembrance of His glory, and of her great misery without Him, and then straight away her affections move for Him, she arises to every duty, and inquires of His friends, "Have you seen Him whom my soul loves?" And rest she cannot until she finds Him, in whom all her joy and life is, and from whose presence all her refreshment flows.

Thus, my dear sister, when I speak of what souls are and do as creatures, it is to be understood of them as when enabled to act according to the new creature life in their hearts. That you may walk in the comforts of the Holy Spirit and be edified, is my hearty desire.

Oh, why me, the chief of sinners

 

My very Dear Sister in our precious Jesus,

I thank you for your last letter, it has been blessed to me. I have read it again and again, with tears of joyful wonder at the infinite grace of God to vile, unworthy me, in making my poor books of such blessed use to you, to bring you to Jesus and to build you up in Him.

Truly, according to the exceeding riches of infinite grace our God abounds towards us in all wisdom and prudence. "He is wise in counsel and excellent in working." And we shall adore Him forever, both in counsel and work, when we see, with the veil cast off, those infinite depths of wisdom and grace in which the whole and every part of our salvation was laid in contrivance of old, before the world began, according to which He all along wrought through time, to the praise of His glory, by men and angels, to a vast and endless eternity.

O how ravishing is the least beam of this glory when it breaks out upon us now! But oh, what tongue can tell, or heart conceive, a thousandth part of that joy which shall enter into us, or rather into which we shall enter, when as vessels of mercy, all-enlarged, we shall be cast into God for a full and everlasting enjoyment of Him, that ocean of bliss and glory—when we shall live forever under all the bright, the burning, he enkindling beams of His infinite glory, or rather, dwell in the Sun, in the Lord our everlasting light, in our God, as our glory?

As you encourage me to go on in the Lord's work, and tell me "my reward will be great," my heart said beforehand what you add, even before I read it, "No, it is reward enough if it was but that great use which your books have been of to me in times past, and are still." Oh, my dear sister, this I acknowledge from the very bottom of my heart, from my inmost soul. Well in this regard has my royal princely Master, in the infinity of His grace, rewarded the poor feeble attempts of His vile worm to serve Him. According to His own heart, and not according to my worthiness, has He done this great thing to make His worm know it. I bless Him for your salvation, for your faith and joy, wrought by His own hand through the means of my poor books. I bless Him for the knowledge thereof which He has given me. He might have wrought this wonder and yet have hid it from me until the day of His appearing. But oh, infinite grace! to cheer me in this service, and draw me further on in His delightful work, He has blessed me with the knowledge of it now, as a part of my present reward, and the first-fruit of that glory which awaits me at His coming. Let you and I praise Him, let men and angels praise Him, for this wondrous grace, both now and evermore. Oh, why me, the chief of sinners, why has the Lord, chosen vile me for this service? I resolve it into the bottomless, boundless ocean of His rich, free, sovereign love and grace, and let Him have the glory of it unto endless ages! And let it in the present time be hung up in Zion as a trophy of victorious grace, of the grace of Zion's King to the least and last, and worst and vilest, of all His subjects. And as an ensign, a banner of His love, let it be lifted up upon His land, to His endless praise, by all that love Him! Amen. Hallelujah!

I am glad, my dear sister, that you love the slain Lamb, and long to see the crown flourish upon His royal head. In this my soul closely joins with yours. Let us mourn for the dishonor done to our Savior-King, and His glorious gospel, the rod, the scepter of His strength, by many that profess to be His subjects and servants. Let us rejoice in that the Father has advanced Him high, has bid Him sit at His right hand until He makes His enemies His footstool. In a little while, we shall see the Lord alone exalted, and all idols abolished, the King of Zion seated upon His royal throne in His personal and relative glory, as Lord of all, and head of His body the Church, in the glory of His universal reign; and Zion made glorious, the perfection of beauty, by the brightness of His rays cast upon her, to the praise of the Savior-God by saints and angels forever and ever. "He who testifies these things says, I come quickly. Even so come, Lord Jesus! And let the whole earth be filled with His glory!" Amen, and Amen.

The grace of Christ be with your spirit. Pray for the same blessing upon me.

The soft embraces of those sweet arms

 

My very Dear and much Honored Parents,

Oh, my dear parents, your dear Lord Jesus will be with you in all your pains and afflictions through the infirmities of an advanced age. The Lord will make all your bed for you when sick. And when death comes, and no creature can help you, then, then will the Lord be your helper. He will never leave you nor forsake you; no, not in death's waters. Jesus, your high priest, will go before you, make a way for you, and bring you safely over Jordan into the promised land. The eternal God is your refuge; and underneath you, in your last trial, will be the everlasting arms.

These almighty arms will keep your spirits from sinking, when your bodies must fall by the stroke of death. The soft embraces of those sweet arms will refresh your souls, and ease the bitterest pains that your body may feel. And not the least pain, not the least sickness, that you endure to bring down your mortal frame, but will serve as a foil to set off that immortal glory you shall enter upon in Emanuel's land, where the inhabitant shall not say, "I am sick." There I shall shortly meet you. And let us remember that death comes to us as a blessing. Death to us will be an entrance into life! We shall never be free from sin, perfectly holy, nor fully happy—we shall never be as we would be, nor should be, until we see Jesus as He is!

Heart-ravishing and soul-attracting

 

My Dear Brother in our most precious Jesus,

Your last kind letter I most thankfully received; the Lord made it sweet and savory to my taste. I rejoice before God, and give thanks to Him for the rich display of His kindness towards you, for the bright manifestations of His everlasting love, through the bleeding Lamb with which you have been so highly favored. It is sweet indeed, heart-ravishing and soul-attracting, to be with Christ on the Mount for a few moments, to behold His glory by faith. It is no wonder that when we are blessed with a glance of His infinite beauty, who has the fairest face in both worlds, that we are winged with a desire to see Him as He is, without a veil or intervening cloud, to a blessed eternity. It is spiritually natural to the newborn, when they have a glimpse of the glory of Christ, to long for the full and immediate vision of that infinitely bright and glorious object, in whom all glories meet and forever shine with transforming rays. The language of such souls at such times is—

"Nothing but glory can suffice

The appetite of grace,

I long for Christ with restless eyes,

I languish for His face."

And with the full enjoyment of His blessed self, and with the endless vision of His infinite glory, shall every such longing soul be satisfied.

I rejoice, my dear brother, that the Lord was pleased to bless what I wrote to excite you to take up and endure the cross of Christ, and that you have found it under the rich supplies of the Spirit of grace to be exceeding sweet, light, and easy. Marvelously has the Lord made bare His arm in causing mountains, which stood in our way and seemed insuperable, to flow down at His presence. Do you see how good it is to follow the Lord fully? how mighty He is to save? and how faithful He is to His promise? And will you not learn hence to cleave unto Him in time to come whenever He calls you to follow Him through difficulties? Will you not henceforth put your trust in Him who with a word can break gates of brass and cut bars of iron asunder? that with His word, "Peace, be still," can silence winds and waves when most tempestuous?

The calm you now enjoy is the effect of your Lord's love and power; prize and praise Him for it accordingly, and learn to trust in Him continually. You see, my dear brother, how easily the Lion of the tribe of Judah could stop the roar of the lion of hell where you were most apt to fear it; and how false the father of lies has proved in that suggestion which he cast your way. Learn hence to cleave unto, and trust in, Christ, and not to listen to Satan. And does this enemy roar at you still from a greater distance? Remember your Lord, the Almighty God, has him in chains! Roar he may, but he shall not hurt you, while you keep on the King's highway, nor would the Prince of peace allow the rage of hell in any sort to vent itself against you if His design were not to overrule it for His own glory and your advantage.

Keep close to Christ, love, honor, and obey Him in all things, and then fear nothing. Be valiant for the truth, for the doctrines, the appointments of Jesus, and with all humility, and a single eye to His glory, bear a becoming testimony for the same in word and practice, adorning the doctrine of Christ with a good conversation in Him, and then fear not what either men or devils can do unto you, for "Who is he who shall harm you if you be a follower of that which is good?" What if a thousand reproaches are cast upon you? the Lord will plead your cause, and make your glory so much the greater. Reproaches, meekly borne for Christ's sake, are the honors which free grace puts upon you here, and will be as so many gems to enrich your crown of glory hereafter. With Moses then, "esteem the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt."

I humbly think, my dear brother, from the rich enjoyments which our Lord gives you of Himself, from the great trials which He calls you to endure for Him, and from the angry roars of the enemy against you, that He designs to honor you with some eminent service for Him, and usefulness to His in the present world, in order to a weighty crown of glory in the world to come. Oh, walk humbly with God, and wait to see how His rich, free grace will exalt you. Perhaps all the bright displays of amazing favor which your blessed eyes have hitherto seen are but, as it were, the first opening beams of more refulgent rays of infinite grace and glory which are yet to be cast upon you.

O, my brother, does God love you? He will love you like Himself! God who is rich in mercy, for His great love with which He loved you, even when you were dead in sins, has quickened you together with Christ (both mystically and influentially) that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness towards you through Christ Jesus! The Lord who loved you from eternity past; who loves you freely, infinitely, and unchangeably; will love you forever, and forever rejoice over you to show new wonders of infinite kindness towards you; therefore, wait on your God continually.

A few hints next as to the things you desire me to write to you of.

1. You say, my dear brother, "That the thoughts and contemplations of the flowings of God's love towards you through the blood of Jesus do so little affect your soul that you are sometimes ready to doubt whether it be not all a mere delusion."

And can it be that a soul who has seen, felt, and tasted the love of God through Christ in its ineffable sweetness, in its all-conquering power and soul-transforming glory, should, after this, be ready to doubt, if all be not a mere delusion? Ah! yes; when the efficacious influence of love's sweetness, power, and glory is withdrawn, a believer, in times of temptation, through the strength of unbelief, may be ready to doubt, yes, even yield to doubt, if the reality of his own experience be not all a mere delusion, so unsteady in faith is a believer himself, though set upon a rock of ages, until his goings are established; until the Lord, taking him by the arms, has taught him to go—to go by faith, without the prop of spiritual sense—until he is eminently sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, and has a steeled assurance of faith given him.

And yet I am persuaded that, if at the same time of such inward hesitations a believer were set upon by outward enemies, who should say but the same things to him which Satan indiscernibly suggests to his mind, his soul would rise up in arms against them, and boldly stand on God's side as a witness for Him and Him infinite love, and the truth and reality of his own experience thereof; but the enemy being within, the soul often discerns him not until it is wounded by him; it yields to hold a parley with Satan, supposing it to be only the reasoning of its own mind. But such parleys are exceedingly dangerous; the soul thereby enters into temptation, disbelieves God, and credits the father of lies; dishonors infinite love, truth, and faithfulness; weakens his own faith and every grace; joins with God's enemy to reproach and deny His work—a work in which His brightest glory shines; yes, gives the enemy vast advantages over him. Then let such souls beware, and whenever put upon this kind of doubting, let them be assured that the enemy is just before them, set in battle-array against them, and, instantly asking support of the Captain of salvation, let them gird on their armor, stand to their arms, and as good soldiers of Jesus Christ, resist the devil, steadfast in faith, and away he shall flee from them, to God's honor and to their joy, both present and eternal.

But perhaps, my brother, you will ask, "What must I say to Satan when he tempts me?" Tell him, God, the God of infinite purity, through His sacrificed Son, loves sinners; that He can, does, and will love them freely, notwithstanding all their unloveliness and ingratitude and evil requiting of His for the infinite kindness of His manifested love; that as a sinner, the very chief, you will go hide yourself in the Lamb's wounds and blood, and that there you shall now and forever find God to be unto you the God of love and peace. Tell him, you will confess and bewail your ingratitude before God, and that He will forgive the iniquity of your sin; but you will not doubt His love, or think the shine of it on your soul to be a delusion, because the father of lies suggests it. And if Satan finds you take this course, and answer him thus, you will soon find him depart from you. And if he returns again, as he thinks, at a more convenient season, as often as he appears resist him, steadfast in the faith, and you shall find that he flees before you.

And for your own satisfaction concerning this doubt, which is raised from the greatness of God's love and the littleness of your love to Him, or the small influence it has on your heart, whence you are put upon thinking that if the manifestation of so great a love was real it would have greater effect upon your soul, consider that this great love is not always greatly manifested. There are times wherein it is, and times wherein it is not manifested, wherein it shines, and wherein it does not shine on the soul. And when love's bright and burning beams do not directly beat upon your heart, wonder not that you are lamentably unaffected therewith and unenkindled thereby.

It is our duty to meditate on the love of God, and He often meets us therein, casts upon us its piercing rays, and kindles up our hearts to a holy flame. But in this, as in all His dealings with us, He acts as a sovereign, and casts His influence as pleases Him, the suspension whereof at one time is designed by him to command and set off the glorious flow of it at another. And at such times of 'suspended influence', we may think of the great love of God, and to our sorrow find that it has but little effect upon our hearts. But when God Himself casts abroad the glory of His love upon our souls, our hearts are instantly set on fire. Love's light never breaks in upon our hearts without love's heat; love's shine, as the cause, is never without love's flame as the effect—God's love enkindles ours. But then, there are different degrees in love's manifestation, and as different degrees of the effects thereof upon us—the degree of love's shine upon us and the degree of love's flame within us, or of our love, enkindled by the shine of God's love—do always hold a strict proportion with and exactly answer to each other.

Do not think, then, my dear brother, that the flowing of God's love to you through Christ are a mere delusion, because the thoughts and contemplations thereof do so little affect your soul, for when you are unaffected therewith, and unattracted thereby, you are not under the immediate flows of all-affecting, all-attracting love. And learn to look for the blessed effects you desire, from their proper causes, and at the proper times of their existence; to look for the powers of your soul being enkindled with the love of God, when it shines upon your heart, and according to the degree of its influence on your soul. Learn, also, from your unaffectedness herewith at other seasons, what a cold, icy mountain your heart is, when the bright sun of infinite love does not cast upon it, its penetrating rays, its melting beams—and humble yourself before God for the hardness of your heart. Learn also, hence, to seek most earnestly communion with God in love—to pray for the Holy Spirit to shed abroad the love of God in your heart—to prize His influence—and to give thanks for the same when you experience it. And no more think that the flowings of God's love towards you through Christ are delusion because the thoughts thereof affect you so little when you are not under love's immediate influence, its bright, its powerful manifestation. But,

2. You say, my dear brother, "Satan often robs me of my comfort by telling me that I carry faith above reason."

Tell Satan, my brother, "That is right. That as revelation is above nature, faith ought to be above reason." Faith is not, ought not, to be without or contrary to reason; but it is, it ought to be above it. There was no ground in nature, no natural reason, for Abraham and Sarah to believe that he should beget and she should bear a son when Abraham's body was dead and Sarah past age. But because God had revealed it, it was fit that their faith should receive it. There was good spiritual reason, though there was no natural reason, that they should credit what God had spoken; because He had revealed it who could not lie, or deceive, who was the God of truth, and infinitely able and faithful to perform what He had promised. And thus Abraham's children, in like manner, are called to act faith as he the father of the faithful was. They are called to set faith above reason, to believe in hope even against hope—to believe that as God has wrought faith in their hearts, to look, to come to His dear Son for all salvation, and as such has given them the promise of eternal life in Christ, so there shall certainly be a performance thereof, notwithstanding a thousand improbabilities and seeming contradictions in themselves, because God, who cannot lie has promised it, who is also able and faithful to do that which He has spoken.

And as they are thus to believe the promise of life in general—that they shall be saved at last—because God has said it, so, likewise, are they to believe all the manifestations of His love to them which He is pleased to make through the application of particular promises of life and grace, for their consolation in the present time, that things are and shall be as God has spoken, because He has said it, who cannot lie; and this they are to hold fast by faith, notwithstanding a thousand seeming contraries in themselves, and gainsayings which may arise from carnal reason. Abraham considered not his own body now dead as a sufficient obstacle in the way of the promise, nor should his children so consider the deadness of their own souls as to think it a sufficient hindrance and bar in the way of what God has spoken, as if the manifestations of His love to them, through the promise of life, were not true and real, or would not, could not stand, because of their own deadness. Reason is a good handmaid to faith, but a bad mistress. Reason is good when spiritualized and subservient to faith, but bad when merely natural, and domineers over faith.

But once more,

3. You say, my dear brother, "I am amazed to find my heart so prone to a covenant of works."

Bless God that you find it so; not that it is so, but that you find it so to your grief. That same grief which you feel when you find any motions in your heart which gender to bondage, is an evidence that you are one of the free children, or the children of promise. Remember that you have a renewed and an unrenewed part in the same soul—that so far as you are renewed by grace, your heart submits to the reign of grace, or cleaves to the covenant of grace; and so far as in this respect your soul is unrenewed, in so far your heart, your old heart, is for cleaving to the law as a covenant of works. But be of good cheer; for if you were not a child of the new covenant, those motions which you find in your heart of cleaving to the old covenant would be no trouble to you. It is evident from hence that grace has the throne in your heart, that you are under its dominion, that you submit to, like, and approve of its reign, that you choose to be under it as a subject under his lawful prince, whose dominion over him is no burden but a pleasure to him. And be not surprised or amazed that a rebel party still remain in your soul, which rise up in arms at times to set the law again upon the throne in your heart, for they shall never effect their enterprise. And their very attempts being afflicting and grieving to you, it is evident that you do not submit to the law, that, as a new creature in Christ, you do not join with legal motions, but esteem them as rebels against your Prince, and their very appearance in your heart as an usurpation upon your Prince's dominions.

And the trouble and afflictions which legal motions give you make you cry to your Prince for help against them as His and your enemies. The appearance of these rebels makes you prize your Prince the more, and cleave the closer to the glorious reign of His grace. But the case is far otherwise with an unregenerate soul, with a man who is under the law. He likes and approves of its dominion. He is all of one piece. Legal motions are not disagreeable to him, but treated by him as we treat natives and fellow-subjects. But if the motions of the law appear in a regenerate man, the are disagreeable and terrible to him, he belonging to another Prince, and being under the dominion of grace.

Great grace be with you.

Does the lion of hell roar at you?

 

 

My very Dear Brother in our precious Lord,

The Lamb who died for us is worthy to reign over us. What a glory then must it be to mortal, sinful worms, to be the servants of Zion's King!

My dear, dear brother, you are married unto the Lord, and nothing must separate between you and Him. The nearest relations must not do it. A house and home must not do it. A trade and business in the world must not do it. No, nor your own life neither, if called to lay it down for the honor of Christ, who bought you with His blood. The Lamb's bride, forsaking all others, must cleave unto Him in life and in death, and follow Him, if called to it, through tribulation and distress, famine and nakedness, peril and sword. And well she may, since none of these shall be able to separate her from the Lamb's love. Oh, my brother, Jesus is yours, forever yours. And in Him you have all, if you were stripped of everything else. As having nothing, by faith you may possess all things in Christ, your goodly heritage, your present and eternal lot, your full, soul-satisfying and everlasting portion! Never fear any need, while Christ has all and is your all. Put Him for a well while passing through Baca's valley, a world of sorrows, and you can lack nothing. This everlasting spring of bliss will flow out upon you in rich streams of supply, to your full joy, and you shall sing unto it. Never fear fainting under the cross while Christ has cordials enough to support your spirits, and while His love and word bind Him to give them.

Does the lion of hell roar at you? flee as a tender lamb to Judah's Lion, who is stronger than he—King Jesus will defend you well. In a word, fear neither man nor devils, things present nor things to come, but follow on to know, love, and serve the Lord, and your joy shall be full here, and your glory great hereafter. Oh, my brother, think nothing too dear to part with for Christ, who parted with His all for you! He left his Father's house, His crown and throne above for you, to endure pain, sorrow, and shame below! And shall your little house and home, and comforts you enjoy therein, if called to leave it for Him, be an insuperable mountain in your way to ascend where Jesus is?

The way to heaven is up-hill; but our Lord is with us every step of it. And when He pleases He gives us the feet of hinds to skip over mountains, or down they shall flow at His presence. Difficulties shall not be insuperable to the Lamb's followers, since He goes before them to prepare their way for them, and brings up the feeble of the flock by His omnipotent grace, to inherit with Him eternal glory. In the spirit of Jesus then, and for His honor, endure the cross, and soon our Lord will turn it into a bright and endless crown!

The Lord can work by whom He will.

 

Dear Sir,

I am glad that you see your own exceeding vileness. The exceeding riches of God's free grace in using you will be thereby the more abundantly displayed in your sight. We are indeed, Sir, in what the Lord does by us, "like the tools that the workman takes into his hand, by which he does his work as pleases him;" only there is this difference—the workman chooses tools that are fit for his work, and not such as will be troublesome and offensive to him therein. But the Lord chooses the worst, the basest, the vilest things to work with, that the excellency of the power might be of God and not of us, and the exceeding riches of His grace displayed—while our unworthiness and vileness serve as a foil to commend and reflect His infinite glory!

I an sure of this—that the Lord takes the worst, else He had never taken vile, provoking me, to do the least service by. But so it is, because grace reigns, and forever shall free grace have all the glory, while I, humbled before the majesty thereof and happy under its glorious shine, do loath myself in my own sight for all my abominations.

The Lord can work by whom He will. And to show His power and grace, He takes the most unworthy and unfit, and makes them fit for His work. He puts a value upon worthless worms as if they were well deserving, and upon their work as if it was well done, whereas, all the good that was done was from Himself, and all the evil that attended us in doing of it He casts into the depths of the sea—into the infinite depths of His pardoning grace and the merit of the Redeemer's blood. This is the Lord! This is our God!

Truly, we are like knotty, cross-grained wood, which requires much skill, labor, and patience in the workman that works it, and a variety of instruments to be used upon it to bring it to that order, beauty and usefulness which other wood is easily wrought unto. But the Lord, our glorious worker, will not give over working upon such knotty, cross-grained pieces as we, nor will He ever become weary of His work, because, in His infinite, free, unchangeable love, He has taken us into His own hand to work us for Himself, and is firmly resolved that He will off with all our knots and ruggedness, whatever it cost Him, whatever ways and means to effect it, and put such a beauty, usefulness, and glory upon us, even upon us, the worst pieces that could be found, as therein and thereby to show His art, power, and patience as God, and the exceeding riches of His grace, upon us the vessels of mercy, whom in His eternal counsels and designs, He had afore prepared unto endless glory.

He is resolved to bring us up to that pattern of glory which He had in His eye; to make us perfectly conformed to the image of His Son in holiness and glory; and for this great good, all things, as so many instruments in His hand, the great, the Almighty Agent does jointly, harmoniously and continually work together.

Transcendent, soul-attracting glories

 

Dear Sir,

I sympathize with you in your trials and trust the Lord will do you good by all, while He makes them a means to exercise your graces and to prepare you for your crown. Oh, that glory reserved for us in heaven! That incorruptible, undefiled, and unfadeable inheritance of which we are now heirs and shall before long be possessors! How delightfully shall our capacious souls drink their fill of these rivers of pleasures which are at God's right hand for evermore. We shall be done then with all our bitter things, sin and the effects of it, and be filled with the heavenly sweets of that everlasting feast prepared for us in the immediate vision of God and the Lamb to eternity.

My longing soul ofttimes stretches forth the wings of its desires after this glory, and is greatly comforted in believing views of that life and immortality which I shall enter into when this earthly tabernacle is taken down, which, through diseases and weakness is often, in my own apprehension, just ready to crumble into its original dust.

Oh, the transcendent, soul-attracting glories of that house, that building of God, eternal in the heavens, which I know through grace is prepared for me! I groan, being burdened in this tabernacle by reason of the sinfulness of my soul and the weakness of my body, both which hinder me from loving and serving my God as I would; and I long for immortality, not merely that I would be unclothed, but clothed with the glory prepared for me there.

The thoughts of death, as it will be to me an entering into life, have been very pleasant to me of late; and if a distant glimpse of that glory be so sweet, even while our views of it are so clouded with unbelief and darkness, what a ravishing prospect shall we have when taken home to be forever with the Lord, and shall see with the veil cast off!