Part 19 (1/2)
To Mrs. Juliet S----, New York, one of her former pupils.
”BELLEVILLE, September 16, 1808.
”MY DEAR JULIET--Since the hour I received your letter, you have been little out of my mind. You call upon me as mother, friend, counsellor. Shall conscious unworthiness, or weakness, or ignorance, prevent my answering? No; for G.o.d often chooses weak instruments to bring to pa.s.s great ends, I have been once and again to a throne of grace, for wisdom to direct me, and grace to be faithful. If your desire after spiritual knowledge be sincere, and from the Spirit of G.o.d operating on your heart, you will bear searching.
”You are a communicant, my Juliet; this presupposes that a very great and important change has taken place in your mind--that you have been made deeply sensible of what the word of G.o.d testifies of every son and daughter of Adam's race. 'As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one.' Rom. 3:10. Man is born as the wild a.s.s's colt, going astray from the womb. Job. The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; I the Lord search it. Having the understanding darkened, alienated from the life of G.o.d, through the ignorance that is in us, because of the blindness of our hearts. Dead in trespa.s.ses and sins. Eph. 4:18; 2:1.
”Your profession presupposes that this chapter may be addressed to you, Juliet, by name: 'You hath he quickened, who were dead in trespa.s.ses and sins; wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: among whom also we all had our conversation in times past, in the l.u.s.ts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. But G.o.d, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ; by grace are ye saved, through faith, not of works, lest any man should boast.'
Works there are, my Juliet, most a.s.suredly; every quickened soul will live, and bring forth fruits of righteousness; but these works are not attainable but in G.o.d's way and order. It follows, 'For we are his workmans.h.i.+p, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which G.o.d hath before ordained that we should walk in them.'
”My Juliet says, 'To you then I look up to teach me.' Let me then bring you to the great Teacher and Prophet of the church, without whose teaching all human instruction will be ineffectual. We read of two amiable characters coming to Christ professedly for instruction.
The first you will find in Matthew 19:16. The young man asks him, 'What good thing shall I do, that I may inherit eternal life?' Jesus answers him by referring him to the moral law: the young man, not made acquainted by the Spirit of G.o.d, either with the extent or spirituality of that law, or of the depravity of his own nature, answers, as many in like circ.u.mstances still do,' All these things have I kept from my youth up.' I do not suppose any one could contradict him. It is added that Jesus loved him, and he was a person of attractive character; but Jesus knew that the true principle was not there--supreme love to G.o.d, 'with all the heart, with all the soul, with all the strength, and with all the mind:' therefore he gave him a test which proved that the world was uppermost in his heart. He went away sorrowful, and we hear no more of him.
”Of the other person we read in that remarkable chapter, the third of John's gospel--Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, and also a teacher. Well knew he the law, as to the letter of it, both moral and ceremonial; he must also have been acquainted with all the Old Testament scripture types and prophecies, it being his office to expound; and no doubt, among others, was looking for the promised Messiah. Jesus does not send him to either the law or the prophets.
This ruler comes with a conviction and an acknowledgment that Jesus himself was a teacher immediately from G.o.d; and Jesus immediately takes upon himself his great office, and begins with urging that which is a sinner's first business--'to know himself,' what he is by nature, and the necessity of the new birth. Nicodemus, with all his learning, was a stranger to this doctrine: 'How can a man be born when he is old?' Jesus repeats his doctrine, 'He must be born of water and the Spirit;' baptized with water and the Holy Ghost. 'That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
Marvel not that I said unto you, Ye must be born again.' Humble that proud reason that will believe nothing but what it can understand.
'The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh or whither it goeth; so is every one that is born of the Spirit.' A mystery it is; nevertheless it is true.
”Follow out the chapter, my dear: Jesus preaches his own gospel, and brings in that beautiful type, the serpent, which he had commanded to be raised on a pole, that those who had been bitten with fiery serpents, whose bite was death, should look upon it and be healed.
Read it, my dear, in the 21st of Numbers; and in reference to this, he himself says, 'Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.' Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of G.o.d.
Quickened, renewed in the spirit, of his mind, old things pa.s.s away and all things become new--new principles, new desires, new pleasures, new ends. The work is G.o.d's. The whole plan of redemption is his from first to last. It is clearly revealed in Scripture, and there is no dispute among Christians concerning it. The fall of man, his corruption and depravity; his state under the curse of a broken covenant, and his exposure to eternal misery; his helplessness and total inability to gain acceptance with G.o.d; his ignorance of himself--'dead in trespa.s.ses and sins,' 'without G.o.d and without hope in the world:' this is his situation by nature. But there is good news proclaimed: 'G.o.d so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son,' to become the surety of lost sinners. He took our nature upon him, our sins upon him, our duties upon him: he was placed in our stead; sustained the penalty of the broken law; fulfilled its utmost demands; redeemed us; gave us a new covenant, of which himself is the surety: and there is 'no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.'
”The merits of Christ, exclusive of any thing of ours, are the sole foundation of our hope. Christ is set forth, in Scripture, as the atonement, the propitiation for sins, the one sacrifice for sin; Christ is the end of the law for righteousness; all is made ours by free gift. 1 John, 5:11. All is ready, justice satisfied, G.o.d reconciled, peace proclaimed. But what is all this to a thoughtless world, insensible of their situation, danger, and need? It is an awful saying, but it is of the Holy Ghost, If our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost, in whom the G.o.d of this world hath blinded their minds, and darkened their understandings, and hardened their hearts, etc. Therefore the application of this grace is also of G.o.d; it is all within his plan; he has appointed means, and commanded our diligence in the use of them. We have his Bible in our hands, his ministers in our churches, who are also pastors and teachers if we apply for their aid in private; we have a throne of grace to go to, and many great and precious promises held up in G.o.d's word for us to embrace and plead for Christ's sake: we have many prayers in the Scriptures which we may adopt.
”I acknowledge we are all still dependent for the effect; that must be from G.o.d himself. But he does honor his own ordinances. He puts forth his power, and convinces of sin; this is his first work.
The soul is awakened, aroused, convinced of sin and misery; sins of the heart, sins of the tongue, sins of the life, press upon the conscience which never disturbed us before; misspent time, wasted talents, lost opportunities, neglect of G.o.d's word and ordinances, so that the soul cannot rest. O, my Juliet, this is a hopeful case. I hope you have experienced something of this. It is one of the surest marks of the operation of the Spirit of G.o.d, and a prelude to the new birth. It never takes place without it, for the whole need not a physician, but they that are sick. Only the weary and heavy laden will prize rest, and Christ is the rest they need; only a convinced sinner will or can prize the Saviour, and now the Lord opens his mind to understand the Scriptures. He sees the provision which G.o.d has made for ruined sinners, by providing a subst.i.tute to stand in his room; he perceives how G.o.d can be just and justify the sinner who takes shelter in Jesus; he falls in with G.o.d's gracious plan: receives the Lord Jesus as G.o.d's gift to sinners; trusts entirely in his merits for pardon, peace, reconciliation, and eternal life; resigns his soul into the hands of his Saviour, in the faith that he will save it, and devotes himself unreservedly to his service, in the faith that he will give him grace to live to him in all holy obedience. Now, and not till now, according to G.o.d's promise, he receives power to become his child; this is G.o.d's order, John 1:12. Now he receives life and begins to live; but there is yet a great work before him. It hath pleased G.o.d in his plan to finish at once a justifying righteousness; it is his own work, and was finished in that awful hour when he announced it in his last words on the cross. John 19:30. To this nothing of ours is to be added, with this nothing of ours mixed; it is for ever perfect, it is G.o.d's gift made ours in the hour when we first believe, receive it, rest our souls upon it.
”But it hath not pleased G.o.d in this plan to deliver the believer at once from indwelling sin. This is the subject of the Christian warfare, the race, the good fight. Now the believer receives life, and is called to work. 'Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is G.o.d that worketh in you both to will and to do.'
All the promises in this blessed Bible are his, they are yea and amen in Christ; Christ himself is his; his Spirit dwells in him. The believer is united to Jesus by as real a union as the branch to the vine, the members to the head, the building with the foundation. Yet sin dwelleth in him, and is to be expunged by constant applications to Christ in prayer; by means of watching, striving, fighting--fighting under his banner. In his blessed word we are informed where our strength lies, what our weapons, what our armor. But what can I say on those subjects? the whole word of G.o.d is on the subject of redemption; to this refer the whole labors of Christ's ministers, and the whole dispensation of G.o.d's providence.
”Are these things so? My Juliet, this is not the doctrine of any one church. About these subjects there is no dispute. Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Baptists, Independents, all agree in these great things. And are these things so indeed? O, my Juliet, where is the time to be spared for plays, a.s.semblies, and such numerous idle parties of various descriptions? I must stop; the subject is great, and we have many excellent treatises on the various parts of it, by able, pious men. It would be improper to crowd it thus into a letter, unless to instigate to further investigation.
”Farewell; I ever am, my dear Juliet,
”Yours affectionately,
”I. GRAHAM.”
The delicate state of health to which one of her granddaughters was reduced in 1808, made it necessary for her to spend the summer season for five successive years at Rockaway, Long Island, for the advantage of sea-bathing. Mrs. Graham went with her, it being beneficial to her own health also. In this place she met with many strangers; the company residing there treated her with much affection and respect. She always attended to the wors.h.i.+p of G.o.d morning and evening in her room, and was usually accompanied by some of the ladies who boarded in the house. Her fund of information, vivacity of manner, and the interest which she felt in the happiness of all around her, made her society highly valued and pleasing. Few of those ladies who stayed with her at Rockaway for any length of time, failed to express, at parting, their esteem for her, and they generally added a pressing invitation for a visit from her, if ever she should travel near where they dwelt.
The following is one of her sweet meditations while at Rockaway:
”ROCKAWAY, August, 1809.