V.—THE UTMOST EXTREMITY.*
BY REV. THOMAS HALYBURTON.
THOUGH hitherto I failed of a right issue, yet I was carried a great length in compliance with convictions. I kept myself from open pollutions, I was careful in duties of worship, yea, further, I was much in secret; I received the Word with joy; I was often challenged for secret pride, unbelief, and other heart-spiritual evils, and as to the knowledge of them, was considerably enlightened. I fasted, prayed, mourned in secret. I resolved and strove against sin, even my peculiar sins that I loved best. Thus I had with others “a name to live,” and took up a form of religion.—Rev. iii. 1; 2 Tim. iii. 5. Yet for all this I was a stranger to its power, which the following evidences sufficiently manifest; for whatever lengths I went, yet—I. I was a stranger to the glorious and blessed relief through the imputation of the righteousness of Christ: not that I had not some notions of this, for I professed to embrace it; but really I was in the dark as to its glorious efficacy, tendency, and design. I was ignorant of the “righteousness of God” all the while.—Rom. x. 3. 2. Still in all this the eye was not single.—Matt. vi. 22. It was only the saving of myself, without any eye to the Lord’s glory, I designed.—Rom. ix. 31. 3. It was still by some righteousness of my own, in whole or part, that I sought relief. No wonder peace was unstable, that stood upon so weak a foundation. 4. Though I was, by the force of conviction, brought to part with my beloved sins, or consent to their destruction, yet it was neither without reluctance, nor without some secret reserve. It was like Pharaoh’s consent in the like case, when his servants persuaded him of the danger of his persisting in his sin. Moses and Aaron were brought back again to Pharaoh: and he said unto them: “Go, serve the Lord your God: but who are they that shall go?”—Exod. x. 8. 5. My heart was utterly averse from spirituality. Sometimes, through the force of
* This extract is taken from Halyburton’s Memoirs. “There are three great books in the world,” said Dr. Duncan, on one occasion, addressing his students, “Augustine’s Confessions, Halyburton’s Memoirs, and Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress.” It was high praise, but duly merited. There are very few books in our language that can be compared to it for its remarkable unfolding of Christian experience.
Dr. Young, in his essay introductory to Collins’ edition, published in 1824, thus speaks of the Memoirs.—”There is scarcely a position which was ever taken up by the enmity of man against the mercy of his Maker, but was occupied by him, and resolutely maintained till it was driven from under him; and scarcely, we should think, can a ‘refuge of lies’ be entered by those who came after him, but was previously entered by him, and made his resting place, till he found it to be no shelter.” In the above extract he gives an account of a very great trial in his spiritual experience, and his happy deliverance from the same.
convictions, I was indeed brought, for some time, to aim at getting my mind fixed upon heavenly things, and kept on the thoughts of them; but my heart being yet carnal, I wearied of this bent, and of this forcible religion. And it was intolerable to think of being always spiritual: “The carnal mind is enmity against God, is not subject to the law of God, nor can it indeed be.”—Rom. viii. 7.
By these means I was at last brought to an extremity; for—1. My sins were “set in order before me.”—Ps. l. 21. “Innumerable evils compassed me about; mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to look up. They are more than the hairs upon my head, therefore my heart faileth me.”—Ps. xl. 12. 2. They were set in order in the dreadfulness of their nature and aggravations; and all shifts, extenuations, pleas, and defences, were rejected, and “my mouth stopped before God.”—Rom. iii. 19. 3. All the vain ways I had taken for my relief baffled my expectation, and increased my pain: they were “the staff of a broken reed”; they pierced my arm when I essayed to lean on them, and I was ashamed, and even confounded, that I had hoped.—Isa. xxxvi. 6. 4. The wrath of God was dropped into my soul, and “the poison of his arrows drank up my spirits.”—Job vi. 20. 5. I was as yet unsatisfied as to the truths of religion, and mine enemies often told me that even “in God there was no succour for me.”—Ps. iii. 2. 6. Yea, at some times Satan, to entangle me more, assaulted all the truths of religion at once, and then I was dreadfully confounded, when the Lord commanded that mine enemies should be round about me; and they “compassed me about like bees.”—Ps. cxviii. 11, 12. 7. All ways I took to bear down my corruptions proved of no avail; for “sin revived, and I died,” yea, “taking occasion by the commandment, it slew me.”—Rom. vii. 9, 11.
By the extremity of this anguish I was for some time, about the close of 1697 and beginning of 1698, dreadfully cast down. I was weary of my life. Often did I use Job’s words: “I loathe it, I would not live alway.”—Job vii. 16. And yet I was afraid to die. I had no rest; “my sore ran in the night,” and it ceased not in the day.—Ps. lxxvii. 2. At night I wished for day; and in the day I wished for night.—Deut. xxviii. 66, 67. I said, “My couch shall comfort me”; but then darkness was as the “shadow of death.”—Job vii. 13, x. 21. When I was in this case, I was often brought to the brink of despair; “He filled me with bitterness; he made me drunk with wormwood. He broke all my teeth with gravel-stones; he covered me with ashes.”—Lam. iii. 15. He removed my soul far from peace: I forgot prosperity. And I said, My strength and my hope is perished from the Lord; remembering mine affliction, and my misery, the wormwood and the gall. My soul had them still in remembrance, and was bowed in me.—Lam. iii. 16-20. Now I was made to think it a wonder that I was not consumed; and though I dreaded destruction from the Almighty, yet I could not but justify Him if He had destroyed
me: “Righteous is the Lord, for I have rebelled.”—Lam. i. 18. I was made to fear that the Lord would make me a “Magor-missabib,” a terror to myself (Jer. xx. 4), and all round about: and that He would make some dreadful discovery of my wickedness, that would make me a reproach to religion, and give the enemies advantage; which put upon me the psalmist’s prayer: “Deliver me from all my transgressions; make me not the reproach of the foolish.”—Ps. xxxix. 8. I was made to wonder that I was not already cut off; and indeed this was sometimes reviving: “It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope.”—Lam. iii. 20, 21. But this hope was easily clouded. It amounted to no more than this: “Who can tell but he may be gracious?”—2 Sam. xii. 22. And to this my fearful heart suggested the greatness of my sins, as above the reach of pardoning mercy; and Satan daily urged me to give over, and take some desperate course—to say, “There is no hope.”—Isa. lvii. 10. Thus I walked about dejected, weary, and heavy laden—weary of my disease, and weary of the vain courses I had taken for relief, and uncertain what to do, what course to take: “I took council in my soul, having sorrow in my heart daily.”—Ps. xiii. 2.
If this extremity had lasted much longer, my soul had sunk under the weight of it, and even, while I was in this case, would have ruined me, if the Lord had not secretly supported in times of the greatest extremity, and, as it were, held me by the hand, even while I carried myself most wickedly. “So foolish was I and ignorant: I was as a beast before thee. Nevertheless. . . thou hast holden me by my right hand.”—Ps. lxxiii. 22, 23. And at this extremity the Lord stepped in; when I had destroyed myself, He let me see help in Him.—Hos. xiii. 9. He found me lying wallowing in my blood (Ezek. xvi. 6), in a helpless and hopeless condition. I had none that would or could save me. I was forsaken of all my lovers. I was caught in the thicket. I was quite overcome, neither was I in case to fight or flee. And then the Lord passed by me, cast His skirt over me, and made, this time a time of love: “And Abraham called the name of that place, Jehovahjireh: as it is said to this day, In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen.”—Gen. xxii. 14.
I cannot be very positive about the day or hour of this deliverance, nor can I satisfy many other questions about the way and manner of it. But this is of no consequence, if the work is in substance sound, for “the wind bloweth where it listeth; and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.”—John iii. 8. Many things about the way and manner we may be ignorant of, while we are sufficiently sure of the effects. As to these things, I must say with the blind man, “I know not: one thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see.”—John ix. 25.
However, it was toward the close of January, or the beginning of February, 1698, that this seasonable relief came; and so far as I can remember, I was at secret prayer in very great extremity, not far from despair, when the Lord seasonably stepped in, and gave this merciful turn to affairs: “When I said, My foot slippeth, thy mercy held me up.”—Ps. xciv. 18. And when there was none to save, then His own arm brought salvation: “God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, shined into my mind, to give the light of the knowledge of his glory in the face of Jesus Christ.”—2 Cor. iv. 6.
That which yielded me this relief was a discovery of the Lord, as manifested in the Word. He said to me, “Thou hast destroyed thyself, but in me is thy help.”—Hos. xiii. 9. Now the Lord discovered, in the manner afterwards to be mentioned, several things, which I shall here take notice of.—1. He let me see that “there are forgivenesses with him,”—that with Him “there is mercy, and plenteous redemption.”—Ps. cxxx. 4, 7. He made all His “goodness pass before me, and he proclaimed his name, The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin, who will be gracious to whom he will be gracious, and will show mercy to whom he will show mercy.”—Exod. xxxiii. 19, xxxiv. 5. This was a strange sight to one, who before looked on God only as “a consuming fire” (Heb. xii. 29), which I could not “see and live.”—Exod. xxxiii. 20. 2. He brought me from Sinai and its thunderings, to Mount Zion, “and to the Mediator of the new covenant; and to the blood of sprinkling,” that cleanses from all sin, “and speaks better things than the blood of Abel.”—Heb. xii. 22, 24. He revealed Christ in His glory. I now with wonder “beheld his glory, as the glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.”—John i. 14. And I was hereon made to say: “Thou art fairer than the sons of men.”—Ps. xlv. 2. 3. Hereon He let me see that He who had before rejected all that I could offer was well pleased in the Beloved: “Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire; mine ears hast thou opened: burnt-offerings and sin-offerings hast thou not required: then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God.”—Ps. xl. 6, 7. And, 4. Hereby I was further fully satisfied that not only there was forgiveness of sins and justification by free grace, “through the redemption that is in Jesus, whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation, through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness in the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God” (Rom. iii. 24); but, moreover, I saw with wonder and delight, in some measure, how God, by this means, might be just in justifying even the ungodly who believe in Jesus.—Rom. iv. 5. How was I ravished with delight, when made to see that the God in whom, a little before, I thought there was no hope for me, or any sinner in my case, if there were any such, notwithstanding His
spotless purity, His deep hatred of sin, His inflexible justice and righteousness, and His untainted faithfulness, pledged in the threatening of the law, might not only pardon, but, without prejudice to His justice or other attributes, be just in justifying even the ungodly! The reconciliation of those seemingly inconsistent attributes with one another, and with the salvation of sinners, quite surprised and astonished me. And, 5. The Lord further opened the gospel call to me, and let me see that to me, even to me, was the “word of this salvation sent.”—Acts xiii. 26. All this was offered to me, and I was invited secretly to come and “take the water of life freely” (Rev. xxii. 17); and to come in my distress unto this blessed rest: “Come to me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden, and ye shall find rest for your souls.”—Matt. xi. 28. 6. He, to my great satisfaction, gave me a pleasant discovery of his design in the whole—that it was “that no flesh might glory in his sight” (1 Cor. i. 29, 31), but that he who glories should have occasion only to glory in the Lord; that He might manifest the riches of His grace, and be exalted in showing mercy; and that we in the end might be saved, “to the praise of the glory of his grace, who made us accepted in the Beloved.”—Eph. i. 6, 7; Isa. xxx. 18. 7. The Lord revealed to my soul that full and suitable provision made in this way against the power of sin; that as there is righteousness in Him, so there is strength, even everlasting strength, in the Lord Jehovah, to secure against all enemies (Isa. xlv. 24); and that in Him there is sweet provision made against the guilt of sins, that through the power of temptation His people may be inveigled into: “These things write I unto you, that ye sin not; but if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and he is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.”—1 John ii. 1, 2. 8. When this strange discovery was made of a relief, wherein full provision was made for all the concerns of God’s glory, and my salvation, in subordination thereto, my soul was by a glorious and sweet power carried out to rest in it, as worthy of God, and every way suitable and satisfying in my case: “They that know his name, will put their trust in him.”—Ps. ix. 10, cxix. 93.
All these discoveries were conveyed to me only by the Word. It was not, indeed, by one particular testimony, or promise of the Word, but by the concurring light of a great many of the promises and testimonies of the Word seasonably set home, and most plainly expressing the truths above-mentioned. The promises and truths of the Word, in great abundance and variety, were brought to remembrance, and the wonders contained in them were set before mine eyes in the light of the Word.—John xiv. 26; Ps. cxix. 18. “He sent his word, and healed me.”—Ps. cvii. 20. This was the rod of His strength, that made me willing (Ps. cx. 2, 3); and it was the plain word of salvation that I found to be the power of God.—Rom. i. 16. I cannot positively say that the particular
places above-mentioned were the words whereby these discoveries were conveyed to my soul; but by these, or such like passages, and I believe by many even of those mentioned promises and truths, were the discoveries above-named made to me.
But it was not the Word alone that conveyed the discovery; for most of the passages whereby I was relieved I had formerly in my distress read and thought upon, without finding any relief in them. But now the Lord shined into my mind by them.—2 Cor. iv. 6. Formerly I was only acquainted with the letter, which profits not (John vi. 63); but now the Lord’s words were “spirit and life” (Ps. xxxvi. 9); and “in his light I saw light,” God opening mine “eyes to see wonders out of his law.”—Ps. cxix. 18. There was light in them; a burning light by them shone into my mind, to give me not merely some theoretical knowledge, but “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, in the face of Jesus Christ.”—2 Cor. iv. 6.