MINISTER OF CROY, INVERNESS-SHIRE. BORN, 1712; DIED, 1775.
Edited from the Original MSS., with Illustrative Notes,
BY THE LATE REV. WM. TAYLOR, M.A., STIRLING.
(Continued from page 121.)
“Monday, 10th February.—Long conference with a most unhappy man who has broken out into a grievous sin, and is now harassed with despairing thoughts and most awful temptations from the destroyer. May the Lord preserve him; for he’s on the brink of a precipice that’s very hideous! O may he be truly and deeply humbled under a sense of his grievous sin, and the black and dreadful fountain whence it flowed. May his trouble, which is very great, be turned to the right channel of that godly sorrow which worketh repentance unto salvation not to be repented of! May he be brought, all contrite and penitent, to the footstool of divine mercy, and by a holy faith to the blood of Jesus which cleanseth from all sin! Amen!
“Monday, 24th.—Spent much of this day in visiting several distressed families in the east end of the parish. Alas! alas! how forgetful was my roving carnal heart, while riding from town to town, to keep up sweet intercourse with heaven, as I ought to do, by ejaculatory prayer and meditation on divine things. Lord, forgive, for Jesus’ sake! Amen! Sweet liberty, notwithstanding, was afforded to the most unworthy of all His servants this night, both in family worship and in secret. Well, therefore, may I sing, ‘Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy’ (Micah vii. 18).
“Wednesday, 26th.—[After a day of remarkable fellowship with God, he adds:] O for more and more! I have infinite need. Little, very little, have I attained; and none farther from perfection. Forgetting therefore the things that are behind, may I press forward every day with redoubled ardour towards the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ! Amen!
“Thursday, 27th.—Long conference at noon with C— F— of this village, who has met with sore trials in the Lord’s holy providence. In conversing with this afflicted Christian, and in mentioning some of my poor, though I hope, gracious experiences, I was not, I fear, so cautious, so humble and thankful and self-denied as I ought to have been, and as I have often recommended to my people on such occasions. I fear I have this day forgotten in part the salutary rule which I had prescribed to others. I dread there was some secret spice of pride and self in some of my expressions; which I have reason to apprehend from the consequence; for in less than an hour thereafter I felt something like midnight darkness, icy coldness, rocky hardness, and atheistical carelessness stealing and growing on my soul. I was alarmed, terrified, and almost ready to sink and faint away; when, looking back and wistfully inquiring what might be the cause of this sudden change, this awful desertion and suspension of divine influences, the cause above-mentioned occurred immediately to my view. I saw it, I confessed, I bewailed and deplored it with some degree of anguish and contrition. Now I felt what I preached last Lord’s-day—that the Lord has a wonderful way of bringing the greatest good out of our greatest evils, making our very pride the mean of the deepest humiliation. Two things supported me in this distress; the one was that I was helped to venture my vile guilty soul, with all its devilish pride, vanity, selfishness, deadness, darkness, hardness, atheism, and wretchedness, on the atonement and righteousness and boundless infinite merits of my adorable Emmanuel, and the infinite mercy of my adorable Jehovah, flowing in the channel of Christ’s precious blood to sinners—and to the chief of sinners like me—in full harmony with His justice. The other was, that often, and very lately on a memorable day, I was helped, in the full assurance of faith, to bring all the works of the devil which I felt in my soul, and that one in particular which now distressed me most of all, unto Christ the King of Zion, to be demolished and destroyed; and as this work was committed with all my heart to Him who was manifested to destroy the works of the devil, I had not then the smallest shadow of doubt but it would be done effectually, as it is impossible that He should deny His own blessed offer. This recollection wonderfully cooled and revived my feverish fainting soul. . . . What shall I render to the Lord for this just and necessary and seasonable rebuke; and for the relief, reconciliation, and sweet embraces of love, to seal my pardon and acceptance in the blood of my adorable Jesus. Heaven and earth, angels that excel in strength, praise Him! for I cannot sufficiently do it in time or eternity; I can only say with adoring wonder and thankfulness, ‘Who is a God like unto thee?’
“Thursday, 22nd October.—Blessed for ever be the Lord! I have it to say to-day with the psalmist, that ‘it is good for me to draw near to God.’ O! it is good to be setting a tryst with the Lord. O how ready and willing and punctual is He in keeping such trysts with poor sinners, that He may encourage them to maintain that intercourse with heaven, through the mediation of Christ, which is their honour and happiness as well as their duty.”
CHAPTER VIII.
NONE BUT CHRIST.
Although in the winter of 1772-3 Mr. Calder complains of little visible present success in his ministry in the way of new conversions, and even speaks of a “deep sleep” as lying on souls in all the neighbourhood, yet the seed he was sowing in tears was, as he himself somewhere phrases it, only “lying for a while under the clods.” For at the end of 1773 he is able to record that there is a more general appearance of seriousness in his flock this year than for many years before, and that there are what he judges to be real conversions. And he himself, amid failing strength and frequent sufferings, is evidently growing continually in grace.
“February, 17th, 1773.—I have, I fear, greatly offended this night, by re proving one of my domestics with a bitterness and severity that ill become the servant and disciple of the meek and tender-hearted Jesus. Lord, forgive this and my other numberless offences for Jesus’ sake. Amen! Received a most comfortable letter from my dear son John, in which I find a sweet answer to a thousand prayers. Heaven and earth praise the God of my fathers, and the God of my children, and I will venture to say, looking to Jesus, my God also, though I am the most unworthy of the human race.
“March 9th.—[For some days he has been greatly distressed by ‘cruel suggestions, fiery darts of the devil,’ the precise nature of which he does not mention, but of which he thus records the issue]: This night my gracious and adorable Lord made the devil and unbelief liars, and relieved me perfectly from the cruel temptation that was distressing beyond measure to my spirit for several days together. My poor soul has got great gain, and my enemy very great loss for his hellish cruel pains. Adored be the Captain of my Salvation. Amen!
“Sabbath Eve, 14th.—This was to me, blessed be the Lord, the best communion as to liberty and enlargement in preaching and exhortation, I had for some years past; but through a misplaced dependence on the pleasing frame and freedom of faith I had for some time before, I lost, I fear, a great deal of that sweetness and nearness of communion in the solemn action which I might have otherwise enjoyed. Though I was at pains to guard others against this mistake, yet I fell unhappily into it myself. Good Lord, forgive, for Jesus’ sake. Amen. . . . This morning there came a letter to my hand from the noble and eminently pious L—y G—n—y.* I know well it contained something that concerned the cause of Christ and the interests of His holy religion, and therefore thought it my duty to look into it; and it was happy I did, for I found in it something of a very sweet sacred nature, which gave joy to my heart, and I believe put an additional edge on my spirit all the day long. The Lord bless and comfort and seal her pious soul until the day of redemption! Long may her useful and precious life be spared to be a lasting blessing to our declining Church! Richly may she be rewarded for her noble and singular labours of love. Amen!
“November 9th.—A sweet morning, a sweet view of the adorable Emmanuel—our Kinsman-Redeemer—sweet access to the ever-blessed God through Him; for ever blessed be His name. Amen! This delicious blink was to prepare me for a sharp trial, a cloud, a storm that came on me within an hour or two thereafter. My blest morning boon was of no use to my poor soul in the trial; but I needed more, and the Lord was and will be a present help in time of need. Lord, sanctify my comforts and my trials, and wean my heart from every comfort and enjoyment this side of precious and glorious Christ! None but Christ, none but Christ, be the song in the house of my pilgrimage!“
These last words we have printed in italics, because they strike the keynote of his experience during the remaining two years of his life. The shadows, indeed, are lengthening, for his health declines more and more, and now and then physical depression seems for a little to weigh even his soul down. More humble perhaps than ever, very watchful, sensitive to the least sin in word or thought, to the least coldness of feeling towards his Saviour, to the least cloud of unbelief or glare of presumption between him and his “glorious Sun,” he is sometimes for a little distressed as by a horror of darkness coming down. But this instantly sends him to the mercy-seat, to obtain a new victory through Jesus Christ his Lord. “God,” so he testifies, “gives him songs in the night.” Evidently he was never happier on the whole, and never nearer to God. And amid increasing labours of love, often beyond his strength, he ripens fast for heaven.
“1774—January 7th.—Heard to-day, with sorrow, that my very dear and worthy brother, Mr. Hector M’Phail, was extremely low and weak in body, and not likely to live any time. Happy, inconceivably happy, will that change be to him, whatever time it comes. But oh! what a loss to his flock, his family, the Church, and to me! Help, Lord, for Jesus’ sake! Amen.
“Sabbath, 9th.—Some sweet liberty in the first discourse; much confusion and formality in the second. Lord, forgive, for Jesus’ sake! I brought this darkness, formality, and confusion on myself by setting out in a proud and blind dependence on myself, on what I had lately received, and often received. Lord, make me wise to my own salvation, and that of others! Amen.
“Monday, 10th.—Glory and praise for ever be to God in Christ, for the sweet and blessed liberty He has afforded me this morning. My clouds of yesterday, yea all my clouds, are scattered, all my bonds are loosened; my soul is established on the Rock laid in Zion. I stand accepted with unspeakable joy in the perfect and most glorious righteousness of my redeeming God. I have access, with humble boldness, to a throne of grace, to a mercy-seat, and there I am at once blessed with pardoning mercy and sanctifying grace! What shall I render to the Lord? Heaven and earth praise Him! Amen, amen! Visited worthy E—th G—t on a bed of languishing. Great sweetness, light, and liberty in conference and prayer with this dear, blessed handmaid of Jesus! Conference with sundries. This was a blessed day to my soul—the best, upon the whole, I had for seven, I may say for twenty years back. I was never more sweetly and solidly established on my Rock, my Centre, my Heaven, the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessings, blessings, blessings to Him for evermore! Amen.
“Sabbath Evening, 23rd.—When I began family worship this forenoon, with singing at the beginning of Psalm ciii., in our ordinary course, I was very much impressed with it, that my dear and heavenly brother, Mr. M’Phail, had begun his everlasting song with Christ in Paradise. The impression became stronger in time of prayer, and upon retiring after worship I could not help breaking out into a flood of tears, and sighs, and plaints, and sorrows, for my sweetest, dearest and most precious friend; not for himself, but for my own great and, in appearance, irreparable loss, and for the loss of his family, flock, and the Church of Christ—yet could not conclude absolutely that he was gone.
“Tuesday, 25th.—Received the mournful news of what was so strongly impressed on my anxious mind Sabbath morning—viz., the much-to-be-lamented death of the most eminently pious, zealous, active, laborious minister of Christ I ever saw, and the most lovely, loving image of his adorable Lord and Master that ever I was acquainted with. Alas! a brave standard-bearer, a great prince is fallen in Israel—a blank, a breach made on this declining Church, and in this poor corner in particular, the sorest, the most affecting, the most afflicting I ever saw of the kind. ‘Help, Lord! for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men.’ Lord, sanctify this mournful breach to his family and flock, to me, to mine, to all; and, Lord, repair it in due time of thy rich grace and infinite mercy. Amen. . . . O that the Lord would give me power and ability, as indeed He has given me will and inclination, to be a father to the children of the best of brothers, the best of friends, the best of men! He was exceeding high in the sphere of grace below, and now he is exceeding high in the regions of glory. He will have many a jewel to adorn the pastoral crown, and to rejoice his honest heart.*
“February 25th.—These words were sweet to me this morning: ‘For this end the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.’ And these words of our Lord: ‘I will, be thou clean.’ Amen; so be it. Do, O Lord, as Thou hast said.
“March 5th.—Last night, alas! I offended my gracious Lord; and though it was through inadvertence, yet I was and am pierced for it still. I have been confessing it often to-day, I hope, with sincere repentance, and imploring forgiveness in the name of Christ, which I trust His mercy hath vouchsafed me, together with some sweet seal of it at family worship and in secret. Glory be to His name! Amen, and amen.
“Monday, 21st.—For ever blessed be the Lord, this was one of the sweetest mornings I had for years back. My whole heart and soul was sweetly and powerfully won to the great end of my creation, that of glorifying God. I asked it as the one thing, through grace to be ever giving Him the glory that is due to His adorable name! Amen.
“June 29th—. . . Yet, alas! I have offended in conversation by animadverting too severely on the misconduct of a young professor, who, I believe, belongs to the Lord, and who came through a remarkable work of conversion under my ministry. For this inadvertent sally and sinful liberty of my unruly tongue I am ashamed, I am grieved before the Lord. Lord, forgive, for Jesus’ sake! Amen.
(To be continued.)
* Lady Glenorchy.
* We have quoted this, and some other references to the saintly minister of Resolis, because it is historically important to preserve this weighty contemporary testimony to his character.