Period VI
(Being a continuation of God’s gracious dealing with my soul from August, 1745 to December, 1750).
The Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper being about to be dispensed in a neighbouring congregation, I went there and got a soul-refreshing view of Christ as His own table both in a way of correction and comfort, these Scriptures being present to my view: Ezek. 6, v. 9, “Because I am broken with your whorish heart which has departed from me”. “Behold, I am pressed under you as a cart is pressed that is full of sheaves” (Amos 2, v. 13); which turned my eyes to the sufferings of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, whose dying love I was now commemorating, and to view my own sins as the cause of His sufferings. I beheld God’s eternal Son pressed by His Father’s divine fury as a cart is pressed under sheaves even to agony and bloody sweat. Oh! it was not what the Jews, the Romans, or what the devils did to Christ, that I was made to see, but what my sins and whorish heart did, and what His heavenly Father did to Him in the days of His hot displeasure when He stood in my law-room and stead as my surety. And how it pleased the Lord to bruise Him and put Him to grief, when He made His soul and body an offering for sins, yea, for my great sins, etc.
Oh! my soul, behold God’s hatred against sin, His love to sinners. See, O my soul, what Thy sins cost the Lord of life, and try if you can make light of it again.
Thus I got a view of the price of my redemption and the heinous nature of my sins which tended to break and melt my heart into real sorrow for my sins, and to mourn and be in bitterness as for an only son.
Then I was made to take a new hold of Jesus Christ as my covenant Head, and of His righteousness as a sufficient clothing for my naked soul. I was made to see that, Jesus Christ the Son of God, by His being flesh, became my elder Brother (Hebrews 2, v. 12) and that it was by Him only that I had the adoption of a son. I saw plainly that I had need of Christ in all these respects, for my own righteousness was too narrow a covering, and my duties too short a bed to rest upon. Then I said, O Son of God, who, in Thy adorable humility, was pleased to become the Son of man, that through Thee the sons of men might become the sons of God. Oh! Thou who art called the repairer of the breach and the restorer of the paths of righteousness. Yea, Lord, there is such a heap of rubbish, guilt and unbelief between me and the foundation, that I find it more difficult to find Thee again as my sure foundation than when I was brought from a state of nature. O, then let all these ruins be under Thy hand and discover Thyself to me as my sure foundation, otherwise I’ll never dig through this heap of guilt and unbelief and build upon Thee alone. At evening I went to secret prayer, and if ever I was sincere in anything, it was in dedicating myself to the service of God and to the honour of His name in yielding up all my members as instruments of righteousness unto holiness; yea, I was made to believe that He accepted me in the beloved, therefore, I concluded that my mountain stood strong and that I should never be moved; but little did I think what a storm was coming and what a journey I had to go before I was to get another meal, no less than two whole years.
Soon after this the rebellion* broke out in the north, but my * The ’45 Jacobite rebellion. spirits were so stupified during the whole time it lasted that I could not be concerned for anything, for I had a rebellion in my own breast against God. Sometimes I got my soul revived by viewing the method of grace in Christ and the promises of the new covenant. Yet, notwithstanding these short blinks, I found that grace, as to its exercise, was under a manifest decay in me, even that which remained; namely, the habit as well as the exercise was ready to die. As I was one day lamenting my sad case before the Lord, beseeching Him to revive His work in me as in the days of old; and that He would graciously look upon the present woeful decays of faith and other graces in me; and that He would send forth His Spirit to renew the decayed face of my soul; while I was thus wrestling with God by arguments drawn from the covenant of grace and the firmness of His purposes, and that nothing less than an unchangeable purpose of grace and love, could suit such a fallen creature; these words sounded, as it were in my ears: “And I will bring the blind by a way that they know not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known; I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them and not forsake them” (Isaiah 43, v. 16).
At this time I did not perfectly know that there was such a word in the Bible; especially the last part of it, “these things will I do unto them and not forsake them”. Instantly there followed peace and calmness into my disturbed soul. There light and life also sprang up, as when Christ said, let there be light and there was light”. Here I found, to my great surprise, an answer to two whole years’ prayers in one verse. O the unsearchable grace and comfort I found in this passage of Scripture! It was to me as if God had said, “my people are all of them blind by nature as well as others; therefore I will lead the blind by a way they know not”. Yea, by a way they never thought of, and I will lead them even in paths they have not experienced nor heard of, for I have paths to lead my people in which no fowl ever saw, and which the vulture’s eye hath not seen; but it is a path of judgment, for I lead in the ways of righteousness, I will make them know that I have a path of weeping and supplication to bring to Zion, as well as a path of comfort, for my way of bringing sons and daughters to glory.
“Therefore, blind soul, trust me to bring thee to myself in my own way, and to exercise thy graces in my own manner. I have opened thine eyes to behold something of my grace in my Son; but, as yet, thou art blind in respect to what is unrevealed; I bring all my children to glory by a way of crosses and losses, by a way of disappointments, tribulations, temptations and afflictions. I am He who destroyeth the hope of man. I will destroy thy hope when thou hopest in anything but my grace. I am the way myself, and what I do, or how I lead thee, thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter. Only for the present follow me, and though I should lead thee through fire and water, I will bring thee to a wealthy place, and lead thee forth by a right way to a city of habitation. These things will I do unto thee and not forsake thee. Thou art still afraid that I will not pursue the designs of my grace in thee which is to destroy thy sins and sanctify thy nature and establish thee in my righteous ways, and thou art yet more afraid that I will forsake the work of my hands. But, O thou of little faith, wherefore dost thou doubt? O fool and slow of heart to believe all that my prophets have said and all that my people have experienced in every age. Read my promise: ‘These things will I do unto thee and not forsake thee.’ Believe my promise and rely upon my faithfulness to my promise. Trust my almighty power to make the promise forthcoming unto thee. What is thy petition? Is it that the body of sin may be destroyed and thy nature sanctified, that the image of my Son may be restored in thee, etc. All these things will I do unto thee and will not forsake thee after I have done it, for I will be unto thee far above what thou art able to ask or think. I will deal with thee according to thy Advocate’s intercession at my right hand.”
“He has the tongue of the learned and I hear Him always. Because thou art naturally bent to forsake me, thou thinkest that I am so too to forsake thee. But thou shalt know that I am the unchangeable God, and that therefore thou art not consumed. I know what thou wert before I manifested my Son Jesus unto thee, and I know what thou art yet and what thou wouldst be if I would leave thee. Thy goodness is as the morning cloud and early dew that soon pass away. And it was not my foreseeing any good in thee above others which made me love thee, but my sovereign pleasure to manifest the riches of my free grace in thee. I loved thee because I loved thee, and will rest in my love towards thee and not forsake thee altogether. So that thou mayest be confident of this very thing, that I who have begun the good work will carry it on till the day of Jesus Christ. Yea I will do better unto thee than at the beginning, that thou mayest know that the whole of thy salvation depends upon free grace from first to last.”
I walked in the comfort of this promise more than twelve months, and in all my addresses unto God I turned that promise into a prayer, saying “all these things do unto me and not forsake me”, etc.
Many a soul-refreshing and comforting meal I had from the promise of God in Christ in whom all the promises are yea and amen.
In the months of July and August, 1748, the Lord confirmed His love in the preaching of the Word and also when receiving the Sacrament of the Supper, and thereby prepared me for that dreadful storm which was coming. And though it is now over yet I tremble to relate it; and O that I could do it in such a way as that God may have all the glory and His people get warning, though I shall be exposed to the greatest shame and ignominy.