Faith — the Gospel — Assurance
“By grace are ye saved, through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God.’’ — Eph. ii. 8. “Being justified by faith, we have peace with God.” — Rom. v. 1.
My pear Frrenp,
I find Scripture presenting fazih to us in more aspects than one. It is sometimes called hearing, sometimes knowing, sometimes believing, and sometimes recetving, and sometimes trusting. Strictly speaking, it is simply the belief of the truth, yet it is referred to throughout Scripture under these different names. ‘These may be said to be its different stages; and it is useful oftentimes to lay hold of it at each of these, and contemplate it under each of these views. They are not in reality the same thing, yet they are all 7l/ustrative of the same thing, and they all point to one object. ‘The things which we hear; the truth which we know; the tidings which. we believe; the gift which we receive; the being whom we trust, may be different in one sense, yet in another they are the same.
Some adopt so exclusively one aspect and others another, that the object itself is lost sight of. Some particular definition is fastened on and elevated into such prominence -as to become little better than a party watchword, furnishing much matter for self-righteousness and self-confidence, no less than for the condemnation of others who may chance in somewhat to differ.
I see, for instance, a person glorying in what he calls his simple views of faith, and spurning every other idea of it but what he calls ‘the bare belief of the bare truth.” I ask such an one, “where is your child-like confidence in God, where is the clinging to the cross, the resting of the soul upon Jesus HIMsELF as to the resting-place?* You are making a saviour of your faith, an idol of the
truth. You are just as self-righteous and proud in your ‘simple views of faith’ as is the
* Thus Calvin speaks. After admitting that the general object of faith is the truth of God, he thus remarks, — * Faith hath no firm footing unless it be placed in the tender mercy of God. Why, then, do we dispute about faith? Is it not that we may lay bold of the way of salvation? Yet how can faith be saying unless in so far as it grafts us into the body of Christ? There is nothing therefore of absurdity, if, in defining it, we thus urge its principal effect; and by way of distinction, subjoin its general character, that special mark by which it distinguishes the believer from the unbelieyer,” — Inst. B. iti. ch. 2, § 30.
|: & i mystic whose religion you profess to shun. Your God seems to be a mere bundle of abstract propositions; your Saviour a mere collection of evangelical phrases, which you use as the mere shibboleth of a sect.”
Again, I see another individual going into the opposite extreme. He overlooks the simplicity of faith. He undervalues the TRUTH. He is wholly occupied with some mystical actings of his own mind, and trying to exert himself to put forth some indescribable efforts which he calls receiving and resting on Christ. I say to such an one, ‘“You are on the road to mysticism, if you be not already enveloped in its mists. You are occupied with your own self, with your own actings and feelings; and you are making a Saviour of these. You certainly need more simple views of true faith. You need to be recalled from your self-righteous perplexities about your own acts, to the precious word of truth which you are despising, as if it contained no comfort for you unless you can be conscious of putting forth certain acts of your own in connection with Atm.
* No man wished more to avoid giving countenance to the idea, that faith is a bare intellectual act, than Mr. Robert Haldane, yet he does not scruple to use such language as the following, — “A man becomes righteous, perfectly righteous,
From this you will see how it is quite possible to admit the full meaning of those words in Scripture which speak of confidence, and trust, and rest, &c.; while, at the same time, we rejoice in those other expressions which represent faith as an “acknowledgment of the truth,” and the salvation of the sinner as ‘the result of his ‘ coming to the knowledge of the truth.” It is quite consistent with Scripture to represent peace as flowing from confidence in God through Christ, and yet as arising. from ‘believing the record which God hath given of his Son.”
I shall not, however, attempt a definition of faith. ‘This only let me say in a few words, that that faith which goes no farther than the intellect, can neither save nor sanctify. It 1s no faith at all. It is unbelief. No faith is saving, but that which links us to the PERSON of a living Saviour. Whatever falls short of this is not faith in Christ. Hence, while salvation is described sometimes in Scripture as
through believing God’s record concerning his Son.” — Haxposition of the Romans. Vol. ii. p. 554, Dr. Owen also thus writes, “Saving faith is our believing the record that God hath given of his Son.... Upon our acquiescing in this testimony, on our approbation of this way of saving sinners, or our refusal of it, our eternal safety or ruin doth absolutely depend.” — Hvidences of the Faith of God’s Hlect. Works, vol. xi, p. 500.
a i i i — s
a ‘ Pr “tol lS. ne a “coming to the knowledge of the truth,” it is more commonly represented as a ‘ coming to Christ himself.” “Ye will not come to ms that ye might have life.” ‘ Him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.”
We often hear the expression, ‘coming to the truth” used as a description of conversion. Now the Bible word is ‘coming to the knowledge of the truth.” Even this expression, however, is seldom used. The more frequent one is ‘coming to Christ; not coming to the truth, but coming to the True One. It is strange how men should so much prefer the phrase “coming to the truth,” to the more scriptural and blessed one ‘‘ coming to Christ.” It would almost seem as if they disliked the idea of a personal Saviour in the matter; or as if they had a secret suspicion that while their kind of conversion might be called a “coming to the truth,” it could not be called a ‘coming to Christ” at all.
But whatever view of faith we take, one thing is obvious, that it is from first to last “the gift of God.” Make it as simple as you please, still it is the result of the Holy Spirit’s direct, immediate, all-quickening power. Never attempt, I beseech you, my dear friend, to make faith simple, with the view of getting rid of the need of the Spirit to produce it. This, I believe, is one of the wretched devices of Satan in the present day. By all means correct every mistake in regard to faith, by which hindrances are thrown in the sinner’s way, or darkness thrown around his soul. Show him that it is with the object of faith, even with Christ and his cross, that he has to do, not with his own actings of faith; — that it is not the virtue or merit that is in his faith that saves him, but the virtue and merit that are in Christ Jesus alone. Tell him to look outward not inward for his peace. Beat him off from his self-righteous efforts to get up a peculiar kind of faith or peculiar acts of faith in order to obtain something in himself — something short of Christ, to rest upon. Simplify, explain, and illustrate faith to such an one, but never imagine that thereby you are to make the Spirit’s help less absolutely NECESSALY.
This, I believe, is the aim of the propagators of the new theology. ‘Their object in simplifying faith is to bring it within the reach of unrenewed man, so that by performing this very simple act, he may become a renewed man. In other words, their object is to make man the beginner of his own salvation. He takes the first step, and God does the rest! He believes, and then God comes in and saves him.*
This is nothing short of a flat and bold denial of the Spirit’s work altogether. If at any one time more than another the sinner needs the Spirit’s power, it is at the beginning. And he who denies the need of the Spirit at the beginning cannot believe in it at the after stages, — nay, cannot believe in the need of the Spirit’s work at all. The mightiest and most insuperable difficulty lies at the beginning. If the sinner can get over that without the Spirit, he will easily get over all the rest. If he does not need the Spirit to enable him to believe, he will not need him to enable him to love. If when a true object is presented to me, I can believe without the Spirit; then when a lovable object is presented, I can love without the Spirit. In short, what is
* After speaking of the “convincing and converting efficacy of EXTERNAL INFLUENCE,” they add the following remark concerning sinners to whom these eaternal influences, (affliction, disease, judgments, &.,) had been applied — * When they have been convicted and disposed to believe him, he sends. his word and heals them.” — Correspondence, p. 42. “When the sinner is willing, then the Spirit begins to work,” were the words used to myself by a maintainer of the new doctrine. It is only then on the willing that the Spirit works! Melancholy doctrine! for who are the willing? Surely some better class of sinners than those who inhabit this poor fallen earth!
there in the whole Christian life which I cannot do of myself, if I can begin this career without help from God? The denial of the Spirit’s direct agency in faith and conversion, ts the denial of his whole work in the soul both of saint and sinner.
But is it not said, ‘“Faith cometh by hearing?” Certainly it is. And who doubts the blessed truth? How can there be faith where there is not something to be believed ?* But does this mean that hearing alone is necessary to the production of faith? The words in the original explain this. They are these, ‘“faith arises out of (ef) what we hear, and what we hear comes to us through means of (dv) the word of God.” Who then would say anything but what the apostle does here ? — viz.: that the foundation of faith is what we hear, — (lit., a hearing or report.) But does this exclude the Spirit from his work in preparing the soul for believing what it hears?
Used in a right sense, I have no objection to the expression, so common even in our best writers, that it is “‘ the truth which produces faith.” And had it not been for the improper
* “There is an inseparable relation between faith and the word, and these can be no more torn asunder from each other than rays of light from the sun.” — Calvin’s Institutes, B, 3, ch. 2, § 6.
use made of it in the present day, no one would hesitate to use it. We are told that before the days of Pelagius there were many expressions in use, which, after his heresy arose, the fathers were afraid to employ. And so we find it here. Calvin, for instance, does not hesitate to speak of the word as that ‘“by which faith is concetved.”* And again, “Faith stands in no less need of the word than fruit does of the living root of a tree.”i Again, Trail in one of his sermons thus speaks, “It is called the word of faith because it is the means of faith, and begets faith: what think you is faith, but only the impression, the stamp, that the word of the Gospel, when brought home with power, leaves upon the soul: it is the heart’s echo to the voice of salvation by Christ in the Gospel.” Again, the same author thus speaks; ‘ Believing is but thinking, it is no more; but it is a rare
* Unde fides concipiatur, Inst. B. 3, ch. 2, § 6.
+ Ibid. B. 3, ch.2, § 31. In like manner Calvin frequently speaks of faith, or of the truth, as producing life, — nay, he even speaks of our being regenerated by faith; but then on the other hand he as distinctly makes the Holy Spirit the real fountain of everything like life or regeneration. See for instance his commentary on John 1. 12, 13. If you take merely one class of extracts, you would say that he gave countenance to some of the modern heresies, but if you look at others you will see that his meaning is totally opposed te these.
+ Trail’s Works, vol. ii. p. 103.
thing, it is a great thought.”* In like manner Mr. Haldane makes this remark upon Rom. x. 17, ‘“‘ Faith never comes but by hearing, that is, from the word of God.”t
I might quote many similar passages from the very best of our divines; but I need not.t These will show you that while they all held faith to be directly “the gift of God,” they never hesitated to use such expressions as ‘faith is begotten by the word.” ‘I’he reason is obvious. If men separate faith from the word, they immediately fall into mysticism or quakerism. ‘They torment and perplex themselves by an attempt to work up some feelings of their own, or they sit down and wait for the uprising of some inward light, or the coming down of new revelation.
And now, having said this much as to faith itself, let me add a few words as to that which it receives, “‘ the glorious gospel of the blessed God.” That which we preach, and that which faith believes, “is the glad tidings of great joy.” It is God’s testimony to his own character, his declaration of his gracious mind towards the sinner, the utterance of his manifold yearnings
* Trail’s Works, vol. ii. p. 51.
+ Exposition of Romans, vol. ii. p. 567.
See a very strong one in Alleine’s Alarm to the Unconverted. Chap. ii. § 3.
over his lost and long-wandered offspring. That which we make known is the story of divine love. We tell men that there is such a thing as love in God towards the sinful; that this love hath found vent to itself in a righteous way, and that to the participation and en-Joyment of this love anu are welcome. We show them how God has opened up his heart, to let them see what riches of grace are there; and how he has done a work upon the earth by which we may measure the infinite dimensions of that gracious heart. These are the NEWs we bring. ‘These are the tidings which we present to sinners, to be believed, and to be rejoiced in with joy unspeakable and full of glory. These tidings are free; truly, absolutely, unconditionally free. They are without money and without price. ‘They make known the exceeding riches of the grace of God. They show us how these riches are pouring themselves freely out upon this fallen world. They tell us that not only is there grace in God for sinners, but also that that grace has found vent to itself, and is flowing down in a righteous channel to unrighteous men. They tell us that the darkness is past, and the true light has risen upon the world. They tell us that the veil is rent from top to bottom, and that every sinner may go freely in. They tell us that there is forgiving love in the bosom of the Father, of which every sinner, without exception, is invited to avail himself. They point each wandering eye to the cross, that it may read there the Divine compassion, the yearning tenderness of Him who made us,
towards the lost, the rebellious, the unholy..
They come up to every man, and invite him to partake of all the fulness of God: they make no exception, but address themselves, in all their gladness and amplitude, to each man as he stands. ‘* Whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely.” Hear the words of Trail: ‘“Shall we tell men that unless they be holy, they must not believe on Jesus Christ; that they must not venture on Christ for salvation till they be qualified and fit to be received and welcomed by him? This were to forbear preaching the gospel at all, or to forbid all men to come to Christ. For never was any sinner qualified for Christ. He is well qualified fur us; but a sinner out of Christ hath no qualification for Christ but sin and misery... .. Shall we warn people that they should not believe on Christ too soon? It is impossible that they should do it too soon. Can a man obey the gospel command too soon;
— — — — or do the great work of God too soon?
If he should say, what is it to believe on Jesus Christ? As to this, I find no such question in the word, but that all did some way understand the notion of it. They all, both Christ’s enemies and disciples, knew that faith in him was believing that the man, Jesus of Nazareth, was the Son of God, the Messiah and Saviour of the world, so as to receive and look for sal. vation in his name. If he yet ask what he is to believe, you tell him that he is not called to believe that he is in Christ, that his sins are pardoned, and that he is a justified man; but that he is to believe God’s record concerning Christ; and that this record is, that God giveth, (that is, offereth,) to us eternal life in his Son, Jesus Christ, and that all who with the heart believe this report, and rest their souls on these glad tidings, shall be saved. If he still say that believing is hard, ask what it is he finds makes believing difficult to him? Is it unwillingness to be saved? Is it a distrust of the truth of the gospel record? This he dare not own. Is it a doubt of Christ’s ability or good-will to save? This is to contradict the testimony of God in the gospel.... If he say that he cannot believe on Christ, and that a divine power is needful to draw it forth,
‘ 14 which he finds not, you tell him that believing in Jesus Christ, is no work, but a resting on Jesus Christ, and that this pretence is as miserable as if a man, wearied with his journey, and who is not able to go one step farther, should argue, I am so tired that I am not able to lie down, when, indeed, he can neither stand nor go.”*
But it may be asked, how is all this freeness consistent with Christ’s substitution for his church alone? I answer, that the gospel is not ‘Christ died for the elect;” neither is it, ‘¢Christ died for all.” But it is, ‘Christ died for sinners.” It was thus that the apostles preached and that men believed. Any reader of the Acts of the Apostles may see this. They preached the glad tidings in such terms as these: “‘l’o him give all the prophets witness, that through his name, whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins,” Acts x. 43. Or again, ‘‘ Be it known unto you, men and brethren, that through this,man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins; and by him all that believe are justified from all things from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses,” xili. 38.
The passage in 1 Corinthians (xv. 3) is often
* Select Practical Writings of Trail, issued by the Cheap Publication Committee, pp. 153, 161.
appealed to as a proof that the apostles preached everywhere that Christ died for all. I have already remarked, that in the only book in which we have a full account of their preaching (Acts,) there is nothing of this kind stated. And, in regard to this passage, I would just ask any one, how it is possible to extort such a declaration out of it? The apostle went to Corinth. He stood up in a city of heathens. He cried out, ‘* Christ died for owr sins.” He did not say ‘‘for all and every one;” nay, he did not say “for your sins;” he simply said “for our sins.’ Now I have no wish to restrict the gospel, or to make it appear as if not literally and actually free to all. But it is plain that the words here are more restrictive than usual. So much so, that had there been some cavilling hearer in the way, he might have said, like some modern objectors, — “Oh! he does not preach the gospel; he says, Christ died for owr sins;” he should have said, ‘‘ Christ died not for our sins only, but for the sins of all.”
The man who lays the stress of what he calls the gospel upon the all, the me, or on the other hand, upon the elect or the church, plainly does not preach the gospel as the apostles did. And the man, who, in believing, is turning his whole thoughts to these words, is going aside from the glad tidings themselves. He is thinking of nothing but himself, and the bearing of the gospel upon himself alone. He is losing sight of the glorious revelation of Himsetr which God has made in the gospel, and is only concerned about that part of it which he thinks includes his own salvation. But how is this, you will ask? For this obvious reason, that it is not with the work of Christ as a work done specially for myself, that I have in the first place to do, in believing, but as a work which opens up to me the grace of God. It shows me that there is such a thing as grace, or free love to sinners, It is the pledge of its reality and the measure of its extent and dimensions. Whether we suppose it to be a work done for many or few, still it is the declaration of God’s free love, and it is that free love that is the sinner’s resting-place. The real question that troubles an anxious soul is in substance this: “Is there free love in God, free love reaching even to the vilest, — free love which no amount of sin can either repel or quench? Is there enough of that free love to reach even to me and remedy a case like mine?” ‘The work of Christ settles all these perplexities, and yet in settling them it does not raise the question, ‘* was that work done specially for me,” any more than it raises the question, “‘am I elected or not?” It is the meaning of that work to which an inquirer has to look in the first place, not to its ultimate and particular destination. He who understands the character of God as the Lord God merciful and gracious, will not be disquieted by the subtle suggestion of the evil one, Am I elected? So he who understands the work of Christ, which is the grand exposition and opening up of that character, will never think of putting the question, Was that work specially intended for me? Apart from such a question, that work contairfs enough to remove all his fears.*
* “It is a real and important truth, that election and redemption are thus particular and sovereign, not universal nor conditional. But remember, though the redemption by Christ is not universal in its intention, yet it is so in its proclamation, which is to be universally believed for salvation: John iil. 14-19, Read over these verses, and you may see that here are good news, here are glad tidings indeed, presented to gain the confidence of poor helpless sinners. This free grace requires no previous marks or evidences of our own particular election or redemption, in order to afford immediate relief to the mind in believing it to be thus open and free. It is true God by his word requires us to believe the doctrines of particular election and redemption, in order to give us a view of the sovereignty of his grace, and to prevent us from thinking it to be any way conditional, or suspended upon any actings of ours. But yet it does by no means require us to believe our own particular election or redemption, in order to our hope God-ward. It presents the
14% ‘Christ died for atu,” it is said, and this is the gospel. Well, granting that it is so, what does this mean? Did he by dying infallibly secure salvation for all? Oh, no. Did he by dying infallibly secure the Holy Spirit for all? Oh, no. Did he by dying infallibly secure regeneration, and faith, and love, for all? Oh, no. Then, I ask, what is meant by his dying for all, beyond what John Owen lays down in his work on the death of Christ: ‘ Sufficient was the sacrifice of Christ for the redemption of the whole world, and for the expiation of all the sins of all and every man in the world?” Or wherein does their gospel present a freer or larger aspect to all men than does the following statement of a recent American divine:
‘The righteousness of Christ therefore, consisting in the obedience and death demanded by the law under which all men are placed, is adapted to all men. It is also of infinite value, being the righteousness of the eternal Son of redemption by Jesus Christ directly before us, as full and free; and wheresoever this takes proper effect upon the mind, conscience, and conduct, this is the proper and sure evidence of our own election. For our election of God is known by the gospel coming with power, 1 Thess. i. 4, 5, Say not then, Who shall ascend into heaven to see whether our names are in the book of life? But look into the gospel, »and see whether thy name asa sinner be not there, and whether
the grace therein revealed, is not free for thee and for any.” — Brief Thoughts on the Gospel.
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God, and therefore sufficient for all. On these two grounds, its adaptation to all, and its sufhciency for all, rests the offer made in the gospel to all. With this, its design has nothing to do; who are to be saved by it we do not know. It is of such a nature and value, that whosoever accepts of it shall be saved. If one of the non-elect should believe, (though the hypothesis is on various accounts unreasonable, ) to him that righteousness should be imputed for his salvation. And if one. of the elect should not believe, or having believed, should apostatize, he would certainly perish. ‘These suppositions are made simply to show, that according to our doctrine, the reason why any man perishes, is not that there is no righteousness provided suitable and adequate to his case, or that it is not freely offered to all that hear the gospel, but simply because he wilfully rejects the proffered salvation. Our doctrine, therefore, provides for the universal offer of the gospel, and for the righteous condemnation of unbelievers, as thoroughly as Dr. Beman’s. It
opens the door for mercy, as far as legal obstructions are concerned, as fully as his; while it meets all the other revealed facts of the case. It is not a theory for one fact. It includes them all, — the fact that Christ died by covenant for his own people; that love for his own sheep led him to lay down his life; that his death renders their salvation absolutely certain; that it opens the way for the offer of salvation to all men, and shows the justice of the condemnation of unbelief. No MAN PERISHES FOR THE WANT OF AN ATONEMENT, is the doctrine of the Synod of Dort; it is also our doctrine.”*
But whilst such is the gospel, you will perhaps ask me what I think of the doctrine of assurance, aS maintained by the holders of the new theology. On this point I have the following remarks to offer.
1. The doctrine of assurance is stated and pressed by many of them in a most arrogant and offensive way; so much so, indeed, that the word has become a suspicious one. ‘They make a god of their assurance, and condemn with the utmost flippancy and ease every one who does not come up to their standard of assurance. Just say that you believe, say that you are perfectly assured of your salvation — join the sect, and this will cover many defects which others would not have consented to overlook. I have been often both amazed and shocked at the vain-glorious boastings of as-
* Hodge on the Extent of the Atonement.
surance, and the contemptuous condemnation of others, which are indulged in. Ah! it is easy to speak of assurance, to boast of it, to despise others for not having it; but it is not so easy to “walk humbly with our God.” And I have seen such pride, such unmeekness, such boasting, such sectarianism, such censoriousness, such evil speaking, in connection with this pretended assurance, that I could not help coming to the conclusion, that the man who could boast of his assurance while indulging in such tempers, was deceiving himself or others most grossly, and had no title to the name of Christian at all. Iam not prepared to deny the name of Christian to men, simply because they hold much that I conceive to be error; but I am quite prepared to deny such a name to the proud, the censorious, the uncharitable boasters of their assurance.
2. ‘The doctrine of assurance is made wholly to rest upon the doctrine that Christ died for all, in the most universal sense. It is maintained that there can be no assurance if this be not its foundation.* ‘Christ died for me,”
* Perhaps these asserters of universal redemption might
learn something from one whom in several respects they considerably resemble — Robert Sandeman, He remarks — is that which every sinner is called upon to believe. Yet it is maintained, at the same time, that Christ did not die for any, so as actually to secure salvation for them, but merely to make it possible to them! And to believe that Christ died so as to make salvation possible to me, is all I need to believe in order to have assurance!
3. The doctrine of assurance sounds very strangely in the lips of men who deny the perseverance of the saints. No man, it is said, can be a Christian who is not assured of his salvation, yet a saint may fall from grace. Can any thing be more utterly absurd than this? In becoming a Christian, I am to be quite sure of being saved, yet I am also to believe that I may fall away and be lost. What is this but telling me that I am to be sure of heaven, and yet I am not to be sure of it? It is plain, then, that if the doctrine of the saints’ perseverance be denied, there can be no such thing as assurance. It is an absurdity, an impossibility. The doctrine of assurance implies that of perseverance, and that of perseverance implies that of election.
“If Christ died for them who perish, then the happiness of them who are saved must be owing to something else beside his death.” — Letters, vol. i. p. 26.
’
But having made these remarks, I would not leave the matter here. While I say these things, I am not denying assurance. Far from it.* I would maintain it most strenuously as a vital and momentous truth. The doctrine of the Reformation, and that which Popery hated so mortally, was, “that a man is justified through faith alone, and that he must know that he is justified.’t And in truth, HOW CAN THERE BE OTHERWISE PEACE OF CONSCIENCE, OR PEACE wiTH God? But just in proportion as I would prize and preach the true doctrine of ‘assurance of God’s love,” and ‘‘peace of conscience,” according to the words of our Catechism, in that very proportion would I condemn and warn you against the flippant, boastful assurance of our day. ‘Peace with God” is the most humbling, solemnizing, and sanctifying of all truths. And when I see no such fruits brought forth by those who speak of it so loudly, I would beseech you to be upon your guard, lest the peace into which you may thus be led be the peace of a seared conscience, or the peace of a
* Samuel Rutherford says, “Make meikle of assurance, for it keepeth your anchor fixed.” — Letters, vol. ii. p. 174.
+ See that precious little German work, Sanders’ Jehovah Zidkenu, p. 20.
hard heart, or the peace of the devil, or the peace of the fancy or the flesh.
As to the doctrine of assurance, I should like to have spoken at some length. This, however, I cannot do without curtailing other points of much moment to which I am hastening on. To be as brief as possible, and to give greater weight to what I advance, I would quote from that admirable work of Mr. Haldane’s, to which I have already referred. He thus writes: — ‘The full assurance of faith in which believers are commanded to draw near to God, stands inseparably connected with having their hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience. An evil conscience accuses a man as guilty, as liable to punishment, and keeps him at a distance from God, regarding him as an enemy and avenger, so that the natural enmity of the mind is strengthened. On the contrary, a good conscience is a conscience discharged from guilt by the blood of Christ. Conscience — tells a man that the wages of sin is death, and that he is liable to it; but when the atonement made by Christ is believed in, it is seen that the punishment due for sin, which is death, has been inflicted on him, the demands of the — law have been fulfilled, and its penalty suf- — fered. On this the believer rests, and his conscience is satisfied. It is thus purged from dead works; and this is what is called the answer of a good conscience toward God. (1 Pet. li. 21.) This answer of a good conscience cannot be separated from assurance of our acceptance with him to whom we draw near, and the degree in which both this assurance and a@ good conscience are enjoyed will be equal.
‘The same is true respecting the grace of hope. ‘This, as well as having a good conscience, purged from dead works (the duty of possessing which, no Christian will deny,) stand
inseparably connected with the personal assurance of an interest in the Saviour, and all of them lie at the foundation of love to God, and consequently of acceptable obedience to him. We love him when we see that he hath loved us, and that his Son is the propitiation for our sins. How can there be love without a sense of reconciliation with God, and how can the fruits of joy and peace be brought forth, till the conscience is discharged from guilt? Love proceeds from a pure heart, a pure heart from a good conscience, and a good conscience from true faith,
‘Tn the hope of the promised salvation they who received the doctrine of the apostles rejoiced as soon as it was announced to them, Acts i. 41; viii. 39; xvi. 34. ‘Their joy then had not its source in reflecting upon or being conscious of their faith, although afterwards so confirmed, but arose from the view they had of the glory and all-sufliciency of the Saviour and his perfect righteousness, made theirs by faith, resting on the Divine warrant and promise. Although the assurance of sense be confirmatory of the assurance of faith, it is not so strong as the latter. ‘ Sanctification,’ says Rutherford, ‘does not evidence justification as faith does evidence it, with such a sort of clearness as light evidences colors, though it be no sign or evident mark of them; but as smoke evidences fire, and as the morning-star in the east evidences that the sun will shortly rise, or
as the streams prove there is a head-spring from whence they issue; — so doth sanctification give —
evidence of justification only as marks, signs, effects, give evidence of the cause. But the light of faith, the testimony of the Spirit, will cause us, as it were, to see justification and faith, not by report, but as we see the sun’s light.’ ‘If it be objected, that a man cannot know
that he has faith without seeing its effects, it is replied that this is contrary to fact. When —
a thing is testified, or a promise is made to us,
. oe ee eee ee ee ae eee ee eee — we know whether or not we believe it, or trust init. According to this objection, when Philip said, ‘If thou believest with all thine heart thou mayest,’ the eunuch should have replied, you ask me to tell you a thing I cannot know; but instead of this he answers, ‘I believe.’ When the Lord asked the blind man, ‘ Believest thou in the Son of God? he did not ask a question whigh it was impossible to answer. ‘In this first act of believing,’ says Mr. Bell on the Covenants, ‘sinners have no evidence of grace in themselves; they feel nothing within but sin; they see a word without them as the sole foundation of faith; and on that alone they build for eternity; this is a point of no small importance to saints and sinners.’ Many of the modern builders are at great pains to keep their hearers from all confidence, till they first discern the evidences of grace in their hearts, and having got evidence, then, and not till then can they have any just, lawful, or well-grounded confidence; nay, they seem pretty plainly to intimate that a sinner’s right to Christ turns on something wrought in him, or done by him, and till he have evidence of this he can claim no interest in Christ, nor assure himself of salvation by him. According to this, Christ, the tree of life, is forbidden fruit, which the sinner must not touch till he has seen inward evidence. I confess that I have not so learned Christ.... The religion of the church of Rome leaves a man nothing but doubts respecting his salvation. It teaches that a Christian should believe in general the promises of God, while the application to himself of these promises, and the assurance of God’s love, it calls presumption. This subjegb was one of the grand points of discussion between that church and the reformers. But how many Protestants have forsaken the ground which their predecessors here occupied, and have gone over to their opponents? The doctrine of the duty of our personal assurance of salvation, and the persuasion of our interest in Christ, is denied by many, and even doubts concerning this are converted into evidence of faith, although they are directly opposed to it. Doubts of a personal interest in Christ are evidences either of little faith or of no faith.”*
Such is the doctrine of assurance, as stated by one whose jealousy for every jot and tittle of Divine truth gives peculiar weight to all he wrote. And with this statement I leave the subject. The sentences I have quoted are worthy of being pondered. While they give
* Haldane on the Romans, vol. ii. p. 418-428, no countenance to the boastful assurance of the false professor, they equally condemn those who either deny that there can be assurance, or who place it afar off, — at the end instead of the beginning of the believer’s career; who discountenance the idea of its immediate pos-Session; who actually prefer the doubting to the assured Christian; nay, who make doubts an evidence of faith, darkness an evidence of light!
There is great danger of making a Saviour of our actings, our feelings, or our faith. These may steal the heart away from Christ as effectually as the works of the self-right- ~eous. ‘I’he search for these, in which many seem to spend their lives, and which makes up the religion of not a few, is often Satan’s subtle device for drawing the eye off from the cross of Christ.
There is oftentimes a far greater prominence given to what man has to do in order to be saved, than what God has done for his salvation. It is the latter, not the former, that contains the Gospel, for it is the latter that opens up the riches of the grace of God. It is not the sight of what we do or feel, but the sight of what Christ has done and felt, that relieves our consciences, removes our burdens, and fills the soul with assured peace. As preachers of the everlasting Gospel, we come to tell the sinner not what he has to do, but wuat God Has pone. It is this that is the ‘“‘oood news,” the “glad tidings of great joy” which are freely preached to atu. ‘I am come a light unto the world, that whosoever believeth in me should not walk in darkness.’’*
And it is a righteous as well as a gracious Gospel which we preach. Christ’s death has made it a righteous thing in God to send you the free message of salvation, a message as honest and sincere as it is free. God is making proposals to you! He is making them in real earnest. -His heart is in unison with his words. He desires your return, and stands ready to welcome and to bless. His are no random words, no feigned invitations, no exaggerated or delusive promises. He does not
* We have somewhere read a statement to this effect, “that God offers salvation to them that believe, and to them alone.” How absurd, as well as how unscriptural! Thus Satan drives men from one extreme to the other! As if salvation were not presented freely to art! As if the invitation were not * WHOSOEVER WILL, let him take of the water of life freely.” To say that God offers salvation to those that believe, is to make our faith the cause or ground of this offer, which is, in truth, a worse kind of Arminianism than that which is professed to be condemned. God presents salvation to all; he gives it to those that believe. The presentation is wniversal; the bestowment is special.
mean to mock or deceive you. ‘* Remember,” says Dr. Owen, ‘that the proposal made unto you this day cost no less than the price of the blood of the Son of God. It is the fruit of the travail of his soul. For this he prayed, he wept, he suffered, he died. And shall it now be neglected or despised by you? Will you yet count the blood of the covenant a common thing? Will you exclude yourselves from all benefit of the purchase of those terms, and only leave your souls to answer for the contempt of the price whereby they were purchased.’’*
I am yours, &c.
THUS SAITH THE LORD:
“Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.” — Isa. xlv. 22.
“Hear, and your souls shall live.” — Isa. lv. 3
“God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.’ — John iii. 16.
“He who heareth my*word and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life.’ — John vy. 24.
“These things are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life through his name. John xx. 31.
“To him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.” — Rom. iv. 5.
* On the 130th Psalm, p. 633. — Tract. Soc, Hdition.
“Being justified by faith we have peace with God.” — Rom. vy. 1.
“In whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him.”’ — Eph. iii. 12.
“We have known and believed the love that God hath to us.” — 1 John iv. 16.
“This is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.” — 1 John y. 11.