Vital godliness : a treatise on experimental and practical piety

Front matter

A TREATISE

ON

EXPEEIMENTAL

CHAPTER V. A sense of wretcliedness - 64

CHAPTER YI.

Conviction — Conversion 82

CHAPTER yn.

Cases of religious distress 106

CHAPTER Vin.

Spiritual darkness - 127

CHAPTER IX.

Backsliding 148

CHAPTER X.

Faith 173

CHAPTER XI.

Kepentance 210

6 CONTENTS.

CHAPTER Xn.

Humility 249

CHAPTER XIII.

The fear of God 287

CHAPTER XIV.

Hope 307

CHAPTER XV.

Love to God 327,

CHAPTER XVI.

Love to Christ 347

CHAPTER XVn.

Ix)ve to our neighbor - - - - -- 369

CHAPTER XVin.

Love to the brethren 393

CHAPTER XIX.

Peace - 411

CHAPTER XX.

Courage 431

CHAPTER XXI.

Contentment - 454

CHAPTER XXII.

Patience 482

CHAPTER XXin.

Joy 514

CHAPTER XXIV.

Zeal 551

CHAPTER XXV.

Concluding observations - 575

FuU alphabetical index 605

Chapter I. General Eemaeks On Eeligious Expeei- Ence

The test of real character is to be sought in each man's experience. He who has never exercised faith, repentance, love, humility, hope, and joy, cannot be profited by his theories and speculations on these subjects. All knowledge which is unfelt and inoperative puffs up the mind and hardens the heart. It is better to have the workings of gracious affections than to be able to define them, or to speak ever so learnedly respecting them. The great use of a large part of divine truth is rightly to affect our minds and hearts, and so to control our practice.

It is often doubted whether the present age is remarkable for depth of religious feeling. In many cases ministers preach a low experience.

The consequence is painful laxity in religious practice. Among many professors there is a manifest disinclination to converse on vital subjects in religion. This is a great evil. Although hypocrites may babble on such topics, yet true Christians should not thereby be deterred from telling what God has done for their souls, or from diligently seeking to discover and commend the highest style of holy living. Perhaps on all branches of these subjects there is less preaching than formerly. A minister of this generation said that he had received many hundreds of printed sermons sent out by his brethren, and that among them all he remembered but one on the subject of experimental religion. Yet it is noticeable that when a preacher of ability and sound discrimination discusses any branch of this subject, he is always highly acceptable to the best class of professors.

The testimonies to the necessity of experimental piety are exceedingly numerous. Almost every fit form of expression is employed by inspired writers to teach us this great trutl}.c Thus says David, "0 taste and see that the Lord is good ; blessed is the man that trusteth in him." Psa. 34 : 8. " Come and hear, all

KELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE. 9

ye that fear Grod, and I will declare what he hath done for my soul." Psa. 66 : 16. So Elihu said, ''Suffer me a little, and I will show thee that I have yet to speak on God's behalf." Job 36:2. Often in the Scriptures religious experience is expressed by hungering and thirsting, by eating and drinking. Isa. 55 : 1 ; Matt. 5:6; Song 5:1; John 6 : 53-58. Job, David, and Isaiah all inform us of the power of religious experience in their own case. Job 42 : 5, 6 ; Psa. 51 ; Isa. 6 : 5.

Nor is the testimony of uninspired men on this point less harmonious. Eichard Baxter says, "The way to have the firmest belief of the Christian faith is to draw near and taste and try it, and lay bare the heart to receive the impression of it ; and then, by the sense of its admirable effects, we shall know that which bare speculation could not discover. Though there must be a belief on other grounds first, so much as to let in the word into the soul, and to cause us to submit our hearts to its operations, yet it is this experience that must strengthen it and confirm it. If any man will do the will of Christ, he shall know that the doctrine is of God. John 7 : 17. The melody of music is better known by hearing it than

1* by reports of it, and the sweetness of meat is known better by tasting than by hearsay, though upon report we may be drawn to taste and try. So is there a spiritual sense in us of the effects of the gospel on our own hearts, which will cause men to love it and hold it fast against the cavils of deceivers or the temptations of the great deceiver."

John Owen says, ''Experience is the food of all grace, which it grows and thrives upon. Every taste that faith obtains of divine love and grace, or how gracious the Lord is, adds to its measure and stature. Two things therefore must briefly be declared: 1. That the experience of the reality, excellency, power, and ef&cacy of the things that are believed, is an effectual means of increasing faith and love. 2. That it is the Holy Ghost which gives us this experience."

John Newton says, "Experience is the Lord's school, and they who are taught by him usually learn by the mistakes they make that they have no wisdom, and by the slips and falls they meet with that they have no strength."

Charles Buck says, "The report of the blessings of the religion of Christ, or the intel-

EELIGIOUS EXPEEIENCE. 11

ligence that provision is made for guilty man, can be of no avail without a real participation of them. We must not perceive only, but we must feel; and feeling, of course we experience."

President Edwards the elder says, "A gracious experience arises from operations and influences which are spiritual, from an inward principle which is divine, a communication of God, a participation of the divine nature : Christ living in the heart, the Holy Spirit dwelling there in union with the faculties of the soul as an internal vital principle, exerting his own proper nature in the exercise of those faculties. Now it is no wonder that that which is divine is powerful and effectual, for it has omnipotence on its side."

The late Dr. John M'Dowell says, "If we be Christians, we shall delight to meet with our fellow-Christians, and engage with them in conversation on experimental piety. And true religion must either be very low or be entirely wanting in the heart of that person who seldom speaks on the subject, or extends not his conversation beyond the doctrines and forms of religion, or speaks in an uninterested or heartless manner. The Scripture saints, as appears from their history, engaged much in religious conversation."

Yet it is to be regretted that but few modern books treat of this subject. Doctrinal discussions, treatises on the history of the Bible, on branches of Scripture morals, and on church government, are numerous. But rarely do we find able men turning their attention to the work of God in the soul. It was not always so. In the seventeenth century the ablest productions of the greatest minds were on experimental religion. The exceeding popularity of a few books, first published in our own age, shows that so far as there is piety, such reading is in great demand. This will be more and more so as true religion shall prevail.

It is admitted that the subject of experimental religion is not free from difficulties. But most of these are theoretical, rather than practical. Yet those which grow out of the deceitfulness of sin and the temptations of the great adversary, should be carefully studied by all persons, by religious teachers in particular, and the consolations of God sought out and administered accordingly. It is also worthy of notice that the best treatises in this department of religious literature are often nar-

KELIGIOUS EXPEEIENCE. 13

ratives of the dealings of God with particular persons. Religious biography constitutes a very useful and popular part of a well-chosen library. If the time shall come when the memoirs of Halyburton and Brainerd shall be unwelcome to the great body of God's people, then indeed the glory will have departed.

John Newton remarks that " it is to be lamented that in this enlightened age, so signalized by the prevalence of the spirit of investigation, religion should by man}^ be thought the only subject unworthy of a serious inquiry; and that while in every branch of science they studiously endeavor to trace every fact to its proper and adequate cause, and are cautious of admitting any theory which cannot stand the test of experiment, they treat the use of the term experimental, when applied to religion, with contempt."

The tendency of this age is to become vague and superficial. In giving an account of the work of God on one or many, there is a proneness to deal in generals and avoid particulars. In some cases there may be reasons of delicacy for saying little ; nor is it necessary to present individuals by name or description of person before the community. But how refreshing it would be to meet with a recent narrative like that which President Edwards has given of one who is now understood to have been the person who afterwards became his wife. In their narratives of revivals of religion, the old magazines often present quite a contrast to many of our modern journals. This deficiency has sometimes been noticed and a desire for a change expressed, but we seem to be getting further and further from the old paths.

Yet let us not be discouraged. Let us labor to banish unreasonable prejudices against this subject as a proper topic of familiar or religious conversation. This will be no easy task. So many ignorant men have spoken things which they ought not, so many weak men have uttered folly, and so many bad men have obtruded their erroneous views upon the attention of others, that some have been quite disgusted with the whole matter. Thus it has come to pass that even in the free church of Scotland a candidate for the ministry is not examined as to his acquaintance with experimental religion or his motives for seeking the sacred office. But it is never safe to argue from the abuse of any thing against its use.

RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE. 15

Not only in preaching, but in tlieir private walks, pastors might exert a happy influence on this subject. Let them converse freely and fully with those seeking admission to the Lord's table. In their pastoral visits let not this subject be forgotten. Sometimes it may be well to leave particular questions to be answered or talked over on a subsequent interview. It would also be well if all that class of able works which have handled the different branches of this subject were brought into general use in our churches. John Newton has long been a favorite. His writings on experimental religion contributed much to the revival of piety in the latter part of the eighteenth and the early part of the nineteenth centuries. John Owen on Indwelling Sin is more profound than any thing Newton ever wrote. One of the best works on the whole subject is Guthrie's Trial of a Saving Interest in Christ. Dr. Archibald Alexander on Eeligious Experience is admirably suited to awaken a fondness for this kind of reading.

But more than any thing else, we always need in the church a copious outpouring of God's Spirit on the hearts of his people, giving them a zest for spiritual things and a great desire for a full assurance of understanding, offaith and of hope. Many real Christians have made but low attainments, and are too little dissatisfied with their present state. One who should speak and act with the* zeal and ardor of Paul, of Knox, of Welsh, of Whitefield, or of Henry Martyn, would by the thoughtless world be esteemed mad. But wisdom is justified of her children. The truly regenerate and growing Christian will not be offended at sound views on this subject.

It may encourage us to study this subject, to remember that, though in unessential particulars there is an endless diversity in the experience of men, yet in all that necessarily belongs to vital piety there is a substantial agreement. Perhaps a more striking contrast could hardly be found between two men, than between John Newton and Occum the Indian preacher. Yet Newton says of the latter, that ''in describing to me the state of his heart, when he was a blind idolater, he gave me in general a striking picture of what my own was in the early part of my own life ; and his subsequent views of the gospel corresponded with mine as face answers to face in a glass."

John Owen also says, " As sin worketh in

RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE. 17

one, so doth it in another; as grace is effectual in one, so is it in another ; as he that prayeth longeth for mercy and grace, so do they that join with him. Of the same kind with his hatred of sin, his love to Christ, his laboring after holiness and conformity to the will of God, are also those in other believers. And hence it is that persons 'praying in thq Spirit' according to their own experience, are oftentimes sup-, posed by every one in the congregation rather to pray over their condition than their own.''

Nor is there any way of preserving men from falling into error respecting the true nature of religion, but by bringing them to feel its power. "The head maybe strengthened till the heart is starved." Indeed, infidelity itself will be sure to gain a footing in a community where vital godliness is not experienced. John Owen truly says, "The owning of the Scripture to be the word of God bespeaks a divine majesty, authority, and power to be present in it and with it. Wherefore, after men who have for a long time so professed, do find that they never had any real experience of such a divine presence in it by any effects upon their own minds, they grow insensibly regardless of it, or to allow it a very common jDlace in their thoughts. When they have worn off the impressions that were on their minds from tradition, education, and custom, they do for the future rather not oppose it than in any way believe it. And when once a reverence unto the word of God on account of its authority is lost, an assent unto it on account of its truth will not long abide. And all such persons, under a concurrence of temptations and outward occasions, will either reject it or prefer other guides before it."

There is not a doctrine of revelation the power of which ought not to be felt in the human soul. If God is revealed to us in a trinity of persons, as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, it is that we may love and serve and worship him just as he is revealed. If Jesus Christ made a vicarious atonement, that great doctrine is revealed to us that we may rest the whole weight of our salvation upon it. If men are totally depraved, that truth ought to be known and felt, that the whole salvation of the gospel may be sought and secured. Nothing therefore can be more unphilosoiDhical than to charge that experimental religion and wild enthusiasm are synonymous terms.

RELIGIOUS EXPEEIENCE. 19

If men dead in sin are ever to be restored to spiritual life, they must be the subjects of a mighty work of grace ; they must be taught of God ; they must be born from above ; they must be called out of darkness into God's marvellous light ; they must be renewed in the inner man.

The advantages of experience are felt in all the affairs of life. The truths we know by experience are worth more to a wise man than all he can learn from the demonstrative sciences or the reasonings of others. In all the departments of life, he who has experience has qualifications denied to the mere theorist or scholar. Eeligious experience puts us on our guard against the snares of the world, the flesh, and the devil. It teaches us modesty, self-distrust, and humility. It causes us to abound in all prudence. It gives us a delightful confirmation in the truth. It fits us for doing good to an extent far beyond what we could ever attain by instruction in the letter of God's word.

All the friends of true religion ought carefully to guard against the abuses of religious experience. They should be very careful to avoid all vain boasting, a sin into which men easily fall. They should learn wisely to discriminate between the genuine and the spurious, between effects produced by divine truth on the one hand and by nervous temperament on the other. They should be especially careful not to rely on any past attainments which do not produce present good fruit. Any exercise of the mind which leads us to dulne^s in devotion, to carelessness about holy living, to want of zeal for the salvation of men, is not gracious. It may be well here to state that there is nothing gained by substituting, as some seem disposed to do, the term consciousness for that of exjperience. There is no word better explained in religious literature than the word experience, and such a change of terms is likely to induce confusion.

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Chapter II. Early Eeligious Impressions

The early exercises of a soul turning to God have unusual interest, because they are connected with the setting up of Christ's kingdom in the heart. The mind of man has a peculiar delight in contemplating the origin of things, and in seeing them rise to vigor. This is so in the growth of grain, plants, and trees, in the beginning of revolutions, in the founding of empires, and in the early struggles of mind to rise to worth and greatness. But the early history of religious impressions has vast interest, from the fact that it is the soul that is then saved and restored to communion with God. Cecil says, "The history of a man's life is to himself the most interesting history in the world, next to that of the Scriptures.'' The reason is that it is a detailed account of what he has learned in the school of experience.

AWAKENING.

The work of God for the recovery of the soul of man begins in what is fitly spoken of as an awakening. A revival of religion a century ago was often so called. It was a good name. It described an effect produced both on saints and sinners. The term seems to be scriptural. ''It is high time to awake out of sleep." ''Awake to righteousness, and sin not." "Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light." Rom. 13 : 11 ; 1 Cor. 15 : 34 ; Eph. 5 : 14. The peculiar fitness of this mode of speaking arises from the fact that the stupor of a sinful state is aptly compared to sleep. That sleep is guilty. It is also profound. It is like the sleep of death, from which none awake but by the power of God. Indulged a little longer, it will prove fatal. There is a time when every subject of divine grace is awaked from spiritual lethargy. This awakening is sometimes so gentle, that its commencement can hardly be fixed to any date. Again, it at once arouse:? the whole soul. It has often been noticed, that in some cases it is preceded by peculiar thoughtlessness, or even by outbreaking wickedness. But when God's time has come, he effectually arouses the soul, and makes his arrows sharp in the heart of the King's enemies. The means employed to this end are various.

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God often puts great honor on the very words of Scripture. " The word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.'' Heb. 4 : 12. ''The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul." Psa. 19:7. Sometimes the mere reading of God's word is blessed to this end ; and if men could be prevailed on to examine and ponder its truths more than they do, they would oftener begin the search for a Saviour. Even of the darkest book of the New Testament it is said, "Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein." Eev. 1:3. Some writers of the seventeenth century notice the fact that God honored the phrase, "And he died," which occurs so often in the fifth chapter of Genesis, to the awakening of a great sinner. It is an interesting exercise in which little circles, composed of religious people, sometimes engage, to inquire what portion of God's word was thus first deeply impressed on the mind of each one.

The word of God preached is still more frequently blessed to the same end. Thus many thousands were awakened on the day of Pentecost. Modern times give us instance's of many hundreds impressed under one gospel sermon. The church of God still sings, "How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things." "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." Eom. 10 : 15, 17.

Uninspired writings, which contain sound Bible principles and urge divine things on the attention with great tenderness and solemnity, are often greatly blessed to men's salvation. They awake them out of sleep, and bring into exercise all their faculties. It is therefore a good thing to circulate good books. The author has known five persons in one neighborhood brought to deep concern, and finally to a hope in Christ, by reading the first part of Doddridge's Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul.

Sometimes God arouses men from their guilty slumbers by some startling providence or some awful judgment. The sudden death of some loved one starts in the mind of the survivor the question, Where should I now be, if I had been called so soon or with so little

BELIGIOUS IMPKESSIONS. 25

warning? ''When thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness." Isa. 26:9. Personal affliction is sometimes sanctified to the same end. In a respectable Christian church, not long since, every official member was known to have been a thoughtless worldling until God's hand was laid heavily upon him. Many a child of God now says, "Before I was afflicted I went astray; but now have I kept thy word. It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn thy statutes.'^ Psa. 119:67, 71. "In their affliction they will seek me early." Hos. 5 : 15. Manasseh went heedlessly and brutally on in a course of crime and cruelty until dreadful calamities overtook him. Then he "prayed, and God was entreated of him." 2 Chron. 33 : 13.

Sometimes a pious conversation, a kind and friendly admonition, a hint dropped in love, a word fitly spoken, has the same effect. A profane oath, an act of injustice, a debauch, or some other sin, has filled a man's soul with such horror that he has had no peace until he fled to Christ. To show his power, God may make any of our sins to flash condemnation in our face, thus fulfilling the scripture, "Thine

vital Qodllnees. 2 own wickedness shall correct thee." Jer. 2:19.

A powerful means of arousing men to attend to their souls' affairs is the conversion of their fellows, and especially of notorious sinners. Our Lord himself speaks as though he regarded this as the loudest kind of call: '' The publicans and the harlots believed John; and ye, when ye had seen it, repented not afterward, that ye might believe him." Matt. 21 : 32. When rightly considered, the conversion of a fellow-creature is well suited to call up the attention of every candidate for eternity.

Frequently, however, men can give no minute account of the causes or beginnings of their increased attention to religion. Nor is it necessary that they should. A man may not know the steps or causes of his recovery from sickness, and yet he may now be a well man. Often too there is at first nothing very clear in the state of mind of one who is beginning to turn to God. Nothing indeed so much interests him as the general subject of salvation. He sees its importance ; he owns its necessity. The mind also often spends its chief thoughts for a season on one sin, or one point of truth, and this serves as a key to many others.

RELIGIOUS IMPRESSIONS. 27

In this state of awakened interest, the course of thought pursued is as much in accordance with the laws of mind, and is in this sense as natural, as in any period of one's history ; so that the man greatly wonders that he never before saw things on this wise. He greatly marvels, and well he may, that his mind could so long be utterly dead to the things of salvation. Although he may not yet be the subject of a saving change, yet the frame of his soul is very different from what it was. Never before was he in such a state, for he has now fairly entered upon a course of

KELIGIOUS REFLECTION.

The power of reflection is that which chiefly distinguishes a man from a brute ; and the habit of reflection, more than any thing else, distinguishes a wise man from a fool. He must be given over to folly who never looks at the remote bearings and consequences of his actions. Things may easily be done which can never be undone. The silliest may plunge himself into ruin. There is no wise man who is not considerate. The rash, light, heedless must expect in all weighty matters to go astray. Reflection is important in proportion to the gravity of the matter on which we are called to exercise it. As religion is the most important theme on which the human mind is ever fixed, so above all other topics human salvation calls for thought, care, reflection. True religion is as reasonable as it is necessary. To be pious without thoughtfulness is not possible. No one acts so wisely as he who counts the cost, looks well to his state, and entirely consecrates himself to God. In their most solemn appeals, the Scriptures address man as rational: "0 that they would consider." "Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Consider your ways." "I speak as to wise men; judge ye what I say." Deut. 32:29; Hag. 1:7; 1 Cor. 10:15.

Every stage of serious reflection is liable to many interruptions. Yet where God has begun a work of grace in the soul, the mind will not fall into continued thoughtlessness. God will employ suitable means to keep the attention awake. Perhaps he will make the example of the righteous at once a reproof and an encouragement, and that of the wicked a warning and a cause of alarm to the soul ready to settle on its lees. The conduct of the worldly or profane is often held before the

RELIGIOUS IMPRESSIONS. 29

mind as a mirror, in which one sees reflected the wickedness of his own life. If God has not yet shown to the soul the beauty of holiness, he at least enables one to see that the truly pious possess many advantages, and awakens a desire to secure them. It is a point gained when one clearly perceives that the servant of God is the better man. So that in the midst of company and lawful employments one often finds his thoughts eagerl}^ turned to everlasting things. This is proof that God has not abandoned him to the power of all evil. Under such circumstances the talkative man will be inclined to silence and seriousness. He will look at the past, think of the life he has led, recount God's mercies to him, review many parts of his conduct with pain, and say, If I had my life to live over again, I would not do as I have done. I am an unhappy man. My state is sinful. Possibly I may be nigh to a miserable death or an undone eternity. I cannot justify my present course of life. I am not fit to die. I am not holy. Sin is deeply rooted in my nature. Without a great change of character, I shall never be what I ought.

Looking at the future, he remembers that he must live for ever, that ere long* death will summon him into the presence of his Maker, and that without a change in his character and prospects, he must pass from the solemnities of his lone interview with God to the retributions of an unblessed eternity. By this time he has probably become a habitual reader of the Bible and of other religious books. Although sinful shame has still much power over him, yet he thinks prayer useful and obligatory. A fit place of retirement, suitable words to be used, and more than all, a suitable frame of mind, seem to him to be wanting. It will be well for him if Satan does not prevail on him at first quite to restrain prayer. A young man under serious impressions once retired to his room, locked his door, closed the shutters, and was about to pray, when he thought some one might see him through the keyhole. He went to cover that, when a band of music began to play under his window. His attention was drawn off. He offered no prayer then. His seriousness left him. Let men be warned by such a case. Men must call upon God or perish. " Let sinners learn to pray." He who is effectually diverted from prayer, is hopelessly involved in guilt.