DISCRIMINATING GRACE.

How is it that so many professors fight against and hate the glorious doctrines of God's discriminating grace, and so few love them? The fact is, the latter are taught of God, and the former are given up to the hardness and blindness of their hearts, deluded by the devil, the father of lies, and led captive by him at his will. Howbeit, when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you, the chosen ones of the living God, into all truth. The blessed Spirit leads his own into a feeling knowledge of their own state, as lawcondemned, law-cursed, hell-deserving sinners in the sight of a holy and just God. It is a sovereign mercy that God teaches a soul what a hell-born wretch he is; that he is the vilest sinner in or out of hell; that there is no wretch upon the face of the earth who so truly deserves God's wrath as himself; that God would be infinitely just in sending him to the lowest hell; for, remember, it is He that convinces the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment, and the man well knows that sovereign grace, and that alone, must save his soul, or damned he must be; that the blood of Jesus Christ, and that alone, must wash away his guilt. Now hypocrites, not being taught these things, are under the delusion that man has power to turn to God, if he will but exercise that power; that God will have mercy on all, and save all on the ground of their repentance; but the point with the soul that is taught of God is not whether he will turn to God, but whether God will turn to him; not whether he will believe on Christ for salvation, but whether God will give him faith to believe. Yes, and the language of his poor soul is, "Lord, thou canst, if thou wilt, make me clean." Thus the blessed Spirit leads the poor soul on till the set time to favour Zion is come, and He then takes of the things of Jesus, and shows them unto the soul, leading him by faith into a sweet discovery of his interest in a full and finished redemption, that neither men nor devils can undo, and this is so much to the joy of his poor soul that he ascribes all the glory to the Author of it. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it. This is one blessed truth of God which Arminians, in their very soul, hate and abhor; but it is what the dear Lord has taught my soul by feeling experience. Wonder, O my soul! and be astonished that ever the Lord should love thee, in spite of all the floods of rebellion in thy cursed nature against his blessed Majesty. Sometimes I feel myself like a double-dyed, raging devil, let loose out of hell, feeling most dreadful rebellion against his dear self. O, bless his dear and precious name. Wonder, and be astonished, O my soul! when I, O awful wretch, have been determined to rush down the awful precipice into eternal disgrace, and damn my own soul, he has, by his mighty power, kept me up in spite of all the rage and fury of hell. Bless his dear name, that he has not suffered these infernal foes to triumph over my soul. I am a living witness that these waters cannot quench love, for the dear Lord has since revealed it to my heart that he has loved me with an everlasting love. On what can such a rebellious, ugly devil as I am

sometimes, in my own feelings, rest my salvation? On any goodness that I fancy I have in myself? No; all glory crown his dear name, he has, as a sovereign act of his discriminating favour, made me see and feel that from the crown of my head to the sole of my foot I am nothing but one mass of sin and iniquity. Deluded professors of religion tell us that God has done one part, and left the other part for man to do; but these creatures, whose eyes are blinded by the devil, the father of lies, experimentally know not one atom of the depth of their fallen nature, nor one jot of the boundless mercy of God; therefore I do not wonder at their talking at such a blind rate. But the boast of the poor devil-hunted, sin-perplexed, law-condemned, elect vessel of mercy, whose heart God has broken under a feeling sense of his own cursed wanderings and awful backslidings against the dear Lord that has been so good and merciful to him, is, the unchangeableness of God, in his immortal decrees and purposes of everlasting love, as the only foundation on which his poor doubting soul can rest. Take this away, and there is no more hope for me than there is for the damned in hell. This has been the language of my poor soul times without number, under a feeling sense of my horrid crimes and transgressions, intermixed with a sight of the glory and majesty of God. I have been constrained to confess, before him, that he would be just, yea, glorified in my eternal damnation. These things, I am confident, neither mere letter-made Calvinists nor rotten Arminians know anything of. If they did, they would not fight against a feeling religion that will stand against floods and flames; and, O bless his dear and precious name, when the devil and cursed unbelief have set in upon my poor soul with all their fiery darts and hellish fury, telling me God has given me up to a hardened and presumptuous mind; telling me I am left in the very hands of the devil himself; that I am nothing but a vessel of wrath, fitted for destruction, filling up the measure of my iniquity; telling me that I shall soon die, and go to my own place; that I have merited a double damnation, and the longer I live the hotter will be my hell; that I had better put an end to my wretched life at once, or it will be worse for me; when I, horrid to tell, have had the fatal instrument in my hand, fully determined to commit the dreadful act even in spite of God himself; then has the dear, blessed Lord, visibly or invisibly, made known the riches of his grace in plucking me as a brand from hell. Ye hypocrites, ye pharisees, ye that pervert the right ways of God, I record it to the honour of his dear name, I have tried to damn my own soul, but could not; and why? because the everlasting arms of his strength, power, love, and mercy have been underneath me, and prevented me. Wonder, O heavens, and be astonished, O earth! Surely, when my soul arrives in his presence, to see him as he is, to be like him, clothed in his righteousness, free grace, and that alone, will be my song through all eternity. These things bring my soul to bless his dear name for such precious declarations as these: "My sheep are mine; I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish;" "Preserved in Christ Jesus, and called;" "For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers,

nor things present, nor things to come," (no, bless his dear name, nor nor all the powers of hell and sin united together,) "shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." "Why, then," say double-blinded hypocrites, "it doesn't matter how you live; whether you sin against God or not. You believe God's decrees will stand, in spite of either hell or sin. Then surely the effects of this can be nothing but opening the flood gates of sin. If I believed such a doctrine as this, I would live as I list, for I should know if I were elected, I should be saved; if not, I should be damned." Great God, what is man! To be sure thou wouldst be damned, because thou art dead in sin. But when the dear Lord reveals these things to the souls of his hungering and thirsting children, it has a blessed effect. Art thou a total stranger to it? No, for I am a living witness among men. The dear Lord, by his Spirit, tells me he has loved me with an everlasting love; that, having loved me, he will love me to the end; that God is love; that this love covereth all sin; and this brings me to love him in return; yea, to love all that God loves, and to hate all that God hates. We love him because he first loved us, for love begets love. Then my soul can delight in his ordinances, in his house, in his ways, and walk in them, not as a slave, nor to merit God's favour, but as a son doing the will of his father, for the grace of God teacheth us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present evil world. And, O bless his dear name for his covenant grace and mercy manifested to me, when, in the distraction of my soul, through the risings up of the dreadful iniquity of my heart, the awful temptations and horrid suggestions of the devil, I have been driven to my very wits' end. " Ah," says the enemy, "God has given thee up; thou wilt surely go raging mad; thou wilt die raging mad in a mad-house as sure as thou art born;" and I have thought, yea, believed I should die blaspheming his name in a madhouse, and be a spectacle both to men and devils; and then how would the enemies of truth rejoice, "Ah, so would we have it." This is sinking in deep mire, where there is no standing; but when I have found my flesh and my heart fail, when I have given it all up for lost, and thought my enemies would surely make a full end of the blessed Spirit has enabled me, like Jonah, to cry to him out of the belly of hell; yea, he has put a spirit of grace and supplication into my soul; enabled me to cry to him for deliverance, and for his love to be manifested to my soul, though sometimes with groanings that cannot be uttered; given me a broken heart under a feeling sense of my cursed wanderings and backslidings from him; and enabled me to plead the blood of Christ, the slaughtered Lamb of God, as the only way in which the poor wretch could be saved, or in which my soul could have any hope of salvation. And, O bless the dear name of Him who is love itself, he has sweetly, in his own time, revealed his glory, love, presence, and salvation to my soul; told me, by his own mouth, that the blood of Jesus has cleansed me from all sin; that he is "the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever;" that no weapon formed against me shall prosper; that every tongue which riseth

me,

against me in judgment I shall condemn; that none can lay anything to the charge of my poor soul, for it is God that justifieth; that none can condemn, for Christ has died, yea, has finished salvation-a salvation that neither men nor devils can undo. To hear his blessed voice, saying to my soul, "Thou art all fair, my love, there is no spot in thee;" and to know that he was wounded for my transgressions, and that by his stripes I am healed, is joy unspeakable. O the blessedness, the soul-ravishing, divine realities of having fellowship with the sufferings of a crucified Saviour, by precious faith; to see him in the garden and on the cross in agonies, drinking up the cup of wrath of a sin-avenging God, that would have sunk us to the lowest hell; to have a blessed revelation of the dying, redeeming love of a God blotting out, pardoning, and covering those very sins against this love! O, bless his dear and precious name, he has led me by these still waters; he has made me to lie down in these green pastures of his everlasting love and mercy, to the joy of my heart, and to his honour and glory. Under these feelings, O how a soul hates and abhors himself for his sins, and rebellion, and wanderings, and backslidings against so good and loving a God! What a desire is felt in his soul to live to the honour and glory of God! The prayer of his soul is, "Lord, do keep me from sinning against thy blessed Majesty;" yea, and he cannot find words half bad enough to call himself for his ungodly conduct to his not half enough loved Lord. I speak of that which I have tasted, handled, and felt; and confident I am the poor soul that knows anything of these things, in any measure, whatever he is, whether he believes it or not, he is one of God's witnesses that he is God, and that there is none else, and beside him there is no Saviour.

Dear Messrs. Editors,-If you think, by the blessing of the dear Lord, this may be of any good to his tried children, please to insert Yours, in gospel truth,

it.

Trowbridge, March 26, 1839.

My dear

ABSENT BUT NOT FORGOTTEN.

(Extract from a Letter.)

L.

-We were very happy to hear from you, and I am truly glad that the Lord gives you testimonies again and again that you are in the footsteps of the flock. As long as you have to cry again and again to the Lord for mercy and help, you will find God true to his promises, and will know that he is a prayer-hearing and a prayer-answering God; but dark and trying places will want something beyond past experience to support the soul in, for I know from experience that it makes us say, how can grace dwell in us? But in the midst of all your temptations and trials, you have not been led to envy those who are settled on their lees, and who are saying respecting their religion, "how comfortable 'tis." I fully believe you have such a religion that will never let you row in a boat with such Christians, for even in your darkest nights you can clearly see that their danger

is great indeed, although they cry peace and safety. I do not apprehend you have been meditating about saying a confederacy to the

letter Calvinists, but you have had your mind more exercised about whether there is any hope well grounded for such a poor sinner as yourself in the mercy of God. If poor, tried, tempted, hardhearted, vile, filthy, murmuring, distressed and discontented, and hell-deserving in their own eyes do not sigh and groan, who will? and how very mindful the Lord appears to be of all such sinners! They are near and dear to him, and he will never leave them nor forsake them. Whatever men, scoffers, professors, or devils may say of such characters, the Lord says such belong to him; and they will stand when thousands who despise them shall fall, who have been trusting in a false faith and delusive hope. I consider that you are placed in an important situation. You have been a leader for some time against all letter-preaching and letter-professors in and I believe that there is not a man in that town that the devil and bastard Calvinists would sooner see staggering drunk, or coming out of a brothel than yourself. They hate you and your religion, and why? Because you are a witness against theirs, and will not say you like their religion, nor their preachers that encourage them in it. What a mercy it is to be kept, and to have a testimony in our souls that we belong to that little band whose hearts the Lord has touched! You may complain, and sigh, and groan, and say how hard is your lot. If you were without such an experience, you would soon begin to think such a narrow condemning spirit was never from heaven; you would think that you ought not to leave the town whilst Christ was so exalted at the Chapel, and you would be sorry that you had ever thought lightly of such old, prudent, consistent, sound, and steady Christians as you have in Trials you will and must have, for God knows you need them, and they will make you particular and separate, a wonder to yourself and to others also; and by these things your soul will live, and you will learn that nothing but union and communion with the Lord Jesus will satisfy you. O-, September 21, 1838.

GONE-BY DAYS OF LOVE LAMENTED.

W. T.

Hail, holy Brethren,-Let me tell you, after being delivered from the snares of death, the fears of hell, and the terrors of the holy law, horror which I cannot describe now, I enjoyed an uninterrupted and perpetual sunshine of heavenly glory in my soul for many months. The sweet, calm, and serene "love of Christ which passeth knowledge" opened such a boundless paradise of bliss to me that all the scenery of this earth seemed heavenly to me wherever I went; every fleecy cloud I saw pass by as the Lord's chariot, in which he majestically rode round the world; the forked and zigzag lightnings as flashes of majesty blazing from his awful eyes; and the rolling thunders as his awful and solemn voice to the sons of men. And in the midst of all, while fear and terror seized upon my unenlightened