the bottomless pit," the infernal den? Is there anything among all its doleful regions that you could wish to possess? Is the company of damned souls and malicious fiends desirable? Is inexpressible and endless torment worth your eager search, and your fast running? Will it amply pay you for the trouble you take in attempting to gain a share therein? The very thought of it is enough to awaken the most careless sinner out of his sinful sleep, and to make the most stout heart tremble! Abyss of complicated woes, Receptacle of sad despair, Where a tempestuous whirlwind blows, 66 5. "Why will ye die?" I hope by this time the sinner is inclined, yea, determined, by God's help not to die. If so, come with me to Calvary. Behold the cross on which your Saviour bled and died! Gaze upon that face which for you was marred more than any man's!" See that side, which for your uncleanness poured forth the purifying stream. Hear that voice, which for your pardon sent up a prayer of unparalleled compassion, mercy, and love, in the petition; "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do!" Luke xxiii, 34. "Acquaint thyself now with him"-implore his mercy-earnestly seek his forgiveness-wash in that fountain "opened" in his side "for sin and uncleanness," "and thereby good shall còme unto thee." Let not the many years wherein you have been wandering from God, nor the great distance at which you may have placed yourself from him, or your present depraved and polluted state, be any hindrance to your returning to him. He will not spurn you for any of these things. He waits to receive all returning wanderers, of whatever character they may be. If they have turned their feet towards him, and are sincerely seeking to find him, that is enough: he will stretch out his hand and receive them, impart his mercy and pardon them; "He that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out.' "But if the wanderer his mistake discern, There, and THERE ONLY, is the power to save Yes, sinner, the atonement is made; God is reconciled; and mercy is offered to you. REPENT, BELIEVE, and LIVE! May the Lord help you to do so, for his name's sake. Amen! 380 Man is a free agent. "What is that?" says one. I answer, a power to choose or reject. There is a consciousness within you that you possess this power, and all the reasoning in the world cannot make a thing more clear to you than consciousness. You know that without holiness no man can see God. You know that Jesus hath died for you, and that by his death he hath removed every obstruction out of the way of your conversion. You know there is now a mercy-seat to which you can go and find pardon. You know you must go there or perish. The blessed Spirit has been pouring light into your understanding, refreshing your memory, touching your conscience, gently bending your will. He has been trying thus to lead you over the line to God. You have been using the tremendous power you possess by halting, resisting, fighting against God. You know the contest is unequal; and though you put yourself in a hostile attitude to the great and dreadful God, he will conquer you. What, are you to "fight against God?" He can shake the universe into atoms in a moment of time, by one single act of his great power. We tell you, He will conquer you; he will put you in the winding sheet, fill your mouth with clay, and hurl your soul into hell. You see there before you a throne of mercy; and you feel conscious you can go there or stay away. You can say, "if there be mercy in heaven, I will find it," or, "away with him, away with him, I will not have this man to reign over me." The great Spirit -the glorifier of Christ-the third person in the Trinity comes to you, not to drag and compel you to be saved, but He gently takes hold of your free agency, and leads you up to Calvary to view the claims of a dying Saviour, and says, YIELD, and you know you have the power to refuse, or obey. Ah! it is this power that constitutes your responsibility. Do you still plead your inability to accept of mercy? I ask, what is there in this process you cannot do? I dare say you have a room, or some place of retirement-though your Saviour could say, "the foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of God hath not where to lay his head," I doubt not but you are in this sense better off than your Master. You have legs, and with those legs you could walk up into your room, and kneel down before God. You have a memory, and you can allow that memory to run back on the years gone by, and call up the deeds of iniquity-you have committed. You have a tongue, and with that tongue you can ask God, for Christ's sake, to forgive you. You can say, "God be merciful to me a sinner." You can do all this; and I ask, do you think were you to do so sincerely, would the blessed God repel you from his throne? No, He will cast out none. Now, this is just what the Spirit of From Caughey's Revival Miscellanies. God has been trying to do with you. This is the point to which He has been trying to bring you to bring you to Christ. But sometimes free agency turns rampant, and cries, "away with him." Poor sinner, take hold of this power which the divine Spirit brings to you, and he will not rest till you are a sinner saved by grace. This is a most important point. Oh! that we could get sinners to use this precious power-a power which has come upon them in virtue of the great atoning death of Christ. This power is a golden chain linked to the throne of God, and let down within their reach. The sinking sinner may seize it and live for ever. This power is a ladder, let down from heaven to earth. You may step upon it, and ascend to glory. The first round, at least, is within your reach, close at your foot. Oh! sinner, what mean you by your mad, reckless course to sit down and perish while help is at hand. See! see! that poor sailor has tumbled overboard yonder. "All hands ahoy!" shouts the watch, "a man overboard." There he rises upon the waves, and again he sinks; once more he rises to the surface; now they see him. There! a rope is thrown out to him, but some unaccountable stupor has come over him; though the rope is within his reach, and he may be saved by laying hold of it, yet there he sinks and perishes, while every effort has been made to save him. That, sinner, is just your case-perishing while the golden chain swings by you. "But how may I know," says one, "that the Spirit is striving to lead me to a decision." I answer, by two ways. By head weights, and heart weights. Firstly, by head weights. The Holy Ghost shoots in, shoots in light into the sinner's dark soul, until the sinner makes tremendous discoveries. He becomes startled and alarmed for his safety. Deep troubles heave and toss in his soul. "Oh!' says one, "I have none of these troubles." Stay, stay, you had them once--you had them until you grieved away the Holy Spirit, and now he has left you to sail on, wrapt up in your own delusion, undisturbed, to move on right in the direction of hell-untroubled-quiet. Ah! these dead calms are only the precursors of the storm!—the stillness that precedes the violent concussions of the earthquakes. These guilty calms will be followed by the hurricanes of hellthe eternal storms that will rage on the lake that burneth for ever and ever. Ah! one of the grandest events in your history would be the return again of the Holy Ghost to trouble you. Secondly, heart weights. Many of you know something about these heart weights. You have had considerable experience in these matters. You have many a time been troubled by abstractions of mind, vacancy of thought, secret uneasiness. Sometimes the unbidden tear has stolen down your cheeks, VOL. XXI. THIRD SERIES. 2 G and you could scarcely tell why-some unaccountable alarm about the future-some undefined dread of some all-pervading Spirit fixing a searching gaze upon you. Many a time you wished you had never been born, or that your station had been fixed among the harmless creatures that browse in the fields; who have no account to render up-no judgment day to face— no frowning God to meet-no hell to be terrified at. These heart weights have spoiled your pleasure. Now, I do not pretend to be a prophet; but it is my solemn conviction that one of two things will happen to you ere long-either you will be converted, or a sickness unto death will come upon you. Trifle with this if you please, but remember the words of Him who has said, "He that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed without remedy." Still you refuse to take hold of help-to yield to the Spirit. What, we ask will be the result? See, see, yonder range of mountains. The ravines are deep, the summits are high and craggy. It is the Alpine mountains. The passage across them is one of danger, of difficulty, of peril. Do you see that man on the summit of the first mountain there, casting a glance across the perilous passage? He is about to attempt that fearful journey. See, now, his friends are gathering around him. See how earnest they are, trying to dissuade him from his determination, but he is resolved-nothing can shake his purpose. The sun is setting behind the western mountains; the shadows of night deepen fast around him. All is now night-dark, dark night-scarcely a twinkling star is seen to relieve the profound gloom. Part of the road across the Alps lies along a tremendous precipice, and many of the passes are so narrow, that a single step will plunge him into the deeps below. See, a kind friend brings and presents to him a brilliant lamp, and entreats of him to accept it to light his feet over the fearful passage; but he dashes that lamp on the earth, and tramples it under his feet. He commences his journey-he moves on in the solemn gloom, under the shadow of the mighty mountain. Do you not see him climbing his way along the narrow passes, as the lurid lightnings blaze and play around him? All again is dark, dark as the tomb. Hark! hark! did you hear that fearful scream, rising above the wild moaning wind? He's over the precipice-he's gone-he's dashed in pieces. Poor halting sinner, such will be your case without the lamp of life—without the Holy Spirit's guidance. Quench not the Spirit-reject not the lamp that heaven tenders to you. You cannot reach the celestial gate without it. Enemies lurk in those passes that lie in your road. The lion of hell prowls about those mountains-fiends lie concealed in the gloom of your way. Take with you, we entreat you, the lamp-spurn not the heavenly light. A ship passing round Cape Horn, without a pilot, in the rigour of winter, when icebergs float like mountains to dash the vessel in pieces, is nothing compared to the danger of attempting the passage to heaven without the Holy Ghost. Still you halt. Ah! the scream of the man falling over the precipice is nothing compared with the shriek that you will utter as you fall down from the precipice of mercy to the hell below! How long, then, halt ye between two opinions? SEEK ACQUAINTANCE WITH GOD NOW.* COMMENCE acquaintance with God now, because now he invites you to his acquaintance. my Do such thoughts as these arise? Well, if I could but be assured that God would welcome me, and had actually given me an invitation, then I could approach him without fear; but no one knows my sinfulness. Oh how my guilt rises up before mind! Can God receive a creature so unworthy as I am into his friendship? You may well wonder at such love; but you shall see that all the unwillingness to Divine communion is on your part, not on his. Are you a backslider, who has departed from his ways in heart, if not in life, and sinned both against knowledge and love? Well, he would heal the breach this day. He stretches out the hand of friendship to you, and in accents of love and fidelity says, "O Israel, return unto the Lord thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity. Take with you words, and turn to the Lord: say unto him, Take away all iniquity, and receive us graciously: so will we render the calves of our lips. I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely, for mine anger is turned away from him." Hos. xiv. 1, 2, 4. Are you in great darkness of mind, saying, "Oh that I knew where I might find him!" I would go 66 even to his seat!" Job xxiii. 3. To you this declaration is expressly made: “I know the thoughts that I think towards you, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end. Then shall ye call upon me, and ye shall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you. And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart." Jer. xxix. 11—13. And you my beloved young friend, whose parents long to see your heart given up to Christ, and are praying day and night for your salvation, behold a promise to you full of strong affection; read it, and be amazed. "Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty." 2 Cor. vi. 17, 18. And to you, O sinner, who have never trodden his paths, nor ever courted, but shunned his acquaintance; to you, who have had so many mercies, so many warnings, and so many narrow escapes from death; to you who have *From Sherman's Guide to Acquaintance with God. |