The Nature and Process of Spiritual Life

Next Part The Nature and Process of Spiritual Life 2

"But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved!" Ephesians 2:4-5

It is not my usual method to weary your attention by a long confinement to one subject; and our religion furnishes us with such a boundless variety of important topics, that a minister who makes them his study will find no temptation to cloy you with repetitions—but rather finds it difficult to speak so concisely on one subject, as to leave room for others of equal importance. However, the subject of my last discourse was so copious and interesting, that I cannot dismiss it without a supplement. I there showed you some of the symptoms of spiritual death; but I would not leave you dead—as I found you; and therefore I intend now to consider the counterpart of that subject, and show you the nature and symptoms of spiritual life.

I doubt not but a number of you have been made alive to God by his quickening spirit; but many, I fear, still continue dead in transgressions and sins; and, while such are around me, I cannot help imagining my situation something like that of the prophet Ezekiel (chapter 37.) in the midst of the valley full of dry bones, spread far and wide around him. And should I be asked, "Can these dry bones, can these dead souls live?" I must answer with him, "Oh, Lord God, you know! Lord, I see no signs of life in them, and no tendency towards it. I know that nothing is impossible to you; I firmly believe you can inspire them with life—as dry and dead as they are; and what your designs are towards them, whether you intend to exert your all-quickening power upon them, you only know, and I would not presume to determine. But this I know, that, if they are left to themselves, they will continue dead to all eternity! For, oh Lord, the experiment has been repeatedly tried; your servant has over and over made those quickening applications to them, which your word, that sacred dispensary, prescribes; but all in vain! They still continue dead towards you, and lie putrefying more and more in transgressions and sins! However, at your command, I would attempt the most unpromising undertaking; I would proclaim even unto dry bones and dead souls, Oh you dry bones, oh you dead souls—hear the word of the Lord! Ezekiel 37:4. I would also cry aloud for the animating breath of the Holy Spirit, Come from the four winds, oh breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live!" verse 9.

You dead sinners, I would make one more attempt in the name of the Lord to bring you to life; and if I have the least hope of success, it is entirely owing to the encouraging perhaps, that the quickening spirit of Christ may work upon your hearts while I am addressing myself to your ears. And, oh sirs, let us all keep our souls in a praying posture, throughout this discourse. If one of you should fall into a swoon or an seizure, how would all about you bestir themselves to bring you to life again! And alas! shalldead souls lie so thick among us, in every assembly, in every family—and shall no means be used for their recovery! Did Martha and Mary apply to Jesus with all the arts of importunity in behalf of their sick and deceased brother; and are there not some of you who have dead relations, dear friends and neighbours, I mean dead in the worst sense, "dead in transgressions and sins"? And will you not apply to Jesus, the Lord of life, and follow him with your importunate cries, until he comes and call them to life?

Now let parents turn intercessors for their children; children for their parents; friend for friend; neighbour for neighbour; yes, enemy for enemy. Oh! should we all take this method, we might soon expect to see the valley of dry bones—full of living souls, an exceeding great army! Ezekiel 37:10. In praying for this great and glorious event, you do not pray for an impossibility. Thousands as dead as they, have obtained a joyful resurrection by the power of God.

Here in my text you have an instance of a mixed crowd of Jews and Gentiles that had lain dead in sin together, and even Paul among them—who were recovered to life, and are now enjoying an immortal life in the heavenly regions! And, blessed be God, this spiritual life is not entirely extinct among us. Among the multitudes of dead souls that we everywhere meet with—we find here and there a soul that has very different symptoms. Once indeed it was dead like the rest; but now, while they are quite senseless of divine things, and have no vital aspirations after God—this soul cannot be content with the richest affluence of created enjoyment; it pants and breathes after God; it feeds upon his Word, it feels an almighty energy in eternal things, and receives vital sensations from them! It manifests life and vigour in devotion, and serves the living God with pleasure, though it is also subject to fits of languishments, and at times seems just expiring, and to lose all sensation.

And whence is this vast difference? Why is this soul so different from what it once was—and from what thousands around still are? Why can it not, like them, and like itself formerly—lie dead and senseless in sin, without any vital impressions or experiences from God or divine things? The reason is, the happy reason, my brethren, is, this is a living soul: "Like the rest, it was by nature an object of wrath. But because of his great love for it, God, who is rich in mercy, made it alive with Christ—even when it was dead in transgressions!" And hence it is alive to him.

My present design is to explain the nature and properties of this divine life, and to show you the manner in which it is usually begun in the soul. I shall open with the consideration of the last particular. Here you must observe, that, though spiritual life is instantaneously infused—yet God prepares the soul for its reception by a course of previous operations. He spent six days in the creation of the world, though he might have spoken it into being in an instant. Thus he usually creates the soul anew—after a gradual process of preparatory actions. In forming the first man, he first created chaos out of nothing, then he digested it into earth; on the sixth day he formed and organized the earth into a body, with all its endless variety of members, muscles, fibres, veins, and arteries; and then, after this process, he inspired it with a living soul; and what was but a lump of clay, sprung up a perfect man. Thus also the foetus in the womb is for some months in formation before the soul, or the principle of life, is infused.

In like manner the Almighty proceeds in quickening us with spiritual life; we all pass through a course of preparation, though some through a longer, and some shorter. And as one reason why the great Creator took up so much time in the creation of the world, probably was, that he might allow the angels time for leisurely surveys of the astonishing process, so he may advance thus gradually in the new creation, that we may observe the various steps of the operation, and make proper reflections upon it in future life.

My present design is to trace these steps to their grand result, that you may know whether divine grace has ever carried you through this gracious process.

And that you may not fall into needless perplexities, it may be necessary for me to premise farther, that there is a great variety in these preparatory operations, and in the degrees of spiritual life. Indeed the difference is only circumstantial, for the work is substantially the same, and spiritual life is substantially the same in all. But then, in such circumstances as the length of time, the particular external means, the degree of previous terror, and of subsequent joy and vitality, etc., God exercises a sovereign freedom, and shows that he has a variety of ways by which to accomplish his end; and it does not matter how we obtain it—so long as we have but spiritual life.

I shall therefore endeavour to confine myself to the substance of this work, without its peculiarities, in different subjects; and, when I cannot avoid descending to particulars, I shall endeavour so to diversify them, as that they may be easily adapted to the various cases of different Christians. To draw their common lineaments, whereby they may be distinguished from all others who are still dead in sin, is sufficient to my present purpose. Whereas, to draw the particular lineaments, or peculiar features, whereby they may be distinguished from one another—is a very difficult task, and cannot be of any great service to what I have now in design.

I have only one thing more to premise, and that is: that the way by which divine grace prepares a sinner for spiritual life, is by working upon all the principles of the rational life, and exciting him to exert them to the utmost to obtain it. Here it is proper for you to recollect what I observed in my last discourse, that even a sinner who is dead in transgressions and sins—is alive and capable of action in other respects: he can not only perform the actions and feel the sensations of physical life—but he can also exercise his intellectual powers about intellectual objects, and even about divine things. He is capable of thinking of these, and of receiving some impressions from them. He is also capable of attending upon the ordinances of the gospel, and performing the external duties of religion. These things a sinner may do—and yet be dead in sin. Indeed he will not exercise his natural powers about these things while left to himself. He has the power—but then he has no disposition to employ it. He is indeed capable of meditating upon spiritual things—but what does this avail, when he will not turn his mind to such objects? Or if he does, he considers them as mere speculations, and not as the most vital and important realities.

How few, or how superficial and unaffecting are a sinner's thoughts of them! Heaven and hell are objects that may strike the emotions, and raise the joys and fears of a natural man—but in general he is little or nothing impressed with them. He is capable of prayer, hearing, and using the means of grace; but I believe, if you make observations upon the conduct of mankind, that you will find they are but seldom employed in these duties, or that they perform them in such a careless manner, that that they have no tendency to answer the end of their institution.

In short, the more I know of mankind, I have the lower opinion of what they will do in religion when left to themselves. They have a natural power, and we have seen all possible means used with them to excite them to put it forth; but alas! all is in vain, and nothing will be done to purpose—until God stirs them up to exert their natural abilities; and this he performs as a preparative for spiritual life. He brings the sinner to exert all his active powers in seeking this divine principle: nature does her utmost, and all outward means are tried, before a supernatural principle is implanted.

The evangelist John has given us the history of the resurrection of the dead body of Lazarus after it had been four days in the grave; and I would now give you the history of a more glorious resurrection, the resurrection of a soul that had lain dead for years—yet is at last quickened by the same almighty power with a divine and immortal life!

Should I exemplify it by a particular instance, I might fix upon this or that person in this assembly, and remind you, and inform others, of the process of this work in your souls. And oh! how happy are such of you—that you may be produced as examples in this case! You lay for ten, twenty, thirty years, or more—dead in trespasses and sins; you did not breathe and pant like a living soul after God and holiness; you had little more sense of the burden of sin—than a corpse has a sense of the pressure of a mountain! You had no appetite for the living bread who came down from heaven; the vital pulse of sacred passions did not beat in your hearts towards God and divine things—but you lay putrefying in sin! Filthy lusts preyed upon you—like worms on the bodies of the dead! You spread the contagion of sin around you by your conversation and example, like the stench and corruption of a rotten carcass! You were odious and abominable to God, fit to be shut up in the infernal pit of hell—out of his sight! And you were objects of horror and lamentation to all who knew and daily considered your case, your dreadful and deplorable case.

During this time, many quickening applications were made to you; you had friends that used all means to bring you to life again; but alas! all in vain; conscience proved your friend, and pierced and chafed you, to bring you to some feeling—but you remained still senseless, or the symptoms of life soon vanished. God did not cast you away as irrecoverably dead—but stirred and agitated you within, and struggled long with the principles of death to subdue them. And if it was your happy lot to live under a faithful ministry, the living oracles that contain the seeds of the divine life were applied to you with care and solicitude. The terrors of the Lord were thundered in your ears to awaken you. The preaching of a Saviour's dying love, and the rich grace of the gospel—were repeatedly tried upon you. Now you were carried within hearing of the heavenly music, and within sight of the glories of Paradise—to see if these would charm you. Now you were, as it were, held over the flames of hell—that they might by their pungent pains scorch and startle you into life.

Providence also concurred with these applications, and tried to recover you by mercies and judgements, sickness and health, losses and possessions, disappointments and successes, threatenings and deliverances. If it was your unhappy lot to lie among dead souls like yourself—you had indeed but little pity from them, nay, they and Satan were plying you with their opiates and poisonsto confirm the deadly sleep. And oh! how astonishing is it that you should be quickened in a charnel-house, in the mansions of the dead—with dead souls lying all around you!

But if it was your happiness to be in the society of the living, they pitied you, they stirred and agitated you with their warnings and persuasions, they, like Martha and Mary in behalf of their deceased brother, went to Jesus with their cries and importunities, "Lord, my child, my parent, my servant, my neighbour is dead! Oh come and restore him to life! Lord, if you had been here, he would not have died; but even now I know it is not too late for you to raise him." Thus, when one is dead in our family, the whole house should be alarmed, and all the domestics be busy in trying to bring him to life again.

But, oh! reflect with shame and sorrow—how long all these quickening applications were in vain; you still lay in a dead sleep. Or, if at times you seemed to move, and gave us hopes you were coming to life again—you soon relapsed, and grew as senseless as ever.

And alas! are there not some of you in this condition to this very moment? Oh deplorable sight! May the hour come, and oh that this may be the hour—in which such dead souls shall hear the voice of the Son of God—and live! John 5:25.

But as to such of you in whom I would exemplify this history of a spiritual resurrection, when your case was thus deplorable, and seemingly helpless—the happy hour, the time of love came, when you must live! When all these applications had been unsuccessful, the all-quickening Spirit of God had determined to exert more of his energy, and work more effectually upon you. Perhaps a verse in your Bible, a sentence in a sermon, an alarming Providence, the conversation of a pious friend, or something that unexpectedly occurred to your own thoughts—first struck your minds with unusual force. You found you could not harden yourselves against it as you were accustomed to do; it was attended with a power you never before had felt, and which you could not resist. This made you thoughtful and reflective, and turned your minds to objects that you were accustomed to neglect; this made you stand and pause, and think of the state of your neglected souls. You began to fear that matters were wrong with you; "What will become of me, when I leave this world? Where shall I reside forever? Am I prepared for the eternal world? How have I spent my life?"

These, and the like inquiries, brought you to a standstill, and you could not pass over them so superficially as you were accustomed to do. Your SINS now appeared to you in a new light; you were shocked and surprised at their malignant nature, their number, their aggravations, and their dreadful consequences! The great GOD, whom you were accustomed to neglect, appeared to you as a Being that demanded your regard; you saw that he was indeed a venerable, solemn, majestic Being, with whom you had the most important concern. In short, you saw that such a life as you had led, would never bring you to heaven. You saw you must make religion more your business than you had ever done, and hereupon you altered your former course. You broke off from several of your vices, you deserted your worldly company, and you began to frequent the throne of grace, to study Scripture, and to attend upon its institutions; and this you did with some degree of earnestness and solicitude.

When you were thus reformed, you began to flatter yourself that you had escaped out of your dangerous condition, and had secured the divine favour. Now you began to view yourselves with secret self-applause as a true Christian; but all this time the reformation was only outward, and there was no new principle of a divine supernatural life implanted in your hearts! You had not the loving passions and sensations of living souls towards God—but acted entirely from natural, selfish principles. You had no clear heart-affecting views of the intrinsic evil, and odious nature of sin, considered in itself; nor of the entire universal corruption of your nature, and the necessity not only of adorning your outer man by an external reformation—but of an inward change of heart by the almighty power of God! You were not deeply sensible of the extent and spirituality of the divine law, nor of the infinite purity and inexorable justice of the Deity. You had no love for true religion and virtue, for their own sakes—but only on account of their happy consequences. Indeed your love of novelty and a regard to your own happiness, might so work upon you, for a time—that you might have very raised and delightful passions in religious duties; but all your religion at that time was amere system of selfishness, and you had no generous unselfish delight in holiness for its own excellency, nor did you heartily relish the strictness of pure, living religion!

You were also under the government of a self-righteous spirit: your own good works were the ground of your hopes, and you had no relish for the mortifying doctrine of salvation through the mere mercy of God and the righteousness of Jesus Christ. Though your education taught you to acknowledge Christ as the only Saviour, and ascribe all your hopes to his death—yet in reality, he was of very little importance in your religion; he had but little place in your heart and affections, even when you urged his name as your only plea at the throne of grace. In short, you had not the spirit of the gospel, nor any spiritual life within you.

And this is all the religion with which multitudes are contented. With this they obtain a name that they live; but in the sight of God, and in reality, they are dead! And had you been allowed to rest here, according to your own desire, you would have been dead still. But God, who is rich (oh how inconceivably rich!) in mercy, for the great love with which he loved you, resolved to carry on his work of salvation in you; and therefore, while you were flattering yourselves, and elated with a proud conceit of a happy change in your condition—he surprised you with a very different view of your case; he opened your eyes farther, and then you saw, and then you felt those things of which, until then, you had but little sense or apprehension; such as the corruption of your hearts, the awful strictness of the divine law, your utter inability to yield perfect obedience, and the necessity of an inward change of the inclinations and relishes of your soul. These, and a great many other things of a like nature, broke in upon your minds with striking evidence and a kind of almighty energy; and now you saw that you were still "dead in sin," weak, indisposed, averse towards spiritual things; and "dead in law," condemned to everlasting death and misery by its righteous sentence!

Now you set about the duties of religion with more earnestness than ever; now you prayed, you heard, and used the other means of grace as for your life, for you saw that your eternal life was indeed at stake. And now, when you put the matter to a thorough trial, you were more sensible than ever—of your own weakness, and the difficulties in your way. "Oh! who would have thought that my heart had been so depraved that it should thus fly off from God, and struggle, and chafe against returning to him?" Such was then your language. Alas! you found yourselves quite helpless—and all your efforts feeble and ineffectual! Then you perceived yourselves, as really dead in sin, and that you must continue so to all eternity, unless quickened by a power infinitely superior to your own! Not that you lay slothful and inactive at this time; no, never did you exert yourselves so vigorously in all your life, never did you besiege the throne of grace with such earnest importunity, never did you hear and read with such eager attention, or make such a vigorous resistance against sin and temptation! All your natural powers were exerted to the highest pitch, for now you saw your case required it! But you found that all your most vigorous endeavours were insufficient, and you were sensible that, without the assistance of a superior power, the work of salvation could never be effected in you.

Now you were reduced very low indeed. While you imagined you could render yourselves safe by a reformation in your own power—you were not much alarmed at your condition, though you saw it was bad. But oh! to feel yourselves dead in sin, and that you cannot help yourselves; to see yourselves in a state of condemnation, liable to execution every moment—and yet to find all your own endeavours utterly insufficient to relieve you; to be obliged, after all you had done, to lie at mercy's gate, and confess that you were as deserving of everlasting punishment as ever the most notorious criminal was of the stroke of public justice; this was a state of extreme dejection, terror, and anxiety indeed! The proud, self-confident creature, was never thoroughly mortified andhumbled until now—when he is slain by the law, and entirely cut off from all hopes from himself.

And now, finding you could not save yourselves, you began to look about you, and look out for another to save you! Now you were more sensible than ever of the absolute need of Jesus; and you cried and reached after him, and stirred up yourselves to take hold of him. The gospel brought the free offer of him to your ears, and you would gladly have accepted of him; but here new difficulties arose. Alas! you did not think yourselves good enough to receive him, and hence you took a great deal of fruitless pains to make yourselves better. You also found your hearts strangely averse to the gospel-method of salvation, and, though a sense of your necessity made you try to work up yourselves to an approbation of it—yet you could not affectionately acquiesce in it, and cordially relish it.

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