September 16

". . . and be not faithless, but believing..

When any grace of the Spirit is in a sickly and declining state, an effect so painful must originate in a cause that needs to be searched out: the great difficulty in a backsliding soul is to bring it to the spiritual and needed duty of self-scrutiny. But as the cure of any disease, or the correction of any evil, depends upon the knowledge of its cause, so does the revival of a declining believer closely connect itself with the discovery and removal of that which led to his declension. Declining believer! what is the cause of your weak faith? Why is this lovely, precious, and fruitful flower drooping, and ready to die? What has dimmed the eye, and paralyzed the hand, and enfeebled the walk of faith? Perhaps it is the neglect of prayer: you have lived, it may be, days, and weeks, and months, without communion with God; there have been no constant and precious visits to your closet; no wrestling with God; no fellowship with your Father. Marvel not, beloved, that your faith languishes, droops, and fades. The great marvel is, that you have any faith at all; that it is not quite dead, plucked up by the root; and, but for the mighty power of God, and the constant intercession of Jesus at His right hand, it would long since have ceased to be. But what will revive it?—an immediate return to prayer; revisit your closet; seek your forsaken God. Oh how can faith be revived, and how can it grow, in the neglect of daily, secret, and wrestling prayer with God? The Eternal Spirit laying this upon your heart, showing you your awful neglect, and breathing into you afresh the spirit of grace and supplication, will impart a new and blessed impulse to faith.

Perhaps you have been misinterpreting the Lord's providential dealings with you; you have been indulging in unbelieving, unkind, unfilial views of your trials, bereavements, and disappointments: you have said, "Can I be a child, yet be afflicted thus? can He love me, yet deal with me so?" Oh, that thought! Oh, that surmise! Could you have looked into the heart of your God when He sent that trial, caused that bereavement, blew upon that flower, and blasted that fair design, you would never have murmured more: so much love, so much tenderness, so much faithfulness, so much wisdom would you have seen, as to have laid your mouth silent in the dust before Him. Wonder not that, indulging in such misgivings, interpreting the covenant dealings of a God of love in such a light, your faith has received a wound. Nothing, perhaps, more tends to unhinge the soul from God, engenders distrust, hard thoughts, and rebellious feelings, than thus to doubt His loving-kindness and faithfulness in the discipline He is pleased to send. But faith, looking through the dark cloud, rising on the mountain wave, and anchoring itself on the Divine veracity and the unchangeable love of God, is sure to strengthen and increase by every storm that beats upon it.

Is it the enchantment of the world that has seized upon your faith? has it stolen upon you, beguiled you, caught you with its glitter, overwhelmed you with its crushing cares?—come out from it, and be separate; resign its hollow friendships, its temporizing policy, its carnal enjoyments, its fleshly wisdom, its sinful conformity. All these becloud the vision, and enfeeble the grasp of faith. Would you be "strong in faith, giving glory to God"?—then yield obedience to the voice which with an unearthly tongue exclaims to every professing child of God, "Do not be conformed to this world; but be you transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God."

Is it the indulgence of unbelieving fears touching your interest in Christ? Yield them, and let the wind scatter them. There is no ground for the doubts and unbelief of a child of God; there may be much in himself to cast him down, but nothing in the truth which he professes to believe; there is nothing in the subject-matter of faith, nothing in Christ, nothing in the work of Christ, nothing in the word of God, calculated to beget a doubt or a fear in the heart of a poor sinner; on the contrary, everything to inspire confidence, strengthen faith, and encourage hope. Does his sin plead loud for his condemnation? the voice of Immanuel's blood pleads louder for his pardon. Does his own righteousness condemn?—the righteousness of Christ acquits. Thus there is nothing in Christ to engender an unbelieving doubt in a poor convinced sinner. Himself he may doubt—he may doubt his ability to save himself—he may doubt his power to make himself more worthy and acceptable—but never let him doubt that Christ is all that a poor, lost, convinced sinner needs. Let him not doubt that Jesus is the Friend of sinners, the Savior of sinners, and that He was never known to cast out one who in lowliness and brokenness of heart sought His compassionate grace. Oh seek, reader, more simple views of Jesus; clearer views of His great and finished work; take every doubt as it is suggested, every fear as it rises, to Him; and remember that whatever of vileness you discover in yourself that has a tendency to lay you low, there is everything in Jesus calculated to lift you from the ash-heap, and place you among the princes.