and experience, and the mere force of reasoning, without any revelation from heaven: but without divine instruction,
1. He can never know the extent of his wants — [He cannot know his fall in Adam, or the depravity of his
fallen nature, or his utter incapacity to restore himself to God's favovir. If told that " his carnal mind is enmity against God," and that " without Christ he can do nothing," and that God alone can give him either to will or to do any thing agreeable to the divine command, he would think it all a libel upon human nature. It is revelation alone that can give him any just views on tliese subjects ]
2. He can still less know how those wants are to be supplied —
[Who could ever have thought that God himself should become incarnate, and live and die for the express purpose of supplying the necessities of his fallen creatures ? Who could ever have imagined that God's righteousness should be imputed to man? and that the Spirit of the living God should ever dwell in man, for the purpose of revealing the Saviour to him, and of imparting to him the divine image ? A man not in- structed in these things can know nothing about them. They are all matters of pure revelation, and directly contrary to those methods of salvation which uninstructed man would have adopted for himself ]
3. He can never avail himself of those offers which God has made to him in the Gospel —
[In the Holy Scrijitures are contained " exceeding great and precious promises," yea, promises confirmed by an oath, and ratified by an everlasting covenant. These promises relate to every want of fallen man, and make over to him a supply of every want by the simple exercise of faith on the part of man. How can the unenlightened man obtain an interest in these ? How is it possible for him to lay hold of them, and rest upon them, and plead them before God, when he has never been in- structed in relation to them ? — It is obvious, that without
divine instruction he must for ever lie under the guilt and power of his sins, and endure the punishment due to his unrepented and unpardoned transgressions.]
What then must be,
H. The light in which lie must be viewed, who re- fuses instruction ?
We use by no means too strong an expression, if we say, '' He despises his own soul." For,
1. He grievously underrates its value —
790.] INSTRUCTION TO BE OBEYED. IGl
[Who can estimate the value of an immortal soul, a soul capable of knowing, honouring, and enjoying, the Most High God ; and actually assured of that honour, if only it obtain the knowledge of Christ, and repose all its confidence in him ? But, to judge of its value aright, we must take into account the love that God has borne towards it, and the price which our adorable Lord and Saviour has paid for its redemption. Contemplate its nature and its capacity, its estimation by God, and its eternal destinies ; and then say, Whether the man who refuses the in- struction whereby he is to be made happy, does not altogether betray an ignorance of its true value ? ]
2. He shamefully disregards its interests —
[Without an attention to the concerns of the soul, it is in vain to hope that it can ever be happy in the eternal world. The man that refuses divine instruction, does in reality inflict upon his soul the heaviest judgment that it can sustain in this life : he says, in fact, ' Let me alone, that I may go on to in- crease my guilt, and " treasure up for myself wrath against the day of wrath." ' What would be thought of a man who should so trifle with his temporal interests ? Would there be any term of reproach too harsh or too contemptuous whereby to designate so foolish a character ? What, then, must we say of a man who so neglects the interests of his soul ? ]