50. Oh! no longer shut your eyes against the light. Know you have a name that you live, but are dead. Your soul is utterly dead in sin; dead in pride, in vanity, in self-will, in sensuality, in love of the world. You are utterly dead to God. There is no intercourse between your soul and God. _You have neither seen him_ (by faith, as our Lord witnessed against them of old time) _nor heard his voice at any time_. You have no spiritual _senses exercised to discern spiritual good and evil_. You are angry at infidels, and are all the while as mere an infidel before God as they. You have _eyes that see not, and ears that hear not_. You have a _callous, unfeeling_ heart.
51. Bear with me a little longer: my soul is distrest for you. _The God of this world hath blinded your eyes_, and you are _seeking death in the error of your life_. Because you do not commit gross sin, because you give alms, and go to the church and sacrament, you imagine that you are serving God; yet in very deed you are serving the devil. For you are doing still your own will, not the will of God your Saviour. You are pleasing yourself in all you do. Pride, vanity, and self-will, (the genuine fruits of an earthly, sensual, devilish heart) pollute all your words and actions. You are in darkness, in the shadow of death. Oh! That God would say to you in thunder, _Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light_.
52. But blessed be God! He hath not yet left himself without witness!
“All are not lost! There be, who faith prefer, Tho’ few, and piety to God!”
Who know the power of faith, and are no strangers to that inward, vital religion, _the mind that was in_ Christ, _righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost_. Of you who _have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come_, I would be glad to learn if we have _erred from the faith_, or walked contrary to _the truth as it is in_ Jesus. _Let the righteous smite me friendly, and reprove me_; if haply that which is amiss may be done away, and what is wanting supplied, till we all come to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.
53. Perhaps the first thing that now occurs to your mind, relates to the doctrine which we teach. You have heard, that we say, “Men may live without sin.” And have you not heard that the scripture says the same? (We mean without committing sin.) Does not St. _Paul_ say plainly, that those who believe, _do not continue in sin_?――――That they cannot _live any longer therein_? Romans vi. 1, 2. Does not St. _Peter_ say, _He that hath suffered in the flesh, hath ceased from sin?――――that he no longer should live――――to the desires of men, but to the will of God_, 1 Peter iv. 1, 2. And does not St. _John_ say expressly, _He that committeth sin is of the devil.――For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil. Whosoever is born of God, doth not commit sin: for his seed remaineth in him, and he cannot commit sin, because he is born of God_, 1 John iii. 8. &c. And again, _We know that whatsoever is born of God sinneth not_, chapter v. 18.
54. You see then, it is not we that say this, but the Lord. These are not our words, but his, And who is he that replieth against God? Who is able to make God a liar? Surely he will be justified in his saying, and clear when he is judged! Can you deny it? Have you not often felt a secret check, when you was contradicting this great truth? And how often have you wished for what you was taught to deny? Nay, can you help wishing for it at this moment? Do you not now earnestly desire, to cease from sin? To commit it no more? Does not your soul pant after this glorious liberty of the sons of God? And what strong reason have you to expect it? Have you not had a foretaste of it already? Do you not remember the time when God first lifted up the light of his countenance upon you? Can it ever be forgotten? The day when the candle of the Lord first shone upon your head?
“Butter and honey did you eat, And lifted up on high, You saw the clouds beneath your feet, And rode upon the sky.
“Far, far above all earthly things Triumphantly you rode; You soar’d to heav’n on eagle’s wings, And found, and talk’d with God.”
You then had power not to commit sin. You found the apostle’s words strictly true, _he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not_. But those whom you took to be experienced Christians, telling you, “This was only the time of your espousals; this could not last always: you must come down from the mount,” and the like, shook your faith. You looked at men more than God, and so became weak, and like another man. Whereas, had you then had any to guide you according to the truth of God, had you then heard the doctrine which now you blame, you had never fallen from your stedfastness: but had found, that in this sense also, _the gifts and calling of God are without repentance_.