THE

ENGLISH WOMAN'S MAGAZINE

AND

Christian Mother's Miscellany.

JUNE, 1851.

THE ESSENTIALS OF CHRISTIANITY THEORETICALLY AND PRACTICALLY CONSIDERED.

BY THE LATE REV. JOSEPH MILNER, M. A., VICAR OF THE HOLY TRINITY CHURCH, HULL.

CONCLUSION.

HE wisdom and goodness of God, providing for the imbecility of his creatures, has interspersed, in various parts of the Sacred Volume, several summaries of Divinity, which collect, as it were, into one focus, all the rays of evangelical truth, and explain, within the compass of a few verses, the whole substance of revealed religion. Should any of my readers desire me to point out a passage confirming and illustrating the whole of what has been advanced in the foregoing chapters, whether of Christian doctrine, in Part I., or of practical religion, in Part II., I would refer them to the thirty-second Psalm, as fully satisfying their demand. A few remarks upon this short psalm, may, perhaps, properly conclude this work,

The psalm which I have mentioned, sets forth the experience of the natural man, in his state of guilt, bondage, and hardness of heart; and describes the condition of a soul when brought to repentance and true humiliation before God. It also exemplifies the comfortable experience

of pardon and peace through faith alone; and the real power of the great doctrine of justification by Jesus Christ. It represents God as one who heareth prayer. It describes the safety and consolation of trusting in Him. It gives advice and directions, adapted to the case of one who sincerely desires to serve and please God, and attended by the most animating promises; and, in conclusion, it affords a view of solid joy in God. These are the leading ideas embodied in this psalm; a psalm which comprises the whole range of Christian experience; of all that, which, in our days, is most uncandidly stigmatized, by men who affect the utmost candour, by the name of enthusiasm.

"Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered."

The Psalmist, as he afterwards shows us, had felt the misery arising from an accusing conscience, and a hard heart. From these sources of misery, he had, by divine grace, been relieved; and feeling himself to be now in the possession of bliss, he makes us acquainted with the nature of that bliss. Is he the blessed man, who succeeds in his worldly affairs; who acquires wealth, honour, and dignity? No; a man may be very miserable in the midst of all possible worldly prosperity. Nothing save God himself, made known to us in Christ, can make us happy. A consciousness that God is with us, as our own gracious and reconciled God, this it is which constitutes happiWithout this, we feel an uneasy void, and pine in misery, even while everything earthly succeeds according to our wish; for God never meant to give us a capacity of deriving happiness from anything but himself. In fact, it may be questioned, whether our possession of such a capacity be possible in the nature of things.

ness.

Again; is he the blessed man whose conscience is at ease, and who is sensible of nothing wherewith to reproach himself?

This is Horace's idea; and that of the whole tribe of mere moralists;

Hic murus aheneus esto,

Nil conscire sibi, nullâ pallescere culpâ."

And truly, there is, in this view of things, something so pleasing to the self-righteous heart of man, that it is no matter of wonder that it is very generally adopted. The idea of being made happy by our own virtue, adapts itself to our pride; to be made happy by Divine forgiveness for the sake of the Redeemer, can only be acceptable to the humble. In this latter way, however, it is, that all truly contrite souls expect happiness; even by the remission of sins, as Augustine

We may

somewhere says, rather than by the perfection of virtues. stand well before our fellow-creatures; our characters may be outwardly spotless; and the laws of our country may have nothing to allege against us; but no man of the least self-knowledge would offer a plea of this kind before that God who requires the obedience of the heart. Let any man ask himself a few such questions as these which follow : "Have I loved God as I ought to love him; namely, with all my heart, and all my soul, and all my strength ?" "Have I avoided sin to the utmost of my power?" "Have I exerted myself as I ought to do for the good of others?" "Am I as thankful to God as I ought to be ?" "Have I redeemed the time, and exercised my talents to the glory of God, as it is my duty to do?" But why do I multiply these inquiries? Our sins are more in number than the hairs of our head.* Who can tell how oft he offendeth ?+ Assuredly, all hope of blessedness, from his own goodness, must be removed from such

a creature as man.

If then happiness be neither in worldly success, nor in conscious innocence ;-not in the former, because of its emptiness; not in the latter, because of the impossibility of its attainment ;-in what does it consist? The Psalmist answers, in the forgiveness of sin. While sin is unforgiven; while we are at a distance from God; and while he is not our Friend, we are, and must be miserable. In his favour is life. When we can look up to him, and behold him, our own reconciled God, forgiving our sins, and comforting us with his peace, then, with forgiveness, all other blessings flow into our souls. It is by the knowledge of salvation by the remission of sins, through the tender mercy of our God, that the dayspring from on high visits us, to give light to them that sit in darkness, to guide our feet into the way of peace.§

Be it then our endeavour to seek the forgiveness of our sins and a comfortable sense of that forgiveness in the conscience, grounded on the propitiation of Jesus. Here is bliss; not only the bliss of heaven hereafter; but of a peaceful conscience here, and of an assured and refreshing hope beyond the grave. There are three sorts of persons in the world. First, there are those who seek happiness only in the world, despising religion altogether. The real misery of such persons, even natural conscience, if attended to, sufficiently declares. Secondly, there are those who do pay a certain regard to religion; but in a proud way. These are, in truth, no less miserable than the others. Their Luke i. 77-80.

Psalm xl. 12.

+ Psalm xix. 12.

Psalm xxx. 5.

religion is identical with that of the Jewish pharisees of old; and not only so, but with that of the antient pagan philosophers; of Mohammedans; of those who are imbued with the spirit of Popery; of ALL, in short, who are ignorant of, or who despise or neglect, redemption by the blood of Christ. Thirdly; there are true Christians; persons who seek happiness in a humble religion; who despair of obtaining acceptance with God by their own virtue; and who rest entirely on the doctrine of forgiveness; and this is the religion of the psalm which we are considering. Wherever these principles are wrought in the heart, they will unquestionably produce, as their necessary effect, a holy life; but a holy life is not itself the foundation of the believer's happiness. In the second verse of the psalm in question, David says, "Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.” Thus David describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works.† Here is that great article of justification by faith in Jesus, on which Abraham rested, and on which all the true children of Abraham rest their souls; and here is the only way of peace which has ever existed since the introduction of sin into the world. It is a way, however, which the man who regards his own works, as in any measure the price of his salvation, shall never know. Such a man must remain either hardened in the false peace of self-righteous vain-glory; or miserably struggling with anxiety or desperation; or lastly, like Gallio, caring for none of these things. How great the mercy to men, that God has opened to us a way of peace, and revealed it in his Word with such energy of description! He who would thoroughly understand this way of reconciliation, would do well to weigh attentively the fourth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans. In that chapter we have the testimony of three men, as holy, perhaps, as any who have ever lived on earth— Abraham, David, and Paul-to the great article of the Christian religion, that God justifieth sinners by grace alone, through faith. If ever any men could boast of their good works, as contributing in any degree to their acceptance with God, these three men might have thus boasted; but they agree in disclaiming every plea save the atonement of Christ; and give Him all the glory; and this humble temper is the only temper in which men are fitted to serve God aright. The particular propriety of the latter clause of verse 2,-" in whose spirit there is no guile" will appear by its connection with what follows. I may just observe at present, that he who looks to God for pardon and peace † Rom. iv. 6. Acts xviii. 17.

• Psalm xxxii. 2.

only by Jesus, gains, in that very disposition of spirit, and in its experimental effects, sincerity towards God. Let us, however, hear king David; who declares not only his belief of this doctrine, but his own experience in connection with it.

"When I kept silence," says the Psalmist, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me. My moisture is turned into the drought of summer." Thus does David describe the misery of his soul while he felt the horrors of guilt in his conscience. He remained, however, in sullen silence; he would not bend in submission to God. He would not freely own, that all was wrong within him. In his pride, he fought against his convictions, and sought to heal himself; but the Lord, in severe mercy, as Augustine happily expresses it, permitted him not to obtain. peace in this way. He had a constant inward disquiet, which day and night oppressed him; the dry, sapless state of his soul is well compared to the drought of summer. This was the effect of God's hand upon him, disquieting him on account of his sins; and though his state, while in this condition, may appear to be by no means desirable, it is, nevertheless, such a state of mind as is usually introductory to a true and full deliverance. When once the hand of God "is heavy" upon a man, producing true conviction of sin, his former unconcern and thoughtlessness vanish. His past sins become bitter to his remembrance, and he is made to feel the iniquities of his youth. It is not now in his power, as formerly, to shake off "the terrors of the Lord ;" and all his endeavours to do this, in the way of diverting himself by various methods of dissipation, fail of success. In fact, they do but increase his misery. Neither can he obtain peace by his attempts after reformation. He sees, indeed, that he ought to repent and amend; and he labours to do so; yet peace is not the result of his endeavours; in truth, he is as far from it as ever. It is no trifling matter thus to fall into the hands of the living God. Sin is a dreadful evil; God must be just and holy; and the remedy of sin, the blood of Christ, is a very wonderful remedy, and affords an astonishing instance of the Divine condescension, mercy, and wisdom. Thus it is always represented in Scripture. The manifold wisdom of God; the unsearchable riches of Christ; these, and such as these, are the admiring terms used in the sacred volume. Can we then imagine the way of obtaining peace with God to be a slight matter? Let those who presume on arbitrary notions of the Divine mercy, remember, that sin cast the great enemy of mankind out of Eph. iii. 8-10. See also the conclusion of Rom. xi.-Note by the Author.