“This great gift of God, the salvation of our souls, is no other than theimage of God fresh stamped on our hearts. It is a ‘renewal of believers inthe spirit of their minds, after the likeness of Him that created them.’ Godhath now laid ‘the ax unto the root of the tree, purifying their hearts byfaith,’ and ‘cleansing all the thoughts of their hearts by the inspiration ofhis Holy Spirit.’ Having this hope, that they shall see God as he is, they‘purify themselves even as he is pure,’ and are ‘holy, as he that hath calledthem is holy, in all manner of conversation.’ Not that they have alreadyattained all that they shall attain, either are already in this sense perfect.But they daily ‘go on from strength to strength; beholding’ now, ‘as in aglass, the glory of the Lord, they are changed into the same image, fromglory to glory, by the Spirit of the Lord.’“And ‘where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty;’ such liberty ‘fromthe law of sin and death,’ as the children of this world will not believe,though a man declare it unto them. ‘The Son hath made them free’ who arethus ‘born of God,’ from that great root of sin and bitterness, pride. Theyfeel that all their ‘sufficiency is of God,’ that it is He alone who ‘is in alltheir thoughts,’ and worketh in them both to will and to do of his goodpleasure.’ They feel that ‘it is not they’ that ‘speak, but the Spirit of’their ‘Father who speaketh’ in them, and that whatsoever is done by theirhands, ‘the Father who is in them, he doeth the works.’ So that God is tothem all in all, and they are nothing in his sight. They are freed fromself-will, as desiring nothing but the holy and perfect will of God; notsupplies in want, not ease in pain, nor life, or death, or any creature; butcontinually crying in their inmost soul, ‘Father, thy will be done.’ Theyare freed from evil thoughts, so that they cannot enter into them, no, notfor a moment. Aforetime, when an evil thought came in, they looked up,and it vanished away. But now it does not come in, there being no roomfor this, in a soul which is full of God. They are free from wanderings inprayer. Whensoever they pour out their hearts in a more immediatemanner before God, they have no thought of anything past, or absent,or to come, but of God alone. In times past, they had wandering thoughtsdarted in, which yet fled away like smoke; but now that smoke does notrise at all. They have no fear or doubt, either as to their state in general, oras to any particular action. The ‘unction from the Holy One’ teacheththem every hour what they shall do, and what they shall speak; northerefore have they any need to reason concerning it. They are in onesense freed from temptations; for though numberless temptations flyabout them, yet they trouble them not. At all times their souls are evenand calm, their hearts are steadfast and unmovable. Their peace, flowing,as a river, ‘passeth all understanding,’ and they ‘rejoice with joyunspeakable and full of glory.’ For they ‘are sealed by the Spirit unto theday of redemption,’ having the witness in themselves, that ‘there is laid upfor’ them a ‘crown of righteousness, which the Lord will give’ them ‘inthat day.’ “Not that every one is a child of the devil, till he is thus renewed in love:On the contrary, whoever has ‘a sure confidence in God, that through themerits of Christ, his sins are forgiven,’ he is a child of God, and, if he abidein him, an heir of all the promises. Neither ought he in anywise to castaway his confidence, or to deny the faith he has received, because it isweak, or because it is ‘tried with fire,’ so that his soul is ‘in heavinessthrough manifold temptations.’“Neither dare we affirm, as some have done that all this salvation is givenat once. There is indeed an instantaneous, as well as a gradual, work ofGod in his children; and there wants not, we know, a cloud of witnesses,who have received, in one moment, either a clear sense of the forgivenessof their sins, or the abiding witness of the Holy Spirit But we do not knowa single instance, in any place, of a person’s receiving, in one and the samemoment, remission of sins, the abiding witness of the Spirit, and a new, aclean heart.“Indeed, how God may work, we cannot tell; but the general mannerwherein he does work is this: Those who once trusted in themselves thatthey were righteous, that they were rich, and increased in goods, and hadneed of nothing, are, by the Spirit of God applying his word, convincedthat they are poor and naked. All the things that they have done arebrought to their remembrance and set in array before them, so that theysee the wrath of God hanging over their heads, and feel that they deservethe damnation of hell. In their trouble they cry unto the Lord, and heshows them that he hath taken away their sins, and opens the kingdom ofheaven in their hearts, ‘righteousness, and peace, and joy in the HolyGhost.’ Sorrow and pain are fled away, and ‘sin has no more dominionover’ them. Knowing they are justified freely through faith in his blood,they ‘have peace with God through Jesus Christ;’ they ‘rejoice in hope ofthe glory of God,’ and ‘the love of God is shed abroad in their hearts.’“In this peace they remain for days, or weeks, or months, and commonlysuppose they shall not know war any more; till some of their old enemies,their bosom sins, or the sin which did most easily beset them, (perhapsanger or desire,) assault them again, and thrust sore at them, that they mayfall. Then arises fear, that they shall not endure to the end; and oftendoubt, whether God has not forgotten them, or whether they did notdeceive themselves in thinking their sins were forgiven. Under theseclouds, especially if they reason with the devil, they go mourning all theday long. But it is seldom long before their Lord answers for himself,sending them the Holy Ghost to comfort them, to bear witness continuallywith their spirits that they are the children of God. Then they are indeedmeek and gentle and teachable, even as a little child. And now first do theysee the ground of their heart; which God before would not disclose untothem, lest the soul should fail before him, and the spirit which he hadmade. Now they see all the hidden abominations there, the depths ofpride, self-will, and hell; yet having the witness in themselves, ‘Thou artan heir of God, a joint heir with Christ, even in the midst of this fierytrial;’ which continually heightens both the strong sense they then have oftheir inability to help themselves, and the inexpressible hunger they feelafter a full renewal in his image, in ‘righteousness and true holiness.’ ThenGod is mindful of the desire of them that fear him, and gives them a singleeye, and a pure heart; He stamps upon them his own image andsuperscription; He createth them anew in Christ Jesus; He cometh untothem with his Son and blessed Spirit, and, fixing his abode in their souls,bringeth them into the ‘rest which remaineth for the people of God.’”
