The life of those who dwell in the secret place of the Most High may be called a Hidden Life, because the animating principle, the vital or operative element, is not so much in itself as in another. It is a life grafted into another life. It is the life of the soul, incorporated into the life of Christ; and in such a way, that, while it has a distinct vitality, it has so very much in the sense, in which the branch of a tree may be said to have a distinct vitality from the root.

Friday, March 24, 2017

Turning to God Anew

Reflections on
the Life of
Madame Jeanne de la Mothe Guyon.





Her statement of some of her early trials:

"It was then I began to eat the bread of sorrow, and mingle my drink with tears."

Such are the expressions which convey to us her sense of her trials. It was in this extremity that it occurred to her, (alas, that we learn this lesson so often from sorrows alone,) that, in the deficiency of all hope in creatures, there might be hope and help in God. It is true, that she had turned away from him; and having sought for solace where she had not found it, and where she ought not to have sought it, she felt ashamed to go back.

But borne down by the burdens of a hidden providence, (a providence which she did not then love because she did not then understand it,) she yielded to the pressure that was upon her, and began to look to him, in whom alone there is true assistance.

— edited from The Life of Madam Guyon Volume 1, Chapter 6.

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