Consecration and the Assurance of Faith (Rewritten)

It’s hardly necessary to say much more to highlight just how important the assurance of faith really is. Anyone who genuinely longs for holiness of heart will naturally place great value on assurance, because holiness — understood in the gospel sense — is simply perfect love. And perfect love grows out of a mature, confident faith. In other words, deep assurance and deep holiness rise together.

When we look carefully at what assurance of faith actually is, it seems to rest on two essential elements. First, there is a steady, unshakable confidence in God — his character, his ways, and his promises. Second, there is a confident belief that we ourselves are accepted by God through Christ. Assurance is not limited to this personal element alone, as some people assume. Personal confidence rests on a broader, settled trust in God as a whole. Without that foundation, personal assurance has no place to stand.

A Life of Consecration and Trust (Rewritten)

From everything we’ve already considered, it becomes clear that the sanctification of the heart — and all the blessings that come with it — rests largely on two foundational principles. First, there must be a complete and wholehearted consecration of ourselves to God. Second, there must be a firm, steady belief that this consecration is truly accepted by Him.

We have already touched briefly on this second principle before, but it deserves further attention here.

When we consecrate ourselves to God in the way described, we take a step that is absolutely essential from every possible angle. Yet simply offering everything is not enough. In the same spirit of reliance, we must also believe — without wavering — that God has accepted that offering.

This belief is nothing less than trust in God’s faithfulness to His word. It is the confidence that God will receive — and does now receive — all who place themselves without reservation on His altar. This faith, more than anything else, secures the presence of sanctifying power in the soul. On the other hand, someone may consecrate themselves sincerely and yet dishonor God’s truth by failing to believe that their offering is accepted. In doing so, they cut themselves off from the very power that faith alone can bring, leaving themselves exposed and defenseless against the adversary.

Consecration to God (Rewritten )

From what has already been said, one thing should be clear: real growth in the life of faith is not likely without a settled, personal, and devout act of consecration. If a Christian is unwilling to make such a commitment — or is content merely to wish for it without actually carrying it out through a clear and decisive act — there is little reason to expect deep progress or the kind of inward spiritual experience that I will describe later.

This duty is so important, and so much depends on it, that it deserves careful and focused attention on its own.

Called to Holiness

It is to this great result, therefore, and to this great work, that every individual is called. “Be ye holy,” says God, “for I am holy.” “Be ye perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect.” The law of God’s holy nature would not allow him to command less or to require less. His mighty heart of love is fixed upon the one great object, that all other hearts, that all other moral beings throughout the universe may be in unison with himself, and bear his own image. It is this, still more than mere forgiveness or pardon, great and wonderful and costly as that is, which constitutes salvation. And if it is a great work, considered in reference to its results, it is great also, considered in reference to the difficulties, which perplex it. 

But difficult as it is, God, operating by the Holy Spirit in the production of faith in the heart, can accomplish it. Human nature, instigated by distrust of God or by confidence in its own efforts, has attempted the work in other ways, and by other instrumentalities, but always in vain. It has found all its toils and all its sufferings useless, its fastings, its pilgrimages, its macerations, its many tears, its fixed purpose of being better and of doing better, of no avail when unattended by faith. They are nothing, and perhaps we may say, are worse than nothing, except when they are yielded as subsequent in time and in cooperation with faith. Undoubtedly some persons have made the attempt, (ecclesiastical history, especially that part of it which exists in the shape of religious biographies and memoirs, furnishes abundant proofs of it,) to gain the victory over their inward sins, and to sanctify themselves by a system of works, who have been ignorant, in a great degree, of the true principles of the Gospel on this subject. They have made the attempt, therefore, as it is probable, with a considerable degree of natural sincerity; with a real desire, according to the light which they possessed, to become what the Lord would have them to be. And God, who always regards real sincerity of feeling, even when it is perplexed by ignorance, has in many cases blessed them. But the result invariably has been, that they see at last, and acknowledge at last, that any system of human effort, which does not consist in simple cooperation and union with the antecedent presence and operation of the grace of faith in the heart, is without avail. So that the first great work of man, the first indispensable work, indispensable for sanctification as it is for forgiveness, indispensable now and indispensable moment by moment forever, is to BELIEVE.

—The Life of Faith, Part 2, Chapter 3.

Consecration and Grace

Consecration therefore, as it seems to us, consecration without reserve either as to time or object, is the indispensable condition of inward religious advancement.

But it will be inquired perhaps with some solicitude, whether this doctrine, which denies advancement in religion without consecration, and which thus implies an act of the creature, does not exclude grace? In replying to this question, we feel obliged to say, that we cannot perceive any reasonable grounds of distrust and anxiety here. It is certainly difficult to see, how an act of correspondence on the part of the creature to God’s intentions and acts of mercy, is inconsistent with what we variously denominate grace, free-ness, or gratuity on God’s part. Man, considered as a moral and responsible being, could not do less than what is implied in such correspondence, without rejecting God. There is, and can be no alternative. He must either correspond with God by a reception of what God proposes to give and by a full and harmonious cooperation, or he must reject. And it is virtually impossible, as it seems to us, for God, while the creature rejects what he offers, to give more, or to continue for any length of time that which he has already given. But the act of correspondence, which is thus rendered indispensable on man’s part, if he would experience the continuance and the increase of the divine favor, being obviously nothing more than an act accepting what God offers, or perhaps more definitely and truly an act of consent to enter into harmony with the divine operation, it does not, and cannot detract from the free and gratuitous nature of the divine gifts. It is self-evident, that the mere reception of a gift, by an intelligent approval and cooperation on the part of the recipient, can never alter its nature as a gift.

The Birth of Her First Child

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

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She had now been married about a year. A number of things occurred about this time, which are worthy of notice. They tend to illustrate what I have remarked, in the preceding chapter, on the operations of grace in connection
with the position in which we are placed in Providence. If it is not strictly true, that God saves us by his providences, a remark which is sometimes made,— I think we may regard it as essentially true, that he saves us by his grace, dispensed and operating in connection with his providences. Providences test the disposition of the mind; they not only test it, but alter it and control it to some extent; and may be the means of placing it in a position the most favorable for the reception of inward divine teaching.

One circumstance, which was calculated to have a favorable effect upon the mind of Madame Guyon, at the time of which we are now speaking, was the birth of her first child. God was pleased to give her a son, to whom she gave the name of Armand Jaques Guyon. This event, appealing so strongly to family sympathies, was naturally calculated to interest and soften the feelings of those who had afflicted her. And we learn from what she has said on the subject, that this was the case. But this was not all. It brought with it such new relations; it opened such new views of employment and happiness, and imposed such increased responsibilities, that it could hardly fail to strengthen the renewed religious tendency, which had already begun to develop itself. Under the responsibility of a new life added to her own, she began to realize that, if it were possible for her not to need God for herself, she might need him for her child.

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

God Works by Grace and by Position

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

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But there she was, and she felt and knew that her earthly hopes were blasted. But she did not then perceive what she afterwards knew, that God placed her there in his providence, as he made Joseph a slave in Egypt, "for her good." God had formed her for himself. He loved her too much to permit her to remain long in harmony with a world, which, in its vanity and its corruption, He could not love. He knew what was requisite in order to accomplish his own work; He knew under what providences the natural life would retain its ascendency, and the soul would be lost; and under what providences grace would be rendered effectual, and the soul would be saved.

I have sometimes thought that God, who always respects man's moral freedom, carries on and completes the great work of his salvation, not only by grace, but by position. I use the word position here as nearly synonymous with external providences; and in laying down this proposition, I mean to say, it seems to me, although I would not speak with much confidence, to be a law of the divine action. Such are the relations between mind and place, that no man ever is what he is, independently of his situation. The mind has no power of acting in entire separation from the relations it sustains; it knows nothing where there are no objects to be known; loves nothing where there are no objects to be loved; does nothing where there is nothing to be done. Its powers of perception, its capabilities of affectionate or malevolent feeling, its resources of "volitional" or voluntary determination, develop their strength and their moral character in connection with the occasions which call them forth. Let any man read the Life of St. Augustine, particularly in connection with what he has himself said in his Confessions, or the Life of Francis Xavier, of Archbishop Leighton, of George Fox, of Baxter, of Wesley, of Brainerd, of Henry Martyn, — and then say, if different circumstances, (a situation, for instance, comparatively exempt from temptation and toil,) would have developed the same men, the same strength of purpose, the same faith in God, the same purity of life. This illustrates what we mean when we say that in the religious life we are the creatures, not only of grace, but of position, or more strictly and truly, of grace acting by position. If this doctrine be true, it throws light and beauty over the broad field of God's providences, and shows us why many have passed to glory through great tribulation. Tribulation was necessary to bring them, if not to the true life of God in the first instance, to that fulness and brightness of the inward life which they have experienced. So that those, who grow in grace by suffering, may do well to remember, that probably nothing but the seasons of trial which they have been called to pass through, would have fitted them for the reception and effectual action of that grace which is their consolation and their hope.

This was the view which Madame Guyon herself subsequently took of the subject.

— from The Life of Madame Guyon Volume 1, Chapter 5.

Restoration to the Divine Image

"We are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord." — 2 Cor. 3.18.

Upon the morning flower the dew's small drop,
So small as scarcely to arrest the eye,
Receives the rays from all of heaven's wide cope,
And images the bright and boundless sky.
And thus the heart, when 'tis renewed by grace,
Recalled from error, purified, erect,
Receives the image of Jehovah's face,
And though a drop, the Godhead doth reflect.
It hath new light, new truth, new purity,
A rectitude unknown in former time,
A love, that in its arms of charity
Encircles every land and every clime;
Submission, and in God a humble trust,
And quickened life to all that's pure and kind and just.

— The Religious Offering (1835) VIII.

Extinction of the Power of Evil Habits

The state of interior nothingness is characterized, further, by the extinction of the power of antecedent evil habits. A person may be sanctified to God, his heart may be pure in the divine sight, and still there may be a constant struggle on the part of the "old man" or the "old nature," to regain possession. It is difficult to explain this, viz. that a truly holy heart may still have a struggle antagonistical to sin, and oftentimes a fearful struggle; but it is probably owing, in addition to the direct temptations of Satan, to the tremendous power of antecedent evil habits. The principle of self-love for instance, may by divine grace be redeemed from its selfish attitude, and may be brought to its true subjective position and become a holy principle; and yet in consequence of its previous habits of inordinate exercise, there may be a strong tendency, which requires constant resistance, to resume its former position of irregularity and sin. This tendency is not, properly speaking, in the principle itself; but is forced upon it exteriorly, if we may so express it, by the law of habit; and therefore although it is extremely dangerous, it does not appear to be necessarily sinful. The idea may here perhaps be illustrated in the case of the reformed inebriate. He has refrained from drinking; but the influence of the antecedent law of habit is still felt in his system. He is no longer guilty of the sin of drinking; but his liability to fall into this sin is greatly increased by his antecedent evil habit. There is, undoubtedly, something mysterious in this: but it seems, nevertheless, to be true. He feels that, in consequence of his former evil habits, the enemy is near at hand and in great power; that his danger is thereby increased, and that he must always be in the attitude of watchfulness and of resistance. Something like this is the case with those, who have just entered into that state where they can say, they "love the Lord with all their heart." The enemy is cast out; but he avails himself of the influence of the law of habit, to take a hostile attitude and to seek a re-entrance.

Now when a person has experienced the state of interior nothingness, as it is conveniently, perhaps, and yet not accurately termed, he has by divine grace, not only succeeded in conquering sin in the gigantic forms of creature-love and of self-will, but in breaking down the perplexing influence and the unfavorable tendency of former habits. And hence there is a vast accession to his power, and to his tendency to union with God, Satan himself, in the presentation of his temptations, has comparatively but little influence over such a soul. He has, comparatively speaking, no basis to operate upon, no way of secret, circuitous, and indirect attack; but must come boldly up and make his attack, face to face, as he did in his temptation of the blessed Savior. And this he would rather not do, if he can approach the object of his attack in some other way.

— edited from The Interior or Hidden Life (2nd edition, 1844) Part 3, Chapter 12.

A Spirit Which Belongs to the World

The man who rests in God, by having the principles of his nature brought into harmony with the divine nature, cannot be restricted by the limitations of name or country; but has a spirit which belongs to the world.  It is true his speculative beliefs may harmonize in certain directions more than in others; but, bearing Christ's image at the center, he belongs to Christ rather than a party, and all mankind are his brethren. The turbulence of nature has given place to the pacifications of grace, in order that he may extend the right hand of fellowship to those of every name and every clime.

— edited from A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 8, Chapter 11.

Judge Not

Oh, do not judge thy fellow man;

Reproachful epithets forbear;

He hath his place in Heaven's great plan;

The God, who made, hath placed him there.

He's POOR. But in his rags behold

A heart  of  pure and high intent;

And if his form is bent and old,

It  is no cause of merriment.

Perhaps he's EVIL. Let thy prayer

Implore the God of truth and grace,

That soon his footsteps may repair

To virtue's bright and better ways.

OH, DO NOT JUDGE HIM. Hadst thou been,

Cast out like him to pine and die,

Thou too, allur'd and stain'd by sin,

Hadst needed tears of sympathy.

— Christ in the Soul (1872) LII.

Freed From the Fear of Sickness and Death

The man who in the exercise of faith is fully united to God, is delivered from the fear of sickness and death. Undoubtedly, in themselves considered, sickness and death are afflictions. The truly devoted and godly man understands this as well as others. But fully believing that all things work together for the good of those who love God, he is freed from anxiety. He welcomes suffering, when God sends it, in whatever form it may come. The physical suffering and weakness which attend upon sickness, become means of growth in grace; and, so far from being causes of complaint, are welcomed and rejoiced in as the forerunners of increased purity and happiness. And while many are constantly subject to bondage, through fear of death, the holy man looks upon it as the end of sorrow and the beginning of glory.

— edited from A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 8, Chapter 5.

The Necessity of the Dispensation of the Spirit

The object, therefore, of Christ's coming into the world, was to place men essentially in the condition in which they were before the Fall. Not only to secure their forgiveness, but to make them holy; not only to make them holy, but to make them so, in the only way in which Adam or any other being was ever made holy, viz. by means of the living and constant operation of God in the soul.

Hence the necessity of the dispensation of the Holy Spirit. Hence the various directions, which are given in the Scriptures not to grieve, and not to quench the Holy Spirit. Hence the declaration, that Christians are the temple of the Holy Ghost. And accordingly it is a great truth, though but imperfectly understood and estimated, that he, who, moves and acts in religious things without the attendant operation and grace of the Holy Ghost, cannot be spiritually wise, and is not in the way to be spiritually benefited.

— edited from The Interior or Hidden Life (2nd Edition, 1844) Part 3, Chapter 1.

Living Near to Christ

"Brethren, be followers together of me, and mark them which walk so, as ye have us for an ensample. For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ."
— Philippians iii. 17, 20.

When the bright sun is nearest to the earth,
In vernal months and days of summer bloom,
The buds and flowers and bending fruits have birth,
Instinct with life and beauty and perfume.
And so the man, who near the Savior lives,
Finds his heart kindling 'neath that radiant face;
The cheering light and heat the Savior gives,
And renovates and blesses with his grace.
But if the Christian keeps himself away,
And. follows Christ, as Peter did, far off;*
But seldom meditates, nor loves to pray,
Or  meets, on doubtful ground, with those who scoff;
His  heart grows cold, no genial ray shall bless,
'Twill be Siberian waste, mere ice and barrenness.

* At the time of his denying the Savior. See Matt. xxvi. 58.

— American Cottage Life (1850) XIX.

The Solitary Tear

It is reasonable to suppose, that a holy soul, one that has experienced the richness of sanctifying grace, will oftentimes be much afflicted in consequence of not finding in others a spirit corresponding to its own. In the present state of the world, when practical holiness is but partially understood and still less realized, such a soul, although the social principle remains strong in it, is necessarily solitary to a considerable degree. How can it enter with spirit and eagerness into worldly conversation? How can it participate with any degree of relish in vain worldly amusements and pleasures? Such souls are sometimes borne down with the desire of imparting to others the spiritual tidings, which God has inwardly communicated to them.  But they find few, and perhaps none, that are ready and willing to hear them. And thus they sit alone in secret places, and shed in silence the solitary tear.

— from The Interior or Hidden Life (1844) Part 2, Chapter 12.

How Selfishness Corrupts Even the Gifts of God

It is difficult to express and even to conceive of the subtleties and insinuations of selfishness.  It enters every path. It lurks in every secret place. And wherever it finds its way, it pollutes, poisons, and destroys. It sometimes attaches itself, by a process almost imperceptible, to God's most valuable gifts and graces; those which are spiritual, as well as those which are natural. An individual, for instance, is possessed of great natural ability. This ability is a gift of God. But how often it is, that the possessor, thinking but little of the great Author of the gift, regards it as something peculiarly his own, and instead of seeing God in it, sees only himself. Almost unconsciously to himself, and greatly to his spiritual injury, he is experiencing a secret elevation of spirit, and is taking a hidden complacency in an intellectual possession, which, when properly considered, should have increasingly detached him from self, and led him nearer to his Maker.

Resentment

The doctrines of holiness apply to the principle of RESENTMENT, as well as to other parts of the mind. It is impossible for a holy person not to be displeased, and sometimes greatly displeased, at acts of iniquity. The injunction of the Apostle, "be ye angry and sin not," seems to imply, that there may be cases, in which a person may be displeased and may be angry without necessarily incurring sin. It is said of the blessed Savior himself, that he looked upon the Pharisees "with anger, being grieved for the hardness of their hearts." But here again the evil hand of nature, (not nature as it was, but nature as it has become,) has been at work. Selfishness, which is but another name for the life of nature, infuses into the displeasure of the unsanctified man, even when there is a foundation for it within proper limits, a degree of severity and unforgivingness, which is inconsistent with holiness, and is fatal to true inward peace.

How often, and how sadly this has been the case; how often and how deeply individuals and churches have been injured from this cause, no one is ignorant. Families and nations, as well as individuals, have experienced the dreadful effects of the displeased and angry feelings, when they are not overruled and kept in check by true piety. The history of the world, from its earliest periods, is a solemn and monitory lesson on this subject. "He, that is slow to anger, is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit, than he that taketh a city." There seems to be need of greater effort and of more faith and prayer, to regulate entirely this department of the Affections, (usually denominated the Malevolent Affections,) than is required in the regulation of the other. But the grace of God is sufficient even here.

— edited from The Interior or Hidden Life (1844) Part 2, Chapter 9.

Restoration to the Divine Image

"That, which is  born of the flesh, is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit, is spirit."  John iii. 6.
"We  are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord." 2 Cor. iii. 18.

Upon the morning flower the dew's small drop,
So small as scarcely to arrest the eye,
Receives the rays from all of heaven's wide cope,
And images the bright and boundless sky.
And thus the heart, when 'tis renewed by grace,
Recalled from error, purified, erect,
Receives the image of Jehovah's face,
And though a drop, the Godhead doth reflect.
It hath new light, new truth, new purity,
A rectitude unknown in former time,
A love, that in its arms of charity
Encircles every land and every clime;
Submission, and in God a humble trust,
And quickened life to all, that's pure and kind and just.

— American Cottage Life (1850).

New Grace for New Trials

The grace which may meet and subdue the temptations of the present moment, may not be appropriate and adequate to the temptations of any future time. Every day and every moment bring their duties and trials, and need their appropriate grace. There must, therefore, be constantly repeated acts of faith; and by means of faith a constant application of the atoning efficacy of the blood of the Cross; both to preserve against the power of existing temptation, and also to wash the mind from the impurity of its stains, when we have already yielded to it. We would observe, finally, that temptations are profitable trials of the religious life, and are particularly calculated to purify and strengthen our faith. They are grievous for a time, it is true; but they are calculated to secure, in the end, the peaceable fruits of righteousness. Very few have become strong in faith, who have not passed through great trials. It is said of the Savior himself, that he "learned obedience by the things which he suffered."

— edited from The Interior or Hidden Life (1844)  Part 1, Chapter 19.

Nature Speaks; Grace is Silent

It is often the case, in the ordinary intercourse and affairs of life, that our actions, without being calumniated as criminal, are more or less misrepresented, and our motives aspersed by thoughtless or evil-disposed persons. Undoubtedly the natural tendency of the heart, under such circumstances, is to reply at once, and generally with as much energy as promptness. But, generally speaking, our true victory will be in silence. Nature speaks, but grace is silent; because nature is destitute of confidence, except in itself, but grace has confidence in God. To be silent, therefore, in ordinary cases, is best in every respect not only because it is the course indicated by true religion, but because it aids in breaking down the irregular and sinful action of the will.

— A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 5, Chapter 6.