XXVI.

Faith is not Assurance.

WHEN, gracious Lord, when shall it be
That I shall find my all in Thee;
The fulness of Thy promise prove,
The seal of Thine eternal love?

Thee, only Thee, I fain would find,
And cast the world and flesh behind;
Thou, only Thou, to me be given
Of all Thou hast, in earth or heaven.

Ah! wherefore did I ever doubt?
Thou wilt in no wise cast me out;
A helpless soul that comes to Thee,
With only sin and misery.

Lord, I am sick; my sickness cure;
I want; do Thou enrich the poor;
Under Thy mighty hand I stoop;
O lift the abject sinner up!

Lord, I am blind; be Thou my sight:
Lord; I am weak, be Thou my might:
A Helper of the helpless be;

And let me find my all in Thee.

C. WESLEY.

IT

XXVI.

FAITH IS NOT ASSURANCE.

T is often a great stumbling-block to humble but faint-hearted Christians that they fancy they cannot be true believers if they have not full assurance that they are accepted by God. Many a worthy soul goes softly all his days, fearing to lay hold on the promises, from a sense of unworthiness and a dread of presumption. But it is very certain, whatever some may say, that assurance is not faith, but a result of it, attained only gradually and sometimes not at all: the ripened fruit in the autumn of one's experience, for the most part, rather than a spring blossom. St. John writes to the Christians of his day,-"These things. have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.'

If the assurance of salvation always attended belief, he could not have spoken in words like these, for he seeks to tell them, how, though believers, they may come to know that they have eternal life. They had the life, and yet did not know it. It is one thing to have a right to heaven, and another thing to know it; it is one thing for God to write a man's name in the book of life, and another thing for a man to know that it is so written. The seven beatitudes are not promised to assurance, but to poverty of spirit, to true mourners, to those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, and to others of similar classes. Not a word is found in all the invitations of Christ that makes our salvation turn on our confidence that we are accepted. In the parable of the Pharisee and the publican, the one is full of false security and presumption; the other, through a sense of his unworthiness, stands afar off, afraid to draw nigh; smites on his breast in self-condemnation; will not so much as lift up his eyes to meet the eyes of a holy God; and accuses himself as a great sinner; and yet, though thus vile and comfortless in his own sight, he goes away justified, while

the other has no such favour vouchsafed.

But

the publican could not have been justified if he had not had faith, which, indeed, his very prayer and presence before God show him to have had.

Christ's sayings to his disciples point to the same comfort. In the chapter in which He rebukes them as, "O ye of little faith,”—He adds, in the fourth verse after, "Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.' The life may be

hid in the root in the cold winter weather of fears and doubts, and yet rise and grow green again with returning spring. David could not have had assurance when He prays, "Restore unto me the joys of Thy salvation," or, "Cast me not away from Thy presence, and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me." St. Paul could hardly have had assurance when he wrote, “lest having preached to others, I myself should be a cast-away." It was long after this that he told Timothy, he "knew Him in whom he believed;" his earlier days had been often dark, but at eventide there was light. We are to work out our salvation with fear and

* Luke xii. 28, 32.