THE EXPERIENCE OF CHRIST's GRACE AND LOVE

"The kingdom of God is not in word, but in power." -I Corinthians 4:20 [KJV]

It is the wisdom of a Christian to improve from the various objects he meets with. See we an open, profane sinner? beware of looking down upon him with Pharisaic pride, and supercilious contempt: behold in him your wicked nature! Remember, grace alone made the difference: be humble: adore the God of grace. See we only the form of godliness in any? St. Paul tells us how to act: “From such turn away” (II Timothy 3:5.) You will get no good from them. There is little hope of doing good to them: leave them. 

Why so? Because they are strangers to the vital power of godliness, and destitute of the inward experience of the grace of Christ upon their souls. True, they may make a great shew; have vast zeal for the interest of a party; be very warm and violent for the form of sound words, a consistent plan of doctrine, and a set of Scripture notions. But, yet, after all, it is but the notion and form of things, which float in their heads, and swim on the surface of their understandings. Their hearts are dead to the love of Christ, but alive to the love of the world. They join the men of the world in their contemptuous sneer upon the power of self-denying godliness; and in irreligious banter upon those, who separate themselves from the ungodly and profane, and live and walk under the influence of spiritual feelings and experience. 

All this they account precise folly, and condemn as rank enthusiasm. Have you the power of godliness? Is Christ the power of God in your heart? Is your soul alive to Him? Is your body the temple of the Holy Ghost? Does God dwell in you, and delight over you? Is it your daily delight to study the word, rely upon the promises, taste the grace, feel the power, feed upon the comfort, and live upon the fulness of the love of Christ? What have you to do with the men who are content with mere form, shadow, and notion; and are strangers to the power of all this? 

Catch the infection of their secure spirit, you may: by such, the keen edge of your spiritual affections may be blunted: you may be drawn to lie supinely down by them, and get into spiritual slumber with them. But of all men, there is the least hope of these rising from their security, running the heavenly race with you, and of being spiritually profitable to you. 

Think of this, and turn from them. Know your danger: though not of losing your soul, yet of losing the life, comfort, and power of godliness. O! what is a Christian without this? How comfortless the moments! how dejecting the hours! how distressing the days! how doleful the nights—without experiencing the power of Christ! Yea, what is life itself, without the experience of His grace and love?

 

-preacher William Mason (1724-1797 A.D.)

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