THE

GOSPEL STANDARD,

OR,

FEEBLE CHRISTIAN'S SUPPORT.

"Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness; for they shall be filled."-Matt. v. 6.

"Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began.”—2 Tim. i. 9.

"The election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded."-Rom. xi. 7.

"If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest.-And they went down both into the water, both Philip and the eunuch; and he baptized him.-In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost."-Acts viii. 37, 38; Matt. xxviii. 19.

No. 50.

FEBRUARY, 1840.

THE RIGHTEOUS ARE SAFE.

VOL. VI.

"The Lord will not suffer the soul of the righteous to famish."-Prov. x. 3. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivereth him out of them all." Many are the ups and downs of a poor weak believer in Jesus; many are the difficulties that he has to contend with, and the straits he is daily brought into, and that often by his own wicked and deceitful heart, for a man's worst enemies are those of his own household, and "out of the heart proceeds all manner of evil." How prone is he to wander and leave the Lord that bought him and paid so great a price for his ransom, even his own life; how prone is he to disbelieve his gracious and all-sufficient promise that he will never leave him nor forsake him, nor suffer his soul to be famished. He restrains prayer before God, and is filled with fretfulness, murmurings, and rebellions against such a kind and beneficent covenant God and Father. Envy and jealousy enter his heart against his Maker and his fellow-creatures. He sees others walking at large while he himself is shut up and cannot come forth. He hears others of the Lord's family telling what God hath done for their souls, and how good and kind He is to them, and he is weighed down and perplexed with the law in his members warring against the law of his mind, and bringing him into captivity to the law of sin and death which is in his members. He looks back at his past experience of the Lord's gracious dealings with him, but fears it is all a delusion, and only a trap laid by that arch enemy of souls, the devil, to lull him to sleep in carnal security, and keep him senseless of the true enjoyment of that endless happiness, even Christ in the heart, the hope

B

of glory. He thinks the Lord is unkind to him, and deals with him in a very austere way; nay, he often fears he is gone for ever. "Is thy mercy clean gone for ever? will the Lord be favourable no more ?" "Zion said, the Lord hath forsaken me, and my God hath forgotten me. Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, she may forget, but I will not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me." Yes, all this is very well, says such a poor soul; I know it is the word of him that cannot lie, and I believe that it will stand when the world and all that is in it is burnt up. I am satisfied that the Lord has a people formed for himself, and they shall show forth his praise, and tell of his goodness, long-suffering, and long-forbearing; but I cannot, I dare not lay hold of it. It kills me to see in the letter of God's truth so many sweet and precious promises, while I cannot come at them for myself; they are intended for others better than I. I am so black; my sins cry out to heaven against me; they are more than the hairs of my head, they cannot be numbered; they are as the sands on the sea shore for multitude. They keep me back; they press me so sore that I cannot touch the hem of his garment. I cannot come at him for the press, or, in touching, I know I should be whole, for he is sufficient to save to the uttermost all that come unto God by him. Here the soul makes an acknowledgment that it has renounced its own works, its self-dependence, self-sufficiency, and that through necessity and a consciousness of its own unworthiness, its many weaknesses and backslidings from him. "Well, now, thou poor, disconsolate, law-tormented, sin-burdened, devil-hunted sinner, thou art come to the place of stopping of mouths. Look at the words which I have selected, which form one of the many precious passages in the word of life." "The Lord will not suffer the soul of the righteous to famish." See how he fed the children of Israel in the wilderness for forty years with manna from heaven. He suffered them not to famish, although a rebellious and headstrong people, neither will he you. He is the same gracious God still, the same loving Father and true friend. Hath he said it, and will he not perform it? Yes; "though heaven and earth pass away, yet his word abideth for ever;" his people shall not famish for lack of any good thing, but he will supply all their needs according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. Many a time have I proved the Lord to be faithful to his promise when I have been led into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil, (Matt. iv. 1,) to deny my most gracious, ever-loving, and kind Lord, and to call all the work he has done for me into question, and to disbelieve it altogether; but, bless his dear name, I am still spared to prove that I never have perished, no, nor ever shall; and when the greatest temptations have been upon me, and I have well nigh fallen into them, the good Lord has come in again with some sweet help by the way, and given me fresh discoveries in his word that he is faithful, which has so warmed my heart with love towards him that I have been melted like wax before the flame. O the riches of distinguishing grace! How has it brought me to the footstool of

Jehovah, made me to mourn over him, to pity him, to thank him, and to praise him, and to acknowledge him Lord of all; renouncing my own works as nothing worth, as filthy rags, as a bed too short, as a covering too narrow. Then joy and gladness have filled my heart, and I have been as a bottle filled with new wine, ready to burst. (Job xxxii. 19.) Is this famishing? Is this perishing for hunger and for lack of knowledge? No. When we come here, we know all that is desirable to be known in this time state. What is this world and all its allurements to me, if I cannot see Christ directing my paths? But when his good hand is seen, I count the world as dung and dross. The prodigal tried it as long as he was able. But when a famine came on, that is, a spiritual famine, he went into the field to feed swine, and would fain have fed with them, but could not. But being now come to himself, he said, "How many hired servants of my father have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger. I will arise and go to my father and confess my sins, and tell him of my unworthiness to be called his son." But see how his loving father saw him a great way off, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him. The best robe was put upon him, a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet; the fatted calf was killed, and they began to be merry. So the Lord leads his people about in the wilderness, to humble them, and to prove them. But he never finally suffers them to famish, nor lack any good thing. May the Lord add his blessing. Amen.

Heckington, Nov. 4th, 1839.

J. T.

REVIVING TIME.

Dear Sir,-As I was returning home after hearing your farewell discourse at Zoar, on Monday evening, I was led to meditate on what I had heard, and the comfort which my poor soul enjoyed, and the great mercy the dear Lord once more vouchsafed toward his hunger-bitten family, who had, for so long a time, been kept very short of the bread of life, and the mercy I had experienced, not only in seeing an answer to prayer in your being raised up a pastor after God's own heart, but of his goodness and mercy in sending you so many miles amongst a poor, hunger-bitten, dispersed people as the hearers of that dear man of God, Mr. Huntington, are, and others of God's dear children. I was highly gratified in seeing so many of my old companions in tribulation once more, as one family, assembling together to partake of that bread which shall never perish; and on looking at each other, I could perceive, by their countenances, (which is often an index of the mind) a ray of gladness, expressive of the joy of their hearts, in seeing each other once more in the flesh. It brought to my mind the meeting of Joseph and bis brethren, and truly there was, I doubt not, a shaking among the dry boues. If one may speak for another, I do believe much spiritual life, and unction, and dew from your preaching were communicated to the broken hearts of God's dear children. You will, in all probability, say, what makes you think so? Because they, as in days of old, sent to one another saying, Come and see, here is Christ; and the house was filled with the blind, the lame, and the halt, and during

your stay the number was not diminished. In leaving the chapel, on the last evening, some came and shook hands most affectionately, whom I had almost forgotten; so that I was astonished, the remembrance of which, while writing, melts my stony heart with gratitude, feeling my unworthiness. For many years past, while under the first work, these words often came into my mind, to the distress of my soul; "How shall I put thee amongst the children, and give thee a pleasant land, a goodly heritage of the host of nations?" Often were that and many more portions of God's word brought to me by Satan to the great discomfort of my poor, heavy-burdened soul, which cut off all my hopes in a propitious God and Father in Christ Jesus, my dear Lord and Saviour; but, through rich mercy, I have proved the devil again and again a liar, and the father of lies. O, what humility, what self-abasement has the dear Lord poured into my soul in your coming amongst us, causing his dear blood-bought family once more in the flesh to assemble together; the like has not been since the death of our dear pastor. Praise ye the Lord! A little revival is now much prized. Time has been we were fed to the full; then, as in old, we loathed the honeycomb, but now the day of small things is highly prized. As to myself, I am glad to travel many miles to pick up the crumbs, should any fall, from the master's table. Thus some would rob the dogs, but, as it is written, a living dog is better than a dead lion. Poverty within, and poverty without in years that are passed, were severe trials to me; now, extreme outward poverty is not my lot, through mercy, although nothing to boast of but the goodness of my dear Lord; yet poverty of spirit within is much greater at times than that which was without, to the casting down of my poor soul; therefore I am constrained, through necessity, to pray that the dear Lord would raise up pastors to feed the hangry with good things, and he who fed the thousands in the wilderness has promised to hear the prayer of the destitute, and not despise their prayer. To this end I am constrained to supplicate the ever-blessed Jesus to do as he did in the days of his flesh, viz., to cause the multitude to sit down, (which is a posture of rest) and that he would take of the five barley loaves, and break, and give to his servants that they may give to his people, his chosen, in this our day of famine, not of bread and of water, but of hearing of the word of God. In great mercy he has heard and answered (although long delayed for years) my poor broken petitions, and brought two servants out of Egyptian darkness to lead his chosen into the land of Canaan, viz., Mr. P. and yourself. Bless his dear name, you, sir, we have seen and heard. I do pray and hope that Mr. P. will, through the constraining power of God the eternal Spirit, be made to come amongst us full of the blessings of the gospel of peace; and that each of your souls may be kept as a well-watered garden, and as springs of water whose waters fail not. This is the prayer of my poor soul, which, through rich mercy, has proved that the Lord is gracious, slow to anger, and of great goodness to the children of men. In this day of awful delusion and declension, the wise virgins as well as the foolish do slumber and sleep. If one may speak for the rest, they are continually backsliding, either in heart, lip, or life, and are in a cold, lukewarm state, for the want of the golden oil flowing from the candlesticks, through the golden pipes. As to myself, I do find it is winter almost all the year round with me, for the want of a searching ministry, the Lord's vineyard being grown over with briers and thorns. Such a ministry is wanted in this great city, to go through and burn all up. Such, sir, has yours been, that I trust you

will some day find, if you have not already found, you have not spent your strength for nought, nor laboured in vain for the Lord, but that you have left a blessing behind. "For as the rain cometh down from heaven, and returneth not thither but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater; so shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth; it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it." The whole of that verse cast a great light upon a promise which formerly came with divine power into my soul when crying for mercy. Just before it was applied, while on my knees, at eight o'clock at night, thus said the Lord; "In an acceptable time have I heard thee, and in a day of salvation have I helped thee." Such was the divine power and unction that attended the words, that my eyes flowed with tears of gratitude. I blessed and praised my God faster in my spirit than words could flow out. I should first have mentioned, that after prayer, I was reading the 49th chapter of Isaiah, and when I came to the 8th verse, that blessed portion was suddenly applied. As soon as I was recovered to see to read again, these words were applied; 66 My words shall not return unto me void," &c., which conveyed great light to my understanding, by the eternal God the Spirit, seeing that that which came from the God of all grace caused thanksgiving and praise to ascend to him who spake to my poor distressed soul. This did not deliver me fully, although it brought great comfort into my soul, which did not last long, having much tribulation, sorrow, and distress to pass through within and without, for many years afterwards, and great fightings of affliction to endure. As an ass was I crouching down between two burdens, the law of mount Sinai in my conscience, poverty and distress on all sides, the world, the flesh, and the devil, to combat with; and like Job, heavy tidings following one after another, destruction and misery in all my paths, kicking and plunging like a wild bull in a net, being unaccustomed to the yoke. O how often have I stood astonished at the merciful forbearance of a covenant God in Christ Jesus, in not cutting so vile a wretch off, and consigning me to that place where hope never comes, and the worm never dies, for my repeated rebellion. O what a long-suffering

ever."

God in Christ Jesus have we rebels to do with! When I remember these things, I am constrained to cry out, "Not unto us, not unto us, but to his ever blessed name be all the praise and glory, now and for Job, David, and Jeremiah were my constant companions. Often have I been blessed while reading the 3rd chap. of Lamentations, seeing that the trials I had to pass through were the footsteps of Christ's flock, however painful the path might be. Oftentimes I have determined to give all up, and fly out of his hands. Again blessed with a little hope; again called to hope against hope. O blessed be his dear name, this promise has often proved an anchor to my distressed soul. "I have overcome the world, and ye through me shall (blessed shall) overcome also." The Captain of our salvation was made perfect through suffering; so must all his followers be. This is to crucify us to the world, and the world unto us. I am now, through nearly forty years' hard campaign, and the tender mercy of my propitious God and Father in Christ Jesus, left a living monument of his mercy, to show forth his praise, and to declare to his tried and afflicted people what great things he has done unto my soul. O, who need despair since I have found mercy! "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit doth rejoice in God my Saviour." When I look