Before The Work Of Grace The Heart

A Man May Be Carried On In A Constant Course Of Mortification All His Days; And Yet Perhaps Never Enjoy A Good Day Of Peace And Consolation.

Let Our Hearts Admit, “i Am Poor And Weak. Satan Is Too Subtle, Too Cunning, Too Powerful; He Watches Constantly For Advantages Over My Soul. The World Presses In Upon Me With All Sorts Of Pressures, Pleas, And Pretences. My Own Corruption Is Violent, Tumultuous, Enticing, And Entangling. As It Conceives Sin, It Wars Within Me And Against Me. Occasions And Opportunities For Temptation Are Innumerable. No Wonder I Do Not Know How Deeply Involved I Have Been With Sin. Therefore, On God Alone Will I Rely For My Keeping. I Will Continually Look To Him.

Some Relate . . . That The Eagle Tries The Eyes Of Her Young By Turning Them To The Sun; Which If They Cannot Look Steadily On, She Rejects Them As Spurious. We May Truly Try Our Faith By Immediate Intuitions Of The Sun Of Righteousness. Direct Faith To Act Itself, Immediately And Directly On The Incarnation Of Christ And His Mediation; And If It Be Not The Right Kind And Race, It Will Turn Its Eyes Aside To Anything Else.

To Kill Sin Is The Work Of Living Men; Where Men Are Dead (as All Unbelievers, The Best Of Them, Are Dead), Sin Is Alive, And Will Live.

He Can Make The Dry Parched Ground Of My Soul To Become A Pool And My Thirsty Barren Heart As Springs Of Water. Yes He Can Make This Habitation Of Dragons This Heart Which Is So Full Of Abominable Lusts And Fiery Temptations To Be A Place Of Bounty And Fruitfulness Unto Himself