The Works of John Bunyan, vol 1 by John Bunyan (books to read to improve english .TXT) 📕

(10.) And if there be anything proffered to it by thee, as to the making of it amends, it throws it back again as dirt in thy face, slighting all that thou canst bring.

Now, when the soul is brought into this condition, then it is indeed dead, killed to that to which it was once alive. And therefore, 3. In the next place, to show you to what it is killed: and that is,

1. To sin. O, it dares not sin! it sees Hellfire is prepared for them that sin, God’s justice will not spare it if it live in sin; the Law will damn it if it live in sin; the devil will have it if it follows its sins. [Here I am speaking of one that is effectually brought in]. O, I say, it trembles at the very thoughts of sin! Ay, if sin do but offer to tempt the soul, to draw away the soul from God, it cries, it sighs, it shunneth the very appearance of sin, it is odious unto it. If God would but serve you thus that love your pleasures, you would not make such a trifle of sin as you do.

2. It is killed to the Law of God as it is the Covenant of Works.

O, saith the soul, the law hath killed me to itself, “I through the law am dead to the law” (Gal 2:19). The law is another thing than I did think it was. I thought it would not have been so soul-destroying, so damning a law! I thought it would not have been so severe against me for my little sins, for my playing, for my jesting, for my dissembling, quarreling, and the like. I had some thoughts, indeed, that it would hew great sinners, but let me pass! and though it condemned great sinners, yet it would pass me by! But now, would I were free from this covenant, would I were free from this law! I will tell thee that a soul thus worked upon is more afraid of the Covenant of Works than he is of the devil; for he sees it is the law that doth give him up into his hands for sin; and if he was but clear from that, he should not greatly need to fear the devil. O, now every particular command tears the caul of his heart; now every command is a great gun well charged against his soul; now he sees he had as good run into a fire to keep himself from burning, as to run to the law to keep himself from damning; and this he sees really, ay, and feels it too, to his own sorrow and perplexity. 14

3. The soul also now is killed to his own righteousness, and counts that but dung, but dross, not worth the dirt hanging on his shoes.

O! then, says he, thou filthy righteousness! how hast thou deceived me! How hast thou beguiled my poor soul! (Isa 64:6). How did I deceive myself with giving of a little alms; with abstaining from some gross pollutions; with walking in some ordinances, as to the outside of them! How hath my good words, good thinkings, good meanings, as the world calls them, deceived my ignorant soul! I want the righteousness of faith, the righteousness of God; for I see now there is no less will do me any good.

4. It is also killed to its own faith, its notion of the Gospel, its own hope, its own repentings, its own promises and resolutions, to its own strength, its own virtue, or whatsoever it had before.

Now, saith the soul, that faith I thought I had, it is but fancy; that hope I thought I had, I see it is by hypocritical, but vain and groundless hope. [These things would be too tedious to enlarge upon]. Now the soul sees it hath by nature no saving faith, no saving hope, no grace at all by nature, by the first covenant. Now it crieth out, How many promises have I broken! and how many times have I resolved in vain, when I was sick at such a time, and in such a strait at such a place! Indeed, I thought myself a wise man once, but I see myself a very fool now. O, how ignorant am I of the Gospel now, and of the blessed experience of the work of God on a Christian heart! In a word, it sees itself beset by nature with all evil, and destitute of all good, which is enough to kill the stoutest, hardest-hearted sinner that ever lived on the earth. O, friends, should you be plainly dealt withal by this discovery of the dealing of God with a sinner when He makes him a saint, and would seriously try your selves thereby, as God will try you one day, how few would there be found of you to be so much as acquainted with the work of God in the notion, much less in the experimental knowledge of the same! And indeed, God is fain to take this way with sinners, thus to kill them with the old covenant to all things below a crucified Christ.

Six reasons of this discourse.

1. Because otherwise there would be none in the world that would look after this sweet Jesus Christ. There are but a few that go to Heaven in all, comparatively; and those few God is fain to deal with them in this manner, or else His Heaven, His Christ, His glory, and everlasting happiness must abide by themselves, for all sinners.

Do you think that Manasseh would have regarded the Lord, had He not suffered his enemies to have prevailed against him? (2 Chron 33:1-16).

Do you think that Ephraim would have looked after salvation, had not God first confounded him with the guilt of the sins of his youth?

(Jer 31:18). What do you think of Paul? (Acts 9:4-6). What do you think of the jailer? (Acts 16:30-32). What do you think of the three thousand? (Acts 2:36,37). Was not this the way that the Lord was fain to take to make them close in with Jesus Christ? Was He not fain to kill them to everything below a Christ, that were driven to their wits’ ends, insomuch that they were forced to cry out, “What shall we do to be saved?” I say, God might have kept Heaven and happiness to Himself, if He should not go this way to work with sinners. O stout-hearted rebels! O tender-hearted God!

2. Because then, and not till then, will sinners accept of Jesus Christ on God’s terms. So long as sinners can make a life out of anything below Christ, so long they will not close with Christ without indenting; 15

But when the God of Heaven hath killed them to everything below Himself and His Son, then Christ will down on any terms in the world. And, indeed, this is the very reason why sinners, when they hear of Christ, yet will not close in with Him; there is something that they can take content in besides Him. The prodigal, so long as he could content himself with the husks that the swine did eat, so long he did keep him away from his father’s house; but when he could get no nourishment anywhere on this side of his father’s house, then saith he, and not till then, “I will arise, and go to my father,” etc.

I say, this is the reason, therefore, why men come no faster, and close no more readily, with the Son of God, but stand halting and indenting 16 about the terms they must have Christ upon; for, saith the drunkard, I look on Christ to be worth the having; but yet I am not willing to lose ALL for him; all but my pot, saith the drunkard; and all but the world, saith the covetous. I will part with anything but lust and pride, saith the wanton. But if Christ will not be had without I forsake all, cast away all, then it must be with me as it was with the young man in the Gospel, such news will make me sorry at the very heart.

But now, when a man is soundly killed to all his sins, to all his righteousness, to all his comforts whatsoever, and sees that there is no way but the devil must leave him, but he must be damned in Hell if he be not clothed with Jesus Christ; O, then, saith he, give me Christ on any terms, whatsoever He cost; though He cost me friends, though He cost me comforts, though He cost me all that ever I have; yet, like the wise merchant in the Gospel, they will sell all to get that pearl. I tell you, when a soul is brought to see its want of Christ aright, it will not be kept back; father, mother, husband, wife, lands, livings, nay, life and all, shall go rather than the soul will miss of Christ. Ay, and the soul counteth Christ a cheap Saviour if he can get him upon any terms; now the soul indents17 no longer. Now, Lord, give me Christ upon any terms, whatsoever He cost; for I am a dead man, a damned man, a castaway, if I have not Christ. What say you, O you wounded sinners? Is not this true as I have said? Would you not give ten thousand worlds, if you had so many, so be you might be well assured that your sins shall be pardoned, and your souls and bodies justified and glorified at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ?

3. The Lord goeth this way for this reason also, that it might make the soul sensible what it cost Christ to redeem it from death and Hell. When a man cometh to feel the sting and guilt of sin, death and Hell upon his conscience, then, and not till then, can he tell what it cost Christ to redeem sinners. O! saith the soul, if a few sins are so terrible, and lay the soul under such wrath and torment, what did Christ undergo, who bare the sins of thousands and thousands, and all at once?

This also is one means to make souls tender of sin (it is the burned child that feareth the fire), to make them humble in a sense of their own vileness, to make them count everything that God giveth them a mercy, to make much of the least glimpse of the love of God, and to prize it above the whole world. O sinners, were you killed indeed [to sin], then Heaven would be Heaven, and Hell would be Hell indeed; but because you are not wrought upon in this manner, therefore you count the ways of God as bad as a good man counteth the ways of the devil, and the ways of the devil and Hell as good as a saint doth count the ways of