Desires Regarded # 1

Desires Regarded # 1

Our religion is sometimes at a very low ebb. What with trials without, stirring up corruption within, and the temptations of satan taking advantage of our various defects - we can scarcely tell whether we have the root of the matter in us or not! At such times, we are led to look back, and to take hold afresh of those portions of God's word, which cheered and comforted us when we first began our pilgrimage. On one such sweet portion my eye is now fixed, may the Lord help me to write a few lines on it, which may do those good who are weak in faith, and weary in the way. "He will fulfill the desire of those who fear Him; He also will hear their cry, and will save them." (Psalm 145:19).

The Characteristics. Fearing. Our fear is often of a very mixed character, partly legal and partly evangelical. Our fears are often very painful; and seldom are they beneficial.

When first awakened by the Holy Spirit, and led to see our lost state and condition - the principal object of our fear is the wrath of God. We know we deserve it, the guilt of sin in the conscience, fills us with alarm respecting it - and we fear that it will suddenly fall upon us. The eye of the mind is fixed on the threatenings of the word, and in them appears the holiness, justice, and majesty of and offended God. Our fears now gain strength, and terrible alarms often agitate the soul. We need the promises and the invitations of the word, and long to appropriate them - but dare not so much as touch one of them. They are for the Lord's people - and we cannot believe that we are such; or they are for particular characters - and we dare not conclude that we are among them. O if we could but escape the dreadful wrath of God, if we were but delivered from His awful threatenings, if we had but a saving interest in His promises, or if we could but even claim His invitations - our fears would not be so strong, or so painful - but we cannot!

When the mind has been led to see something of the graciousness of the Divine character, and the nature and design of the great atonement - hope springs up, and our fear is somewhat changed in its character. We now fear sinning against God. If we could but abstain from sin! If we could but live a holy life! If our hearts  were but clean! But when we turn the eye within, and see what a horrid pit of pollution the heart is, and mark the working of corruption there - we fear that we are too vile to be noticed, or regarded with pity or compassion, by a holy God. O what painful fears we feel working within us now - we fear that we must be banished from God, that we shall never see His face, or feel His forgiving love! We see not how a just God, can ever forgive or justify such sinners as we are! If we could but pray, or repent, or believe, we might hope; but when we try to pray - we are all confusion; when we would repent - our hearts are as cold as ice, and harder than the millstone; and when we would believe - we feel as if we we could believe anything but the gospel, and every one but God. Yet under all this, there is the fear of God - for conscience is tender, the soul is set against sin, and the walk is in accordance with God's precepts. Of such, though they have not peace, though they do not enjoy rest, though they are not happy - we must say that they "fear God."

They have had many and painful desires working within them, which desires indicate the bent of the mind, and the working of the Spirit of God. The principal, the ruling desire, is for a saving interest in Christ. This appears to the soul, as the one thing needful. If soul had this - it could endure any privations, suffer any pains, and do anything God requires; but without this - every duty is a task, and every privilege a burden. It cannot rest on general principles, saying, "Christ died for sinners, and therefore He died for me; or He is the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the whole world, and therefore for my sins." It wants something more satisfactory. It wants to see that Christ was its personal substitute, and its all meritorious sacrifice; doing all that the law required of it, and suffering all that the law threatened to inflict upon it. Or to realize that it is savingly interested in the person, work, and death of Jesus - being identified with Jesus, represented by Jesus, and doing and suffering in Jesus.

With such a sense of a saving interest in Christ is obtained, then the desire of the soul is to know Christ, to know all about Christ. To know Christ thoroughly, scripturally, and experimentally; so to know Him, as to commit all to Him, and leave all with Him. Then the soul desires to hold near, dear, and close communion with Him; often to hear from Him, having His word applied to the conscience and the heart. The soul also longs to love Him, trust Him, obey Him, enjoy Him, and praise Him; to share with His people in all their joys and sorrows, griefs and gladness, to be one with them on earth, preparatory to being one with them in Heaven forever. Such are some of the desires of those who fear Him.

~James Smith~

(continued with # 2)