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CHAPTER XV.

Assurance Confirmed in Experience.

THE assurance of faith-this "resting in Christ"this "assured confidence wrought by the Gospel in the heart"-has sometimes been confused with what is variously called "the assurance of love," "the assurance of hope," and "the assurance of sense."

The latter in the larger catechism, is thus defined: "Such as truly believe in Christ, and walk in all good conscience before him, may without extraordinary revelation, by faith grounded upon the truth of God's promises, and by the Spirit enabling them to discern in themselves those graces to which the promises of life are made, and bearing witness with their spirits that they are the children of God, be infallibly assured that they are in a state of grace, and shall persevere therein unto salvation." How different this!

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No one will ever pretend to say that all this is necessary to constitute faith. No wonder that it is declared in the next answer that, "not being of the essence of faith, true believers may wait long before they obtain it; and after the enjoyment thereof, may have it weakened and intermitted through manifold distempers, sins, temptations, and desertions." This is the result of experience, and of the observation of the work of God's grace within us.

No less clearly does it appear from the Heidelberg Catechism, that there is such an assurance, entirely distinct from the act of believing, however confidently. We find it in the answer to the eighty-sixth question: "Since then we are delivered from our misery, merely of grace, through Christ, without any merit of ours, why must we still do good works?" Ans. "Because Christ having redeemed and delivered us by his blood, also renews us by his Holy Spirit, after his own image; that so we may testify, by the whole of our conduct, our gratitude to God for his blessings, and that he may be praised by us; also that every one may be assured in himself of his faith, by the fruits thereof; and that by our godly conversation others may be gained to Christ.”

As soon as defined this falls into its place in the rear, which is the right order and proper relative position. The one is a simple confidence, the other its confirmation in experience. The one is a direct

act of faith in Christ as he is offered in the Gospel; the other, a reflex act of the soul, turning away from the Divine testimony to the inspection of its own exercises, and of the various fruits of faith in holy living. The one is an immediate duty, and the other a result of its performance.

We cannot do better than to give this distinction as it is richly drawn and illustrated by that eminent old Scottish divine, Ebenezer Erskine, in sermons upon the subject of faith, in which he takes the language of the Westminster Catechism as his basis:

"There is a great difference between the assurance of faith, and the assurance of sense which follows upon faith. The assurance of faith is a direct, but the assurance of sense a reflex act of the soul. The assurance of faith hath its object and foundation from without, but that of sense has them within. The object of the assurance of faith is a Christ revealed, promised, and offered in the word; the object of the assurance of sense is a Christ formed within us by the Holy Spirit. The assurance of faith is the cause, that of sense the effect; the first is the root, and the other is the fruit. The assurance faith eyes the promise in its stability, flowing from the veracity of the promiser; the assurance of sense eyes the promise in its actual accomplishment. By the assurance of faith, Abraham believed that he should have a son in his old age, because God who cannot

lie had promised; but by the assurance of sense he believed it when he got Isaac in his arms. By the first, Noah was sure that he and his family should not perish in the waters of the deluge; but by the last, he was assured of it, when the ark rested on the mountains of Ararat, and the waters were withdrawn again into their proper channels. By the former, the believing Israelites were assured that Canaan should be their possession, because God had made a grant and a deed of gift of it to them in his promise; by the latter, they were assured of it, when they passed Jordan, overthrew the old inhabitants, and divided the good land by lot, as the inheritance of the tribes of Israel. Time would fail to illustrate this matter by instances that stand on record in the sacred oracles. Faith asserts its interest in a future good, because promised; sense asserts its interest in a present good, because possessed. Faith says, 'My God will hear me;' sense says, 'My God hath heard me.' Faith says, 'He will bring me forth to the light, and I shall behold his righteousness;' sense says, 'He hath brought me forth to the light, and I do behold his righteousness.' Again, faith is conversant about things that are not seen, and hoped for; sense is conversant about things seen, and actually enjoyed. Faith says, 'He is my God, because he hath said in the covenant, I will be their God;' sense again says, 'He is my God, because I know my

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