That man honoreth God, edifieth the saints, convinceth the
world and condemneth them, and is become 'heir of the righteousness
which is by faith.' But I have dishonored God, stumbled and grieved
saints, made the world blaspheme, and, for aught I know, been the
cause of the damnation of many. "These are the things, I say,
together with many more of the same kind, that come to him; yea,
they will come with him, yea, and will stare him in the face, will
tell him of his baseness and laugh him to scorn, all the way that he
is coming to God by Christ-I know what I say-and this makes his
coming to God by Christ hard and difficult to him. Shame covereth
his face all the way he comes. He doth not know what to do; the God
that he is returning to is the God that he has slighted, the God
before whom he has preferred the vilest lusts; and he knows God
knows it, and has before Him all his ways.
The man that has been a backslider, and is returning to God, can
tell strange stories, and yet such as are very true. No man was in
the whale's belly, and came out again alive, but backsliding and
returning Jonah; consequently no man could tell how he was there,
what he felt there, what he saw there, and what workings of heart he
had when he was there, so well as he.
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