When we weigh the importance of the words-" Whatever is not of faith is sin," it becomes a matter of deep anxiety how, ever and anon, we may walk simply under the action of that principle.
"The fall" was perpetrated when Adam ceased to have faith in God. When he surrendered faith he resigned the key-stone to the vast arch of all his blessings. To abstract it from man was Satan's great aim. When once unbelief in God was engendered, all other sentiments were qualified and deteriorated. What sentiment could you value from one in whom you had lost confidence? Adam lost confidence in God; and this poison, with electric precision, has reached every sentiment of the soul. Man is fallen, and his nature is the impregnation of unbelief. Be under the guidance of nature, and you must be at a distance from God. Be led by faith, that is, simple confidence in God, and you must be antagonistic to the natural mind. Faith is founded on a right estimate of God. The highest conceptions of nature are imperfect, because they are formed in ignorance and distrust of God. There could be no restoration of man to God without faith. Works and sentiments offered with distrust, however great and distinguished, must ever be questionable and inappreciable. To argue this seems superfluous; for if a position is lost by the surrender of any quality, how can. that position (not to speak of a higher), be regained without it, unless one would have a position with an inferior capacity for enjoying it, which, in this instance, would be monstrous to suppose, because it would be asserting that man could endure nearness to God without confidence in Him, and nothing could be more miserable. Consequently, the first breathing of regeneration is faith, and where faith is, there regeneration and new birth must be, for it is not in the nature of man -it is fallen! it is the repository of unbelief! When faith in a new power is at work, Jesus is the beginner as well as finisher of faith. If you will act, then, in the power of the new life, act in faith; for whatever is not of faith is sin, that is, it is the product of the flesh.
With these preliminary remarks, let us consider some of "the traits and difficulties of faith;" for it is plain, if we, who have been accustomed to walk according to the dictates of one principle, and that a natural one, are now called to adhere to a totally opposite one, and not natural to us-it is plain, I repeat, that we not only require uncommon shrewdness to apprehend the traits of the new, but also great prowess and steadiness in combating the difficulties which this new course must expose us to. Let us first inquire-To what limit faith can be reckoned on? It is always offered adequate to the revelation, that is, it is sufficient to sustain the servant of God: conformable to the nature of the dispensation, whatever it may be. This, I judge, should be a trait of the last importance, so that wherever. I saw an assertion of faith not warranted by the dispensation, I should then hesitate to approve. I think it will be granted that we have not faith, nor is faith offered to us, such as the millennial saints shall enjoy, that is, their faith will be applicable (though all of God) to a different state of things from that with us: for instance, we could not believe that Satan is bound; they will, and act accordingly. Again, I should take exception on this ground to those who profess to carry on war in the name of the Lord. I cannot see such faith applicable to this dispensation, the revelation is against it; and they who argue for it have to refer to the dispensation under the law, which has been superseded by the dispensation under grace, in which we now are. Hence they are deceived, because they are unmindful that faith is only in conformity to the dispensation. I believe also benevolent associations, as well as any philanthropy which meets with public sanction and countenance, being of earthly recognition, is not consonant with the faith of this dispensation, which is heavenly, and therefore secretly and unseemly diffusing its influence and services. Though it would be possible to dwell longer on this trait, yet enough is said to convince us, that if this is not observed in limine, all our course may be outside the path of faith, even though to men it may have a better appearance.
Faith is confined within the limits of the dispensation, for faith is confiding in God as He reveals Himself, and the dispensation is the manner of the revelation. We now pass on to consider whether faith is so supplied as to be applicable to every contingency. We must acknowledge that it is offered to the limit of the dispensation, but how is it offered? Is it offered as the abilities of life, or as the chain of powers which are not co-existent, but may be independent of one another,-or in other words that because a person has a certain power of faith (I speak not now of gifts, as such, but faith in practice), which suits him in a certain contingency that does not prove that he may reckon on another power of faith, when in a new and another contingency-or again more simply-is faith the action of life, or is it a special creation for special circumstances? If faith is the action of life, that is, the principle on which it acts, it is evident that, no matter what the circumstance that may arise, if life acts, it acts conformably to the dispensation, manifesting confidence of God, and giving testimony to Him therein, though never called on in a like manner before; and the soul having this conviction moves onward placidly because the resources are sufficient and they are vested. If, on the other hand, faith is to be specially created or bestowed as special need arises, then the soul is not without anxiety as to whether the power will be given or not, confidence is disturbed, uncertainty is damaging us at the moment when immovable reliance in possession of necessary power is of all importance; and makes the decree that " whatever is not of faith is sin," not to rest on our responsibility to use a power committed to us, but on divine favor, irrespective of our responsibility, which, to say the least, is not the way of God's dealing with us in grace. But what is the Apostle's argument to the Hebrews? Is it not that they ought to endure; that they are not of them who draw back unto perdition, but of faith (see Greek) unto the saving of the soul-that is, they have a fund of faith which is able to supply them with strength in any emergency-and hence he enumerates many of the qualities of faith, component parts of the faith of which we are partakers, and then sums up (since the time would fail him to trace all its powers) with this exhortation: " Let us cast aside every weight and the sin which cloth so easily beset us [unbelief], and run with patience the race set before us [that is conformable to the dispensation] looking unto Jesus the beginner and finisher of faith"-not our faith, but faith in the abstract. Now the answer to this question is by no means immaterial. I fully admit faith is the gift of God, but it greatly concerns me whether the life I am sustained in by the Holy Ghost is one, which as flowing from Jesus Christ risen, has in itself inherently all the necessary abilities of faith for me in my race: if it has, I feel bound to acknowledge that God has not left me without resource, and that I have no right when difficulty arises, when my dispensational position, that is, my testimony, is challenged, to say, " I can't proceed, I have not faith." Could I say I had not life-if I act in life it is faith-if I act without life it is sin. I may not, I admit, be in the energy of faith, but then I ought not to act denying it, as is generally the case when we use the plea of not having faith-in fact I am in nature; and in running the race set before me, I am not able (as exhorted) to cast aside unbelief. The Lord says He prayed that Peter's faith might not fail; that the energy of new life might triumph in his soul; not that a special power should be administered at the moment, but a true exertion of that already existing.
This is a great comfort to know that there is vested in me, through Christ, a power to meet every shade of circumstance which affects my race here. I am not looking out for it, I am depending on that within, which is of Christ; and here a grievous difficulty arises to the action of faith. If I am not clear as to my vested resources, through the life of Christ, I am looking for some manifestation on which to depend. It is not God simply that is my dependance, which the life of Christ in the Spirit leads to, it is the cry of unbelief-" Let us see a sign." When our confidence in God rests on anything but Christ, who reveals God, there is no permanency. It may serve for an occasion for God meeting our weakness, but it is not power in life. Whenever faith falls short of reckoning on God, because from knowledge of Him, then faith has lost virtue or energy, which the apostle lays down as the addition to faith. When we seek a sign, or judge by appearances, it is not a knowledge of God sustains us, but an evidence of His power controlling our senses and helping us to conviction. I doubt much if the faith so formed is attended with much vigor to ourselves; certain it is, that it does not seal strength to our souls. Jonathan, confirmed by a sign, successfully assaults the Philistines. It served him for the occasion, God meeting him in his weakness; but when, a little after, called upon to assert the honor of Israel against the proud defier of their armies and their God, he is not to be had, not from indifference, for we find none owned more largely or eagerly the victor and the victor's deeds. He was not confirmed in God as David, who could say" My God, who delivered me out of the paw of the lion and the bear, will deliver me out of thine hand." Faith can speak of God when there are no signs, and signs neither deter nor are regarded. Faith does honor unto God: it says," All my springs are in Thee." Thus the Lord Jesus glorified the Father. In the wilderness and on the cross He judged not God by the circumstances around- not by what He saw, but by what He knew of God. All earthly blessings- God's witnesses of Himself to man-were overlooked by Adam in the hour of his unbelief. The blessed Son had not even one, but a terrible reverse, in the great declaration of His faith. He judged God' by Himself intrinsically, and not by aught else; and this was Job's lesson. -Satan thought, and well he might, that Job's judgment of God was founded on the memorials of His kindness and mercy which surrounded him. Surely we may see, then, the slow and painful process by which the soul arrives to count God above every gift, and is established in Him and naught else; for this the sequel of Job's history teaches. When God fills his soul he rises above personal considerations, and prays for his friends. So Satan's accusation is proved false; for Job, in the most abject condition, is cast upon God, and so cast that his own miseries are lost sight of in his interest for others, and then his captivity in essence, as, in fact, ends. When we wear the yoke of Jesus and learn of Him, we find rest unto our souls.
It is one of the greatest practical difficulties that we have to contend with-seeking a sign. It is saving the soul the deep and holy exercise of faith, which is repugnant to nature; and the more dangerous, because it works in the mind of the awakened, and may, therefore, be often mistaken for true zeal. It is superstition which is the action of fear; faith, on the other hand, is confidence, and, in a word, without it, " it is impossible to please God." Every sentiment, however commendable, consequently falls behind faith, and how much more any which would pre-occupy its place. But I may be told, evidences are not against faith, they are only sought for to confirm faith, The answer is simple-Faith wants no evidence. It is itself an evidence. Faith rests on the word of God. I cannot ask your faith for aught else; but if you have faith in God, the moment His word is brought before you, you can accept it and start from it, because it is God's, in whom you believe. But the fact is an evidence or sign is generally to confirm one in an opinion which is asserted to be founded on the word of God, and which to convince me of, something additional is required. This will not be allowed; but is it not so? Take the case of Irvingism. The originators of that heresy did not doubt as they asserted the truth of their propositions, for they said, " Scripture was on their side'; but scripture was not deemed sufficient to convince me, and therefore they pretended that God would corroborate them by miraculous signs. This was plainly saying that miraculous signs would have greater weight with me than the word of God, in whom my soul was resting with confidence, Was it not, in fact, making the word of God of none effect? No miracle yet had the power of the word of God. Nothing, in my mind, is a greater proof of the soul's dubitancy of the word of God than the impatience we sometimes feel to see it verified:-and here
I come to a very interesting trait of faith. If I have faith in God touching any particular fact or hope, the more my faith is, the more patient am I, because the more I am convinced of the certainty, the more present comfort have I from it, because I am as sure of it as if I possessed it. "He that believeth shall not make haste."
When a promise engages the soul more than the Lord, the eagerness to obtain its benefits is sure to be a snare. The promise becomes thus, not as it should be, an exposition of the love of God, but a guarantee for a certain benefit-all the promises of God are Yea and Amen in Christ Jesus, and faith finds them in Him and never separates them from Him, because He is the fountain of faith. The moment the promise (though it declares the goodness of God to me) is my hope, I am dwelling more on its fulfillment than on the Lord. Is the Lord all my expectation and hope without it? Would the fulfillment of the promise glorify Him, or is it to satisfy a want in my own soul? If it is the latter, that, which should have linked my soul with God and counted (because trusting in Him) "things that are not as though they be" is taken up by nature, and while believing in the promise I have not faith in God, and my haste will, to my confusion, reveal it. Thus Eve called her first-born Cain, as the man gotten from the Lord, in allusion to the promise that her seed should bruise the serpent's head; and, as if filled with the hope, Cain undertakes the task in which he so fatally and signally failed. If Eve trusted in God while she rejoiced in the promise, she would have interpreted events with divine accuracy-the son of the fallen could not repair what the innocent could not retain. The holiness of God would have rejected such a thought, and if she believed God and not the promise apart from God, she had not made haste. Abraham believed the promise of God because he believed in God, and that though great was the promise, he knew God was able to fulfill it. The belief of the promise only vouched his belief in God. Esteem the promise above God, and you are sure to be in error respecting it, for God alone can guide you in discovering and ascertaining that which is of Him. Let the mind swerve from Him and there is nothing to check its folly and wandering. Abraham, for a moment, was engrossed with the promise which he believed in because he believed in God, and so was the proof of his confidence in God, but when anxious for its fulfillment, he cried "O, that Ishmael might live before thee!" it is evident he lost both promise and faith. This error is very common and fatal in its effects, a great difficulty to faith-we are in trouble of some kind or other-the Lord is our comforter, and instructs us by his unchanging purposes (as revealed in His word), how we may escape. A promise is laid hold of. I don't say always, for the soul abiding in the Lord and guided by His eye will discover the way to escape without searching for a distinct promise to rest on: yet the promises are given to assure the soul and guide it to a happy issue from all its afflictions, only let the soul not regard it more than elucidating the love of God, and therefore but the handmaid to it; for thus the promises will be a snare to expose the selfishness of our hearts. For instance, if one comforts himself that he will not suffer from poverty and want because it is written, " He who gave His Son will He not with Him freely give us all things?" and because of this promise, is idle and improvident, it is evident that he is dwelling more on the benefits accruing to him from the promise than on God, whom such a promise ought to have magnified in his soul, and if so would have instructed him in the ways of God, would have taught him the righteous judgment of God upon man on this earth, that by the " sweat of his brow he should eat bread," and this, the hourly expectation of the coming of Christ was neither to interrupt nor mitigate, as we read in second of Thessalonians. We are not to content ourselves with believing the promises. Faith and hope must be in God. If we believe in God we shall believe in the promise. "He being not weak in faith" was the secret of Abraham's power to confidently lay hold on the mighty promise. Jesus Christ ought to be to my soul the guarantee and accomplishment of every promise of God. If faith rests in Him, the promise is but an exponent, and never valued apart from Him. This error
as to promises is constantly committed respecting precepts. If we are acting from faith in God touching a precept, we should always maintain God supremely to the precept. There would be no apparent upholding of the latter, for a precept is only a divine mode for the soul to increase in the knowledge and service of God. God is paramount, and this always faith asserts. The closest following of precepts is not faith-faith always reaches unto God and we may rest satisfied when we find a man arguing for the maintenance of a precept more than for the honor of God, that faith is not lively then, nor the soul looking to Jesus, the author and finisher of faith. Faith has to do with God, and reckons assuredly that He will give grace and faithfulness to adhere to His precepts, but the eye must be on Him seeking His glory, and not even the strictest obedience of a precept.
Like a promise, a precept may be observed apart from God, and then it is a snare to me. "Obey the powers that be," but if not held in faith that is acknowledging God, Peter would never have said, "Whether it is right in the sight of God to obey God rather than man, judge ye." Again, "We ought to give our lives for the brethren," and yet it is enjoined, If any man love not our Lord Jesus Christ let him be Anathema Maranatha." Finally, if faith leads us, we are drawing it from Christ the author of it. We hold neither promise nor precept apart from Him, we know Him, we can touch Him, and the promise and the precept we are assured He will fulfill and confirm in His own time, and we do not make haste," we are not uncertain, and consequently not nervously anxious to see the issue. Faith appropriates to us the fruition of each, and so we are patient as if in full possession.
But to the man of faith perhaps no difficulty is so great as the proper use of means, and it is the resolving practically this difficulty that an important trait of genuine faith is best seen. Faith always recognizes God-Jesus is the author of it, for He only has done so—we draw from Him. And in Him we learn that in all his course down here, He always found God's creational or political, arrangements suited to Him-if not apparently so, faith declared them so. A fig-tree with only leaves on it, affords no hospitality to the hungry Lord of glory, and yet it was a needed symbol to disclose to his disciples the condition of Israel, and his faith accepted it and pronounced its destruction. The persecution of the storm on the sea-the clamor of devils-no boat to cross the lake, etc., these and so many more were all, though apparently antagonistic to the author of faith, but right and useful. He knew God was equal to any emergency, and only seeking his glory in it, He must find God's succor therein, for God is ever true to His glory. No circumstance-no appearance to the contrary could alter his full repose and confidence in God; but this was not all. Every circumstance he encountered in his path suited him. The thought was never admitted, much less acted on, that the present means were inadequate to the exigency, whatever it might be. They were reckoned as of God, and faith made them sufficient. Faith never overlooks any-the least of God's arrangements. It does not disparage his arrangements, but so rests on Him, that through Him they are found full and abundant for our need.
Faith so finds its region with God that demonstration is not of its seeking, though perception of its power is. It can connect itself with the smallest gift of God, and recognizing God there, find it equal to any demand. Christ fed the five thousand by five loaves. Philip considered that it would require "two hundred pennyworth, that every one might take a little"-human calculation! Another communicates all the provision God had supplied them with. He who trusted in God at all times accepts with thankfulness the mercies provided, proves that God is able to make them sufficient for all their need, and more, for there remained twelve baskets full. This is a remarkable trait of faith, but surrounded with many difficulties. Nature is always, like Philip, calculating the means required, and despising the present as inadequate—silently reproaching God for not providing more. Faith is required to assert, " The Lord is my helper, I will not fear what man can do unto me;" and therefore we are to be content with such things as we have. When the widow cried unto the prophet, " The creditor is come to take unto him my two sons to be bondmen;" what answers Elisha? At first, as if embarrassed by this touching appeal, he replies, " What can I do for thee? Tell me" (he continues as if he had discovered the mode of relief), " what Nast thou in the house?" God does not allow us to be placed in circumstances which bear no evidence of His providing mercies. They may be very small and scanty, yet faith appropriates them, and encouraging the soul in God, proclaims, " the Lord is my helper," not outside His own mercies, but through them. The widow here borrows from abroad from her neighbors empty vessels. The testimony in asking the loan of an empty vessel was that she who was known to be in such abject circumstances had something to put into them. She might doubtless have been taunted that her poverty was notorious, and that it was folly to borrow empty vessels. She had only boldly to say, " The Lord is my helper!" Now this is an example of the simple action of faith in the use of means. Nature would have despised the " pot of oil," and sought unto the king and those in high estate, or to the lender for relief; but this is not God's way. God only wants to bring Himself into the scene, for He can touchingly appeal to His people, " What could have been done for my vineyard which I have not done for it?" Clearer still we see this trait and its difficulties in the case of David, when preparing to encounter the Philistine. Saul's armor was offered him (he even had not sought it), it was legitimate for him to accept. He did accept-was accoutred with it, and then renounced it, for he had not proved it. Now nature would loudly demand of him to retain it; how many arguments could be used for the prudence of doing so. The man of faith does not trust in means, and yet he does not despise means; and this is just his difficulty as it was here to David. He had not proved the armor; it is renounced, but the stones of the brook, yea the smooth ones, too, with a sling are assumed in its place. These latter were the means naturally at his disposal. They were what a youthful shepherd had easily within his reach, and he knew God did not require to alter his position and circumstances to vanquish Goliath. As he was, God would use him, and not as the world might make him. He despised none of the mercies of God distinctly vouchsafed to him. The occurrence of trial did not require new and greater circumstances. God was with him in his own, and this faith could reckon on and know His succor through them. To require a new position because of the presence of a trial is but to say that God is not equal to it in my present one. If I am trusting in God in my present one, and know Him, He is able to use it for my deliverance. It is not position or circumstances-it is God; but I don't improve my position or means because simply I am there of God's providence, and through them God will deliver me if faithful to Him.
Another important trait of faith, and very valuable in our course, is that it does not forecast the mode or manner of God's succor and deliverance. Human reasoning said, " Let him now come down from the cross and we will believe." He who trusted, though forsaken, waited till the angel rolled away the stone from the sepulcher. When the soul reposes in God-for this is faith, the faith of the Son of God-the mode and manner of the succor or deliverance, is not our object. W e do not want to be distinguished by it. We want to know and feel that it is God's act, and how it is to be effected is not the subject of faith. When we prescribe a plan to God, faith is forfeited and our wanderings are manifold. We read of one who "went away in a rage," because the mode did not suit his ideas. Faith places us at the disposal of God, not God at ours. Faith says -" Here am I, let Him do to me as seemeth good unto Him." God achieves for us as it pleaseth Him. If I prescribe a certain mode I am not waiting upon God. I want something to signalize myself, as the sons of Zebedee asking the Lord to command fire from heaven.
Faith leaves the mode of succor or deliverance to God. It varies according to the claim of God's glory at the time. Thus God succored Israel at Jericho and also at Ai, and yet how differently at each! The man of faith gloried in God in one as much as in the other, though, to human judgment, one only was a magnificent display of God's intervention in their behalf. The failure of Israel demanded this, but faith rejoiced in God, though an ambush was the means. If we recognized and felt our failure personally and corporately, we should neither presume nor expect very open manifestations of God's favor in our behalf. But these manifestations are not the objects of faith; God only is; and the manifestations neither add to nor detract from the strength and enjoyment faith always has in God; for Jesus, we do well to remind our souls, is the beginner and finishes of it, and hence by it we can reckon (however great has been our failure) on Him to sustain us in the race set before us. Faith assures us that He will sustain us; the plan and the way we happily leave to Himself. Gideon was as contented, through faith, with three hundred as with thirty-two thousand. Deborah sang as sweetly at the subdual of Israel's foes by the hand of Jael the Kenite, as if the armies of Israel had achieved it. The fact, and that it is of God, satisfies faith.
The man who was a welcome guest in the third heaven was here let down by the wall in a basket, and escaped his enemies' hands. Did this mode of deliverance shake his faith in God? See this faithful servant combating all the reasonings of unbelief in Acts 27. At first his advice is disregarded; the word of the man of God is set aside, because the owner and master (who, from interested motives, was not likely to give a deceitful opinion) did not agree with him. Nor did the majority. Nay more, the south wind and providential circumstances, corroborate their opinion; but the man of faith can afford to be patient: and when the south wind changes to Euroclydon, and all hope that they should be saved was taken away, he stands forth, increasing in confidence in God. As human resources fail, he openly and largely draws upon God; and yet there was nothing magnificent in the mode of deliverance. It is commanded " that they which could swim should cast themselves first into the sea, and get to land: and the rest, some on boards, and some on broken pieces of the ship. And so it came to pass, that they escaped all safe to land." Faith proclaimed that there should be no loss of any man's life among them: the mode of safety remained with God, and the believing soul honored God for it, while the unbeliever had nothing to glory in. Nay a little after, a viper fastens on the hand of God's instrument in this deliverance, and he is stigmatized as a murderer; but he confided in God, and shook off the venomous reptile into the fire and felt no harm. Time and patience in well-doing put to silence the ignorance of foolish men; but Paul knew the hand of God, though man did not see it. We are constantly wanting man should see that God is on our behalf, and this is to magnify ourselves and not God. If we really desired our faith to increase, it is in circumstances when sight could glean nothing that it would best do so: he who trusts in God only wants Him, and counts it all joy when he falls into divers trials. To human judgment, trials indicate the desertion of God. If everything here was right there would be no trials, for every one would yield easily to the will of God; nothing or no one would prevent us. And if the world was of God, and not lying in the wicked one, His people might expect to be set up and gifted with it; and, moreover, it is no uncommon snare nor a new one to suppose that gain is Godliness, and, therefore, to measure God's favor by temporal mercies.
Perhaps no thought has tended more to displace the church from the humble sorrowing path which the disciples of Christ must ever traverse. If earthly acquisitions are an evidence to me of God's love, surely I must desire apart from human ambition to secure them. But the world lieth in the wicked one, and the Spirit of Christ in His disciple is struggling not only against it and its course and the power which influences it, but also against a disposition kindred to it in himself-yet we have not to conquer an unconquered foe, but we have to encounter that we may know the nature and the power of the victory. The ways of God are a trial to nature; but trial affords an opportunity to the Spirit of Christ to make known to us the strength of Christ; and therefore, we can take pleasure in infirmities, etc. We do not immediately see how this is. When Paul suffered from a thorn in the flesh and contrasted this with the elevation of glory to which grace had raised him, he besought the Lord thrice that it might depart from him. Though he had learned glory and the wondrous things there, too wondrous for man, yet he had not learned as soon to take pleasure in infirmities, etc. In fact it is here that discipleship is perfected-taking up the cross daily is requisite, though every visible affection and interest has already been surrendered, and here faith alone can sustain. For patience we always want faith. We cannot endure but as we are cast on God, and this the Apostle argues at such length and power in Heb. 10 to 12. After we have done the will of God we have need of patience, but who are they who do not draw back? Those who have faith to the saving of the soul; and hence we, when instructed in the qualities comprehended in faith, are exhorted to cast aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and run with patience the race set before us, looking unto Jesus the beginner and the finisher of faith. The leaven of Herod and the Pharisees is not to trust God when there is no visible indication of His succor. Of this the Lord warned His disciples when they had not in the ship more than one loaf; they blame themselves for their thoughtlessness and imprudence. He only chides them for want of faith. This want is always at the root of our difficulties. It is the sin which doth so easily beset us, and from it how often are our prayers unanswered. Unless we ask in faith we waver, and we are double-minded; and let not that man think that he shall receive anything from the Lord. The prayer of faith is not a mere expression of our necessities unto God. In a moment we may have faith, but generally there is so much self-confidence and dependence in other resources that until we see an end to these barriers faith has not scope, and there is no answer. We are taught this in the example of the man who goes unto his friend at midnight saying, " Lend me three loaves." The friend at first refuses because of all the inconvenience it would entail; but he yields to importunity what he does not to mere friendship. He rises and gives him as many as he needs. The moral of this is not that the Lord answers and succors because of our importunity. But importunity discloses not only to God but to ourselves, that we have no other resource but Him, or we should not continue importuning. We very often mention in our prayers matters which we scarcely remember having alluded to; and if our desires are granted we are distressed at the small conviction we have that it is in answer to our prayers. Hence how necessary is the exercise this importunity expresses! In fact, we shall not go on praying earnestly and continuously for anything unless the soul has got some confidence in God respecting it. There may be a superstitious recital of our necessities and desires before God; but this seldom lasts, and is not evidently of faith. If the soul is growing in confidence in God respecting anything, or has confidence-if it can ask in faith and reckon on His succor-I assuredly believe that except in communion with Him, this confidence is not retained; and to express it when out of communion and in the flesh is but revealing the riddle to the Philistines to their own destruction and our confusion. God's dealings with us are not communicable. There are some things impossible for a man to utter; and the really believing soul that has known what it is to trust God, magnifies Him and not His gifts to it.