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Very helpful extracts from five letters which appeared in Things New and Old and in various other Christian publications since.
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Many years ago, Charles H. Mackintosh carried on an extensive correspondence, and his responses to the letters he received were very helpful to very many then and since. You may best enjoy these extracts from five of his letters by reading them as if addressed to you.
Dear Friend:
Your case is painfully interesting. We consider your mistake to be self-occupation. You are looking for evidences of your conversion as a ground of peace. This will never do. The true ground of peace is, not that you were converted six years ago, but that Christ died for your sins according to the scriptures; that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day, according to the scriptures. We do not think you have ever really laid hold of the true ground of peace in the presence of God. This is not to be found in yourself, or in anything that you can do, or think, or feel, or experience, or pass through. It is entirely and exclusively in Christ. He has made peace by the blood of His cross. He is our peace. It is by Him God preaches peace; and being justified by faith we have peace with God. It is when your faith lays hold on God as the One who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead that your peace will flow as a river. Even though you could be sure that you were converted six years ago—though you could see your name written in the book of life, that would not be the proper basis of your peace in the presence of God, but simply that Christ died for you, and that God raised Him from the dead. Ponder this. You will never get any comfort by looking in at yourself, or back at your past history. We could not think of building upon the most remarkable conversion that ever took place in this world. Even supposing you had all the feelings of which man is capable, and all the feelings which attend upon true spiritual conversion, this would not be the proper ground for your soul to build upon; you must build upon Christ alone. You must commit your precious soul, absolutely, to the truth of God; you must believe what He tells you about Christ and not be looking for evidences in yourself. “Being justified by faith [not merely being sure of our conversion], we have peace with God.”
It is not that we question your conversion. It is not that we do not believe in the reality and necessity of conversion; and in the proper feelings attendant thereon. No, we most fully believe in all these things. But we do not believe in such things as the ground of a sinner's peace. If you ask us what gives us peace—true, settled peace, we reply, “Believing in Jesus”— “Believing in ‘Him that ‘justifieth the ungodly’—Believing in ‘Him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead.’” Read Romans chapters 3 and 4. This takes us clean out of ourselves; and this is just what you want. Why have you fallen away? Why have you gone back? Why have you been drawn into worse sins since your conversion than ever you committed before? Because you have never really laid hold of Christ as your true ground of peace—as the one who is made of God unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. If He were a covering for your eyes, and an object for your heart—if you were occupied with Him and not with yourself, you would have victory over your lusts, passions, tempers, and tendencies—over habits, influences, and circumstances. In short, to be occupied with Christ, by the Holy Ghost, is not only the true foundation of peace, but also the secret of strength and victory, and of all real progress in holiness.
Here is precisely where so many go astray. They are occupied with themselves—their conversion and its evidences—their frames and experiences—what they have passed through, and the like. They take comfort from their likes and dislikes, from their loving what they once hated, and hating what they once loved; all of which, though real enough in themselves, are not the ground of peace, the secret of liberty, or the source of true spiritual power. These latter you must seek in Christ alone. The moment you take your eye off Him, you lose peace and power. “Looking off unto Jesus” must be the motto, from the starting post right onward to the goal. May God's Spirit make all this most real and precious to your soul!
TN&O Volume 11, p. 141, #76 Scripture References: 1 Corinthians 15:3-4, Colossians 1:20, Ephesians 2:14, Acts 10:36, Romans 5:1, 4:5 & 4:24, Hebrews 12:2
You have our fullest sympathy. We have met many of God's dear children in precisely your condition. Indeed, they have, in stating their exercises, used your very words. “This,” you will say, “is poor comfort for me.” And yet it may not be so. We know a very dear saint of God who was under exercise for years, and the only thing that gave him the smallest comfort was the eighty-eighth Psalm. And why? Because there was not a single bit of comfort in it. Yet it was written by a saint of God; and therefore he might be a saint, though he was thoroughly miserable. We write not thus, dear friend, to lead you to be content in your present dark and unhappy condition. Far from it. We beseech you to look off from your feelings, your experiences, your evidences, yea, and your very faith itself, and rest in Christ and His finished work. God is satisfied with Christ on your behalf. Is He not enough to satisfy you? Do you want to add something of your own to Christ? This is really the question. May God bless you!
TN&O Volume 12, p. 71, #23
You are entirely too much occupied with your own state and feelings. Seek to be more simple, to rest like a child in your Father's love, and stay your soul upon His faithful word. It is of no possible use to “try” to be this or that. The more you dwell, in calm sweet confidence, of the love of Christ—the more you think of Him and feed upon His word, the more you will grow into His likeness. “We all beholding … are changed.” May the Lord keep you, beloved, and make you very sound in His own precious truth! To His own loving pastoral hand we commend you.
TN&O Volume 13, p. 118, #47 2 Corinthians 3:18
We give you one sentence of Holy Scripture as an answer to your letter, namely, Hebrews 12:2, “Looking off unto Jesus.” If you could only lose sight of that troublesome, good-for-nothing, guilty, hell-deserving “I,” and rest in Christ and His full salvation, you would be able to write a very different sort of letter. Your letter reminds us of Romans 7, by the pre-dominance of “I.” You must look simply to Christ. He has settled the entire question. You will never get anything but misery by looking at yourself, and reasoning upon what you find there. People are always sure to be full of doubts when they are occupied with “I.” It must be so; for how could “I” ever furnish a ground of peace? You may rest assured, dear friend, that until you learn to look out of yourself, and rest simply upon Christ, you will never know what solid peace really is.
TN&O Volume 13, pl 143, #59
You may be thoroughly assured of this, dear friend, that you will never get peace by looking at your repentance or your anything. If such a thing could be, it would simply be satisfaction with yourself; and this could never be right. Christ has made peace by the blood of His cross. God preaches peace by Jesus Christ. It is not by repentance, though, most surely, we believe in the necessity of repentance! But what would you say, dear friend, to a person if he were to tell you, that he had found peace, because his repentance was of the right kind—
because he hated sin as God hated it? Doubtless you would say to him that his peace was a false one. Thanks be to God the believer's peace rests on no such rotten foundation. The apostle does not say, “Having repented enough, we have peace with God.” No, but “Being justified by faith, we have peace with God.” The believer's peace rests on a divine foundation. It is based on the glorious truth that God is not only satisfied as to the entire question of our sins but that He is actually glorified in respect to it. He has reaped a richer harvest in the matter of the putting away of our sins than ever He could have reaped in the fields of an unfallen creation. Nothing has ever glorified God like the death of Christ. The hearty belief of this must give peace to the soul. It is not the work wrought in us, whether repentance or anything else, that gives peace; but the work wrought for us. It is not the work of the Spirit within, precious and essential as it is, that gives peace; but the work of Christ for us. This is a grand and most necessary truth for all anxious inquirers. It is all well and right enough to judge ourselves, our state, our ways—to be humbled because of our shallow repentance, our coldness and indifference; but we shall never get peace by self-judgment. If we have not found peace ere we sit down to the work of self-judgment, we shall find it very dismal work indeed.
It seems to us, dear friend, that you are too much occupied with the thoughts of men. One preacher tells you this; another preacher tells you that; and your own heart tells you something else. Would it not be well to listen to what God says? This is what faith does, and thus finds settled tranquility. The believer's peace can no more be disturbed than Christ can be disturbed from His seat on the throne of God. This seems strong, but it is true; and being true, its strength is part of its moral glory. Let us entreat you to take up the lovely attitude of the soul in Psalm 85, “I will hear what God the Lord will speak” (not what this or that man will speak) “for He will speak peace unto his people and to his saints; but let them not turn again to folly.” May the blessed Spirit lead you into the enjoyment of that peace which Christ has made by the blood of His cross, which God preaches in the gospel of His grace, by Jesus Christ, and which faith finds in the simple testimony of Holy Scripture.