Search -
Fifty-two Lectures on the Church Catechism
Fifty-two Lectures on the Church Catechism Author:Samuel Walker Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: 16 Thirdly.—Whether you are determined thus to believe and do by a constant faithful recourse to the help of God ? For your diligence in seeking that help, wi... more »thout which you own you cannot do any of these things, will be your best proof that you have really given unto you a will to do them. If you say, I am determined to believe and do as a Christian ought, and yet do not seek the help of God to give you power for the work; do not pray, do not read, do not communicate, do not meditate; where can be your good-will to your Christian duty ? It is not a warm and hasty resolution that proves you have a heart fixed and determined herein, but a steady deliberate choice, producing an unwearied diligence in the use of all the means of your obtaining that grace, without which you can perform none of these things: yet neither is it a formal customary attendance upon, and going over all these means, that will argue the determination of heart that is in question ; but an attendance upon them in a sincere, earnest, express desire of obtaining grace to grow in faith, to overcome sin, and to serve God. If you have really thus a will to the work, and are pcrseveringly seeking Gods help for the power; if, whenever you come short or fall, you still continue calling upon God to give you more grace, and are never beat out of your seeking it by any discouragements, you arc the Christian; and however great your imperfections, and manifold your failures, still be assured that Christ lives in you, and you in him ; for no less than that is the very truth of your case. What has been now submitted to inquiry very properly affords ground for an address to all who arc here present. And, First.—To those who are young, and as yet but growing up to years of discretion. What I have to say to them on the o...« less