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Religious Experience, Described in 18 Discourses
Religious Experience Described in 18 Discourses Author:John Petty General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1856 Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million book... more »s for free. Excerpt: 23 DISCOURSE III. FORGIVENESS OF SINS. "Be it fcnown unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins: and by him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses." -- Acts xiii. 38, 39. In the foregoing discourses we have chiefly dwelt upon those early stages of religious experience which are of a painful and sorrowful character, and which, though necessary to our spiritual safety and eternal well-being, afford at most but small degrees of comfort, and generally none which is abiding. But we are now to enter upon a more advanced and a delightful stage; we are about to contemplate the exercise of Divine mercy towards the penitent in the forgiveness of his sins and the communication of peace to his conscience. We have accompanied him through the gloom and darkness of a night of sorrow ; we are now to behold him emerge into the light of celestial day. " Forgiveness of sins" is a blessing about which he feels intensely solicitous, and the realization of which will afford relief to his burdened mind, and bring rest and satisfaction to his soul. But can sin be pardoned? Natural reason, or the unassisted exercise of our intellectual powers, cannot satisfactorily answer this question. Noble as are the faculties of the human mind, they cannot, by their own unaided efforts, determine whether God can or will forgive sins. Neither can this question be determined from the works of nature. These do indeed " declare the glory of God; " they prove his "eternal power and Godhead," and illustrate his inf...« less