Emmanuel

“ Emmanuel puts that righteousness upon all His saints; while, at the same time, they put it on themselves; they work it out for themselves, and for themselves they keep it clean. They work it out, put it on, and keep it clean, and yet, all the time, it is not they that do it, but it is Emmanuel that doeth it all in them. The truth is, you must all become mystics before you will admit all the strange truth that is told about Emmanuel’s livery. For both heaven and earth unite in this wonderful livery. Nature and grace unite in it. ”

“ I trust that time is now come, and that the glorious Emmanuel hath at length captivated and taken full possession of your heart. Will you give me leave to ask a few friendly questions? Has religion sunk out of your head into your heart? You was civilized when I was at London: Are you yet really converted? Your affections were now and then raised towards,—are they now centered in and fixed on the Lord Jesus? If you can answer these questions in the affirmative, I pronounce you a wise virgin, even wise to eternal salvation; blessed art thou among women. ”

“ Blessed be God, I can still send you an account of the increase of Emmanuel’s kingdom. I preach always twice, sometimes three or four times in a day. The people are more eager than ever, and much solid work is done for God. My strength is daily renewed. Still I desire to cry, grace! grace! I am fondled exceedingly, I scarce have any damp. My soul continually magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour. ”

“ Pale and trembling, he looks eagerly around him, and sees nothing but revelations of wrath. Overwhelmed with fear and dismay, he cries out—“O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me! What shall I do?” A voice reaches his ear—penetrates his heart—“Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world!” He turns his eyes to Calvary. Wonderous vision! Emmanuel expiring upon the cross! the sinner’s Substitute satisfying the demand of the law against the sinner! Now all his fears are hushed, and rivers of peace flow into his soul. This is the peace of Christ. ”

“ It is a pleasure to me to steal a few minutes to keep up a correspondence with one I so dearly love, and with whom I am persuaded I shall live in the regions of peace and joy, through the endless ages of eternity. This the glorious Emmanuel hath purchased for us, and of this, (for ever adored be his free grace) he hath given us an earnest! Supported with this, I am still enabled to pursue my delightful work of preaching to poor sinners the unsearchable riches of redeeming love. Thousands and thousands flock to hear, and we have had a blessed Christmas and new year’s season indeed. ”

“ Brother Emmanuel had one of those keenly intelligent and versatile minds that are always craving a wider knowledge, and think no knowledge, even of the humblest, beneath notice. He would ask the poorest wood cutter to instruct him in the handling of his tool or in the simple mysteries of his craft as humbly as though he were asking instruction from one of the learned of the land. ”

“ Yes, for He is Emmanuel, God incarnate for me. Let me hand Him through His Mother all my poverty and wretchedness and weakness and failure, together with my [Pg 129] contrition and repentance and love, and in exchange He will hand me His forgiveness and the promise to offer my inadequate worship, together with His own Divine perfections, to His Father, Who will be satisfied. This is what Emmanuel means.
Point II. Our Lawgiver.
"The Lord is our Judge, the Lord is our Lawgiver, the Lord is our King He will save us." (Is. xxxiii. 22) .
He is our King, therefore He has a right to make laws for us. ”

“ I long for that time, “when the watchmen shall all see eye to eye; when the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the lion eat straw like the ox, and the people of God learn war and jangle no more.” Hasten that time, O glorious Emmanuel, and let thy kingdom come!—Rev. Sir, whilst I am writing, the fire of love kindles in my heart. I am amazed, to think the blessed Jesus should employ such an unworthy wretch as I am: But thy grace is free, for, O my God, it found me out. The love you bear to the lovely Jesus, I am persuaded will excite you to pray for me. ”

“ Therefore what we need is God brought near and sin taken away—the very blessings guaranteed in these two precious names of our Lord. As Emmanuel, He brings God near to us, near in His own incarnate person, near in His loving life, near in His perfect sympathy, near in His perpetual presence according to the promise, "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." ”

“ In God’s keeping we are always moving, and we are moving towards Emmanuel’s land, where the sun shines, and the birds sing night and day.
There is no stagnancy for the God-directed soul. He is ever guiding us, sometimes with the delicacy of a glance, sometimes with the firmer ministry of a grip, and He moves with us always, even through “the valley of the shadow of death.” Therefore, be patient, my soul! The darkness is not thy bourn, the tunnel is not thy abiding home! He will bring thee out into a large place where thou shalt know “the liberty of the glory of the children of God.” ”

“ Let no one say that our poor Irish do not grasp the meaning of this central mystery of our faith! It is true that their senses are touched by more visible things; but whoever understands our people will agree with me that no great theologian in his study, no philosopher in his rostrum, no sacred nun in her choir, realizes more distinctly the awful meaning of that continued miracle of love and mercy that is enshrined on our altars, and named Emmanuel. ”

“ This is the Captain of your salvation, of whom the Evangelical Prophet inquires—“Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah? this that is glorious in his apparel, travelling in the greatness of his strength?” This is Emmanuel; mighty to conquer, and mighty to save. Who can stand before the glory of his power? Who can hinder the universal triumph of his cause? The government shall be upon his shoulder, and he shall reign for ever and ever.
What has been said is deemed sufficient to show the certainty of Messiah’s universal empire. ”

“ Even in Emmanuel's Land there is a door in the side of a hill which is a byeway to hell, and beyond Emmanuel's Land is the country of conceit, a new and special temptation for those who think that they are near salvation. Here they encounter 'a brisk lad of the neighbourhood,' needed soon after for a particular purpose, who is a good liver, prays devoutly, fasts regularly, pays tithes punctually, and hopes that everyone will get to heaven by the religion which he professes, provided he fears God and tries to do his duty. ”

“ But, oh! no foe invades the bliss, When glory crowns the Christian's head; One view of Jesus as he is Will strike all sin for ever dead.
LVIII. THE NEW CONVERT THE new-born child of Gospel grace, Like some fair tree when summer's nigh, Beneath Emmanuel's shining face Lifts up his blooming branch on high.
No fears he feels, he sees no foes, No conflict yet his faith employs, Nor has he learnt to whom he owes The strength and peace his soul enjoys.
But sin soon darts its cruel sting, And comforts sinking day by day, What seemed his own, a self-fed spring, Proves but a brook that glides away. ”

“ THOUGH I am jealous of myself, lest I should make too free with persons in high life, yet when I have good news to send concerning the kingdom of Jesus Christ, I am constrained as it were to write to your Ladyship. Will it not rejoice you very much, honoured Madam, to hear the glorious Emmanuel is riding on in the chariot of his gospel, from conquering to conquer? Every day people flock to hear the word, like doves to their windows. I have preached about thirty times in Yorkshire, and at the desire of many am returned thither again. ”

“ Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son; and ye shall call His name Emmanuel. Butter and honey shall He eat: before He knows or chooses out things that are evil. He shall exchange them for what is good; for before the child knows good or evil, He shall not consent to evil, that He may choose that which is good." [405] Carefully, then, has the Holy Ghost pointed out, by what has been said. His birth from a virgin, and His essence, that He is God (for the name Emmanuel indicates this) . And He shows that He is a man, when He says, "Butter and honey shall He eat;" ”

“ O Key of David and Sceptre of the house of Israel! Who openest and no man shutteth; Who shuttest and no man openeth; come and lead the captive from prison, sitting in darkness, and in the shadow of death. O Gabriel! blest messenger of heaven, thou camest through closed doors, and didst announce the word “Thou shalt conceive and bear a Son, and He shall be called Emmanuel”! O Jesus, Son of David, heir to his throne and his power, Thou art now passing over, on Thy way to Bethlehem, the land that once was the kingdom of Thy ancestors, but now is tributary to the Gentiles. ”

“ Gravesend Bethels, I trust, will not easily be forgotten. I am sure you do not forget to pray for a very worthless worm: a worm, and no man! And yet, (O amazing love!) Jesus, a never-failing, ever-loving, altogether-lovely Jesus, careth for and comforts him on every side. Hitherto it seems like my first voyage. Grace! grace! What hath God wrought? With all thy mercies, glorious Emmanuel, deny not the mercy of a thankful heart! Had I more humility, I should be more thankful to God and man. But I once more bid you and yours farewel. ”

“ They are lines of joy; for who can help rejoicing that hears what the blessed Jesus hath done for your soul? O Madam, how much are you indebted to that grace which hath made such difference between you and others. To see any one converted is a miracle. But to see a rich person, one of the mighty, one of the noble converted, is yet a greater. May the Lord Jesus add more of your rank to his church, such as shall be saved! Never fear, Madam; all things are possible to the glorious Emmanuel. ”

“ He reaches down to man, the sinner, at His cross—the end of His descent to us, the beginning of our ascent with Him to God. There we meet Him; and saved from sin, we know Him as our Jesus; and reconciled to God, we have Him with us as Emmanuel, God with us, always with us, with us throughout all life's changes, with us in death's agony, with us in the life to come, to guide us into all its wisdom and honour and riches and glory and blessing. ”

“ There is no pause for our thoughts, none for our sympathy, none for our work, till our keels have visited, and the 'shout of a King' has been heard on every shore that fills 'the breadth of Thy land, O Emmanuel!' The limits of the visible community of Christ's Church to-day are far within the borders to which it must one day stretch. ”

“ For when has Godhead without body worked naturally the works of the body? or, when has a body without Godhead worked works which substantially belong to the Godhead? But Emmanuel, being One, and in this Oneness both, that is, God and Man, did, in truth, the works of each Nature; being One and the Same, as God He did the divine, as Man the human works. ”

“ But He was never called Emmanuel, but Jesus, who in Latin is called Saving, or Saviour, [6] because He comes bringing salvation to all nations. But by this name the prophet declared that God incarnate was about to come to men. For Emmanuel signifies God with us; because when He was born of a virgin, men ought to confess that God was with them, that is, on the earth and in mortal flesh. Whence David [7] says in the eighty-fourth Psalm, “Truth has sprung out of the earth;” because God, in whom is truth, hath taken a body of earth, that He might open a way of salvation to those of the earth. ”

“ Feelings, once morbid, drawn from the deepest depths of the human heart, and soarings, often presumptuous, of poetic fancy to the utmost boundaries of human thought, such are the ingredients of the religion which Emmanuel preaches and practises in his ascetic solitude, and the flame of which he keeps alive in the hearts of those under his influence, especially of Victor and Clotilda, the latter of whom alone, being a communicant of the Church, holds her high faith in a Christian form, and under the Christian name. ”

“ Persons that stand alone, and in high places, must expect storms. But Jesus is able and willing to uphold you. Thanks be to his great name for giving your Ladyship such a share of prudence and courage. May the glorious Emmanuel increase both; and without being attached to any party, may you be preserved unspotted from the world, and be a common friend to all!—Since I saw your Ladyship, I have disengaged myself from the immediate care of the societies, and am now still more at liberty to preach the gospel of the blessed God. ”

“ Does not God take care of us all? Those who are taken are in His keeping as truly as those He leaves behind. In life or death we are with Him. Why should Emmanuel be the next? He is sober and cleanly. He is better cared for in every way than his neighbours.’
‘Oh, Mr. Culverhouse, I love him so, he is all the world to me. I could not live without him. I have watched him grow up, as a child watches the one flower in his little garden. Every day and hour of his life has been precious to me. My only grief has been that he should set his face against the Bible. ”

“ All our windows should open toward Jerusalem, and none toward Sodom. We will gather our flowers always and only from Emmanuel's land, and Jesus himself shall be their savor and sweetness, so that when he lingers at the lattice to hear us speak of himself he may say, "Thy lips, O my spouse, drop as the honeycomb: honey and milk are under thy tongue." [28] That which grows beyond the border of purity and good repute must never be bound up in our garlands, nor placed among the decorations of our discourses. ”

“ I trust your prayers will be heard in my behalf. Glory be to free grace! many are here brought under convictions. Unworthy as I am, the glorious Emmanuel is pleased to clothe his word with power. I am amazed at his loving-kindness, and want heaven and earth to join with me in praising his holy Name. By your son I have sent some papers, and shall gladly receive any from you. I wish you would not trouble yourself or me in writing about the corruptions of the Church of England. I believe there is no church perfect under heaven ”