Gambar halaman
PDF
ePub

and bad alike caught in it; showing again that, under the preaching of the Word of God, false conversions take place as well as true.

And in the parable of the Wheat and the Tares, He speaks of "the children of the wicked one," false converts of the worst sort, as continuing all the way through, and apparently in abundance, among "the children of the kingdom," the true

converts.

And in the parable of the Virgins, He makes the number of the foolish ones, representing the false converts, equal to that of the wise, representing the true. And in the parables of the Pounds, and of the Talents, and of the Marriage Feast, He also brings in the representatives of false converts.

And St. Paul wept over the number of them, and the mischief done to the cause of Christ by the contradiction of their conduct to their profession of his name. 66 Many walk," he wrote to the Philippians, " of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things" (Phil. iii. 18, 19). And his other epistles abound in notices of them, and so do those of St. Peter, St. James, St. John, and St. Jude, and so does the Revelation of St. John, and so do the epistles in it of our Lord Jesus Christ to the churches.

False converts, therefore, so far from being a reason for not believing that there are any real ones, are only so many proofs of the truth of the word of God which tells us of true conversion.

I wish to speak in the next few chapters of some of the different sorts of false conversion.

CONVERSION

66

CHAPTER IX.

OF THE WILL OF THE FLESH."

As many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: which were born, not of blood, NOR OF THE WILL OF THE FLESH, nor of the will of man, but of God.-John i. 12, 13.

THERE is a conversion" of the will of the flesh " (John i. 13), by the working, that is, of our own fallen hearts uninfluenced by the Spirit of God d; which, though utterly false, nevertheless often has great power, at any rate for a time, on the outward life.

The conversion of Judas Iscariot seems to have been only of this sort, and yet to have led him to forsake all and follow Christ like the other Apostles, and to have deceived for a long time both himself and them; also that of Simon of Samaria, which completely deceived both himself and Philip under whose preaching it took place, and who on the faith of it forthwith baptized him (Acts viii. 13).

66

Those also, referred to in the last chapter, of whom St. Paul wrote to the Philippians, that they Iwere the enemies of the cross of Christ; " but who had no doubt appeared at one time to be real converts, were probably instances of the same sort of false conversion.

God permitted Bunyan, we may perhaps venture to suppose as part of his preparation for writing the "Pilgrim's Progress," to pass through two

such false conversions before his true one, in both of which he completely deceived himself, and in at any rate the second of them completely deceived also many about him.

The first of them was brought about by his marriage, of which he says: "My mercy was to light upon a wife whose father was counted godly. This woman and I, though we came together as poor as poor might be, not having so much household stuff as a dish or a spoon between us both, yet had she for her part The Plain Man's Pathway to Heaven,' and 'The Practice of Piety,' which her father had left her when he died.

6

"In these two books I would sometimes read with her, wherein I also found some things that were somewhat pleasing to me; but all this while I met with no conviction. She also would be often telling of me what a godly man her father was, and how he would reprove and correct vice both in his house and among his neighbours; what a strict and holy life he lived in his days, both in words and deeds.

"Wherefore these books, with the relation, though they did not reach my heart to awaken it about my sad and sinful state, yet they did beget within me some desire to reform my vicious life and fall in very eagerly with the religion of the times: to wit, to go to church twice a day, and that too with the foremost and there would very devoutly both say and sing, as others did, yet retaining my wicked life. But withal, I was so overrun with the spirit of superstition that I adored, and that with great devotion, even all things (both the high-place, priest, clerk, vestment, service, and what else) belonging to the church."

"But all this while I was not sensible of the danger and evil of sin. I was kept from considering

that sin would damn me, what religion soever I followed, unless I was found in Christ. Nay, I never thought of Him, nor whether there was such

a one or no.

"But," he says, "one day, amongst all the sermons our parson made, his subject was to treat of the Sabbath Day, and of the evil of breaking that, either with labour, sports, or otherwise," and "I fell in my conscience under this sermon," and "at that time I felt what guilt was, though never before that I can remember;" and " so went home, when the sermon was ended, with a great burden upon my spirit."

But this soon went off, and he went to his sports again that same day; but in the midst of them "a voice," he says, " did suddenly dart from heaven into my soul, which said, 'Wilt thou leave thy sins and go to heaven, or have thy sins and go to hell?' At this I was put to an exceeding maze; wherefore, leaving my bat upon the ground, I looked up to heaven, and was as if I had, with the eyes of my understanding, seen the Lord Jesus looking down upon me, as being very hotly displeased with me, and as if He did severely threaten me with some grievous punishment for these and other ungodly practices.

66

"I had no sooner thus conceived in my mind but suddenly this conclusion fastened on my spirit that I had been a great and grievous sinner, and that it was now too late for me to look after heaven, for Christ would not forgive me nor pardon my transgressions. Then I fell to musing on this also, and while I was thinking of it and fearing lest it should be so, I felt my heart sink in despair, concluding it was too late; and, therefore, I resolved in my mind to go on in sin: for, thought I, if the case be thus my state is surely miserable; miserable if I leave my

sins, and but miserable if I follow them. I can but be damned; and if it must be so, I had as good be damned for many sins as be damned for few."

So he went into sin again with all greediness, worse than ever before, determining that as he must, as he now thought, go to hell, he would have his fill of sinful pleasure before he got there.

66

He has drawn his own character in the frothy religious joy of this his first false conversion followed presently by despair, in "Pliable," in the Pilgrim's Progress," who at first seemed as much a pilgrim as" Christian," and indeed able to get on faster than he, because he had no load on his back, no conviction of sin, as poor Christian had. But his haste was mere natural eagerness for the good things to be expected at the end of the pilgrimage, without counting the cost; the quick joy of the stonyground hearer; and when he came to the " tribulation" of the "Slough of Despond" he was "offended," and said to Christian, "May I get out again with my life, you shall possess the brave country alone for me.'

And so he did get out, not by struggling through, like Christian, to the side towards the Celestial City, but on the side that he got in, towards the city of Destruction, to which he returned with shame to himself and discredit to the name of Pilgrim, the discredit which each professed convert returning to the world brings on the name of conversion.

I need not give here any more cases of this shallow temporary stony-ground conversion, as more of them will appear further on in this book as part of the early experience, as in the case of Bunyan, of several afterwards truly converted.

« SebelumnyaLanjutkan »