There are different degrees of nearness to God, which the
saints enjoy. One of these is essential to the very being of piety in the
soul; namely, when the lost soul is brought near to God, through the blood
of Jesus, and made a fellow-citizen with the saints, and of the household of
God. But, another and higher step is the special indulgence of Heaven to
some saints, and but at some times. In the nearness of faith, (for
none that have true faith can be far from God,) I walk with God in the
duties of religion. In the nearness of sense, he sometimes walks with
me in special manifestation—of himself, of his love, and his glory.
The one is sure and satisfying; the other is sweet and
comforting. Without the approaches of faith, I cannot expect sensible
communion. But I may have the first, when the last is withheld from me. The
one is my daily allowance from the King's table, without which I
could not live. But the other is my sitting down at the table with
the King, to the feast made by him, for the joy of his chosen ones. The one
makes me obtain the victory over the world; the other makes me weary of the
world.
The former is the King's highway to heaven; and in the
latter, I walk on it in the sunshine of his presence. The one gives a
continual relish of spiritual things; the other, a refreshful foretaste of
heaven and of glory. In the first, I have access to God in all my
perplexities, that I may not despair; but I am favored with the last only at
times, that I may not presume. The joy of the first excels the worldling's
gladness from all his abundance, as far as light excels darkness; but the
joy of the last is a akin to the joy of saints in glory. In acts of lively
faith, the world is to me but rubbish and loss, for the excellency of the
glorious object; but in near access to, and communion with my Lord, I would
gladly put off corruption, put on immortality, and become an inhabitant of
the world above. O how does a beauty beam on my soul, in the few moments of
communion, as if heaven opened before me, and eternal day shone full in my
face! What sacred joy prevails within, and how am I refreshed in every
power!
Though the Christian must not build on them, since
without them his soul may live, yet they are not, as scoffers would
affirm—delusion, enthusiasm, and such like. For always after this divine
fellowship—Christ is dearer to me, self more loathsome, sin more odious, the
world more vain, piety more pleasant, my affections more refined, my desires
more on spiritual things, and heaven more desirable.
But now, if a pleasure so great, of which we can only
conceive while we enjoy it—springs from a few moments communion in a more
glorious way than usual, (for every has saint communion with God,) how
divine is a pious life! And what a tragic scene is the most pleasant life of
the most mirthful sinner, compared to this! And, in a word, what must the
life of glory be, where communion, of a greater nature than ever known
below, shall be the privilege of all the heavenly family! where God shall
shine in all his glory, and shed abroad his love in every glowing heart! and
where it shall be the ineffable bliss of every ardent adorer, to see more
and more of God's goodness, and approach nearer and nearer to him, in the
uninterrupted freedom of rapturous communion, through an endless evermore!