THE

SPIRITUAL WRESTLER,

OR,

ZION'S CHILDREN IN THE WILDERNESS.

"Strengthen ye the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees. Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not: behold your God will come with vengeance, even God with a recompence; he will come and save you." ISAIAH XXXV, 3, 4.

"Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted." MATTHEW v, 4.

No. 7.

JULY, 1847.

One Penny.

THE WRESTLER.

"And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day." GENESIS XXXii, 24.

(Continued from page 64.)

If my Reader will just look back with me for a few moments, and consider this subject in the 2nd and 3rd Numbers, it will be there found, that the warfare of every quickened soul is on account of God's decree being immutable, without the least shadow of turning, "The elder SHALL serve the younger;" not he may if he please, but he shall, and the younger shall be the greatest, as it is written in the blessing, "Let people serve thee, and nations bow down to thee: be lord over thy brethren, and let thy mother's sons bow down to thee: cursed be every one that curseth thee, and blessed be he that blesseth thee." Genesis xxvii, 29. Likewise it is written, "So the last shall be first, and the first last." Matthew xx, 16. "And, behold, there are last which shall be first, and there are first which shall be last.” Luke xiii, 30. As I have endeavoured, with what light

has been given me, to set forth there, what is the elder and what is the younger in every regenerate soul, that it is our nature is the elder, and God's quickening Spirit within us, the younger, it will be quite needless for me now to go over the same things; but, let the Reader keep them in mind, and the following illustration of last month's matter will be seen with greater light.

After a soul is quickened to life, that is to say, immediately this new and living principle is implanted by the Holy Ghost in the soul, it begins to wrestle for the preeminence, it begins to strive for the mastery, yea, it begins its victorious warfare in causing Nature to yield up her powers, and fall submissively and mutely at its feet, so that the Scriptures might be fulfilled, "Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so grace might reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." Romans v, 20, 21.

And it is during this struggle, and in this struggle, and by this struggle, that we learn the true meaning thereof. It is shown to us first, that we are sinners deserving the reward of, what it discovers to us in the second place, the Spirit of the Law holds forth in awful soundings, "The soul that sinneth, it shall die." We fall to repairing the breach, in order to turn the sword from striking its blow; but this struggle teaches us in this next place, that we only make the breach worse, and we hear still more awful and much louder soundings, "He that offendeth in one point is guilty of all!" We despair; and but for this struggle, should fall into the pit for ever to endure the pains of the wrath of Divine Justice this discovers to us individually, that Divine Justice is satisfied with the Surety Divinity has provided,

for, it saith in the language of the Faithful, "My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt-offering.' Genesis xxii, 8. We learn the necessity of the struggle, and rejoice in the Way set before us. We see who this Surety is, that it is Christ, and that by his work, truly he is "the end of the Law for righteousness to every one that believeth;" Romans x, 4; and we feel a struggling within us, and a going out after him, "the chiefest among ten thousand, the altogether lovely." Cantic. v, 10, 16. And the new principle, this younger in our souls bursts forth with, "Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thine arm ;" Can. viii, 6, which manifests it to be blessed, for, "Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled;" Matt. v, 6; which is, they shall be filled with Christ, and become as is their description in Rev. xxi, 11-27, "Having the glory of God, &c., &c.," and this is proved from the 5th and 6th verses of Jeremiah xxiii, "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth. In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely and this is his name whereby he shall be called, THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS." But, our nature, the elder, which has been observed is but the breathings or essence of the God of this world, declares it all to be otherwise, and this is manifest in this manner here following:

We have struggled and been taught from one thing to another, till the Divine Blessing is made plain to us to be the only thing that shall redeem us from the curse of the Law of God; and now the time is drawing at hand, that we must receive that that is according to the purpose of

God. We feel much in the place of Jacob; we would the blessing was ours, but, like him, as we seem to need it more than ever, the greater are the obstacles that discover themselves to oppose us; and though it be written, "As thy day, so shall thy strength be," yet we are so self accused and condemned that we cannot see any thing before us but impossibilities: our very flesh trembles, and Satan haunts us with thoughts, that we have been misled all the way before, and now this evil is befallen us; and we cry, "Woe, woe unto us, the day of grace is past, the door of God's mercy is for ever shut against us;" and Satan tells us that he will strongly resist and accuse us before Divine Justice, and therefore, what we fear, will come to pass, and that, in a two-fold measure, there is no way of escape. O, what a state for our souls to be in! It is no trifling thing to apprehend the pains of eternal death, and the echoings for ever of the awful sentence of the righteous Judge, "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels." Matthew xxv, 41. O, what groanings and cryings and pantings! What rollings and windings and twistings! What a burden on the soul! O, what totterings and shakings beneath it! What a looking on the right hand, and on the left, behind and before! What secret wishes that we had never been in being! O, that we had a Mediator now to speak for us! O, that but one ray of hope remained! And, at the very moment we feel sinking beneath this tremendous weight, one steppeth forward to our rescue, bidding us not to fear, there is hope yet. Ah, the Mother of Jacob-the Alpha of the new principle within us-Divine Love, who conceived us in the Chambers of the Everlasting Covenant of Mercy, who, by the Holy Ghost, hath quickened us

H

to eternal life, now, by the Holy Ghost also, (who is the Comforter that shall receive of Christ, and shew it unto us,) again owns us, and declares unto us what is provided for us to appear in before God. We feel the revive, and while musing on the cause thereof, the Holy Ghost supplicates from the very inmost part of our souls in the name of Jesus Christ; and we cannot plead in any other, for, "There is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved;" Acts iv, 12, and this representeth something of the skins Jacob was covered with; but, like him, we fear lest our pleadings will rather bring on a curse than a blessing, we do seem so undone. Indeed do we feel the language of Esther to be our's, "If I perish, I perish," iv, 16, for Christ is now become our only hope, he is our refuge, and if we perish, we perish looking unto him. We now venture with this necessitous persuasion, this royal apparel, to stand before the King, and though Satan appears to resist us, we find favour in the King's sight; he holdeth out the sceptre of his power, and we draw near and touch it; yea, he says, "Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee." And, we repeat, "I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine." Cant. iv, 7; vi, 3. And our King saith unto our Enemy, "The Lord rebuke thee, O Satan; even the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee: is not this a brand plucked out of the fire? Our filthy garments are all taken away, our iniquities are passed from us, and we have change of raiment, and are crowned with a fair mitre." Zec. iii, 1-5. 0, the views now of what our precious Christ has done for us! "Now is our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with singing." Psm.

cxxvi, 2. 0, this blessed change!

What! such worth

less creatures sons of God to live for ever to praise the