Withdrawing

Was reading Owen on temptation this morning and it reminded me of this thread.

He’s discussing ‘watching,’ part of which is paying attention to the different seasons of life and how temptation might especially show up there:

“As in part was manifested before, a time of the slumber of grace, of neglect in communion with God, of formality in duty, is a season to be watched in, as that which certainly some other temptation attending it. Let a soul in such an estate awake and look about him. His enemy is at hand, and he is ready to fall into such a condition as may cost him dear all the days of his life. His present estate is bad enough in itself; but it is an indication of that which is worse that lies at the door. The disciples that were with Christ in the mount had not only a bodily, but a spiritual drowsiness upon them. What says our Saviour to them? "Arise; watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation." We know how near one of them was to a bitter hour of temptation, and not watching as he ought, he immediately entered into it.
I mentioned before the case of the spouse, Cant. 5:2-8. She slept, and was drowsy, and unwilling to gird up herself to a vigorous performance of duties, in a way of quick, active communion with Christ. Before she is aware, she hath lost her Beloved; then she moans, inquires, cries, endures woundings, reproaches, and all, before she obtains him again. Consider, then, O poor soul, thy state and condition! Doth thy light burn dim? or though it give to others as great a blaze as formerly, yet thou seest not so clearly the face of God in Christ by it as thou hast done? 2 Cor. 4:6. Is thy zeal cold? or if it do the same works as formerly, yet thy heart is not warmed with the love of God and to God in them as formerly, but only thou proceedest in the course thou hast been in? Art thou negligent in the duties of praying or hearing? or if thou dost observe them, thou doest it not with that life and vigour as formerly? Dost thou flag in thy profession? or if thou keep it up, yet thy wheels are oiled by some sinister respects from within or without? Does thy delight in the people of God faint and grow cold? or is thy love to them changing from that which is purely spiritual into that which is very carnal, upon the account of suitableness of principles and natural spirits, if not worse foundations? If thou art drowsing in such a condition as this, take heed; thou art falling into some woful temptation that will break all thy bones, and give thee wounds that shall stick by thee all the days of thy life. Yea, when thou awakest, thou wilt find that it hath indeed laid hold of thee already, though thou perceivedst it not; it hath smitten and wounded thee, though thou hast not complained nor sought for relief or healing.
Such was the state of the church or Sardis, Rev. 3:2. "The things that remained were ready to die." "Be watchful," says our Saviour, "and strengthen them, or a worse thing will befall thee." If any that reads the word of this direction be in this condition, if he hath any regard of his poor soul, let him now awake, before he be entangled beyond recovery. Take this warning from God; despise it not.”

Likewise in seasons of spiritual joy:

“A season of great spiritual enjoyments is often, by the malice of Satan and the weakness of our hearts, turned into a season of danger as to this business of temptation.
We know how the case stood with Paul, 2 Cor. 12:7. He had glorious spiritual revelations of God and Jesus Christ. Instantly Satan falls upon him, a messenger from him buffets him, so that he earnestly begs its departure, but yet is left to struggle with it.
God is pleased sometimes to give us especial discoveries of himself and his love, to fill the heart with his kindness; Christ takes us into the banqueting-house, and gives our hearts their fills of love; and this by some signal work of his Spirit, overpowering us with a sense of love in the unspeakable privilege of adoption, and so fills our souls with joy unspeakable and glorious. A man would think this was the securest condition in the world. What soul does not cry with Peter in the mount, "It is good for me to be here; to abide here for ever?" But yet very frequently some bitter temptation is how at hand. Satan sees that, being possessed by the joy before us, we quickly neglect many ways of approach to our souls, wherein he seeks and finds advantages against us. Is this, then, our state and condition? Does God at any time give us to drink of the rivers of pleasure that are at his right hand, and satisfy our souls with his kindness as with marrow and fatness? Let us not say, "We shall never be moved;" we know not how soon God may hide his face, or a messenger from Satan may buffet us.”

-Chapter 6, On Temptation.

Let us pay attention to the season we are in, watch and pray, that we might not fall into temptation.
 
Hello Scott,

In your post 15 you said (twice), "there is so much more" to the depth and richness you are talking of. Would you care to elaborate on this for a soul with ears to hear?
 
Jerusalem Blade said:
Hello Scott,

In your post 15 you said (twice), "there is so much more" to the depth and richness you are talking of. Would you care to elaborate on this for a soul with ears to hear?
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Matt 13
He who has ears, let him hear."10 The disciples came to him and asked, "Why do you speak to the people in parables?"11 He replied, "The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them.12 Whoever has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him.13 This is why I speak to them in parables: "Though seeing, they do not see; though hearing, they do not hear or understand.14 In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah: "`You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.15 For this people's heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.' [1]
 
Sad about this, as it was in sincerity and truth I asked concerning "there is so much more", knowing somewhat of my shortcomings in devotion of my Lord.
 
Was doing a little editing this morning and came across this poem from Flavel. Think it is fitting to the topic at hand.

Poem V.

Thou art the Husbandman, and I
A worthless plot of Husbandry,
Whom special love did ne'retheless
Divide from natures wilderness.
Then did the Sun-shine of thy face
And sweet illapses of thy grace,
Like April showers, and warming gleams,
Distill its dews, reflect its beams.
My dead affections then were green,
And hopeful buds on them were seen:
These into duties soon were turned
In which my heart within me burned:
O halcyon days! Thrice happy slate!
Each place was Bethel, heavens gate.
What sweet discourse! What heavenly talk!
Whilst with thee I did daily walk!
Mine eyes o'reflow, my heart doth sink;
As oft as on those days I think.
For strangeness now is got between
My God and me, as may be seen
By what is now, and what was then;
'It is just as if I were two men.
My fragrant branches blasted be,
No fruits like those that I can see.
Some Canker-worm lies at my root.
Which fades my leaves, destroys my fruit.
My soul is banished from thy sight,
For this it mourneth day and night.
Yet why dost thou desponding lie?
With Jonah cast a backward eye.
Sure in thy God help may be had,
There's precious balm in Gilead.
That God that made me spring at first,
When I was barren, and accurst;
Can much more easily restore
My soul to what it was before.
'Twas Heman's, Job's, and David's case,
Yet all recovered were by grace.
A word, a smile on my poor soul;
Will make it perfect, sound, and whole.
A glance of thine hath soon dissolved
A soul in sin, and grief involved.
Lord, if thou canst not work the cure,
I am contented to endure.
 
Yes, as many here have intimated, we should all seek renewal in the use of the means of grace, publicly, privately, and secretly. Who here, when he or she is right-minded, does not long for and seek a closer walk with the Lord in this state of humiliation? We know that we shall not have the fullness that we desire until glory (satisfied only in waking in his likeness), but here below we have, and are called to, even in the midst of our greatest suffering, joy unspeakable and full of glory.

What happens in renewal? We grow in love for God and our neighbor. Scott testifies to growth in love for God as he had prayed. That is wonderful to read! He also suggests that there is a "more" that must happen experientially, perhaps beyond all that we speak about regarding the ordo salutis (effectual calling, regeneration, faith, repentance, justification, adoption, sanctification, perseverance, glorification). Steve rightly inquired into what this "more" consists of.

I do know this: as we walk closer to God, we experience not only "more love for Christ," together with all the Godhead, but we love our fellow believers, and even our enemies, far more. We experience, in the best times of love, the sense of our own worthlessness more keenly (and how amazing it is that God and others love us) and the sense of unity with other believers (Ephesians 4:1-16; my wife and I just read, and prayed through that, in our morning devotions). I John is also rather dedicated to the notion that love to God always manifests in and entails love to the brethren.

I say all of this because it's easy, while we are experiencing God's love and presence palpably, to make our experience the touchstone. It never is, and such always threatens to displace God himself. We seek communion with the living God and not a particular experience. When most where I should be, my thoughts should be full of him, self-forgetful, not reflecting on what a great experience I am having and that others must have the same. The danger here becomes, as Jonathan Edwards well knew from renewal in Northampton, censoriousness toward my brethren that I may perceive as lacking what I have.

Edwards made clear, in Charity and Its Fruits (and some other writings, like Religious Affections), that the chief mark of walking with the Lord as we should is not any particular experience but an increase in love for God and our neighbor. The insistence that others experience what we've experienced and regarding them as deficient if they haven't is what constitutes censoriousness. And censoriousness is a fruit of pride, the root of all other sins.

So we have to be watchful against pride and its fruit when we experience a time or times of especially blessed communion with our Triune God. Whatever happens to us in terms of spiritual experience, we have to remember that the flesh never betters and we must always die to it. In times of spiritual dryness, we have to die to despair. In times of greater richness, to pride. We always have the flesh, our idol-producing factory, with us and we must always die to it, as fits the situation.

Having said all of that, I wish us all times of spiritual feasting, in which we see Christ more clearly, in the beauty of his person and work. But even when we are not experiencing such, our Savior has not diminished a whit, and we can rest in that: it is not our apprehension of our God that is most important but our sure knowledge that He remains constant (Mal 3:6; James 1:17), whatever our perception may be at any given moment, prone as we are to temptation and sin. Soli Deo gloria!

Peace,
Alan
 
Pastor Strange,
Thank you for your exhortation. I would agree with most everything you said. To be accurate, I am crushed by the mercies and tenderness of our Lord. This recent experience I describe, has buckled my knees. It has been a catalyst for me, being that I am reformed, to reevaluate a lot of things. Specifically, whether or not in the 25 years that I studied and read incessantly, finding myself six years ago, empty, to seek out the Lord on the matter. To which by His mercies, He answered. Praise God, hallelujah.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve read through the confession. For some strange reason, this portion that I cited in the opening post, never struck me like it has recently.

Being a deeper thinker, I had to really think about, this withdrawing that the divines speak about.

The whole biblical premise about being filled with the Holy Spirit, the portion of Luke 11 that I cite, imperatives about being filled, fanning the flame, drawing near to God and He will draw near to you; the grieving of the Holy Spirit, and the like, it’s caused me to reevaluate the doctrine.

My premise in the post was on the heels of my meditations, and thought it would be important for us to consider some of these things; I find that in the past, I didn’t even consider any of this, in light of the immutability of God and his omnipresence. Yet, as we can see, the mathematics of the subject require a different Vista.

I believe that in the reformed rank-and-file, there is a certain lack of outward joy and power, that many of the charismatics have. Granted, I would say they’re less inclined to a scholasticism as we are, and I don’t know if it’s a deficiency any longer. In my exchanges over the years with many charismatics, it’s not like they’re completely ignorant of the scriptures.

When I speak of charismatics, I speak of people like Piper and Lloyd Jones.

So I just write this to say, I thank the Lord for the work is done in me. I find no pride in it, it’s more of a jealousy for the people of God. If it came across as censorious, it was not my intent. I only wanted people to consider what Westminster said on the matter and possibly that they, as I did, take stock and inventory.

Since our faith is a supernatural faith and our God the supernatural God He is, and the same power that rose Jesus from the dead lives in us now, would it be a sin to believe that the supernatural power that lives in us, be experientially evident?

Lastly, I believe it’s a conflation, to a degree, to hang our hat on the consistency of God’s immutability and omnipresence of God, when we see the Scriptures telling us, that the spirit can be quenched, resisted, and even his direction, rebelled against. These two truths run side-by-side through scriptures, and we must really consider them. To not see this doctrine through this lens, is in my opinion, irresponsible.

Blessings to you, brother
 
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Scott Bushey said:
Since our faith is a supernatural faith and our God the supernatural God He is, and the same power that rose Jesus from the dead lives in us now, would it be a sin to believe that the supernatural power that lives in us, be experientially evident?
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Of course, we must have an experimental faith and not a dead faith (without fruit) or a faith that fails to work through love.

But the chief expression of experiential evidence is not a particular religious experience as such but love to God and to neighbor properly manifesting itself. This will be accompanied, in varying degrees and different measures, from person to person, due to their own personal make-up, with different sorts of emotional experiences and expressions. For some, it may be relatively lacking in such. In others, it may be quite emotionally overwhelming. My point is that your subjective experience of God's love, how that stirs your emotions particularly, does not, nor can it, become the touchstone for "true religious affections."

We've been down that path before and the best Christian thinkers have refused to make particular subjective (or mystical) experience the rule for the Christian faith. Censoriousness is insisting that my experience, since it was true, must be determinative for all and that if one is lacking in such experience, then he is a deficient Christian.

There's much that could be said, Scott, about what you've said in other respects in this thread (e.g., Is God bound to heal in all cases? Is it necessarily unbelief on my part if He doesn't?,): I am not sure where you stand with regard to those and other questions. I've not chosen to engage you on your theology at this point (there are many things that I appreciate about Piper and MLJ but they also are not, self-admittedly, confessional on all their theological points).

All that aside, I thought that someone needed clearly to address what seemed to be a recurring point for you: that you've experienced something "more" that all Christians must experience if they don't wish to be deficient. I don't seek to take anything away from that but only to point out that while it is not only legitimate but proper to call for all to enjoy a closer work with the Lord in the means He has appointed, to maintain that such a "closer walk" does and must take a certain subjective religious shape is not sound and such should be resisted.

Peace,
Alan
 
Doctor Strange,
Thanks again for your reply. There’s much more that I could say as well, but I will refrain.

Lastly: What has been a bit frustrating to me is that I’ve interacted with a few different people and posited a few different biblical premises that are on the heels of what Westminster wrote, and absolutely no one interacted with them; that being, that the Holy Spirit can withdraw and many times, does. As in my case. The whole gist of the post, was essentially just to say, you may want to take inventory and some of the recourse I took in the observation of my own walk.
 
Scott Bushey said:
what Westminster wrote
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Scott,

I appreciate your response and what you cite from our Standards. I agree that our Standards are, at these places, particularly insightful and remarkably cogent. I think that the genius of our Standards comes through in a variety of places and I certainly find their considered, mature judgments about Providence and Assurance, which is what you cite, to be chief among them.

Yes, God often does what He does for the reasons that He does it as 5.5 notes. This is especially challenging and encouraging, but, to me, above all, heartening. Similarly in 18.4: I may not feel like a believer for any number of reasons, many of which are due to my sin and coldness, but by his Spirit, I may be brought back to Him, and meanwhile kept from despair. That's all magnificent and reminds me that I am his and he is mine even when I don't subjectively "feel" it, and to pursue him all the more so that I might enjoy more fully his comfortable presence and the sweetness and joy of his fellowship.

Peace,
Alan
 
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