Page:Records of the Life of the Rev. John Murray.djvu/177

Rh man and his dwelling, I was abundantly more so, by his conversation, from which I learned, that he had been imposed upon by the accounts he had received of me; he had been made to believe I was, for matter and manner, a second Whitefield. My heart sunk, as I reflected what I had to expect, from a gentleman thus circumstanced. I beheld before me a self-righteous Calvinist; and I believed, when he discovered (as I was determined he immediately should) the amount of my testimony, he would sincerely repent, that he had summoned me to his abode, and that I should, in consequence, have much to suffer. The house afforded no spare bed, and, of course, I lodged, I cannot say slept with my host. The whole night was devoted to conversation, and I embraced the first pause to inform him, that I once viewed the Deity, and the creature man, precisely as they now appeared to him; but that a complete revolution had been wrought in my mind. Sir, I once believed the faithful Creator had called into existence by far the greatest number of human beings, with no other intention, than to consign them to endless misery, rescuing only a few respected persons, from a state of sin and suffering. You will, my dear sir, probably regret that you have invited me hither, when I inform you, that the Christ, in whom I trust, and the gospel, which I preach, is not the Christ, of whom you expected to hear, nor the gospel, you supposed I should preach. The Christ, in whom I formerly confided, was a partial Saviour; but the Christ, in whom I now trust, is the Saviour of the world. The gospel, you have been accustomed to hear, and which you expected I should preach, is a partial gospel, conveying the glad tidings of eternal life in Christ Jesus, only to an elected few. The gospel, I preach, is glad tidings to every individual of the human race; assuring them that, in Christ, the promised seed, all the nations, all the families of the earth shall be blessed. I fear, sir, that, not being accustomed to the ministry of the reconciliation, committed to the apostles, to wit, that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing unto them their trespasses; that, when all mankind like sheep had gone astray, the Lord, the offended God, laid upon Jesus the iniquities of us all, that he might put them away by the sacrifice of himself, that they might thus, as a mill-stone, be cast into the depths of the sea, and be found no more at all; that Jesus, thus performing the will of God, the world may ultimately behold him in his true character, as the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world; thus becoming the Saviour of all men,—not in, but from their sins. I fear, my good sir, that when you hear me thus preaching the gospel, which God himself preached to Abraham, and which he testified by the mouth of all