Page:The works of the Rev. John Wesley, M.A., late fellow of Lincoln-College, Oxford (IA worksofrevjohnwe3wesl).pdf/345

 faith, ye have obeyed his word My son give me thy heart. He is your God, and your love, and desire of your eyes, and your exceeding great reward. Ye have sought and found happiness in him: ye delight in the Lord, ''and he hath given you your hearts desire''.

6. Once more, though they were heavy, yet were they holy: they retained the same power over sin. They were still kept from this ''by the power of God: they were obedient children, not fashioned according to their former desires, but as he that had called them is holy, so were they holy in all manner of conversation''. ''Knowing they were redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without spot and without blemish'', they had thro' the faith and hope which they had in God, ''purified their souls by the Spirit''. So that upon the whole, their heaviness well consisted with faith, with hope, with love of God and man! with the peace of God, with joy in the Holy Ghost, with inward and outward holiness. It did no way impair, much less destroy, any part of the work of God in their hearts. It did not at all interfere with that sanctification of the Spirit, which is the root of all true obedience; neither with the happiness which must needs result from grace and peace reigning in the heart.

II. 1. Hence we may easily learn what kind of heaviness they were in: the second thing which I shall endeavour to shew. The word in the ori