What, then, is your experience? Have you ever tasted that the Lord is good, and have you from that taste been led to adore sovereign grace? How wonderful that God, in mere sovereignty, should have distinguished you by bestowing on you such wonderful love, while many, it is to be feared, of the present generation are passed by! A taste of God, a discovery of him to be ours in very deed, what ecstasy should it give to the professor? To have an experience of this kind is worth all the world; for here will he not only find peace of conscience, but freedom of access to God. And the precious promise is, Whatever you ask in the name of our Lord, it will be given unto you; and the Holy Ghost says by our apostle – ‘the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.’ Now, permit me to say a word: Remember David. Bear him on your mind when you approach the throne of sovereign grace. Ask him for the Spirit of Christ. If he obtain the Spirit through your instrumentality and prayer of faith, happy are you, and happy he, for it is an abiding Spirit, whereby he will be sealed unto the day of redemption. May he be regenerated and sanctified by the Lord the Spirit; and if spared to years of maturity, may he be kept from the evil that is in the world! When I think of the dangers to which the young are exposed, I am alarmed for David. How wicked and deceitful is the human heart! It is indeed a truth that nothing can change and renew it but Almighty power. None is able to do it but Jehovah the Spirit. May he who can work effectually operate on the soul of the child!
Sadly, David was not spared to years of maturity. He took ill and died before his father returned home. James and Nancy soon moved to Bloomington. God gave them nine more children, eight growing to years of maturity. They prayed the same way for them all; the Lord was mercifully pleased to effectually operate on their souls.
The letter is one of few extant records from his own pen. Most of James’ personal papers were burned in a barn fire years after his death (so save your files to the cloud as well as otherwise). This letter was published as part of his obituary in The Covenanter in August, 1855, p. 60-62.
This article originally appeared here, and is used by permission.
