Read Ebook: The Power of Faith Exemplified In The Life And Writings Of The Late Mrs. Isabella Graham. by Graham Isabella

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temptation without. I had seen her often staggering, sometimes falling under the rod; I had heard her earnestly wish for deliverance from sin, and when death approached she was more than satisfied: said she had been a great sinner, but she had a great Saviour; praised him and thanked him for all his dealings with her--for hedging her in, for chastising her; and even prayed that sin and corruption might be destroyed, if the body should be dissolved to effect it. The Lord fulfilled her desire, and, I may add, mine. He lifted upon her the light of his countenance; revived her languid graces; increased her faith and hope; loosed her from earthly concerns, and made her rejoice in the stability of his covenant, and to sing, 'All is well, all is well; good is the will of the Lord.' I did rejoice, I do rejoice; but O Lord, thou knowest my frame; she was my pleasant companion, my affectionate child; my soul feels a want. O fill it up with more of thy presence; give yet more communications of thyself.

"We are yet one in Christ our head--united in him; and though she shall not return unto me, I shall go to her, and then our communion will be more full, more delightful, as it will be perfectly free from sin. Christ shall be our bond of union, and we shall be fully under the influence of it.

"Let me then gird up the loins of my mind, and set forward to serve my day and generation, to finish my course. The Lord will perfect what concerns me; and when it shall please him, he will unclothe me, break down these prison-walls, and admit me into the happy society of his redeemed and glorified members: then 'shall he wipe away all tears from my eyes,' and I shall taste the joys which are at his right hand, and be satisfied for evermore."

"1795.

"MY DEAR MRS. WALKER--My last informed you that we had been made to taste of the Lord's visitation--the yellow-fever--but in great mercy had been spared in the midst of much apparent danger. I have now in my house a girl who lost both father and mother, and many whole families were cut off; my house was emptied; my school broken up; we confined to town, and heavy duty laid upon us at the same time. I trembled again for fear of debt; but 'the Lord brought meat out of the eater.'

"Three years ago, when tried by having one house taken over my head, another bought, and obliged to move three times in as many years, some speculating genius brought me under the influence of the madness of the times, and persuaded me I might build without money. It is quite common here to build by contract. I could not purchase ground, but I leased two lots of church land, got a plan made out, and worried myself for six months, trying to hatch chickens without eggs. I had asked the Lord to build me a house, to give success to the means, still keeping in view covenant provision, 'what is good the Lord will give.' After many disappointments I said, Well; I have asked--I am refused--it is not good--the Lord will not give it: he will provide, but in his own way, not mine.

"Of course I had to pay ground-rent, which in three years amounted to two hundred and twenty dollars. I think I hear you say, I never could have believed that Mrs. Graham could be guilty of such folly--nor I; but seeing and hearing of many such things, I fancied myself very clever. Last year a basin was formed, and wharves around it, opposite to the said lots; the epidemic raging on the other side of the city brought all the vessels that came in round to them, and great expectations were formed for this new basin; houses and stores sprung up like mushrooms, and Mr. Bethune sold my lease for one thousand pounds. Lo, and behold, part of it is already spent. All my provision through this wilderness has been so strongly marked by peculiar providences, my mind seems habituated to a sense of certainty. I feel my portion of earthly good safer and better in my Lord's hand than in my own."

In the ensuing year we find the following outbreathings of her rich Christian experience:

"JANUARY 3, 1796.

"'Rejoice in the Lord alway, and again I say, rejoice. Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand.' Philippians 4:4-7.

"'Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds, through Christ Jesus.'

"Christ Jesus! what does not this name comprehend? He is mine, and all is mine. I do rejoice in the Lord, yea, more or less, I rejoice always. This heart of mine is sensible to every human affliction; my tears flow often and fast: I weep for myself, and still more for others; but in these very moments of heart-wringing bitterness, there is a secret joy that Jesus is near; that he sees, knows, and pities. He is Jehovah as well as Jesus, and could have prevented the affliction under which I groan; but for my good, and the good of those near and dear to me, he suffered it, or prepared it. The good of his people is connected with his glory; they cannot be separated: therefore, Father, glorify thy name; I rejoice, and will rejoice. The Lord can remove, and will remove the affliction the moment it has answered the gracious purpose for which it was sent. I would not wish it one moment sooner. While it lies heavy, he is my almighty friend, my rest, my staff of support.

"'In the time of trouble, he shall hide me in his pavilion; in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me; he shall set me up upon a rock." Psalm 27:5.

"'The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in him, and I am helped, therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth; with my song I will praise him,' and in his strength and by his grace, let my 'moderation be known unto all men.' My Lord is at hand--at hand to support, at hand to overrule, at hand to deliver. Therefore I rejoice always.

"Blessed be God for the heart-easing, heart-soothing privilege of casting all my cares upon him, and for the blessed assurance that he careth for me and mine: that he allows, invites, yea, commands me to be careful for nothing, but in all things, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, to let my requests be made known unto him, who is man, and touched with the feeling of our infirmities--Jesus wept--and God, the almighty God, to support, overrule, deliver. Therefore my heart rejoiceth always."

"MAY 16, 1796.

"'If his children forsake my law, and walk not in my judgments, if they break my statutes and keep not my commandments, then will I visit their transgression with the rod, and their iniquity with stripes: nevertheless, my loving-kindness will I not utterly take from him, nor suffer my faithfulness to fail; my covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips.' Psalm 89: 30. Amen; blessed promise. Oh, it is a well-ordered covenant, and it is sure. Of all the provisions of the covenant, this has been to my soul among the most comfortable. Thanks be to God for the discipline of the covenant; often has it been administered: thou knowest, and I know in part, how necessarily, although I shall not know nor understand all, until that blessed rod shall have perfected its correction, and shall never more be lifted up.

"Many ups and downs has thy servant experienced in this vale of tears; many tears have watered these now aged cheeks; in a variety of ways hast thou stricken, and at times stripe has followed stripe, but mercy and love accompanied every one of them. I bless thee, Oh, I praise thee, that I have seldom received a stripe but I had with it a token of love. Sin was imbittered, a Saviour endeared, and grace given to kiss the rod, and cleave to him that had appointed it. And now I can read in legible characters where, in many instances, thy check met my wandering steps, stopt me short of huge precipices, and preserved me from destroying even my worldly comfort. In some instances--I thank thee they have not been many--thou hast been pleased to let me alone, to let me pursue my own way, ways so wise in my own eyes that I have either not sought counsel at all, or sought it as Balaam did, with my heart set on my own will.

"In some cases thou hast let me eat of the fruit of my own doings, and let me weary myself in my own way, until I found it not only vanity and vexation of spirit, but sometimes a labyrinth from which I could find no escape: then did I cry unto the Lord; then did I remember my backslidings; then did I seek unto the cleansing fountain and to the appointed Mediator, the maker up of the breach: then did I experience afresh the Lord's power to save.

"In how many instances has he given a sudden turn to providences, which have been made means of my deliverance; not only so, but brought good out of my evil, so that I have been made to wonder, and to say,' Surely this is the finger of God.'

"I destroy myself, but in thee is my help found. O let these wanderings end; fix it deep on my mind, that in the Lord only have I wisdom as well as strength: that 'it is not in man that walketh, to direct his steps.' When shall I learn to live simply on Christ, by the light of his pure unerring word, and the Spirit coinciding; and have done with these carnal reasonings, the wisdom of men. 'Search me, O Lord, and know my heart; try me, and know my thoughts, and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.' Amen."

"MAY 28, 1796.

"This is the anniversary of my dear Jessie's birth, no more to call us together here; but I yet remember it as a day in which our God Was merciful to me, and made me the mother of an heir of salvation. I bless, I praise my covenant God, who enabled me to dedicate her to him before she was born, and to ask only one thing for her as for myself, even an interest in his great salvation, leaving it to him to order the means, time, and manner, as of her natural birth and ripening age, so of her spiritual birth and ripening for glory; he accepted the charge, and he has finished the work, to his own glory, to her eternal happiness, and my joy and comfort. I have witnessed remaining corruption fighting hard against her, and bringing her again and again into captivity to the law of sin and death warring against her. I have seen the rod of God lie heavy upon her, according to the tenor of the covenant, when she forsook his laws and went astray: when she walked not in his judgments, but wandered from his way, he visited her faults with rods and her sins with chastisements, but his loving-kindness he never took from her, though he often hid it, nor altered the word which he had spoken, that he would never leave her, never forsake her; that in due time he would deliver her from all her enemies. I perceived her desires to be delivered from the world and the body, and taken home to the bosom of her God, since that appeared at times the only way she could be delivered from sin. I heard her lament her unfruitfulness, her unsteadiness: I heard her exclaim, 'Oh, what a sinner, what a great sinner;' and, 'Oh, what a Saviour; O the goodness of God in hedging me in, and saving me from myself; his covenant stands fast, it is established, it is sure.' I witnessed a God pardoning sin, yet taking vengeance on inventions. I witnessed the sinner, after being sixteen years in the school of Christ, taught by his ministers, and most effectually by his rod, taking shelter in 'the city of refuge,' in the atonement of God's providing, and in 'a surety righteousness,' and finishing her struggles with, 'All is well.' My heart echoed, and does echo, and will to all eternity, 'All is well.' Glory to God; sing, not unto her, not unto me, not unto any creature, but 'to God be the glory,' that she is now delivered from 'a body of sin and death, and made meet to be a partaker with the saints in light.' HALLELUJAH."

"JUNE, 1796.

"'I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the Lord.' Psalm 122.

"'The house of the Lord, whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord, unto the testimony of Israel, to give thanks unto the name of the Lord,' to seek his face, to learn his will, to taste his love, to behold his' glory, to enjoy God as their own God and reconciled Father.

"Lord, let my heart be warmed more towards thy house; I have sought and found thee in thy sanctuary, read thy providences, and been taught thy will; I have tasted thy love and beheld thy glory; I have enjoyed thy presence as my own reconciled Father in Christ Jesus; I have been satisfied with thy goodness, as with marrow and fatness; and yet how cold and languid at times, how little desire to return, how small my expectations, how wandering my imagination. How do I sit before thee as thy people, and my heart with the fool's eyes at the ends of the earth. Lord, I should blush and be ashamed were a fellow-mortal to see my heart at times. I may hide my eyes from viewing vanity, but the evil lies within. O Lord, thou knowest the cause. After all I have heard, seen, tasted, and handled of the word of life, I am still of myself an empty vessel, unable to speak a good word, or think a good thought. Great are thy tender mercies, O Lord. 'Quicken me according to thy word; turn thou away my eyes from beholding vanity, and quicken me in thy way: then shall I run in the way of thy commandments when thou hast enlarged my heart.'

"The house of God; the owner, the builder, and maker is God, and it is his peculiar treasure. Christ is the foundation and chief corner-stone, and his house are we, built upon him, cemented together, a spiritual building; the foundation cannot fail, the corner-stone can never give way; neither can we fall to pieces, or be separated from him.

"The house of God; 'Jerusalem, Zion, the rest of God, where he delights to dwell,' where he will for ever stay; the house of God, the church, yea, the body of Christ: Christ the head, his people the church, his members whose life is in him, and derived from him; and because he lives we shall live also. Lord, enlarge my understanding to comprehend more and more of the height and depth, length and breadth of the love of Christ, which passeth all understanding. Open my eyes to behold wondrous things in thy law and gospel. I am as yet but a babe; glory to God that I am what I am, a babe in Christ. I shall be nourished with life and strength from my divine Head; educated and nurtured by the blessings of the new covenant. I shall arrive at the perfection of stature appointed, and stand in my lot at the latter day. Amen."

"AUGUST 4, 1796.

"A day to be remembered. Rose at four, not to mourn--no, but to repeat my grateful thanks to my covenant God for the work he finished this day last year, in delivering my weak, feeble, tossed, and tried Jessie from a body of sin and death, and giving her 'the victory through Jesus Christ, who loved her and gave himself for her.' To thee she was dedicated ere she saw the light; to thee a thousand times I repeated the dedication, begging that thou mightest bring her within the bond of thy covenant; this was the sum and substance of all my askings for her. I witnessed the time of her second birth, saw the tears of conviction and remorse. I witnessed thy loosing her bonds, and tuning her heart and tongue to praise redeeming love. I witnessed the teaching of thy Spirit, and the enlightening of her eyes, and the taste thou gavest her of thy salvation; I thought her mountain stood strong, and she would not be easily moved; but who can tell the deceitfulness of the human heart? Too soon did we all turn aside like a deceitful bow, forsook the fountain of living waters, and hewed out broken cisterns that could hold no water. Glory to God for the discipline of the covenant, that he did not cast us off, but chastened and corrected. He repeated the discipline stripe upon stripe: I stood by and saw it, and though my heart melted at times, I said, 'She is in her Father's hand, let him do his pleasure.'

"I too was unfaithful to her, thou knowest, and often entered into the same vanity of mind, which stifled the love of God in our hearts, instead of guarding her and warning her; still, still the Shepherd of Israel followed after both, and with the precious rod restored both, time after time, till it pleased thee to finish her warfare, and deliver her from both body and sin. Lord, I thank thee for all the circumstances, for the privilege of attending her in her warfare, for the cheerfulness of her spirits, for the rich support we all experienced, for the view we all had of thy faithfulness and fatherly dealing, and for her last words, 'All is well.' O yes, every thing thou doest is well, and this was peculiarly well. I resigned her to thee with joy and thankfulness, and I still acquiesce. Her thou hast taken, me thou hast left, to be yet exercised with further discipline. It is well; thy will be done. O help me to profit by every pang. Let sin be mortified and my soul be purified; enlarge my heart to run the ways of thy commandments. Now may I lay aside every weight, and that vanity of mind which doth so easily beset me, and hath been the secret spring of much backsliding both to myself and to my children. Lord, destroy it.. O let me now live to God, closely and consistently; down with my will, with self in every form. O purify my motives, and let my whole heart, soul, body, substance, and influence in the world be devoted to thee. Empty me of every thing that is my own, and let 'Christ live in me the hope of glory,' and let the glory of thy workmanship in my soul redound to thee, and thee alone. Amen."

"AUGUST 13, 1796.

"'As ye have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him, rooted and built up in him, and established in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving.' Colossians 2:6.

"O Lord, this is what I pant after. I would fain have done with wandering, Lord, thou knowest, for the work is thine. I have received the Lord Jesus as thy gift to a lost world, as thy gift to me an individual of that world, as having made peace by the blood of the cross. I account it a faithful saying, worthy of all acceptation, that 'Christ came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief,' I have received thee as the Lord my righteousness, crediting thy own word, that 'Christ is the end of the law for righteousness,' and that 'there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.' I have received thee as 'the covenant given of the people.' In all the relations by which thou art held out to me in this Bible, so far as I know or understand, I have received thee. I have no hope in myself, no trust in myself, nor any views of communication from God of any kind, but through the one 'mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus.'

"O my God, what is my life, what is my happiness but a continual receiving? Thou art 'the bread of life' that must keep alive the living principle in my soul. In thee 'dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.' Thy people are complete in thee; thou art their head, they are thy body, and by joints and bands have nourishment ministered to them, and are knit together, and increase with the increase of God.

"This, O this is what my soul pants after, closer and more intimate union and communion. I would be transformed into thine image; I would be thy temple; I would have thee live in me, walk in me, make me one with thee; I would be delivered from self-will, self-wisdom, self-seeking; I would be delivered from that philosophy and vain deceit which spoils souls and leads them off from their head: then, and not till then, shall I cease to wander, shall 'run and not be weary, walk and not faint.' Then shall 'I run in the way of thy commandments,' and no longer turn aside to crooked ways. Then shall I eat and drink, work and recreate, all to thy glory. Lord, send thy Spirit into my heart, that he may continually take of the things of Christ and show them unto me; that I may grow and be no longer a babe, but arrive at the fulness of stature in Christ Jesus, and more steadily, and more purely, and more zealously, and O, more humbly live to God, and glorify him in the world. Amen."

"Do you remember how much I used to say about our dear Methodist Society in Antigua? and the three holy, harmless, zealous Moravian brethren? and how the preachers gave each other the right hand of fellowship, forgetting their differences, in that land of open hostilities, on the kingdom of their common Lord? Thither the Lord brought me from a land of entire barrenness, where, as far as I know, a gospel sermon was never preached. Here I was brought into great affliction, and to pass through the severest trial that I ever experienced before or since.

"'The Lord brought me into this fold, a poor straggling lamb, who had for five years herded among the goats; and little difference was there between them and me, except that my soul longed after green pastures and rejoiced to hear the shepherd's voice, and when I heard it I knew it, though from one who did not belong to my original fold; these good people nourished me with tenderness, bore with patience my carnality. When my dear husband was taken ill, they wrestled for him in prayer; Mr. Gilbert was every day with him; the Lord heard and gave a joyful parting; yes, joyful, never did I experience such joy; then they sympathized with and soothed the widowed heart, fed her with promises, and in a measure established her: thus they wrought with God in calling in one, and restoring another; never, never shall I forget the labors of love of that dear little society.

"Ever, my dear friend, yours,

To the same.

"1796-7.

"Last week a considerable number of ministers and lay Christians met for the third time, and established a society for sending missionaries among the Indians, and also among the poor scattered settlers on the frontiers. A sermon was preached in the evening in one of the Dutch churches, 'The liberal deviseth liberal things,' etc., after which an address was read by the Secretary--our dear Mr. Mason--which, when printed, I will send you.

"The society is to keep up a correspondence with your and the other societies. If they can effect anything themselves, apart here in America, well; if not, they will throw their subscriptions into the common funds and get help from you. This view is very pleasant to us. There is great need of itinerant preachers in our back settlements; they are scattered, and no churches of any kind; even in some thick settled counties they will not pay a minister. These are 'the highways and hedges;' O that the Lord may compel them to come in.

"FEBRUARY 10, 1797.

"MY EVER DEAR FRIEND--The desire of waiting you a long letter has occasioned too much delay on my part. One thing I can assure you of, you have been much on my mind, and the subject of all our prayers.

"'Trust in the Lord with all thy heart, and lean not to thine own understanding;' be not discouraged because of deadness, darkness, wandering, want of love, want of spirituality, want of any kind. Who told you of these evils and wants? the Sun of righteousness shining into your soul has shown you many of the evils there, but the half you know not yet. The more you learn of the holiness and purity of the divine nature and the spirituality of his law, the more you will be dissatisfied with every thing yours. Even a holy apostle said, 'In me, that is, in my flesh,' or natural mind, dwelleth no good thing. The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; so that the things that I would, I do not; and the things that I would not, those I do. Yet it is not I,' not my new nature, 'but sin that dwelleth in me; for to will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not.'

"If this was the case with the apostle, who sealed his testimony with his life, is it strange that you and I should have hearts full of all abominable things? These realities are cause of deep humility before God, but none of despair or doubt. All are alike guilty and vile, the whole head is sick, and the whole heart unsound; therefore we need a whole Christ to atone for our sin, to cover our naked souls with his imputed righteousness, and to be surety for us; to sanctify us by his Spirit, and prepare us for the purchased inheritance. O try to rest in him: believe it, you are complete in him; give up, my dear friend, poring over and diving into your own heart and frames, and try to trust in an almighty Saviour to save you from foes without and foes within. Read Romaine's Walk and Life of Faith: he himself attained to a high degree of holiness by getting out of himself, and trusting, resting, believing from day to day, for grace, for every duty, as it occurred. The promise runs, 'As thy days so shall thy strength be.'

"I cannot at this distance, and knowing nothing of characters, offer you any advice with respect to outward means; but if you know any truly pious, spiritual minister, I should think it your duty to lay open your mind to him. You may find in books matter as good as any man living can speak; but it is the Lord's appointed way, and he often honors his servants, his ministers, by making them messengers of peace and comfort to his children. 'Are any sick, let them call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over them.' See how the Christians of old associated with one another. I am now doubly yours, etc.,

"APRIL 14, 1797.

"Eternity seems very near. I have often thought so without any visible cause. Well, it will come; a few more rolling years, months, weeks, or days will assuredly land me on Canaan's happy shore. Then shall I know and enjoy what ear hath not heard, eye seen, nor heart conceived, even the blessedness that is at God's right hand. I have desired, though I know not that I have asked, to glorify God on my death-bed, and to leave my testimony at the threshold of eternity, that not one word of all that my God has promised has failed. He has been--O what has he not been?--in all my trials, all my afflictions, all my temptations, all my wanderings, all my backslidings, he has been all that the well-ordered covenant has said. Let this Bible tell what God in Christ, by his Spirit and his providence, has been to me; and let the same Bible say what he will be to me 'when flesh and heart fails;' yea, when 'the place that now knows me shall know me no more.' Perhaps when the messenger does come I shall not know him, but depart in silence. Well, as the Lord wills; he knows best how to glorify himself. Jesus shall trim my lamp and perfect his image on my soul, sensible or insensible. I shall enter into his presence, washed in his blood, clothed in his righteousness, and my sanctification perfected. I shall 'see him as he is,' and be like him.

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