FOURTH NIGHT.
“I fear I weary you, grandmamma,” said little Emma, as she opened the room‐door on the following Sabbath, and resumed her accustomed seat by the good old lady’s side—“I fear I weary you, coming so often to hear your nice explanations of Bible doctrines; but you have already enabled me to understand a great deal I never knew before, and have made my Sabbath evenings so happy!”
“I assure you, you have made me happy too, my dear child,” said Mrs Allan, wiping the tear that was rolling down her withered cheek. “I can truly say, I have no greater joy than to talk to you about these glorious truths. I will soon be in that silent place,” continued she, pointing, as she was closing her shutters for the night, to the churchyard, on which the moon was then shining; “but it makes me happy to think, that when you can hear my voice no more, you will remember, with joy, the Sabbath evenings we have spent together. Happy, dear Emma, will it be,” her face brightening as she spoke, “if we meet to speak of these blessed truths in the better Sabbath in heaven!”
Emma was about to reply, when her grandmother took her by the hand, and said, with a kindly smile, “Well, dearest, and what would you have me talk to you about to‐night?”
“You are the proper judge,” replied her little scholar, “as to what will best follow after the two beautiful doctrines you have last explained to me, of Justification and Adoption. The other day I came to a difficult word in a book, which, |Of Regeneration.| if it would not be out of place, I should like to know something about. The word was Regeneration, and”——
“Stay, my dear,” interrupted her grandmother; “that is the very subject I was thinking of. You could not have named a better; and if you will give me all your attention, I shall try to open up this great doctrine to you as simply as I can.
“Do you remember what I told you about Justification?—What God does to the sinner when He justifies and adopts him?”
|Difference between Justification,| “He changes his state,” replied Emma. “He brings him from a state of wrath to a state of grace,—from a state of condemnation to a state of pardon.”
“You have given me just the answer I wanted,” said her grandmother—“that it is a change of state or condition. In Justification, from being a rebel, the sinner is pardoned by |Adoption,| his Sovereign. In Adoption, from being a prodigal, he is received back into his Father’s lost home. Now, dear,” continued she, “did I say that in these there is produced also any change in character?”
“I don’t think so,” replied Emma.
“You are right; and you will instantly see how well it is that I should speak to |And Regeneration.| you about Regeneration to‐night, which is the very word which tells about this great change of character or mind, which is as necessary to salvation, as the great change of state and condition of which I have already spoken. What is your own idea, my dear child, as to the meaning of Regeneration?”
“Indeed, grandmamma,” replied Emma, “it is such a long and difficult word, that I am ashamed to tell, though I have often heard it mentioned in Mr R——’s sermon, I never understood it aright.”
“You should never be ashamed, my dear, to ask those older than yourself to explain Bible difficulties to you. Many grow up to be big people, in great ignorance, owing to this false shame.”
“Is it the same, grandmamma,” said Emma, “as Repentance? I think I understand that word better.”
|Bible Terms about Regeneration.| “Yes, my child, there are many words in the Bible used to denote this same great change, and which you must often hear ministers speaking about. ‘The new birth’—being ‘born again’—‘Conversion’—‘Repentance’—‘Regeneration;’ but the meaning of them all may be summed up in this,—the necessity of a new heart, produced by the Holy Spirit, who turns the old heart from the service of sin to the service of God.”
|Necessity of Regeneration.| “But must every one have this entire change of heart before he can be saved?”
“Yes, dearest, it is a doctrine many don’t like to believe, or to hear about, because they think it makes the way to heaven too strait and narrow; but do you remember anything Jesus said about it, when He was speaking to inquiring Nicodemus?”
|What Jesus says of it.| “Oh, yes,” said Emma, “you have put me in mind of the verse now—‘Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.’”
“You are quite correct,” replied the old lady. “That same blessed Saviour never spoke an unkind word, and He would never have uttered this, unless it was a solemn truth, ‘Marvel not that I said unto you, Ye must be born again.’”
“But if the sinner,” asked Emma, “is justified in the sight of God, and God calls him ‘not guilty,’ and pardons him, and says of him there is no condemnation, what more does he require, in order to be saved?”
|A Change of State and a Change of Heart must go together.| “A great deal more,” replied her grandmother. “Let me ask you,” said she to Emma, “two questions, which may help to explain the matter to you. If a king pardoned a rebel, and if that rebel still hated his sovereign, and sought to kill him, would it be safe for the king to receive the ungrateful rebel into his palace?”
“No!” replied Emma.
“Or, if a father received back a prodigal son; but if that son continued prodigal as ever, breaking, with fresh sin, his poor old father’s heart, and corrupting his other brothers, could that father permit him to live in his house?”
“No, surely,” still replied Emma.
“Well, dearest, what would require to be done to make it safe for the king to keep company with the rebel he had pardoned; and the father to take the son to live with him in his own household?”
“If they had changed and better hearts,” said Emma.
“You have just given again the answer I wanted,” said her grandmother. “I want you to see it is the same with the sinner. God the King has pardoned the sinner‐rebel. God the Father has adopted the sinner‐prodigal; but He never could receive him into His glorious palace of heaven, unless what?”
|Change of Heart in Regeneration needed for Heaven.| “Oh, unless his heart is changed,” exclaimed Emma. “I understand it now. He must have a holy heart,—a heart to love God and hate sin. I see quite well he could not get into heaven with an unchanged heart!”
“Yes, my dear child,” said the other (happy that her little grand‐daughter was now able to see the meaning of Regeneration); “and even if the sinner could get into heaven with his sinful, unchanged, unconverted heart, could he be happy?”
|Heaven a place for holy Hearts.| “I don’t think,” said Emma, “he could; he would be miserable in that holy place, amid holy angels and a holy God. I see quite well now the truth of what Jesus says, ‘Except ye be converted, ye cannot enter in the kingdom of heaven.’
“But,” continued little Emma, getting more interested in the subject, “I should like much to know how, and when, and where we are regenerated, and get this new mind.”
|The Agent in Regeneration.| “Like every other thing in salvation,” replied the old lady, “this great change of heart and life is the work of God; and though all the glorious Trinity are engaged in producing it, it is more especially brought about by the agency of the third person in the blessed Godhead—the Holy Ghost.”
“But how do you know when it takes place?” continued Emma. “Are we aware of the time when the Holy Spirit works this great change?”
|The Method of Regeneration.| “No,” replied her grandmother. “You remember how simply and beautifully Jesus speaks of this to one who was asking about it, and wondering about it, like you. That, just as you cannot tell where the wind comes from—you hear it blowing, but cannot tell from where—‘so is every one that is born of the Spirit.’ That new birth, or change, is wrought silently in the soul. It is like the little dew‐drops that sparkle in the morning sun, which gather unseen and unnoticed during the night; or like the Temple of Jerusalem of old, which was built without any noise of ‘hammer, or axe, or any tool of iron;’—it rose without din or observation; and this is the case with every renewed heart when it becomes a ‘temple of the Holy Ghost.’”
“Then it takes a long time, grandmamma, before a sinner’s heart can be changed?”
|Various Modes of Operation.| “The Spirit of God, my child, acts how, and where, and when He pleases. He sometimes converts and renews, in a moment, as He did the thief on the cross and the jailer of Philippi, or the thousands at Pentecost. Sometimes He does it gradually (or by degrees), as in the case of Nicodemus; and sometimes, as I trust, my dear Emma, is the case with you, He sanctifies from infancy, changes the young heart, as He did in the case of Timothy, and Samuel, and Jeremiah.”
|Am I Regenerated?| “Oh! I am happy to hear you say so,” replied Emma, “for I was beginning to fear that I had never felt the Holy Spirit changing my heart, and that I must surely be yet unregenerated and unsaved. Such a thought would be very awful to me.”
“I trust, my dear child,” said her grandmother, “I have good reason to believe that God, by His grace and Spirit, has ‘turned you from darkness to light,’ and given you a heart to love Him and serve Him. I wish that many little children would have such a |Awful Importance of Regeneration.| fear as you speak of. I wish many, too, would remember that one little word MUST, and who says it, ‘Ye MUST be born again!’”
“Dear grandmamma,” said Emma, “I must pray more than I ever have done for a clean heart. I fear, till you have been explaining this to me, I have thought too much about my sins being washed in Jesus’ blood, and too little about my heart being changed and made holy by Jesus’ Spirit. I see that I need both, and will try and pray for both.”
“It is a good resolution, my dearest,” said the other; “and the Great God, for your encouragement in asking for a change of heart, gives you in His own blessed Bible both a prayer |A Prayer for it, and its Answer.| and an answer. Give me your Bible,” continued she, “and, as I feel unable to speak more to‐night, I will mark the two places to which I refer, and you can take them with you to your own room, and read them to yourself.”
The good old lady kissed her little grandchild, putting two pieces of paper at what she had so marked. Emma, saying “Good‐night,” ran up‐stairs with her Bible in her hand, and, having shut her door, read to herself, before she knelt down to her evening prayer, these two verses:—
The Prayer.—“Create in me a clean heart, O God; renew a right spirit within me” (Ps. li. 10).
The Answer.—“A new heart also will I give you, and a right spirit will I put within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh” (Ezek. xxxvi. 26).