"SEPTEMBER, 1798.
"MY DEAR YOUNG FRIEND — You have now ratified in a public manner that transaction which, no doubt, passed previously in private between you and your God. You have declared your belief of the gospel, and have taken hold of God's covenant of promise. You have fallen in with his own plan, which he has appointed for the salvation of guilty sinners; and rested your soul upon his word of promise that you shall be saved. You have, at the same time, dedicated and devoted your soul, your body, your time, your talents, your substance, your influence, all that you are and have, to be disposed of at his pleasure, and for his glory, in the world. You are no longer your own. You are bought with a price, adopted into the family of God, numbered with and entitled to all the privileges of his children. Your motives of action, your views, your interests, are all different from those of the worldling. Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, your aim must be, and will be, to do all to his glory. This must go with you, and be your ruling principle in all the walks of life. By your integrity, uprightness, diligence, and disinterested attention to the interest of your employers, you will glorify God and have his presence with you in business. By a due and marked observance of the Sabbath, and attendance on the ordinances, you will
glorify him. By regularity, order, and temperance, crowned with an open acknowledgment of God before all who may surround your board, you will glorify him in an especial manner in these days of degeneracy, and, crowned with family worship, you will glorify him, and his presence will be with you, and great will be your comfort. God's interest in the world must also be yours. The good of his church in general, and that of your own family in particular; and O, my son, if you would be rich in comfort, follow the Lord fully, and follow him openly; and if you would do it so as to suffer the least from the sneer of the world, do it at once.
"Already you have received congratulations on your joining the church, by those belonging to it; soon will it be known to those who will scoff at it. But Christians and worldlings will look for consistency; and if it be wanting, the last will be the first to mark it. A decided character will soon deliver you from all solicitations to what may be even unseemly, and dignified consistent conduct will command respect. Not but the Lord may let loose upon you the persecuting sneer and banter of the wise of this world, whose esteem you wish to preserve; but, if he do, the trial will be particular, and he will support you under it, and bring his glory and your good out of it.
"And now, my son, suffer the word of exhortation. You have entered the school of Christ, and have much to learn, far beyond what men or books can of themselves teach, and you have much to receive on divine credit, beyond what human reason can comprehend.
"I would recommend to you to read carefully, and pause as you read, and pray as you read for the teaching of the Spirit, the epistle of Paul to the Ephesians. Read it first without any commentary, and read it as addressed to you, S—— A——. You will there find what may in part stagger your reason; you will find what far surpasses your comprehension; but yet read on, with conscious weakness, and ignorance, and absolute dependence on divine teaching. When you have read it through, then take Brown's or Henry's exposition of it.
"A degree of mystery, my son, runs through the whole of God's revealed word; but it is his, and to be received with reverence, and believed with confidence, because it is his. It is to be searched with diligence, and compared; and, by God's teaching and the assistance of his sent servants, the child of God becomes mighty in the Scriptures. Let not mystery stagger you: we are surrounded with mysteries; we ourselves are mysteries inexplicable: nor let the doctrine of election stagger you; how small a part of God's ways do we know, or can comprehend! rejoice that he has given you the heritage of his people — leave the rest to him: 'Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?'
"Jesus took once a little child and set him in the midst of the people, and said, 'Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye cannot enter the kingdom of heaven,' intimating with what simplicity and docility men ought to receive the gospel; and the following text also alludes to this: 'Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of heaven.' There are many
promises made to the diligent searchers after truth: 'Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord.' 'The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him; and he will show them his covenant.' Yet the highly enlightened Paul calls the gospel a mystery, and godliness a mystery; 'for now we see through a glass darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then,' in heaven, 'shall I know even as also I am known.' Therefore, while you use all diligence, accompanied with prayer and the expositions of God's faithful ministers, to understand every part of divine revelation, be neither surprised nor disheartened at the want of comprehension, far less attempt to reduce it to human reason, as many have done to their ruin. The Scripture says, 'Vain man would be wise, though born like the wild ass's colt.' 'The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God.'
"I. GRAHAM."