Wesley Corpus

(3) You think ‘full assurance excludes all doubt.’ I think so too. But there may be faith without fun assurance. And these lower degrees of faith do not exclude doubts, which frequently mingle therewith, more or less. But this you cannot allow. You say it cannot be shaken without being overthrown; and trust I shall be ‘convinced upon reflection that the distinction between “shaken” and “destroyed” is absolutely without a difference.’ Hark! The wind rises: the house shakes, but it is not overthrown; it totters, but it is not destroyed. You add: ‘Assurance is quite a distinct thing from faith. Neither does it depend upon the same agent. Faith is an act of my mind; assurance an act of the Holy Ghost.’ I answer: (1) The assurance in question is no other than the full assurance of faith; therefore it cannot be a distinct thing from faith, but only so high a degree of faith as excludes all doubt and fear. (2) The plerophory, or full assurance, is doubtless wrought in us by the Holy Ghost. But so is every degree of true faith; yet the mind of man h the subject of both. I believe feebly; I believe without all doubt. Your next remark is: ‘The Spirit's witnessing that we are accepted cannot be the faith whereby we are accepted,’ I allow it. A conviction that we are justified cannot be implied in justifying faith. You subjoin: ‘A sure trust that God hath accepted me is not the same thing with knowing that God has accepted me.’ I think it is the same thing with some degree of that knowledge. But it matters not whether it be so or no. I will not contend for a term. I contend only for this -- that every true Christian believer has ‘a sure trust and confidence in God that through the merits of Christ he is reconciled to God’; and that in consequence of this he is able to say, ‘The life which I now live, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.’