Wesley Corpus

Indeed, whence should they spring ? “Out of the heart of man, if at all, ‘proceed evil thoughts. If, therefore, the heart be no longer evil, then evil thoughts no longer proceed out of it: For ‘a good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit.’ “And as they are freed from evil thoughts, so likewise from evil tempers. Every one of these can say, with St. Paul, ‘I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me;’--words that manifestly describe a deliverance from inward as well as from outward sin. This is expressed both negatively, ‘I live not, my evil nature, the body of sin, is destroyed; and positively, ‘Christ liveth in me, and therefore all that is holy, and just, and good. Indeed, both these, ‘Christ liveth in me,’ and, ‘I live not,’ are inseparably connected. For what communion hath light with darkness, or Christ with Belial? “He, therefore, who liveth in these Christians hath “puri fied their hearts by faith; insomuch that every one that has Christ in him, ‘the hope of glory, purifieth himself even as he is pure.’ He is purified from pride; for Christ was lowly in heart: He is pure from desire and self-will; for Christ desired only to do the will of his Father: And he is pure from anger, in the common sense of the word; for Christ was meek and gentle. I say, in the common sense of the word; for he is angry at sin, while he is grieved for the sinner. He feels a displacency at every offence against God, but only tender compassion to the offender. “Thus doth Jesus save his people from their sins, not only from outward sins, but from the sins of their hearts. “True,” say some, “but not till death, not in this world. Nay, St. John says, “Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because, as he is, so are we in this world. The Apostle here, beyond all contra diction, speaks of himself and other living Christians, of whom he flatly affirms, that, not only at or after death, but ‘in this world, they are “as their Master.’ “Exactly agreeable to this are his words in the first chapter: ‘God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.