Wesley Corpus

If you ask, “Why then have not all men this faith? all, at least, who conceive it to be so happy a thing? Why do they not believe immediately?” We answer, (on the Scripture hypothesis,) “It is the gift of God.” No man is able to work it in himself. It is a work of omnipotence. It requires no less power thus to quicken a dead soul, than to raise a body that lies in the grave. It is a new creation; and none can create a soul anew, but He who at first created the heavens and the earth. 10. May not your own experience teach you this? Can you give yourself this faith? Is it now in your power to see, or hear, or taste, or feel God? Have you already, or can you raise in yourself, any perception of God, or of an invisible world? I suppose you do not deny that there is an invisible world; you will not charge it in poor old Hesiod to Christian pre judice of education, when he says, in those well-known words, “Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth Unseen, whether we wake, or if we sleep.” Now, is there any power in your soul whereby you discern either these, or Him that created them? Or, can all your wis dom and strength open an intercourse between yourself and the world of spirits? Is it in your power to burst the veil that is on your heart, and let in the light of eternity? You know it is not. You not only do not, but cannot, by your own strength, thus believe. The more you labour so to do, the more you will be convinced “it is the gift of God.” 11. It is the free gift of God, which he bestows, not on those who are worthy of his favour, not on such as are previously holy, and so fit to be crowned with all the blessings of his goodness; but on the ungodly and unholy; on those who till that hour were fit only for everlasting destruction; those in whom was no good thing, and whose only plea was, “God be merciful to me, a sinner !” No merit, no goodness in man. precedes the forgiving love of God.