Part 112

9 A godly man’s prayers are sometimes answered by terrible things in righteousness. He prays to be quickened in his walk with God; and the answer, dictated by wisdom and love, is the loss of some temporal blessing, that he may be kept ‘looking unto Jesus.’—Ed.

10 The heart ‘unweldable.’ This homely allusion, drawn from Bunyan’s trade of blacksmith, is worthy of remark. The heart a mountain of iron, so hard that no heat in nature can soften it so as to weld it to Christ. To weld is to hammer into firm union two pieces of iron, when heated almost to fusion, so as to become one piece. The heart of man is by nature ‘unweldable,’ until God the Spirit softens it; and then the union is such that Christ becomes THE LIFE of his saints. Reader, has thy heart passed through this process?—Ed.

11 This is a solemn and heart-searching consideration. It is not enough that we fear eternal wrath, but we must love heaven, for the sake of its purity. It is not sufficient that we go to Christ for pardon, but we must go through him to the infinitely holy God, for holiness and fitness for heaven.—Ed.

12 There have been, in every age, professors who, instead of gratefully receiving and obeying the whole truth, have indulged in favourite doctrines. Happy is that Christian who equally loves to hear Christ set forth as a priest and sacrifice, or to dwell upon his power and authority as king and lawgiver; who delights as much in holy obedience as in electing love. The saints are bound to bear with each other, never forgetting that they are members of one family, and must cherish and comfort one another, as we hope to enjoy fellowship with heaven and the smiles of the great Head of the church.—Ed.

13 Nothing can be more solemn and awful than are these warnings. O that we may feel the spurs, the condemning curse of a broken law, and a sense of the jaws of hell, urging us on in coming to, and cleaving to Christ.—Ed.

‘To any boot,’ to any profit. ‘What boots it at one gate to make defence, and at another to let in the foe!’

Milton’s Samson Agonistes—Ed.

15 ‘Them.’ As Christ is the Saviour of both body and soul, notwithstanding the sins of the body, they break not the covenant; because it is God’s covenant, and stands fast in Christ for evermore.—Ed.

16 ‘Plenary’; full, perfect, or complete.—Ed.

17 Bunyan saw that time very far off, which much more nearly approaches us: when Antichrist will find a grave in the side of the pit’s mouth; when no national barriers, either Pagan, Popish, or Protestant, shall exist to prevent the glorious spread of pure and vital Christianity. And, however abundant that harvest of souls shall be, there will prove a superabundance of grace in Christ to supply all their wants. He was, is now, and ever will be, ‘a complete Saviour.’—Ed.

18 ‘Gospellers,’ a nickname given to the Reformers, when first a holy band determined, at the imminent risk of life, to read the New Testament or Gospels in English. It was like the term Methodist, a few years ago. The gospel has now so much spread, that these terms of reproach are only used by fanatics.—Ed.

COME AND WELCOME TO JESUS CHRIST;

OR,

A PLAIN AND PROFITABLE DISCOURSE ON JOHN 6:37

SHOWING THE CAUSE, TRUTH, AND MANNER OF THE COMING OF A SINNER TO JESUS CHRIST; WITH HIS HAPPY RECEPTION AND BLESSED ENTERTAINMENT.

WRITTEN BY JOHN BUNYAN, AUTHOR OF “THE PILGRIM’S PROGRESS.”

“And they shall come which were ready to perish.”—Isaiah 27:13.

London, 1681.

ADVERTISEMENT BY THE EDITOR.

“Come and welcome to Jesus Christ,” is a subject peculiarly fitted to the deep and searching experience of John Bunyan. He knew all the wiles of sin and Satan, in placing stumblingblocks in the way of a sincere penitent; all the human craft employed in keeping the soul from a simple and entire reliance upon Christ for salvation. This little work soon became most deservedly popular, passing through four large editions during the last seven years of the author’s life. It is an enlightened display of the dealings of the Father in giving sinners to Christ; the Son in saving them by his atonement, mediation, and intercession; and the Holy Spirit in sanctifying and fitting them for glory. Here is no Calvinism, Lutheranism, or Arminianism; no Episcopacy, Presbytery, or Independency; nothing but Christism and Bibleism. The gracious invitation is addressed to all who feel their misery, Come unto me, and I will make you happy and blessed. All who feel the leprosy of sin are invited to this spiritual Physician, and he only can and will heal them. All who suffer under the slavery of sin and Satan, Christ alone can make you free. Come to him, and you shall be free indeed. The analysis of Bunyan’s treatise shows that ALL mankind are born in sin. ALL sinners are invited to Christ. None will come but such as feel the plague, and see the leprosy of sin. Those who come are drawn in a variety of ways—some terrified with the horrors of hell, others allured by the gracious voice of the Saviour, and the prospects of heavenly felicity. ALL who sincerely come, attain the same end, a sincere and total reliance upon the Saviour as the only refuge from the roaring lion.

Every other way to life is guarded by the flaming swords of the cherubim. Christ opens his golden arms wider than all our miseries. But he suffers no rival on his throne, no partnership with Moses or John Baptist. The personification of “shall come,” and of “ignorance,” is strikingly illustrative; as is “sin, the winding-sheet of the soul;” “unbelief, the white devil;” the sinner being a counsellor for Satan; and the two ways of taking our own likeness. His appeal to persecutors is most forcible. But I must not detain the reader longer from the pleasure and profit he will receive from an attentive perusal of these pages.

HACKNEY, 1850. GEORGE OFFOR.

COME AND WELCOME TO JESUS CHRIST.

“ALL THAT THE FATHER GIVETH ME SHALL COME TO ME; AND HIM THAT COMETH TO ME I WILL IN NO WISE CAST OUT.”—JOHN 6:37.

A little before, in this chapter, you may read that the Lord Jesus walked on the sea to go to Capernaum, having sent his disciples before in a ship, but the wind was contrary; by which means the ship was hindered in her passage. Now, about the fourth watch of the night, Jesus came walking upon the sea, and overtook them; at the sight of whom they were afraid.

Note, When providences are black and terrible to God’s people, the Lord Jesus shows himself to them in wonderful manner; the which sometimes they can as little bear, as they can the things that were before terrible to them. They were afraid of the wind and the water; they were also afraid of their Lord and Saviour, when he appeared to them in that state.

But he said, “Be not afraid, it is I.”

Note, That the end of the appearing of the Lord Jesus unto his people, though the manner of his appearing be never so terrible, is to allay their fears and perplexities.