Chapter Four: My Experiences After Conversion
Chapter 4.
My Experiences after Conversion Our faith at times has to fight for its very existence. The old Adam within us rages mightily; and the new spirit within us, like a young lion, disdains to be vanquished. These two strong ones contend until our spirit is full of agony.
Some of us know what it is to be tempted with blasphemies we would not dare repeat. We know what it is to be vexed with horrid temptations that we have grappled with and overcome but which have almost cost us resistance unto blood. In such inward conflicts, saints must be alone. They cannot tell their feelings to others; they would not dare. Even if they did, their own fellow Christians would despise or scold them, for most professing Christians would not even know what they meant. Even those who have walked other fiery ways would not be able to sympathize in all cases. They would answer the poor, troubled soul, "These are points in which we cannot go with you."
Christ alone "was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin" (Hebrews 4:15). Not one man is tempted in all points exactly like another man. Each one has certain trials in which he must stand alone amid the rage of war. He may not even have a book to help him or a biography to assist him, since no man ever went that way before except that one Man, whose trail reveals a nail-pierced foot. He alone knows all the devious paths of sorrow. Yet, even in such byways, the Lord is with us, helping us, sustaining us, and giving us grace to conquer in the end. When my eyes first looked to Christ, He was a very real Christ to me. When my burden of sin rolled off my back, it was a real pardon and a real release from sin to me. When that day I said for the first time, "Jesus Christ is mine," it was a real possession of Christ to me. When I went up to the sanctuary in that early dawn of youthful piety, every song was really a psalm. When there was a prayer, oh, how I followed every word! It was a prayer indeed! It was the same way, too, in silent quietude, when I drew near to God. It was no mockery, no routine, no matter of mere duty; it was a real talking with my Father who is in heaven. And oh, how I loved my Savior Christ then! I would have given all I had for Him! How I felt towards sinners that day! Youth that I was, I wanted to preach, and
Tell to sinners round, What a dear Savior I had found.
One of the greatest sorrows I had when I first knew the Lord was to think about certain individuals I had known. I knew right well that I had had ungodly conversations with some of them, and I had tempted various others to sin. One of the prayers that I always offered, when praying for myself, was that such a person would not be lost because of sins that I had tempted him to commit. This was the case also with George White-field, who never forgot those with whom he used to play cards before his conversion. He had the joy of leading every one of them to the Savior.
About five days after I first found Christ, when my joy had been so great that I could have danced for joy at the thought that Christ was mine, suddenly I fell into a sad fit of despondency. I now know why. When I first believed in Christ, I am not sure that I thought the Devil was dead, but certainly I had a kind of notion that he was so mortally wounded that he could not disturb me. And then I also imagined that the corruption of my nature had received its deathblow. I read what Cowper said:
Since the dear hour that brought me to Thy foot And cut up all my follies by the root,
and I really thought that the poet knew what he was saying, whereas never did anyone blunder so terribly as Cowper did when he said that. No man, I think, has all his follies cut up by the roots.
However, I fondly dreamed that mine were; I was persuaded they would never sprout again. I was going to be perfect—I fully calculated on it—and, lo, I found an intruder I had not thought of: "an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God" (Hebrews 3:12). So I went to that same Primitive Methodist chapel where I first received peace with God through the simple preaching of the Word. The text happened to be, "O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" (Romans 7:24).
"There," I thought, "that's the text for me." I had just gotten that far in a week. I knew that I had put my trust in Christ. I knew that, when I sat in that house of prayer, my faith was simply and solely fixed on the atonement of the Redeemer. But I had a weight on my mind because I could not be as holy as I wanted to be. I could not live without sin. When I rose in the morning, I thought I would abstain from every harsh word, from every evil thought and look; and I came to that chapel groaning because "when I would do good, evil [was] present with me" (Romans 7:21). The minister began by saying, "Paul was not a believer when he said this." Well, now, I knew I was a believer, and it seemed to me from the context that Paul must have been a believer, too. (Now, I am sure he was.) The man went on to say that no child of God ever felt any conflict within. So I took my hat and left the chapel, and I have very seldom attended such places since. They are very good for people who are unconverted to go to but of very little use for children of God. That is my notion of Methodism. It is a noble thing for strangers but a terrible thing for those who need spiritual food. It is like the parish pound: it is a good place to put sheep in when they have strayed, but there is no food inside. They had better be let out as soon as possible to find some grass.
I saw that that minister understood nothing of experimental divinity or of practical heart theology; otherwise, he would not have talked as he did. I do not doubt he was a good man, but he was utterly incompetent for the task of dealing with a case like mine.
Oh, what a horror I have had of sin ever since the day when I felt its power over my soul! O sin, sin, I have had enough of you! You never did bring me more than a moment's seeming joy, and with it there came a deep and awful bitterness that burns within me to this day!
Well do I recollect when I was the subject of excessive tenderness—some people called it "morbid sensibility." How I shuddered and shivered at the very thought of sin, which then appeared exceedingly sinful! The first week after I was converted to God, I felt afraid to put one foot before the other for fear I should do wrong. When I thought over the day, if there had been a failure in my temper or if there had been a trifling word spoken or something done amiss, I did punish myself severely. At that time, if I had known anything to be my Lord's will, I think I would not have hesitated to do it. To me it would not have mattered whether it was a fashionable thing or an unfashionable thing, but only if it were according to His Word. Oh, to do His will! Oh, to follow Him wherever He wanted me to go! It seemed then as though I should never, never, never be slack in keeping His commandments.
I do not know whether the experiences of others agree with mine. However, the worst difficulty I ever met with, or I think I can ever meet with, happened a little time after my conversion to God. When I first knew the weight of sin, it was a burden, a labor, a trouble. Then I prayed that I might know the Lord better.
I asked the Lord that I might grow, In faith, and love, and every grace, Might more of His salvation know, And seek more earnestly His face.
He answered me by letting all my sins loose upon me. Then they appeared more frightful than before. I thought the Egyptians in Egypt were not half as bad as the Egyptians out of Egypt. I thought the sins I knew before, though they were cruel taskmasters, were not half as much to be dreaded as those soldier-sins, armed with spears and axes, riding in iron chariots with scythes on their axles, hastening to assault me. It is true they did not come as near to me as before; nevertheless, they caused me even more fright than when I was their slave. The Israelites went up wearing their armor, marching in their ranks, and, no doubt, singing as they went because they had been delivered from the daily task and from the cruel bondage. Suddenly, they turned their heads while they were marching, for they heard a dreadful noise behind them, a noise of chariots and of men shouting for battle. At last, when they could really see the Egyptians and the thick cloud of dust rising behind them, then they said that they would be destroyed, that they would now fall by the hand of the enemy. (See Exodus 14:10-12.)
I remember that after my conversion (it may not have happened to all, but it did to me) there came a time when the enemy said, "I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil; my lust shall be satisfied upon them; I will draw my sword, my hand shall destroy them" (Exodus 15:9). So Satan, reluctant to leave a soul, pursues it speedily. He will have it back if he can; and often, soon after conversion, there comes a time of dreadful conflict when the soul seems as if it could not live.
"Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that the Lord brought us into this condition of temporary freedom, that we might be all the more distressed by our adversaries?" So said unbelief. God, however, brought His people right out by one final stroke. Miriam knew it when she took her tambourine, went forth with the women, and answered them in the jubilant song, "Sing ye to the LORD, for He hath triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea" (Exodus 15:21).
I love best of all that note in the song of Moses where he says, "The depths have covered them" (Exodus 15:5). There remained not so much as one of them. What gladness must have been in the hearts of the children of Israel when they knew that their enemies were all gone! I am sure it was that way with me. For, after my conversion, being attacked by sin again, I saw the mighty stream of redeeming love roll over all my sins, and this was my song, "The depths have covered them." Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.(Romans 8:33-34) I was raised with such care that I heard very little foul or profane language, having hardly ever heard a man swear.
Yet, I remember times in my earliest Christian days when there came into my mind thoughts so evil that I clapped my hand over my mouth for fear I would utter them. This is one way in which Satan tortures those whom God has delivered out of his hand. Many of the choicest saints have been harassed this way.
Once, when I had been grievously attacked by the tempter, I went to see my dear old grandfather. I told him about my terrible experience, and then I wound up by saying, "Grandfather, I am sure I cannot be a child of God, or else I would never have such evil thoughts as these."
"Nonsense, Charles," answered the good old man. "It is because you are a Christian that you are tempted like this. These blasphemies are no children of yours; they are the Devil's brats, which he delights to lay at the door of a Christian. Don't you own them as yours; give them neither house room nor heart room."
I felt greatly comforted by what my grandfather said, especially since it confirmed what another old saint had told me when I was tempted in a similar manner while I was seeking the Savior. Many people make fun of that verse,
'Tis a point I long to know, Oft it causes anxious thought, Do I love the Lord, or no?
Am I His, or am I not?
If they ever find themselves where some of us have been, they will not make fun of it anymore. I believe it is a shallow experience that makes people always confident of what they are and where they are, for there are times of terrible trouble that make even the most confident child of God hardly know whether he is on his head or on his heels. It is the sailor who has sailed on great waters who, in times of unusual stress and storm, reels to and fro, staggers like a drunken man, and is at his wits' end.
If Jesus whispers that I am His at such a time, then the question is answered once and for all. Then my soul has received a token that it waves in the face of Satan, making him disappear. Then I can go on my way rejoicing.