JM
Puritan Board Doctor
I've been visiting the True Gospel site for a while now and have finally made it to the Letters of James Bourne. They are packed with spiritual insight and warm experiential Calvinism. J. C. Philpot writes in his review of the Letters,
Bourne writes much about tribulation:
I'll post this last letter
[To W. B.] Pulverbach, 19 May 1844.
My dear young Friend,
I am much disposed to enter into your feelings, having been myself entangled by bondage, misery, and sin in many ways, and I believe you are brought to this that you may be taught effectually how helpless you are. We naturally have a will and a way of our own, and no prayer or inclination to give it up. The Lord suffers us to fall into many difficulties that may appear to have no reference to the particular bondage that grieves us, and it is that our UNIVERSAL BONDAGE may be discovered to us, not only in one thing, but in all. This works despair of any remedy within; and it is God's design that it should. For it is a mighty work for one that is great in his own conceit to be brought down to feel himself very little. It is true, as Mr. Maddy says, that if we prosper in the least, we have such gentlemanly feelings; but the Lord will teach us effectually that all such rubbish shall be burnt up, and we shall appear before him as lost sinners, and nothing else.
The Lord has opened the eyes of your understanding to comprehend the meaning of a little encouragement from him in your distresses. You know that it is an assurance of the work begun; and though through the power of temptation you soon lose sight of it, yet you do not give up seeking for a renewal of the same; and though you say the power of temptation keeps you from seeking, yet it does not keep you from mourning, and we call that seeking; and though you are terribly alarmed at the hardness and bondage that sin brings, yet it is life that shows these dreadful effects of sin, which make the spirit sink. The hope which you find does not create bondage, but counteracts it, though it be but for a short season, and you return again to your sad place.
Bunyan writes, that though Christ's love is hated in the world, yet it is not despised by the tempted and distressed; and that it is our mercy to believe that we are HIS LOVE when assaulted with temptations, HIS LOVE when he hides his face, and HIS LOVE at all times. I would entreat you to look at Christ's love, and at his power and his willingness to save poor sinners. Search this out by prayer in his Word, and look less at your sin. The sore rankles worse and worse, the more you look at it; looking to Jesus can alone cut the bondage. Lay this to heart; I see the devil binds you down to the works of the law. The love of Christ will constrain, and gives a sweet and heavenly power which the law knows nothing of. May the Lord help you.
Yours &c. J. B.
I hope you find them helpful.
jm
"Those who are blessed with much godly fear, and walk in the light of God's countenance, usually die in sweet peace; and if there be no remarkable triumph, no being carried to heaven as in a chariot of fire, they find the everlasting arms underneath to support them as they pass through the valley of the shadow of death. And those who have through much tribulation entered here below the kingdom of grace usually enter with corresponding consolation into the kingdom of glory. Mr. Bourne was singularly favoured during a long life to walk much in the fear of God, and to enjoy much of the light of his countenance and the manifestation of his love. We have the advantage, in his case, of an account drawn up by himself of the early dealings of God with him in providence and in grace, from which we shall make some extracts, as showing, far better than we can do, the way in which he was led of the Lord both in providence and grace."
Bourne writes much about tribulation:
"I had two friends about my own age, with whom I had often taken sweet counsel, and whom I had often freely reproved for what I saw inconsistent in their conduct. One night, in the middle of private prayer in my own room, and not thinking of my friends, I was stopped with these words, which seemed spoken in my heart: 'Suppose you were called upon to give up your friends?' alluding to the above two. I was greatly surprised, and replied, I could not do that; but I felt seriously disposed to recall my words, and said, 'O Lord, if thou enable me, I can give them up.' Upon which these words followed: 'You will be called to give them up for ever.' This startled me, and I was filled with fear, but could not tell what it meant. All this passed from my mind until on the following Sunday we met as usual, but to my great surprise they told me they could no longer associate with me, and therefore begged me to leave them. I was much cast down, and went home very sad and solitary, for the cause of their behaviour at this time never once entered my mind; (I was afterwards informed that it was my absolutely setting my face against the intended marriage of one of them with a worldly woman, I believing that he was a child of God; ) but I concluded, as David did when Shimei cursed him, that the Lord had bidden them; so I feared they had discovered I was a hypocrite, and that I was unworthy of the notice of any of God's people. I sank in spirit, 'like lead in the mighty waters.' I think I never cried to the Lord in such agony of spirit before. I seemed on the brink of despair, and could think of nothing but a person I had heard of who had died in despair. The people of God, as I believed, having judged me altogether wrong, I thought it was needless for me to eat or to drink for nothing but hell. Yet, under all these feelings, I never gave up crying to God. My two friends went to Mr. Huntington, and gave such an account of me as to cause him to direct his utmost severity against me from the pulpit, which made all who knew me by sight to avoid me. My health became impaired; I could not properly attend to business, and mine appeared altogether a lost case. One morning I was brought to such an extremity of despair as to fear I should die in it and be for ever lost. I said in secret, 'If nothing appears in my behalf before 7 o'clock this evening I am gone for ever.' I well remember the evening. While I was in bitter cries before the Lord, lying on the floor in a state of utter hopelessness as to my own feelings, these words were gently whispered in my heart, 'Thou shalt return in the power of the Spirit.' I said, 'Lord, what does this mean?' and it was repeated again and again seven times, and at last broke my heart to pieces and set my soul free from the misery and bondage under which I had laboured so long. Now I knew by the power of the word that the Lord Jesus Christ was my Saviour, and my comfort was great and inexpressibly sweet, so that I could not describe it. The Lord was now with me, though my friends had forsaken me. I went to public worship, and the minister preached from these words: 'Show me a token for good, that they which hate me may see it and be ashamed; because thou, Lord, hast holpen me and comforted me.' (Ps. 86:17.) The whole discourse was so sweetly applied to my heart, and so suitable to my case, that though I believed it was intended to favour them that had taken part against me, yet I do not know that I ever before had heard with such sweetness and power."
I'll post this last letter
[To W. B.] Pulverbach, 19 May 1844.
My dear young Friend,
I am much disposed to enter into your feelings, having been myself entangled by bondage, misery, and sin in many ways, and I believe you are brought to this that you may be taught effectually how helpless you are. We naturally have a will and a way of our own, and no prayer or inclination to give it up. The Lord suffers us to fall into many difficulties that may appear to have no reference to the particular bondage that grieves us, and it is that our UNIVERSAL BONDAGE may be discovered to us, not only in one thing, but in all. This works despair of any remedy within; and it is God's design that it should. For it is a mighty work for one that is great in his own conceit to be brought down to feel himself very little. It is true, as Mr. Maddy says, that if we prosper in the least, we have such gentlemanly feelings; but the Lord will teach us effectually that all such rubbish shall be burnt up, and we shall appear before him as lost sinners, and nothing else.
The Lord has opened the eyes of your understanding to comprehend the meaning of a little encouragement from him in your distresses. You know that it is an assurance of the work begun; and though through the power of temptation you soon lose sight of it, yet you do not give up seeking for a renewal of the same; and though you say the power of temptation keeps you from seeking, yet it does not keep you from mourning, and we call that seeking; and though you are terribly alarmed at the hardness and bondage that sin brings, yet it is life that shows these dreadful effects of sin, which make the spirit sink. The hope which you find does not create bondage, but counteracts it, though it be but for a short season, and you return again to your sad place.
Bunyan writes, that though Christ's love is hated in the world, yet it is not despised by the tempted and distressed; and that it is our mercy to believe that we are HIS LOVE when assaulted with temptations, HIS LOVE when he hides his face, and HIS LOVE at all times. I would entreat you to look at Christ's love, and at his power and his willingness to save poor sinners. Search this out by prayer in his Word, and look less at your sin. The sore rankles worse and worse, the more you look at it; looking to Jesus can alone cut the bondage. Lay this to heart; I see the devil binds you down to the works of the law. The love of Christ will constrain, and gives a sweet and heavenly power which the law knows nothing of. May the Lord help you.
Yours &c. J. B.
I hope you find them helpful.
jm
