Dear Vigilant Watchman:

I've spoken to you at length about my situation and how at this point I am
being quiet to show that I am ready to lose my old life.  I now have time to think
about things and examine them.  I came across a sermon by Finney that not
only has implications for my personal consecration but for how the Spirit
deals with souls and what this means for ministers of the gospel.

Finney (a lawyer by trade as I recall) is very interesting to read and is
able to draw illustrations that help the reader to understand.

Here are a few notes on what I've learned as well as an excerpt from the
sermon.

M

*******

SINNERS BOUND TO CHANGE THEIR OWN HEARTS. (Finney)

-- Ezekiel xviii. 31.--
"Make YOU a new heart, and a new spirit, for why will ye die?"

In this sermon, Finney (a lawyer as I recall) handily proves that sinners,
like me, are bound to change their own hearts.  To change their
preferences from self-interest to the glory of God.  In reading this
sermon, directed to the unrepentant, I eventually came to that portion
where he says that the new preference for the glory of God can be weak at
first and inefficient.  Old habits are to be broken up that the new
preference should gain strength, stabilty, firmness, perpetuity, and thus
take over the whole man.

Finney made a comment or two that I did not care for (most notably
something that "should" have been translated another way), but he made
critical distinctions in how the Spirit works and he did it in a way that
could be easily understood.  He showed how the Spirit does not physically
override the heart and mind, but rather uses truth to pierce the sinner
with arguments, motives, heaven, hell, life, death, happiness, misery. 
The Spirit labors with sinners like a lawyer labors to prove points with a
jury.  A number of scriptures are brought together to show the tenor of
the Spirit's work.

Finney says the sinner should not content himself with praying for a new
heart  Just as he chose to sin, he has to choose right.  Finney made his
point through various arguments including the case of Adam.  And in his
concluding points, he shows how important it is that ministers of the
gospel understand how these things work.  Ministers should use the same
techniques that the Spirit does.  Like a lawyer in a courtroom we make our
case before sinners.  Let them weigh the arguments and give a verdict on
the spot according to the rules of law and evidence.  When we look at the
book of Romans, this is how Paul lays out his case.  The Spirit lays out
the case in so many ways.

Finney says that the power that God exerts in the conversion of a soul is
moral power.  He sways the mind.  He pursues it step-by-step with the
truth.  He hunts us out from behind the refuge of lies.  He constrains us
by force of argument alone to yield up selfishness and dedicate ourselves
to the service of God.  We weigh the arguments and make up our minds.  He
compels us to consider the truth that we already know, to consider our
ways, and to turn to the Lord.  He urges upon our consideration what we do
not want to consider and causes us to feel the weight of it.  This
pressing of truth upon us induces us to turn.  The Spirit works through
debates and strivings with the mind, he does not physically change our
constitution.  I see arguments, appeals, entreaties, threats, promises,
overtures, truth kept before the mind and made to bear on my life.  The
sinner is pressed, hedged in, and visited until until constrained to
yield.  He works to make the sinner willing.

Many, especially Calvinists, believe that the working of the Spirit cannot
be known.  As a result these people are dangerous.  He gave an example of
a man who told sinners to just keep on trying and they would see if they
would be saved or not.  I've actually seen this occur in a church service
while the poor man just sat there (I believe I've mentioned this to you
before).  It leaves people thinking they have to wait for some outside
physical agency to work on them.

An excerpt from near the end of the sermon--

The Spirit selects such considerations, at such times and under such
circumstances, as are naturally calculated to disarm and confound the
sinner; to strip him of his excuses, answer his cavils, humble his pride,
and break his heart. The preacher should therefore acquaint himself with
his refuges of lies, and as far as possible take into consideration his
whole history, including his present views and state of mind; should
wisely select a subject; so skillfully arrange, so simply and yet so
powerfully present it, as to engage the sinner's whole attention, and then
lay himself out to the utmost to bring him to yield upon the spot. He who
deals with souls should study well the laws of mind, and carefully and
prayerfully adapt his matter and his manner to the state and
circumstances, views and feelings, in which he may find the sinner at the
time. He should present that particular subject, in that connexion and in
that manner, that shall have the greatest natural tendency to subdue the
rebel at once. If men would act as wisely and as philosophically in
attempting to make men Christians, as they do in attempting to sway mind
upon other subjects; if they would suit their subject to the state of
mind, conform "the action to the word and the word to the action," and
press their subject with as much address, and warmth, and perseverance, as
lawyers and statesmen do their addresses; the result would be the
conversion of hundreds of thousands, and converts would be added to the
Lord "like drops of the morning dew." Were the whole church and the whole
ministry right upon this subject; had they right views, were they imbued
with a right spirit, and would they "go forth with tears, bearing precious
seed, they would soon reap the harvest of the whole earth, and return
bearing their sheaves with them."

The importance of rightly understanding that God converts souls by
motives, is inconceivably great. Those who do not recognize this truth in
their practice at least, are more likely to hinder than to aid the Spirit
in his work. Some have denied this truth in theory, but have happily
admitted it in practice. They have prayed, and preached, and talked, as if
they expected the Holy Spirit to convert sinners by the truth. In such
cases, notwithstanding their theory, their practice was owned and blessed
of God. But a want of attention to this truth in practice has been the
source of much and ruinous error in the management of revivals and in
dealing with anxious souls. Much of the preaching, conversation and
exhortation have been irrelevant, perplexing and mystical. Sufficient
pains have not been taken to avoid a diversion of public and individual
attention. Sinners have been kept long under conviction, because their
spiritual guides withheld those particular truths which at the time above
all others they needed to know. They have been perplexed and confounded by
abstract doctrines, metaphysical subtleties, absurd exhibitions of the
sovereignty of God, inability, physical regeneration, and constitutional
depravity, until the agonized mind, discouraged and mad from contradiction
from the pulpit, and absurdity in conversation, dismissed the subject as
altogether incomprehensible, and postponed the performance of duty as
impossible.


***