Читать книгу The Life of Rev. David Brainerd, Chiefly Extracted from His Diary онлайн

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4. “Another point was the sovereignty of God. I could not bear that it should be wholly at God’s pleasure, to save or damn me, just as he would. That passage, Rom. 9:11-23, was a constant vexation to me, especially verse 21. Reading or meditating on this, always destroyed my seeming good frames; for when I thought I was almost humbled, and almost resigned, this passage would make my enmity against God appear. When I came to reflect on the inward enmity and blasphemy which arose on this occasion, I was the more afraid of God, and driven further from any hopes of reconciliation with him. It gave me a dreadful view of myself; I dreaded more than ever to see myself in God’s hands, and it made me more opposite than ever to submit to his sovereignty; for I thought He designed my damnation.

“All this time the SpiritSpirit of God was powerfully at work with me; and I was inwardly pressed to relinquish all self-confidence, all hope of ever helping myself by any means whatsoever. The conviction of my lost estate was sometimes so clear and manifest before my eyes that it was as if it had been declared to me in so many words, “It is done, it is done, it is for ever impossible to deliver yourself.” For about three or four days my soul was thus greatly distressed. At some turns, for a few moments, I seemed to myself lost and undone; but then would shrink back immediately from the sight, because I dared not venture myself into the hands of God, as wholly helpless, and at the disposal of his sovereign pleasure. I dared not see that important truth concerning myself, that I was “dead in trespasses and sins.” But when I had, as it were, thrust away these views of myself at any time, I felt distressed to have the same discoveries of myself again; for I greatly feared being given over of God to final stupidity. When I thought of putting it off to a more “convenient season,” the conviction was so close and powerful, that the present time was the best, and probably the only time, that I dared not put it off.