This article is part 13 in a series by Tom Nettles on Remembering Jesus Christ. (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12).

The orthodox party of Nicea prevailed for less than a decade. Challenges to the formula of Nicea soon began to multiply. For a brief period, Arianism was made the received doctrine of the empire.

Two other theological issues arose that called for closely reasoned biblical exposition. One concerned a construction of the human nature of Christ that compromised his full humanity by eliminating his human reason, human will, and thus, all true human initiative. This was propounded by Apollinarius. His zeal for the deity of Christ and the necessity of his sinlessness and incorruptibility led him to deny that Jesus had a human soul (thus no human reason, and will, and motivation).

Another issue concerned the person of the Holy Spirit. Was he a creature or was he, like the Son, of the same essence with the Father? Those who claimed the Spirit’s works were the works of a creature were known as “Fighters against the Spirit.”

The Emperor Theodosius I called a council in 381 at Constantinople in order to reaffirm the theology embraced at Nicea fifty-six years earlier and to give closure to the controversy over the Holy Spirit and the humanity of Christ. The creed of Nicea was reaffirmed with several phrases inserted to give clarity to the person and work of the Holy Spirit. We find, “by the power of the Holy Spirit he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary, and was made man.” Also, we find, “We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father [and the Son]. With the Father and the Son he is worshipped and glorified. He has spoken through the Prophets.” The phrase, “And the Son,” filioque in Latin, was added to the western version of this creed during the time of Charlemagne. It affirms the double procession of the Holy Spirit in eternity who is, even as love flows eternally and personally between Father and Son, “the perfect bond of unity” (Colossians 3:14).

Although the Constantinopolitan creed gave a measure of balance to affirmations concerning the persons of the Trinity and locked Arianism outside the pale of orthodoxy, it did not give a detailed synopsis of the relation of the uncreated (God) to the created (man) in the person of Christ. That the eternally generated Son of God had taken to himself real humanity was now beyond dispute. The manner of this assumption of the human nature, however, and the appropriate words to use in asserting this truth still seemed to elude a clear, biblically defensible, theologically sustained definition.

Nestorius, bishop of Constantinople, in response to a Mary-cult developing in his diocese, found it absurd to use the word theotokos, God-bearer, for Mary. He preferred the term christotokos, Christ-bearer. While firmly sustaining both the human and the divine, conscientiously resisting the tendency to fuse, and lose, the human into the divine nature, Nestorius was perceived as erring on the other side. It seemed that he maintained such an individuality in the human nature that he treated the nature as a person. He viewed the union as one only of undivided moral purpose, or a divine indwelling of the man born of Mary. His was a kind of high adoptionist Christology.

Cyril, bishop of Alexandria, kept the pressure on Nestorius insisting that he anathematize the positions attributed to him. To mke his position clear, Nestorious should affirm, “If anyone does not confess that Emmanuel is God in truth, and therefore the holy Virgin is theotokos—for she bore in the flesh the Word of God become flesh—let him be anathema.”[1] Unable to consent to this anathema, Nestorius was exiled after the Council of Ephesus (431).

Cyril’s language, however, gave rise to a group known as Monophysite (one nature) and Monothelite (one will). They contended that Christ, because of infinite greatness of his deity, had only one nature. The humanity was like a drop of honey absorbed into the ocean. In this vein of thought, Eutychus declared, “I confess that our Lord was of two natures before the union, but after the union I confess one nature.” This formula was resisted by Flavian, the bishop of Constantinople, and was condemned by a council in 448 that used the terminology of “two natures,” obviously protecting the full human nature, existing in the one Christ.

Eutyches, representing this as Nestorianism, with support from Theodosius II, called a synod in 449 composed of those that revered him and his theological instincts to approve his formula. Flavian’s attempt to attend this council and provide a reasoned objection resulted in his being grossly manhandled so that he died.  This synod soon was termed the Latrocinium, Robbers’ Synod, by those that opposed Eutyches.

During the time of this theological, and sometimes physical, punch and counter-punch, the bishop of Rome, Leo, appealed to by both parties in this dispute, gathered enough information about what was at stake to weigh in with unusual clarity and vigor. Before Flavian’s ultimate conflict, Leo wrote him concerning his view of the issue. This letter, so profoundly practical and biblical in its content, has gained a just commendation through the centuries. Known as Leo’s Tome, its argument virtually sealed the issue concerning the relationship of Jesus’ human nature and his divine nature in the single person.  When a new council was called in 451 at Chalcedon to revisit the Eutychian problem, Leo’s letter was read. Many of those in attendance greeted its reading with the words, “Peter has spoken.” This should not prejudice those who reject the papal primacy or the Petrine succession of Rome against the power of the reasoning and synthesis of biblical truths present in this document. Edward Hardy wrote, “It is a fine specimen of the straightforwardness and clarity of the Latin mind—as also of the Western approach to the mysteries of Christianity from the facts of faith rather than the speculations of philosophy.”[2]

Leo’s reasoning, in fact, from the commonly accepted confession of Christians and the biblical material concerning the incarnation of the Son of God is tightly constructed and profound.  The argument is Bible-centered and doctrinally coherent.

Leo said that if Eutyches “was not willing, for the sake of obtaining the light of intelligence, to make laborious search through the whole extent of the Holy Scriptures,” at least he should have learned from the common confession, particularly the implications of its words, “His only Son, our Lord, who was born of the Holy Spirit and the virgin Mary.” Failing that, he should submit to the implications of the gospel descriptions of the person and work of Christ which show that “in the entire and perfect nature of very Man was born very God, whole in what was his, whole in what was ours” except for the corruption of sin.

As for the formula set forth by Eutyches (“out of two natures into one”), Leo indicated the greatest disdain. “I am astonished,” he told Flavian, “that so absurd and perverse a profession as this of his was not rebuked by a censure on the part of any of his judges [in 448], and that an utterance extremely foolish and extremely blasphemous was passed over.” Leo noted that it was just as impious to say that the only-begotten Son of God “was of two natures before the incarnation as it is shocking to affirm that, since the Word became flesh, there has been in him one nature only.”[3] How could two natures exist in the Son of God prior to the incarnation? Also, how could one that was not fully man as a result of the incarnation ever reclaim for humanity the moral image of the divine and the warrant to eternal life?

A method of biblical citation emerges in Leo’s letter that helps the student of the Bible with an important principle of interpretation. His synthesis of texts employs a theological observation called the communicatio idiomatum—the fellowship of peculiar properties. This means that many texts in the Bible which would otherwise be confusing are perfectly clear when one sees the integrity of two natures in one person, Jesus Christ. Often Scripture asserts an action or attribute of one nature that, strictly speaking, holds true only for the other nature. Such is Paul’s statement in Acts 20:28, “to feed the church of God which he purchased with his own blood.” God does not have blood, but the person who purchased the church by his death, did have blood and also was God. The same inference we draw from the words of Jesus in John 3: 13: “And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.” Jesus had never been in heaven as Son of man, but as Son of Man he is the same person that as Son of God had come down from heaven. Even at that moment, as he spoke, as Son of Man united in person with the eternally generated Son of God, he was in heaven. Though he stood before Nicodemus, isolated in time and space by his body and by every property of his humanity even as Nicodemus himself was, unlike Nicodemus, he also resided in heaven. As he spoke, his eternal generation from the Father, an eternal and immutable property of his personhood as Son of God, explained the meaning of “which is in heaven.” The communicatio idiomatum gives the key to a proper grasp of such a text.

Sometimes Scripture will indicate a condition of the whole person that is true only of one nature (“Before Abraham was, I am” John 8:58). These kinds of texts are the seed bed for the theology of two natures in one person, and, once established, the theology becomes a principle of interpretation for a large number of texts. For example, consider the following used by Leo himself in the famous “Tome” in which he argued and illustrated that in this single person “the lowliness of man and the loftiness of Godhead meet together.” Though it does not belong to the same nature, it is true of the same person, to say, “I and the Father are one” and to say, “The Father is greater than I.” We find clearly stated the same mysterious truth in Paul’s statement, “For had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory?” When Jesus asked who he the Son of Man was, why does he commend the answer, ”Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God?”

Leo also kept pressing that the ontology of the person of Christ served the interests of the salvation of sinners, “because one of these truths, accepted without the other, would not profit unto salvation.” It would be equally wrong, as well as dangerous to the soul, to believe the Lord Jesus to be God only and not man, or man only and not God.

At the time of the Olivet discourse, Jesus made the puzzling affirmation, “But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only” (Matthew 24:36). Jesus, speaking by the Spirit and in his humanity, had been isolated from that knowledge. He could state with perfect accuracy and verity that, in his perfect manhood, the Son did not know what the Father had decreed concerning the coming in glory of the triumphant, risen, ascended, redeeming Son of Man (37, 39, 44). In his humanity, Jesus increased in wisdom. His knowledge and his perfect ability to apply it continually increased throughout his life as the man who was being perfected, that is, brought by degrees to a full and immutable righteousness (Luke 2:52; Hebrews 5:8). This event was hidden even from him, in that peculiar capacity, at this time.

In his commentary on Matthew, John A Broadus observed: “If there was to be a real incarnation of the Eternal Word, then the body he took must be a real body, and the mind a real mind. How his divine nature could be omniscient, and his human mind limited in knowledge, both being united in one person, is part of the mystery of the Incarnation, which we need not expect to solve.”

If Christ in his perfection of moral rectitude and full commitment to all that the Father willed, had this event hidden from him at this time, and yet trusted fully even though he would go through the torturous propitiatory death, how willingly and joyfully should we submit to the mystery of our future with absolute trust in a faithful creator and Father.  In this way, we “Remember Jesus Christ” and emulate his submission to and trust in the Father’s wisdom and will.

[1] Hardy, Christology of the Later Fathers, 353

[2] Hardy, 359.

[3] Hardy, 359-370.

This article is part 13 in a series by Tom Nettles on Remembering Jesus Christ.

Join us at the 2024 National Founders Conference on January 18-20 as we consider what it means to “Remember Jesus Christ” under the teaching of Tom Ascol, Joel Beeke, Costi Hinn, Phil Johnson, Conrad Mbewe and Travis Allen.

Imagine the following statement being made from the pulpit of your church by a guest speaker: “Our mission is to make this nation a Christian nation.”

What is your reflexive reaction in this hypothetical situation?

Perhaps you have noticed the lack of context in this thought experiment. Regardless of what context you may have added in your imagination, now consider if your visceral response is any different if our fictional guest speaker is:

A political officeholder sharing his agenda for the upcoming legislative session.

A Chinese missionary explaining his exploits in Asia.

An urban evangelist summarizing his recent ministry in your city.

Each of these scenarios that what the phrase “Christian nation” denotes can vary widely from what it connotes.

If this thought experiment teaches us anything, it is that context matters. Such is always the case in matters of theology in general, and this is nowhere truer than in matters of political theology, and specifically, the conversation on Christian nationalism.

In terms of the latter, Andy Naselli has attempted a helpful taxonomy of the various species of this movement—making clear the great deal of overlap between various camps of principled, biblical conservatism regardless of whether one willingly wears the Christian nationalist moniker. Naselli has done commendable work, with all the necessary nuance and carefulness in his definitions. Yet in the emotion-laden discourses that prevail in the negative world, Christians do not always have the opportunity to offer such clarifications. Sometimes, we are best off attempting to steer the connotations in a positive direction.

But, returning to our hypothetical scenario, we can easily imagine how the connotations of terms like Christian nation or Christian nationalism can vary widely, even among ostensibly conservative evangelicals. In political discussions, such shibboleths often arouse suspicion, thanks to progressive rhetoric linking them with colonialism, racism, or other aberrations. But in the context of global missions, to long for the flourishing of Christian nations is simply to echo the refrain of Scripture’s great missionary texts:

“Let the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you judge the peoples with equity and guide the nations upon earth.” (Psalm 67:4)

“All the nations you have made shall come and worship before you, O Lord and shall glorify your name.” (Psalm 86:9)

“And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:18-20)

“After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands[.]” (Revelation 7:9)

My simple contention is that as the debate over Christian nation boils, we must keep these texts close at hand for the sake of our brothers and sisters who have yet to work out their theology of political engagement. The missionary spirit of the Christian faith, expressed in these and similar passages, contains all the resources we need to awaken (some might say “radicalize”) our fellow evangelicals to the monumental task of subjecting our civil life to the lordship of Christ. If our fellow Christians who are indifferent to the civil sphere, or who have imbibed the secularist fantasy, would but consider what Scripture says about discipling the nations, they’d soon be our allies in discipling ours.

By way of illustration: recently, I was privileged to spend nearly two hours with a pastor from the Indian state of Manipur—now a war zone. My pastor friend described in detail the conflict between the Hindu-majority valley tribes and the predominantly Christian hill tribes, along with the persecution and internal displacement happening to Christians as a result.

“The conflict between the two tribes flared up on [May 3rd], 2023,” he explained, “when the students from Kuki-Zo community namely All Tribal Student Union of Manipur called for a Tribal Solidarity march to oppose the High Court’s recommendation for inclusion of Meiteis in Schedule Tribe list. The Kuki-Zo were against this inclusion because it would help the Meiteis to monopolize all privileges and resources such as jobs, lands, and property which would be a threat to their very existence.”

He continued, “Thousands of tribal students participated in this rally which was held peacefully. In retaliation, the valley-based Meitei organizations organized counter-blockades, beat a pastor to death, and started burning houses belonging to Kuki-Zo community. From then on, the situation spread like wildfire with the burning of over 300 churches, hundreds of villages, 150 deaths, 60,000 displaced with ongoing kidnappings and arsons.”

At the heart of these tensions lies a complex interplay of ethnicity, religion, and political maneuvering—most notably a broader Indian political context in which radical Hindu groups, leveraging the Meitei tribe, have expanded their influence. Despite these barriers, the pastor to whom I spoke, together with his church, is ministering to displaced Christians who have lost everything and preaching Christ to those they encounter from the valley tribe. Sacrificially, they have devoted themselves to frontlines ministry including orphanage work, education, evangelism, and more.

Hearing such accounts overwhelms comfortable suburban ears such as mine. Yet impressed as I was with the faith and endurance of this community of believers, what struck me most was the pastor’s analysis of the situation in general and its potential answer: “The only solution to end this ongoing conflict is to grant Total Separate Administration to the Hill Tribals who are under the governance of Valley State government.” This amounts to the division of Manipur into two states: one with a Christian government, the other under Hindu rule.

At this point, I questioned my friend. Surely this is not possible, I reasoned, given the Hindu character of India as a whole. But he then proceeded to list several Indian states in which Christianity, in his characterization, is a “dominant cultural force”: Kerala (18.4% Christian), Nagaland (80%), Mizoram (80%), and Meghalaya (70%).

He shared as well, of course, the way in which the current Hindu regime would resist the addition of a new Christian state in India. “India is still a Hindu majority country,” he explained. “There has been propaganda to make India an entirely Hindu nation, with many pro-Hindu parties and government calling for everyone to return to Hinduism.”

Still, from his standpoint, the notion of organizing the hill tribes into a Christian state was at least plausible—especially since the hill and valley tribes currently cannot coexist peacefully. For him, this “Christianized” hill tribe government would simply entail freedom from persecution, freedom to consume foods such as beef, and freedom from anti-conversion laws which impede Christians throughout the country—benefits, he noted, which other predominantly-Christian parts of India do enjoy.

Throughout the entire conversation, I was struck by the straightforwardness of this pastor’s reasoning. Here was a Christian pastor—hailing from a corner of the world marked by idolatry, spiritual warfare, violent persecution, high concentrations of unreached people groups, and Hindu nationalism—unironically advocating for Christian self-governance. Yes, he was completely aware of the negatives of a nominal Christianity. (He shared that calling nominal hill tribes Christians to true discipleship forms a major part of his ministry.) Still, he saw no conflict between his evangelistic aims and the parallel goal of aligning their civil polity with the aim of Christ’s kingdom. And why should he?

Put another way: it apparently did not occur to this faithful minister that statements such as those found in John 18:36 (“My kingdom is not of this world”) and 1 Peter 2:13 (“Be subject for the Lord’s sake to every human institution”) preclude the formation of Christian states or nations. This shepherd was willing to “dirty” his hands with political concerns because of his overriding concern for the peace of his people and the welfare of his sheep. His desire for the conversion of the nominal Christians of his tribe and the ultimate evangelization of the enemy tribe cannot be fulfilled if his own tribesmen are all dead. Christian self-rule in Manipur, thus it seems, is the logical implication of missionary zeal and love for one’s neighbor.

Reasoning according to a biblical worldview demands we employ just weights and measures (Leviticus 19:35-36). This means employing the same standards evenhandedly upon others’ ideas as we would use in measuring our own. Thus, when we hear talk of Christian nations or even Christian nationalism, ought we not afford such persons the benefit of the doubt—given that their aims for our body politic are those same aims we pursue in missions for all nations? And if this is the case, could we not win more and more of our brothers to the cause of godly Christian political engagement by emphasizing these biblical realities—that Christ has received authority over all the nations (Revelation 11:15), and that we are to labor in the public square in light of that authority ourselves?

Brothers: let us recognize that if we truly believe in global missions, then we necessarily confess the imperative of striving for Christian nations—and inversely, if we believe in shaping Christian nations, then we must joyfully commit ourselves to doing so not only at home but also abroad. And in this way, may the Lord establish the work of our hands.

Through many dangers, toils, and snares,I have already come;’Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,And grace will lead me home.

“Amazing Grace,” or “Faith’s Review and Expectation,” appeared in “Olney Hymns” in 1779, six years after it was first sung in the parish church at Olney. It was number 41 in Book One, devoted to “select passages of Scripture” the lone entry under 1 Chronicles. Newton viewed the prayer of David in that text, 1 Chronicles 17:16 and following, as a review of the operations of divine grace in his experience. David looked to the past, to the present, and then to the future. When the Christian contemplates the grace of God, he sees it in its seamless power, recognizing its effectual workings of the past, observing its sustaining power in the present, and confident of its immutable purpose in the future.

The text of “Amazing Grace” contains the word grace six times. Notably, verse two has the most direct exposition of the operation and effects of converting grace—grace to fear and grace for fears relieved. This is “grace upon grace” (John 1:16). John explains that the first grace was in this, “The law was given through Moses.” The grace that was layered on top of that was found in this: “Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ” (John 1:17). The powerful grace of the Spirit in using the law to teach the fear of God and the consequences of sin led inexorably to the grace of faith in the completed work of Christ. Led to biblical belief by the Spirit of God showing the glory of Christ, the believer finds such grace as precious when the assaulted conscience under the terrors of God’s curse on lawbreakers find release by the certainty of acceptance. Verse two captures it

‘Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,  And grace my fears relieved;How precious did that grace appear  The hour I first believed!

Verse three continues with the emphasis on sustaining grace, the necessary concomitant to saving grace. All of it is of the same quality and necessary, not only for the power and effectuality of regeneration, but for sustaining faith in a world hostile to the gospel and those who believe it.

Through many dangers, toils, and snares,I have already come;’Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,And grace will lead me home.

Verse four, five, and six look to the future of God’s sustaining grace in the believer’s life: “As long as life endures. … when mortal life shall cease, … will be forever mine.” Though the final three stanzas do not contain the word grace, the preciousness of the promises communicated find their origin and certain sustenance in sovereign omnipotent grace.

 Newton did not view grace as a cooperative power of God, but a unilateral and effectual exertion of power based on the eternal saving intent of God. In the preface to Olney Hymns, Newton made clear that he did not intend the hymn book to be an element of a polemical dispute with those who “differ with me, more or less, in those points which are called Calvinistic.” [Newton, 3:303] He was not out to promote controversy, but to edify the worshipper and convict the unregenerate of sin and absolute dependence on God. He claimed the freedom, however, as others of a different viewpoint claimed for themselves, to make his hymns as clear as he could on points of doctrine and Christian experience that glorified God and sent the sinner to the merits of Christ and the grace of God without reservation. “The views I have received of the doctrines of grace,” Newton explained, “are essential to my peace; I could not live comfortably a day, or an hour, without them.” As to any accusation that they promote carelessness and diminish evangelistic concern, Newton contended for an opposite viewpoint. “I likewise believe, yea, so far as my poor attainments warrant me to speak,” Newton averred, “I know them to be friendly to holiness, and to have a direct influence in producing and maintaining a Gospel conversation; and therefore I must not be ashamed of them.” {Newton, Works 3:303]

In a sermon entitled, “Sovereignty of Divine Grace Asserted and Illustrated,” Newton began his final paragraph with the encouragement, “Does it not appear from hence, that the doctrine of free sovereign grace is rather an encouragement to awakened and broken-hearted sinners than otherwise?” [Newton Works, 2:413, 414] Newton consistently encouraged his auditory to find in Christ not only a sovereign Savior, but a merciful and willing Savior. In 1800, preaching before the “Lord Maor, Aldermen, and Sherifs,” Newton closed a message on “The Constraining Influence of the Love of Christ” with an earnest appeal to flee from “everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord,” for “We have incurred the penalty annexed to the breach of this law.” [Newton 6:516]

To those who are sensible of their desert and danger, the gospel points out relief and a refuge. Jesus invites the weary and burdened sinner, and says, “Him that cometh, I will in no wise cast out. You have heard something of his glorious person, power, authority, and love. He is able, he is willing, he has promised to save to the uttermost all that come to God by him. Oh, that today you may hear his voice, and comply with his invitation! [Newton 5:516.]

When Newton, therefore, wrote of grace, he had in mind the sovereignly chosen, eternal disposition, of love toward sinners viewed as fallen and under just condemnation. From the unit of fallen sons of Adam, the triune God placed electing, redeeming, justifying, persevering love on particular individuals to bring them from being under a sentence of eternal damnation to inherit the status of sons of God and receive eternal life. In a hymn on Leviticus 8, Newton versed, “He bears the names of all his saints deep on his heart engrav’d; attentive to the states and wants of all his love has saved.” [Newton, 3:328] At the same time, that the gospel call is to be sent to all, Newton gave no pause. He wrote, “But Jesus invitation sends, treating with rebels as his friends; And holds the promise forth in view, to all who for his mercy sue.” [3:330] He used Samson’s lion to teach God’s protective grace for believers: “The lions roar but cannot kill; then fear them not my friends, they bring us, though against their will, the honey Jesus sends” [Newton, 3:333]. Contemplation on 2 Kings 2 in the story of Elisha’s healing the waters of Jericho with salt led to this verse. He emphasizes human depravity which can only be healed by grace.

But grace, like the salt in the cruse,

When cast in the spring of the soul;

A wonderful change will produce,

Diffusing new life through the whole:

The wilderness blooms like a rose,

The heart which was vile and abhors,

Now fruitful and beautiful grows,

The garden and joy of the Lord.

[Newton, 3:349]

The present experience of grace forms the substance of verse three. Newton viewed that experience in two parts—the dangers, toils and snares, of struggle involved in present sanctification, and second, the settled assurance that grace will lead us home. That idea is an element of and leads into the internal dominant hope (1 John 3:3) energized by the “Blessed Hope” (Titus 2:13) we find in verse 4–“His word my hope secures; He will my shield and portion be as long as life endures.”

Newton described the “fears-relieved” kind of grace (verse 2) in a sermon entitled “Grace in the Blade” on Mark 4:28. Though punctuated with various manifestations of immaturity, lack of knowledge, fright, and terror before enemies, this is a time “remarkable for the warmth and liveliness of the affections.” [Newton 1:202] This new and enthusiastic believer Newton has named “A.”

The next stage, “B,” is “Grace in the Ear.” (Mark 4:28). Whereas desire and perhaps rapidly fluctuating joy and despair characterize “A,” Newton saw conflict as the state of “B” leading to a maturing understanding of the nature of the conflict caused by the operation of the flesh against the Spirit. “Through many dangers, toils, and snares, I have already come.” The person denominated “B” knows that grace has brought him safe thus far.

Having felt the wrath of God pacified by the blood of Christ, having achieved some spiritual equilibrium, and having seen the deadly enemies of the past held at bay, B may think that little conflict will occur in his future pilgrimage. He learns otherwise very soon. “Alas!” Newton says.” “His difficulties are in a manner just beginning; he has a wilderness before him, of which he is not aware.” God’s operations of grace will include some severe tests to “humble and prove him, and to shew him what is in his heart.” Aiming toward the “latter end” of life with more sustained comfort and anticipatory joy, this stage is designed by God “that all the glory may redound to his own free grace.” [Newton 1:205]

B learns that he lives “in a world that is full of snares, and occasions, suited to draw forth those corruptions.” [206] He is wiling to endure hardship and knows from Scripture that his heart is deceitful and desperately wicked, but he could never anticipate how deeply he could fall if left to his own devices and strength. When he finds respite from breakthroughs of perversity and malicious sin, God gives occasions in which he still will discover “new and mortifying proofs of an evil nature.” Hezekiah and Peter had exalted manifestations of grace followed by events in which, left to their own strength and determination, they fell to a sensible and distressing experience of their own evil nature when unsustained by immediate grace. A variety of experiences will teach B to be more “distrustful of his own heart” and view the way before him with ever-increasing conscious dependence on grace and “to suspect a snare in every step he takes.” [209]

As Newton described his own pilgrimage as person B, he found “multiplied instances of stupidity, ingratitude, impatience, and rebellion, to which my conscience has been witness!” [208] The person in this stage of pilgrimage in grace has a mind is more thoroughly informed by Scripture truth concerning the call to “lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily besets us” (Hebrews 12:1). Parallel to that, and with a maturing grasp of the coordinate operations of the “renewing of the mind” (Romans 12:2) and the “renewal of the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5), he has an increased awareness and admiration of “the rich sovereign abounding mercy of the covenant.” [209] “Through many dangers toils and snares I have already come. ‘Tis grace has brought me safe thus far.”

When the result of grace is the “Full corn in the ear,” the Christian pilgrim can say, “and grace will lead me home.” Newton labeled this stage of pilgrimage as the experience of “C.” He more fully develops this in verse 4, but the threshold to that stage is introduced here. C recognizes more profoundly that whether living or dead, he belongs to Christ. He knows that even if he lives as long as Methuselah, and does not enter heaven for centuries, this will mean fruitful labor for him. It will involve opportunities for glorying in Christ before a wicked and perverse age. Like Paul, he desires to be with Christ, knowing that such a state is far better, but he has learned to be content in any condition in this life and to trust God’s wisdom as to the time and condition of his entry to the heavenly presence of Christ among the “spirits of just men made perfect” (Hebrews 12:23), for he knows that, by invincible grace, his place there is assured. “Grace will lead me home,” and that same grace will sustain me while I am here.

Newton described this state of grace as characterized by humility, spirituality, and “a union of heart to the glory and will of God.” [214, 215] He learns humility in looking back “upon the way by which the Lord has led him; and while he reviews the Ebenezers he has set up all along the road, he sees, in almost an equal number, the monuments of his own perverse returns.” [212] He learns a deeper and more humble submission to the will of God in all circumstances. While he is impatient with his own failures in light of God’s immeasurable grace, he learns to bear with others as they also will stumble over the “snares of the world.” [213].

C learns more intensely how deeply rooted is the evil principle that clings to him in this life and thus learns to seek and value more profoundly the operations of the Spirit in mortification of the flesh. He learns how vain it is to cling to temporal things and how excellent it is to increase in the knowledge of God and conformity to Christ. As he looks with confidence to the grace that will lead him home, “He sees that the time is short, lives upon the foretastes of glory, and therefore accounts not his life, or any inferior concernment dear, so that he may finish his course with joy.” [214]

For C, grace still reminds him of the sinful pit from which he was lifted, and reminds him of the snares, dangers, and toils that once were more prominent and threatening than now. He still knows and feels the power of indwelling sin and yearns to be free of its hindrances. Increasingly diminished, however, is the fixture on oneself, and ever more prominent is a joy in savoring and contemplating the glories and beauties of God. “That God in Christ is glorious over all, and blessed for ever, is the very joy of his soul.” [216] They may have great grace for great difficulty and appear to make slow progress in their grasp of the glory of God. They may also have less intense outlays of grace for small difficulties and seem to advance rapidly. In both cases grace makes them endure.

Grace must sustain us from first to last.  Preceded by the grace of election, Christ’s condescension, and victorious resurrection, we are dependent on divine grace even prior to any experience of it in our hearts. Made by grace to fear the curse and brought by grace to embrace the cure, we find grace upon grace. Born spiritually by the Spirit’s grace and secured eternally by the Redeemer’s intercession, grace will lead us home.  The absolute and perpetual need of grace arises from the depravity of our hearts. We are humbled by this but not thrown down for an unending fountain of grace flows from the saving wounds of Christ “since Jesus is appointed to me of God, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption; and since I find that, in the midst of all this darkness and deadness, he keeps alive the principle of grace which he has implanted in my heart.” [Newton 1:250, “On a believer’s Frames.”]