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Editorial Annotations |
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Life in the small and struggling
settlements of Upper Canada was difficult and fraught
with danger throughout the period of Bangs's itinerancy. As
Bangs's own journals show, disease, inclement weather,
and violence continually threatened both preachers and
settlers with disaster. The hypothetical widow Bangs
depicts in the second part of this entry perhaps opens a
window on his preaching style and helps to explain why
Methodism grew so quickly in wilderness settings. It is
not difficult to imagine how such a person would be
driven to organized religion not only for the spiritual
consolations it offered, but also for the many social supports available to members of
cohesive, vibrant, and growing religious sub-cultures of
the period. |
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Fryday 15 [Friday 16 August 1805]
Praised be God I am still permitted to
pray in faith and by faith to live in the Son of God. God
gave me a happy season yesterday in preaching. Salvation
through faith in the Son of God as a theme which I delight
to dwell upon, a truth which my soul feels and lives upon.
Well might the Apostle say that he counted all things but
loss for the Excellency of Christ [Phil 3.8]. Surely every man in his
senses will follow his steps herein and by so doing will feel
his soul swiftly attracted with the view of the heavenly
Mansion [cf.
Jn 14.2]. There are many things which afford some degree of
delight, but nothing short of Christ can satisfy an immortal
Spirit. In surveying the creation of God we are much pleased
with its variety, order and harmony: but even this in time
burns insipid; considered as abstract from God, we can find
no object worthy of adoration, but if the Judgement be
previously informed concerning God; and if the heart has
before been touched with a feeling sense of Redeeming Love,
we be may derive both instruction & comfort from every thing
we see. Now when we consider that all thes[e] are only as
the concomitants of the Redemption of Christ, or only the
fruits of his resurrection, we must surely alow [sic] that
every thing that may
be called excellent, is in him.
It is very certain that Nature itself is not sufficient to
be bear up and sustain with a manly and becoming fortitude
the various shocks which adversity brings upon us. Only
paint to the mind a wretched mother surrounded with a number
of fatherless children, and her affliction heightened by
poverty, brought upon her by a flood of Adversity, what
relief can we afford her if the religion of Jesus Christ be
set aside: what comfort can she promise herself either in life or in
death, in this world or in the next, if the excellency of
Christ is kept from her view. Will she not be likely to sink
beneath her load into despair and fly for refuge to that
last and most dreadful of all helps suicide. But if on the
other hand her Judgement be rightly informed concerning the
scheme of
Redemption, and her heart be prepared by the Spirit of Grace
for the reception of God’s truth, then amidst all her
troubles she finds a source of relief and instantly
experiences those heart-felt Joys
which are the fruit of a Justifying faith in Christ. She is
wholly delivered from that sore evil which so long burdened
her mind and weighted down her spirits and instead of this
she finds herself safely sheltered under the spreading wings of the
Almighty who is now become her God and Father, who will be
her guide through life & after wards receive her to Glory.
Is not all things loss in comparison of this excellency
which is to be found only in Christ.
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