Our Frailty, God's Faithfulness - GBC Bulletin Column #34

I recently came across these heartfelt words about human frailty, particularly that of the Christian:

Take the best of the human species, the watchful diligent self-denying Christian, and let him decide the controversy; and that not by inferences drawn from the practices of a thoughtless and dissolute world, but by an appeal to his personal experience. Go with him into his closet, ask him his opinion of the corruption of the heart, and he will tell you that he is deeply sensible of its power, for that he has learned it from much self-observation and long acquaintance with the workings of his own mind. He will tell you, that every day strengthens this conviction; yea, that hourly he sees fresh reason to deplore his want of simplicity in intention, his infirmity of purpose, his low views, his selfish, unworthy desires, his backwardness to set about his duty, his languor and coldness in performing it: that he finds himself obliged continually to confess, that he feels within him two opposite principles, and that “he cannot do the things that he would” [cf. Romans 7:19]. He cries out with the excellent Hooker, “The little fruit which we have in holiness, it is, God knoweth, corrupt and unsound: we put no confidence at all in it, we challenge nothing in the world for it, we dare not call God to reckoning, as if we had him in our debt books; our continual suit to him is, and must be, to bear with our infirmities, and pardon our offences.

The words are from a book entitled A Practical View of Christianity. The author was William Wilberforce (1759-1833), a Christian British politician who spent decades as a Member of Parliament campaigning against the social ills of his day. The fruit of his labour includes the abolition of the slave trade in 1807, and a bill abolishing slavery and emancipating slaves passed by the House of Lords a month after his death in 1833. Books, articles, and essays have been written by him, Christian politicians today are inspired by him, and an American-British biographical drama was made about him a few years ago called Amazing Grace (it’s available on YouTube and Netflix – check it out).  Now regarded as a hero, here Wilberforce bears no sign of the haughty triumphalism that emanates from those who have achieved contemporary celebrity for accomplishing far less. Instead we read the words of a man crushed before Christ’s cross and lifted by Christ’s love to trust in God alone and to live not by the power of the flesh, but by faith in the power of God. 

This was printed in the worship bulletin of Grace Baptist Church (Wood Green) on 15 December 2013