The Old Guys

[Pleading with his brother-in-law who had just recovered from a sickness]

I used a wrong word when I spoke of your recovery. Dear brother, look upon it as no more than a REPRIEVE; for you carry the sentence of death about with you still; and unless you should be cut off (which God of his infinite mercy prevent) by a sudden stroke, you will as surely lie on a dying bed as you have now got up from a bed of sickness. And remember, too (I can hardly bear to write it), that should you neglect my admonitions, they will all tend to render you more inexcusable. I have delivered my own soul by faithfully warning you. But if you will not examine the matter with that seriousness which it deserves,–if you will not look up to God, the former of your body and the preserver of your spirit, for direction and assistance how to please Him,–if you will have your reading and your conversation only on one side of the question,–if you will suffer mercies and providences, afflictions and deliverances, to pass unimproved and unacknowledged, and live in the world as though you were created only to eat, sleep, and play, and after a course of years to be extinguished like the snuff of a candle,–why then, you must abide by the consequences. But, assuredly, sooner or later, God will meet you. My hearty, daily, constant prayer is, that it may be in a way of mercy, and that you may be added to the number of the trophies of rich, free, and sovereign grace. Amen.

~John Newton~

The Letters of John Newton – To Mr. John Catlett (Edinburgh, Scotland; The Banner of Truth Trust; 2007) p. 28.

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Tags: John Catlett, John Newton, The Letters of John Newton