THE TEN VIRGINS - Burns, William Chalmers

Chapter 15

[preached in moulin parish church on sabbath evening, september 6, 1840. In the forenoon of the same day, mr. Burns preached in a tent to the people who were seated in the churchyard. Many of the higher classes were present who were not likely to have a second opportunity of hearing him, unless attracted by the discourse. He was almost unable to get through the service. He said afterwards, that the adversary of souls had been at his right hand the whole time; and that each statement he sought to make from the word of god, seemed to be contradicted by a voice within as soon as made. At night he preached as follows to a congregation of country-people in the same place; the emptied vessel was filled to overflowing. ]

Matthew 25:1-13

Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps and went forth to meet the bridegroom. “then, ” this expression shows us that the following parable is prophetical, relating to an event which shall take place at a future period, which, if you look at the close of the last chapter, you will find to be the coming of emmanuel to judge the world in righteousness. This event happens in one sense to every man at the hour of death, but it is his second coming, when he shall come to all, to judge all, to condemn all who believe not, that is here spoken of; it is an event to which the believer looks forward with joy unspeakable. Now, how many are there here who can say they are hasting to his coming? I heard of a little child, who has been lately, we trust, indeed, brought to jesus, who seemed already to enter into this feeling. She said to her sabbath school teacher, “oh! I’m wearying to see christ. ” can you say this? Ah! Can you say it, christians? This expresses the feeling of the faithful followers of christ, when they are not in a very dead state; they are “wearying to see jesus, ” “whom, having not seen, they love. “

Unto ten virgins. this number seems to have been merely chosen from the circumstance of that being a usual number of persons to wait for the bridegroom on occasion of a marriage. It is said “they took their lamps. this expression is employed to represent the profession of religion made by christians. By the lamps of profession we understand more than it is sometimes supposed to mean. What is a professing christian? Who is considered now as a consistent professor? One would think that the nineteenth century had widened the gate to heaven. In the idea of too many among us, he is a consistent professor, whom his neighbour cannot charge with open violation of the moral decency of the community in which he dwells. If a man is not a drunkard, if he does not steal, if he has not lifted the murdering knife, if he is a good neighbour, and, in short, a peaceable member of society, that man is a christian, and it would be uncharitable to doubt it. At what point of degradation, of sleep of death, have we then arrived, when this is the standard of christians in a christian land? Yet there is many a name in the communion roll that never was inscribed in the lamb’s book of life; there is many a baptized face that never got the spirit’s seal upon its forehead; there is many a one looked up to and esteemed by men and considered as a true believer, who never was missed from his place on the sabbath in church, that stands also on satan’s catalogue for the hottest place in hell. But all this does not nearly amount to the profession of the foolish virgins, for the difference between them and the wise virgins does not seem to have been discovered till the last scene of life, they all went forth to meet jesus.

This going forth implies much more than is included in a profession. The foolish virgins, as well as the wise, come out from the world and take up their lot with the followers of emmanuel: going forth to meet him, implies expecting him, waiting for him, looking forward to his coming, deriving joy from the thoughts of it, and the hope of his glory. There is very often nothing in such characters by which they can

223 be distinguished from the true servants of jesus, nothing in their outward conduct, nothing in the account they give of their experiences, by which it can be discovered. To the eye of man, the difference is often unapparent. The features of their character, their feelings, seem identical. It is a great mistake to think that among the foolish virgins, none know anything of experimental religion of a natural kind. There can be no doubt, that such persons as are here described may know much of this.

But here there is a clear distinction made between the two classes: “five were wise, and five were foolish. ” there is a difference in the eye of god. The wise are his own elect, his redeemed, his chosen, his reconciled children; and the others – poor, deluded souls, little do they think whose they are , little do they think that satan binds them, holds them fast, possesses them as his slaves, just as much as he does those careless, thoughtless sinners that are lying contented in his chains. They little know that, honoured and loved as they are, they are satan-bound, satan-deluded, satan-enslaved, and satan-possessed. It is fearful to see men rushing headlong, sunk in crime, down to hell: but who can image the state of those who are living and dying in the hope of a heaven they are never to enter, and without a single fear of the hell to which they are now condemned?

What, then, distinguishes the one from the other? One certain distinction exists between the saint in the very lowest state into which a saint can sink, and the sinner in the highest state of outward perfection to which a hypocrite can rise. The difference is just this: in the one heart god reigns, and in the other satan reigns. In the unregenerate heart of the professor, satan may have assumed, as he constantly does assume, the character of an angel of light, but still it is satan, in whatever form, that is on the throne. The influences of the spirit of grace which operate on his heart, striving with him in a manner common to all sinners, are entirely subordinate and uninfluential. Christ is always knocking at the door, calling him by his providences, calling him by his love to man, and the poor sinner thinks he belongs to christ, thinks he is getting grace from christ, thinks he is saved, while satan has still the citadel, the dominion, the command.

In the regenerate heart, it is not so. Emmanuel reigns. He has assumed entire command, and however much the saint may sink into ungodliness, into temptation, into sin, emmanuel holds him in his hand, whence no devil shall ever tear him. Satan is not less active in this man’s heart than in the other, but he is dethroned. The very moment that emmanuel first entered that heart, he took the command of it, he sat down forever on the throne, he took the crown, he took the scepter, and the devil was cast down forever. That man’s heart is no longer in the power of the devil; he comes often to the door, pays many a visit, and makes many a loud, boisterous knocking from without; but he does not dwell, he does not reign there, it is his dwelling-place no more. The spirit of jehovah fills his room, and spreads around the graces of emmanuel. He is often tempest-tossed – rudely and severely tempest-tossed – so rudely, that he thinks he is sinking altogether; but grace, however weak, is still there; there, ready to kindle up afresh, to burn into a flame.

We do not say that those characters represented by the foolish virgins never receive grace; we believe that there are some operations of the spirit common to all; in other words, that there is such a thing as common grace. For instance, take the case of a man under convictions of sin, which never issue in saving conversion. That there are such cases, no one can deny; all have heard of it, most have met with it in their own experience. I daresay there are some among yourselves, brethren, who recollect such cases in the revival of moulin, forty years ago. I have seen such cases myself. A man, during an awakening of great power, sees one and another, and another of his former associates change, and become thoughtful and anxious, and, in short, turning to the lord with full purpose of heart, he says, “what is the meaning of all this? What has  come over them? ” by degrees the man sees that it is he who is mad in continuing unconcerned, and that they are in their right minds. The man is convinced. The sins of his former life come crowding round his in dread array. Past iniquities take hold on his affrighted conscience, with all the pungency and all the bitterness of newly committed sin; he feels wrath to be his portion, and he is bound down under the full weight of the approaching wrath of god.

Righteousness. 225 there lies the grand distinction between the wise and the foolish virgins. The wise are united to christ. The others are not. Union to christ! Here is the difference, here is the distinction, and here is the life- giving principle that has been inspired into the new created heart by the holy spirit. Here is the principle, without which, whatever be his profession, whatever be his hopes, whatever be his actions, the sinner is unprofitable, dead, unsaved, unsanctified, condemned. Union to jesus is the humble christian’s life, his hope, his all, leave him but this, and you may take what you will away from him. It makes his trials, his afflictions, his losses, his sorrows, his griefs, not only supportable, not only endurable, but precious, sweet, a cause of thanksgiving, a matter for glory, just because in them, in the very severest, in the very hottest, that union is always the more closely cemented. The furnace burns, burns, burns, but ah! It touches not his union with emmanuel. The hotter the furnace burns, self, and sin, and pride, die out and waste away, are sometimes so nearly consumed, that the soul forgets that there is any other in the wide universe but jesus. Self is all but destroyed, for one desire and another is checked, cut off, and consumed; a rebellious will has been so crushed, so broken, so bended, so moulded to the image of him to whom alone it has clung in the storm, that for a time it seems to have forgotten to be rebellious. For the time no other will is known than his, who, while he wounds, is tempering every trial with a hand gentle and tender, and filling up every place that is left vacant of its creature tenant, with a creator’s infinite love. The foolish professor, as one said, is like a tree bending to one side, leaning over on the support of another, whereas the christian, not only leans on christ, but he is like a slip of a tree grafter into another tree, he has come off his own room, he has been cut off completely, and grafted deep into christ. It is quite necessary that the sinner should be entirely reduced to self-despair; for nothing but self-despair can make him feel his need of a saviour, and the holy spirit brings every savingly convinced sinner into this state. Helpless and lost, he lies down as it were, to die, and feels that no efforts of his own can ever in the least even enable him to arise and lay hold on the rock of salvation. He feels that, unless jehovah, by an act of absolute, free, sovereign, and resistless grace, lay hold of him, raise him up and translate him from satan’s power to that of christ, he must die. He sees that, unless reconcilement begin on the part of jehovah, he can never be reconciled, and thus he is brought by the spirit to lay aside all those things, which formerly he was vainly trying to perform and to work out in his own soul, and just simply to come out of himself into jesus. Christ first apprehends the sinner; having elected him, he begins by the drawings of his grace to attract him to himself; and then, as the natural consequence, the first strength thus received is employed by the thankful penitent in loving, serving, and adoring his divine redeemer. The newborn babe is cherished, cared for, and tenderly watched by its mother, while unconsciously it lies, folded in her arms, insensible of her love. But whenever it begins to grow a little, and to get even a little strength, its first natural action is to clasp its little arms round the neck of its mother. Just so is it with the poor sinner. Jesus, long before he is aware of it, says, “i have called thee by thy name, thou art mine. he continues by his providence and love to incline the sinner, till at last, coming willingly to him, and no longer desiring to rebel, he begins to love such a saviour, to serve such a lord. Have you ever surrendered your hearts? Christ will not accept an unwilling gift, he does not ask your heart, unless you give it wholly, freely; but if you are willing to do that, he is both able and willing to save you. Are you united to christ? Many among you have not even got the length of the foolish virgins, many of you have got no lamps at all, but to you who are carrying your lamps we speak, and we again simply ask, are you, or are you not, united to jesus? It is no light matter. It is not the unimportant trifle which some seem to consider it, whether or not you can answer this question. Oh! That you would even now begin, in the light of the holy ghost, to think on these things, to consider your latter end.

It was only last friday, as often before, that i witnessed such a scene. I saw men, young men, strong in body and mind, almost overwhelmed with a sense of their guilt, and of the justice of their eternal condemnation. But i saw cases too at perth, where the feelings were thus aroused, and where persons have been so overcome by a discovery of their present actual state in god’s sight, as children of wrath that it has almost been too much for them to bear. Many a sleepless night have they passed, many an anxious day, many watchings, many tears, has it cost them, and this led them to do many things to attend meetings regularly, to read the bible, and to pray; and after a time they seemed really to find peace and joy in believing. But, ah! Friends what are some of these become? The dog has returned to his vomit again, and the sow that was washed to his wallowing in the mire. These very men have i seen returning, with more greediness than ever, to the gratification of their lusts. The outward man was changed, the character was formed a new, but the nature, the old man, the swinish nature, still remained. It has never been removed. It had never given place to the spirit of jesus. But can we think that this change was the work of the mere natural heart, of the sleeping, dead conscience? No, beloved brethren, no man who reads the bible can suppose it.

Common grace is often given without the new nature, and that grace is often given to change and improve the outward character. But why was this grace asked from god? It was just to exalt the creature, to exalt self, to exalt the sinner, and to cast down the saviour. It is not to glorify jesus such a man asks grace, but just that he may turn it against the giver. He kneels below mercy’s golden scepter, just that he may, as it were, wrest it from emmanuel’s hand; he has got grace, but then he has never got christ. You have all heard of the common fable of the jay, that tried to imitate the peacock, by getting itself all covered with its beautiful plumage. Now, the persons to whom we have been alluding, just reminds us of the poor bird in this fable. They have asked grace, only that they might deck out and adorn the hideous mass of corruption that lies concealed within; they use it to adorn themselves, and never simply to glorify jesus.

Not so with renewed hearts; the spirit of god has shewn them not only the future punishment of sin, but it has shewn to them the gigantic strength and power of prevailing inward corruption. It has shewn them that they must be entirely changed, entirely renewed, born again, or they must perish, they must die, they must be damned; they see, as it were, all help cut off from every side, above, beneath, all around. There is nothing, nothing but a fearful looking for a wrath and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries, and must devour them. Their iniquities cover their heads, and they sink in the mire and in the deep waters; all the lord’s billows go over them, so that they cannot look up.

Such a soul feels as if he had been, cast down over a precipice, whose base arises from perdition’s gulf, and that he might just as soon catch by the air, grasp it in his hand, and thus save himself, as conquer the heart disease that rages within, or behold a reconciled father in the avenger of sin. This is no exaggerated picture of human destitution; for oh! A guilty sinner is too heavy a material to fly up through the either of holiness to the glorious presence of jehovah, or reach the thrice holy precinct of the heaven of heavens. He feels this, and he can never soar aloft unless borne on the eagle pinions of emmanuel’s unspotted righteousness.

There lies the grand distinction between the wise and the foolish virgins. The wise are united to christ. The others are not. Union to christ! Here is the difference, here is the distinction, and here is the life- giving principle that has been inspired into the new created heart by the holy spirit. Here is the principle, without which, whatever be his profession, whatever be his hopes, whatever be his actions, the sinner is unprofitable, dead, unsaved, unsanctified, condemned. Union to jesus is the humble christian’s life, his hope, his all, leave him but this, and you may take what you will away from him. It makes his trials, his afflictions, his losses, his sorrows, his griefs, not only supportable, not only endurable, but precious, sweet, a cause of thanksgiving, a matter for glory, just because in them, in the very severest, in the very hottest, that union is always the more closely cemented. The furnace burns, burns, burns, but ah! It touches not his union with emmanuel. The hotter the furnace burns, self, and sin, and pride, die out and waste away, are sometimes so nearly consumed, that the soul forgets that there is any other in the wide universe but jesus. Self is all but destroyed, for one desire and another is checked, cut off, and consumed; a rebellious will has been so crushed, so broken, so bended, so moulded to the image of him to whom alone it has clung in the storm, that for a time it seems to have forgotten to be rebellious. For the time no other will is known than his, who, while he wounds, is tempering every trial with a hand gentle and tender, and filling up every place that is left vacant of its creature tenant, with a creator’s infinite love.

The foolish professor, as one said, is like a tree bending to one side, leaning over on the support of another, whereas the christian, not only leans on christ, but he is like a slip of a tree grafter into another tree, he has come off his own room, he has been cut off completely, and grafted deep into christ. It is quite necessary that the sinner should be entirely reduced to self-despair; for nothing but self-despair can make him feel his need of a saviour, and the holy spirit brings every savingly convinced sinner into this state. Helpless and lost, he lies down as it were, to die, and feels that no efforts of his own can ever in the least even enable him to arise and lay hold on the rock of salvation. He feels that, unless jehovah, by an act of absolute, free, sovereign, and resistless grace, lay hold of him, raise him up and translate him from satan’s power to that of christ, he must die. He sees that, unless reconcilement begin on the part of jehovah, he can never be reconciled, and thus he is brought by the spirit to lay aside all those things, which formerly he was vainly trying to perform and to work out in his own soul, and just simply to come out of himself into jesus. Christ first apprehends the sinner; having elected him, he begins by the drawings of his grace to attract him to himself; and then, as the natural consequence, the first strength thus received is employed by the thankful penitent in loving, serving, and adoring his divine redeemer. The newborn babe is cherished, cared for, and tenderly watched by its mother, while unconsciously it lies, folded in her arms, insensible of her love. But whenever it begins to grow a little, and to get even a little strength, its first natural action is to clasp its little arms round the neck of its mother. Just so is it with the poor sinner. Jesus, long before he is aware of it, says, “i have called thee by thy name, thou art mine. ” he continues by his providence and love to incline the sinner, till at last, coming willingly to him, and no longer desiring to rebel, he begins to love such a saviour, to serve such a lord.

Have you ever surrendered your hearts? Christ will not accept an unwilling gift, he does not ask your heart, unless you give it wholly, freely; but if you are willing to do that, he is both able and willing to save you. Are you united to christ? Many among you have not even got the length of the foolish virgins, many of you have got no lamps at all, but to you who are carrying your lamps we speak, and we again simply ask, are you, or are you not, united to jesus? It is no light matter. It is not the unimportant trifle which some seem to consider it, whether or not you can answer this question. Oh! That you would even now begin, in the light of the holy ghost, to think on these things, to consider your latter end.

They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them, but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. we are not told that any difference appeared between the foolish and the wise virgins; it is not even unlikely that, at the beginning, some of the lamps of the foolish virgins burned the brightest. Christians are judged of very differently by god from what man sees in them. Grace often dwells in the heart of some poor, despised, heart-broken one, who trembles at god’s word, and who is oppressed with doubt, fear, unbelief, and temptation, never hoping that he is a subject of grace; while many a flaming profession has nothing in it on which the eye of god can bear to look. We are thankful when we see a lamp burning brightly for one year, but how many of those that have been lighted are blown out. At kilsyth, for instance, there are a few who, for some months, promised fair for heaven, but the light is extinguished. It reminds us of a nursery of young plants. The first year, when they are all lying close together in the plantation, they seem to thrive, and they are allowed to grow up together; but the second year they must be thinned, and only the choice plants can be given a place in the ground; in successive years they are thinned, and thinned again, and what a small, small number of the original seedlings remain in the dark forest of a hundred years. It is just so, in the spiritual world, especially when there has been a great awakening. At first, there are numbers of professors, the crowd follows jesus. There is no shame, no reproach, and it is easy to follow him when there is no cross on the way. But in a short time, when religion is no longer the fashion of the day, when the crowd forsakes him, then too many of those whose lamps for a time seemed to burn the brightest, turn back, and walk no more with jesus.

Some go further than this, their lamps remain lighted for a longer time, and while all goes on smoothly, and they remain in the society of their christian friends, they find that, after all, it is rather a comfortable thing to serve god; but when they have to sacrifice something that is peculiarly dear to them, or else to give up christ, it is found that they have been hypocrites all along. Friends, what madness, not to give up everything gladly, freely, for christ; remember i beseech you, these affecting words of the lord, “what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul. none can tell in this world, how many, once promising professors, have been ruined by the example and influence of the ungodly. I daresay those of you who are old enough, remember examples of this at moulin. One man married an ungodly wife, and that cost him his soul; some woman married an ungodly husband, and that cost her, her soul. Some fell in the time of reproach on account of the word, and alas! Too many, have continued in the sunshine of worldly prosperity so long, that the riches of this world and the cares of this life, have sprung up and choked the word.

O, prosperity! Prosperity! Who can resist thy baneful influences? Who ever stood thy unclouded sunshine? Who ever escaped unhurt from thine unceasing smile? There is nothing, nothing so difficult as to escape this; indeed, we may say at once, that without a great degree of the influence of the spirit of god, it is impossible. Blessed be jehovah’s name, that with him all things, the very greatest of human impossibilities, are possible. Commonly speaking, however, this is not the case; it too often happens, and i think it is perhaps just the greatest proof of the fearful depravity of our nature, that all god’s gifts are, one after another, turned in measure against the giver.

Sometimes the lamp of profession will last even for a longer period, and the lamp burns on with its deceitful flame, even till that solemn hour when it lights the sinner to the entrance of the dark valley. It leaves him there alone. It is a fearful discovery to make at such an hour as that, that a man has been walking in the directly opposite road from heaven all his life, and walking in it at ease; that he has been carrying all his life a lamp which, in the hour of need, is to leave him in the dark.

We are not left in ignorance as to the cause of this, it is contained in the 3 rd and 4 th verses of this chapter, “they that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them. But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. ” here is the secret of the difference. The foolish virgins’ lamps may not only burn on till a dying hour, they may go further still (for the wicked have often no bands in their death) – the lamp may lead them fearless to the judgment-seat, nor go out till they reach the bar of god. They have got no oil with them. They have got light enough to maintain a consistent outward profession, but they have never got christ, they have never got the spirit of christ; they have no secret supplies in themselves, and they have got no key to the treasure-house. Believer, you feel that in yourself you have no good thing, no supply of grace, no faith, no light, no love; but then the more you are conscious of that, the more will you confide in that everlasting provision, that exhaustless fountain that sends forth the rich streams of heavenly blessing to poor dead souls: even in that holy spirit who is come into the world to convince it of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment, and to take of the things of christ and shew them to men’s souls. Though you have been savingly and abidingly united to christ, you still need to come afresh every hour, just as for the first time.

The provision we receive at once is sometimes great, but it soon needs renewing. When you have gone to rest at night, after getting very near to god in prayer, feeling that you had certainly got enough to last till the morning, yet when morning came, with its vanities and its cares, you felt the need of carrying back your empty vessel to the fountain of living water to get it replenished. Sweet to lay down an empty soul at the feet of a saviour, who filleth all in all! Take care to have your lamps always trimmed, for listen, “while the bridegroom tarried they all slumbered and slept. ” i do not mean to say that the lamp which has once been lighted by the spirit can ever go out. It cannot, it will not. But beware, beware, that you have indeed received the grace of christ, that you have indeed seen his glory. Have oil in your vessels with your lamps. The coming of the bridegroom is here shewn to be an unexpected event. We should all be on our guard; he will not come when he is expected. Watch and pray, lest, coming suddenly, he find you sleeping. It is a sad surprise to a christian when he is not ready for his master’s coming; it is a sad surprise to find himself unprepared, his books all unsummed up, even though he may have been a faithful servant. This is the chief object of desire which he has presented to his dear people. Whenever the people of god have been in a lively frame, ever since his ascension, their desire for his second coming has always been the greater. His last words to the church are, “i come quickly. now, are you all adding your amen; or are some of you secretly wishing that it might be just a little longer deferred, and then you would have made up your mind to part with all that is now so dear to you, and then you would be ready and willing to go with jesus home to heaven. But, friends, if you feel thus towards christ’s second coming, unless you are hasting unto it, examine, examine, i beseech you, e’er it be too late, and do not rest until you discover if your profession be really genuine. Better, if need be, make the mournful discovery on this side death, than to find out only at the judgment-seat that you have been self-deceived hypocrites. It is said that the coming of jesus will be as a thief in the night. It will be in the dark. Though in a far more fearful sense he will come in the night to the foolish virgins to cast them into outer darkness, this is also true to his coming to believers.

It will be without a warning. You know that it is generally prefaced by some bodily distress or affliction, as it were, to prepare for the last scene, and the more you are enabled to be in such a state of preparation, the more likely will your death be either peaceful or triumphant. In whatever state of solemn preparation you may be, it will be a sudden and overawing surprise to a soul, to find that it has crossed the jordan of death, and floated away out of the stream of time, to see the king in his beauty.

Every figure used to represent this to us, brings the suddenness of it to mind, but none so much as that of a thief in the night. A thief never comes in the day time, he does not like the sunshine, it does not suit him; he won’t come when the moon is shining brightly, for then he might be detected, and easily found out. No, no, the thief does not like the moonshine, he would not like even a very starry night, but he likes a dark, cloudy, evening like this, when the shades are deep. He comes at midnight when it is pitch dark, and when all men are asleep. Now, believers, this is the way he will come to you, and he tells you this, so that you may be watching and ready, for you see his followers are sometimes slumbering and sleeping, when the cry is heard – “behold the bridegroom cometh! ” oh! For a well-trimmed lamp. Oh! That you would, everyone of you, see that your lamps are all burning, that they are all trimmed, and that besides you have oil in your vessels with your lamps. Are you not afraid, you what think yourselves christians that your lamps at last will go out? The words, “ye must be born again, ” ring in our ears. Unless you are sure that that great change of conversion has passed in your soul, don’t you think you have reason to tremble? You do not know but your lamps may go out. I do not know whether my lamp may not go out. Does it not make you tremble to see the lamp of judas shine so long?

Does it not make you cry out, “lord is it i? Lord is it i? better, far better, ask with all the apostles that awful question now, than read the fearful answer for the first time in hell. And, remember too, that not only those who shall be saved, now ask that question with anxious fear, for judas too asked, “lord, is it i? men and brethren, be up and doing; strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, are words that seem almost forgotten in these days of ease, carelessness, and sin. They are not expunged from the bible. No, the gate is as strait; the way is as narrow as it was on the day that jesus proclaimed to disbelieving jerusalem, that few there be that go in thereat. It reminds us of the gate which you find at the toll-bar, when, during the night, the wide gate is locked. You know there is always a small turnstile at the one side of the wide road, contrived in such a way that nothing larger than a man can pass through it. Neither can more than one man pass at a time, each one must go alone. This is using a familiar illustration, which you must all understand. It is just so with the narrow gate to heaven. All men are going along the same road, the broad road of life, leading its millions down to eternal death. Now the wide gate stands open all day long, and there is always a crowd passing through it. The broad road is just the road in which the poor, blind sinners are born, brought up, and carried along by the thoughtless crowd. It is the way they have always walked in; it is the road their fathers passed over; it is the way which they see thronged by their relations, companions, neighbours, friends; and it is a road they never think of leaving. By the side of the wide gate stands the narrow gate of life, heaven, and glory; and jesus stands upon that narrow path, and calls to all the poor, weary travelers to ruin, to come to him, and he will give them rest. He tells them he is able, he tells them he is willing, he tells them he is near, to help and save them, and stretches forth his hands, all the day, to a disobedient and gain-saying people. A chosen few, drawn by his resistless grace, he brings to himself, and he will lead them till he carries them on to glory.

Sometimes the crowd is so mixed, that those who pass along mistake which road they tread. But, however closely the two ways may run together, they end as widely apart as heaven and hell. Every man, woman, and child among you is walking along either the one or the other of these ways, the one ends in life eternal, the other in death. Which are you in? Which are you in? Eternal life! Eternal death! Which is yours?

Are we to go away to-night without a blessing, without one soul for jesus? Oh, that the former days of moulin were revived with tenfold power! Oh, that the spirit, who, not forty years ago, was poured out in moulin, in this very place, on the same ground on which we stand, were to be poured out in rich abundance, that the dry, parched wilderness might rejoice, and blossom as the rose. Christians, will you not pray for moulin, that it may again become a very garden of the lord.

Brothers, sisters, are you going to choose destruction, are you going to stand out against the entreaties of emmanuel, the strivings on the spirit? You hear how all around you, people are coming into christ. Blessed be god, the question is already asked, “who are these that fly as a cloud, and as the doves to their window? ” the poor world is already beginning to stagger at the unaccountable change that has come over some who used to be just as sensible, firm, and manly, as they. I doubt not that there is sometimes a strange sinking of heart as they pronounce them silly, mad, woman-hearted, an involuntary asking, “how am i to account for this in such a one? what has made these calm, reasoning, quiet, respectable men, these good neighbours that have always been as regular in their duties, as sober and as kind to their families, and as punctual in their performance of every duty as i am, begin to say so much about new hearts? It is so incomprehensible to them, and yet so powerful, so brightly glorious in its effects, that they are filled with wonder. Is the same question, “who are these that fly as the doves to their windows, ” not to be asked of moulin? There have been many coming to christ in scotland. Only weak women? Nay, i have seen strong, sturdy men, in the very pride of youth, of manhood, and of sin, bend till they nearly sank. So near yourselves as aberfeldy, i saw it only last friday, when there was a marvelous impression made, as some present well know, which, god grant, may be followed up by a work of conversion, if these impressions do not dissipate again. Yes, men of kilsyth have come to christ, men of dundee, men of perth; there is a little band of new disciples in kilsyth, in dundee, in perth, is there not to be one in moulin? Are we not to get you for christ, sons of the mountains? We long to see the prayers of the saints that lie in yon churchyard answered. They float in the heaven over your heads like clouds of blessing, clouds that were attracted to heaven by the rays of the sun of righteousness. Forty years ago, his rays sped down, and poured light, and heat, and glory over this fair land, that had long been dwelling in spiritual darkness.

We long to see the clouds which are bending towards your mountain tops, called for as they are by a parched soil – called for also now by the prayers of children‘s children. Your fathers made moulin in their day like a city set upon a hill, which could not be hid. Coming towards this place, i overtook a middle-aged labourer on the road, and when he asked one or two questions about his spiritual state, he seemed quite astonished. When he was asked whether he was a christian, he looked with unfeigned amazement in the face of the speaker, and said, “a christian! Oh, sir, we’re all christians here; why do you ask that? poor man! I daresay there were many such christians as he in the place where he lived. Are there none here of whom jesus said, “i pray for them; ” none that are to look back on this night, and say, “on that sabbath evening the spirit awoke me from sleep. On that sabbath evening i first saw christ. It was then my bleeding conscience found peace in the blood of the lamb. “

Sinner, open your heart to jesus. You would not keep the queen waiting for admission, or even your landlord. There never was such a thing heard of, as to keep a landlord waiting! You never even kept a friend, a relations, a neighbour, perhaps some of you never kept a poor beggar waiting at your door. And yet you, who have not yet freely embraced christ, you have been keeping the glorious emmanuel, the blessed and only potentate, king of kings, and lord of lords, waiting, and waiting, and waiting, at the door of your poor, dark, blinded hearts. Yes, the king of kings, by whom princes reign, has knocked, and knocked, and knocked repeatly, again and again, and the door is still shut. To-night, he still is standing at the door. Is he to see the portals of one heart, the everlasting doors of one hitherto barred dungeon, lift up their heads to let the king of glory enter in? You have an open door to sin, to folly, an open door to the devil; and yet, it is shut against jesus, against god, against the spirit. behold, i stand at the door and knock; if any man hear my voice, and open the door, i will come in to him and will sup with him, and he with me. ” will you not say, “welcome, emmanuel, as all my salvation”? [we give the following intimations as they were made by mr. Burns, at the conclusion of the service, to shew how unweared his labours were at that time. ]

I trust, if the lord will, to meet with you several times before leaving the country. First, there will be service on tuesday forenoon, at straloch, at 12 o’clock, for the benefit of the people in that neighbourhood. To-morrow evening, there will be service at 5 o’clock, at tenandry, when mr. M’leod from ross-shire, whom you have heard to-day will preach again. On wednesday, there will be likewise service at tenandry, at 5 o’clock. On thursday, there will be a meeting in this place at 12 o’clock; and in the evening, there will be a prayer-meeting at 6 o’clock. On friday evening, there will be another prayer-meeting at 5 o’clock. By prayer-meetings, we mean an evening service, but only, not wishing to restrict ourselves to particular hours. The service to-morrow evening will be in gaelic; the other services will, of course, be in english. I am very sorry that i am unable to address you in gaelic, your own language; but it is surprising how much people will understand when they are anxious for it. Believers, if you desire a great blessing, be much in prayer for it. Ask and ye shall receive. Ask in faith, nothing doubting. According to your faith be it unto you. Amen.