ROBERT HALL

1764—­1831

MARKS OF LOVE TO GOD

But I know you, that ye have not the love of God in you.—­John v., 42.

The persons whom our Lord addrest in these words made a high profession of religion, valued themselves upon their peculiar opportunities of knowing the true God and His will, and proclaimed themselves as the Israel and the temple of the Lord, while they despised the surrounding pagans as those who were strangers to the divine law.  Yet the self-complacent Pharisees of our Savior’s age were as far from the love of God, he assures them in the text, as any of those who had never heard of His name.  In this respect, many of “the first were last, and the last first.”  The rejection of the gospel evinces a hardness of heart which is decisive against the character; and, in the case of the Pharisees, it gave ample evidence that they possest no love of God.  Had they really known God, as our Lord argues, they would have known Himself to be sent by God:  whereas, in proving the bitter enemies of Christ, they proved that they were in a state of enmity against God.  By parity of reason, we, my brethren, who know God and His Word in the way of Christian profession, ought not to take it for granted that we possess the love of God, and are in the way of eternal life:  the same self-delusion may overtake us also; and similar admonitions may be no less necessary to many present, than to the Pharisees of old.  Suffer then, my brethren, the word of exhortation, while I invite each individual seriously to consider this subject, with a view to the discovery of his real character.

In proceeding to lay down certain marks of grace, let it be premised, that either these marks partake of the nature of true religion, or they do not.  If they do, they must be identified with it, and here the mark is the thing:  if they do not partake of its nature, some of them may exist as indications where genuine religion is not.  It is necessary, then, that we combine a variety of particular signs of grace:  any one taken by itself, may, or may not, exist, without true religion; but where many are combined, no just doubt can remain.

Whether you have the love of God in your soul presents a most critical subject of inquiry; since the love of God will be acknowledged by all to be the great, the essential, principle of true religion.  The simple question, then, to which I would call your attention, is this:  “Am I, or am I not, a sincere lover of the Author of my being?”

In endeavoring to assist you in the decision of this momentous question, as it respects yourselves.  I shall entreat your attention while I suggest a variety of marks which indicate love to God; and supposing the conviction produced by the statement to be, that you have not the love of God, I shall point out the proper improvement of such a conviction.