The hymnist who thus so deeply sympathized with his agonizing Lord was Joseph Hart, who, from 1760 to 1768, was the earnest, eloquent, and much-beloved minister of the congregation which met in the old wooden meetinghouse in Jewin Street, built in 1672 for the well-known William Jenkyn. Born in London, about the year 1712, and brought up by pious parents, he began, when entering on manhood, to be deeply anxious about his personal salvation. For seven years his life was, as he tells us, an uneasy, restless round of sinning and repenting, working and dreading. At length the Lord was pleased to comfort me a little by enabling me to appropriate, in some measure, the merits of the Saviour to my own soul. In this blessed state my continuance was but short, for, rushing impetuously into notions beyond my experience, I hasted to make myself a Christian by mere doctrine, adopting other mens opinions before I had tried them; and set up for a great light in religion, disregarding the internal work of grace began in my soul by the Holy Ghost. This liberty, assumed by myself and not given by Christ, soon grew to libertinism, in which I took large progressive strides, and advanced to a dreadful height, both in principle and practice. In a word, I ran such dangerous lengths both of carnal and spiritual wickedness, that I even outwent professed infidels, and shocked the irreligious and profane with my horrid blasphemies and monstrous impieties. . . In this abominable state I continued for more than ten years. . . . Then I began by degrees to reform a little, and to live in a more soberly and orderly manner. . . . For several years I went on in this easy, cool, smooth, and indolent manner, with a lukewarm, insipid kind of religion. . . . But the fountains of the great deeps of my sinful nature were not broken up. . . . Nor was the blood of Christ effectually applied to my soul. I looked on His death, indeed, as the grand sacrifice for sin, but I did not see the inestimable value of His blood and righteousness clearly enough to make me abhor myself, and count all things but dung and dross. On the contrary, when I used to read the Scriptures (which I now did constantly, both in English and the original languages), though my mind was often affected, and my understanding illuminated by many passages that treated of the Saviour, yet I was so far from seeing or owning that there was such a necessity for His death, and that it could be of such infinite value as is represented, that I have often resolved—oh, the horrible depth of mans fall, and the desperate wickedness of the human heart!—that I never would believe it. After a time, I fell into a deep despondency of mind, and, shunning all company, I went about alone, bewailing my sad and dark condition. . . . This suffering was aggravated by physical infirmity and pain, and in this sad state I went moping about till Whit Sunday, 1757, when I happened to go in the afternoon to the Moravian Chapel in Fetter Lane. The minister preached from Rev. iii. 10. I was much impressed. I thought of hastening to Tottenham Court Chapel, but presently altered my mind, and returned to my own house. I was hardly got home, when I felt myself melting away into a strange softness of affection which made me fling myself on my knees before God. My horrors were immediately expelled, and such light and comfort flowed into my heart as no words can paint. The Lord, by His Spirit of love, came not in a visionary manner into my brain, but with such Divine power and energy into my soul that I was lost in blissful amazement. I cried out, What, me, Lord? His Spirit answered in me, Yes, thee! I objected, But I have been so unspeakably vile and wicked! The answer was, I pardon thee freely and fully! The alteration I then felt in my soul was as sudden and palpable as that which is experienced by a person staggering and almost sinking under a burden when it is immediately taken from his shoulders. Tears ran in streams from my eyes for a considerable while, and I was so swallowed up in joy and thankfulness that I hardly knew where I was. I threw myself willingly into my Saviours hands; lay weeping at His feet, wholly resigned to His will, and only begging that I might, if He were graciously pleased to permit it, be of some service to His Church and people. . . . Jesus Christ and Him crucified is now the only thing I desire to know. All things to me are rich only when they are enriched with the blood of the Lamb. In this remarkable course of soul discipline, and this deep experience of Divine mercy through the sufferings and death of the Saviour whom he had blasphemed, is to be found the secret of that spiritual freshness and touching power of his hymn on the passion and the cross. None but a heart like his could have uttered his hymn on Good Friday :— Oh! what a sad and doleful night Preceded that days morn, When darkness seized the Lord of light, And sin by Christ was borne! When our intolerable load Upon His soul was laid, And the vindictive wrath of God Flamed furious on His head! We in our Conqueror well may boast: For none but God alone Can know how dear the victory cost, How hardly it was won. Forth from the garden fully tried, Our bruised Champion came, To suffer what remaind beside Of pain, and grief, and shame. Mockd, spat upon, and crownd with thorns, A spectacle He stood; His back with scourges lashed and torn, A victim bathed in blood. Kaild to the cross through hands and feet, He hung in open view; To make His sorrows quite complete, By God deserted too! Through natures works the woes He felt With soft infection ran; The hardest things could break or melt, Except the heart of man! This day before Thee, Lord, we come, Oh, melt our hearts, or break; For, shouM we now continue dumb, The very stones would speak! True, Thou hast paid the heavy debt, And made believers clean; But he knows nothing of it yet Who is not grieved at sin. A faithful friend of grief partakes; But union can be none Betwixt a heart like melting wax And hearts as hard as stone; Betwixt a Head diffusing blood, And members sound and whole; Betwixt an agonizing God, And an unfeeling soul. Lord, my longd happiness is full, When I can go with Thee To Golgotha: the place of skull Is heavn on earth to me!
Posted on: Sun, 25 Jan 2015 06:45:00 +0000