Thomas Charles was a leader among the second generation of Calvinistic Methodists in Wales during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. He is known for his work in founding the British and Foreign Bible Society (BFBS) and for establishing the Sunday school movement throughout Wales to teach the Bible and catechism in the medium of Welsh to children and adults. He consolidated and codified the Calvinistic Methodist movement in Wales during a turbulent time of transition through his published writings and public ministry – taking on the mantle of leadership following the death of William Williams, Pantycelyn in 1791. He is principally known for his Geiriadur Ysgrythyrol (‘Scriptural Dictionary’) and for his catechism Yr Hyfforddwr (‘The Instructor’). These documents explore themes developed in the context of Post-Reformation Reformed theology and firmly locate Thomas Charles within the milieu of European Reformed orthodoxy. This essay will explore the contents and offer commentary on Thomas Charles’ catechism in English with choice quotations from Puritan and Reformed writings as a point of comparison with Charles’ theology. The full title of Thomas Charles’ catechism is The Christian Instructor or Catechism on the Principals of the Christian Religion based on the revised edition published by his grandson Rev. David Charles in 1867.[1] All references in the footnotes are to this edition of the text.
The Doctrine of God
The first chapter considers the doctrine of God – also known as theology proper in systematics. Theology comes from the Greek meaning a study or discourse concerning God. Thomas Charles begins with the question ‘Who made you?’ and answers concisely: ‘God’.[2] A simple yet profound reminder that we are created beings and that there is a Creator-creature distinction between ourselves and the almighty God. Charles cites the psalm: ‘It is he that made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture’ (Psalm 100: 3).[3] Not only therefore has God made us, but he also cares for us as the divine Shepherd of his sheep. The verse ties together the doctrine of creation and providence. God not only makes us, but he also watches over us pastorally, shepherds us, and guides us. Having determined our basic relationship to God, Charles considers the nature of God’s being: ‘What is God?’, he asks, ‘God is a spirit’.[4] In other words, God has no body or parts. He is not composed of various pieces like a machine but is a most pure and holy spirit – immortal, invisible, and almighty. And there is but one God only with this nature – as the Shema prayer reminds us: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord’ (Deuteronomy 6:4). Though there is but one true and living God, yet there are three persons in the Godhead: ‘the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost’.[5] Each of these three persons are ‘co-equal and co-eternal’ in power and in glory. Charles confesses that this ‘a great mystery to be believed and not to be comprehended’.[6] It is a reasonable doctrine, but not an exhaustively comprehensible one to finite human minds.
The three persons of the Holy Trinity are one true God, yet certain operations are more especially attributed to them distinctly: ‘Creation and Election to the Father; Redemption and Intercession to the Son; and Sanctification to the Holy Ghost’.[7] Though there is ontological equality between the three persons of the Godhead so that each person is fully and truly God, yet there is economic subordination between the three persons and a certain definite order: the Father is of none, neither begotten nor created; the Son is eternally begotten of the Father; and the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. In terms of attributes shared by all three persons of the Holy Trinity, Charles argues that God is almighty, omniscient, omnipresent, eternal, unchangeable, great, wise, merciful, faithful, holy, just, and good.[8] And these attributes belong to the Godhead infinitely, eternally, and unchangeably. No one attribute is more important than any other attribute and each attribute may be attributed to the one God as pure and simple being without composition or parts. Jesus Christ is the complete picture of God. According to Patrick Gillespie, ‘There is a full manifestation of the attributes of God in Jesus Christ, the Mediator of the new covenant. These attributes that were never manifested before, [such as his] mercy and longsuffering, are revealed in Him; and these that were manifested before shine more brightly through Christ’.[9] The entire glory of God shines most clearly and simply in the face of Jesus Christ. He is everything that God is.
The Doctrine of Creation
Charles invites us to consider the doctrine of creation and to think about what God created beside man. According to Charles, ‘God created all things in heaven and earth’.[10] There is nothing that exists that does not receive its existence, being, and sustenance from God as creator and sustainer of the entire cosmos. According to Stephen Charnock, ‘The whole creation is a poem, every species a stanza and every individual creature a verse in it. The creation presents us with a prospect of the wisdom of God, as a poem doth the reader with the wit and fancy of the composer. By wisdom He created the earth (Proverbs 3:19) and stretched out the heavens by discretion (Jeremiah 10:12). There is not anything so mean, so small, but glitters with a beam of divine skill’.[11] Heaven and earth belong to God almighty: ‘I am the Lord that makes all things; that stretches forth the heavens alone, that spreads abroad the earth by myself’ (Isaiah 44:24). According to Thomas Charles, God created the cosmos ‘out of nothing’ or ex nihilo in the technical theological language. As the writer to the Hebrews reminds us: ‘Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear’ (Hebrews 11:3). This all raises the question: why did God create the heavens and the earth and all things visible and invisible in the first place? ‘For what purpose did God create the world? For the purpose of manifesting His own glory’.[12] Creation is the theatre wherein God displays his own glory. This is not to say that there was a need in God for the creation, but that God created out of the freedom of his sovereign good pleasure. In terms of providence, God is said to uphold and govern the world which he has created: ‘He upholds and rules over all things’.[13] Since God is all-present, he is able to sustain and uphold all things by the word of his power in every part of his creation (Hebrews 1:3).
Charles argues that God created the world in six days and rested on the seventh day which he consecrated as the Sabbath.[14] Charles does not explore the meaning of the six days of creation as to whether they were literal 24-hour days or whether they may be taken to represent substantially longer periods of time equivalent to the geological ages discovered by modern science. Charles identifies the first covenantal representatives of humankind as Adam and Eve – our first parents and federal representatives under the covenant of works.[15] There are two parts making up a human being, according to Thomas Charles, namely body and soul (sometimes the word ‘spirit’ is used interchangeably in Scripture with the word ‘soul’, but these parts do not designate a trichotomy in humankind).[16] In other words, human beings are a psychosomatic unity of body and soul – neither being designed to be without the other. Man was originally made from the dust of the earth and upon death – which is the separation of the soul from the body – ‘the dust [shall] return to the earth as it was; and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it’ (Ecclesiastes 12:7). Charles highlights the fact that Eve was made from Adam’s side while he was in a deep sleep.[17] As Matthew Henry famously commentated, ‘The woman was made of a rib out of the side of Adam; not made out of his head to rule over him, nor out of his feet to be trampled upon by him, but out of his side to be equal with him, under his arm to be protected, and near his heart to be beloved’.[18] Humankind was originally place in the Garden of Eden ‘to dress it and to keep it, and to have dominion over every living thing’.[19] Adam was not created for indolence, but to work and live for the glory of God. Work – both physical and mental – is a good thing and only became burdensome to humankind after the Fall of our first parents in the Garden of Eden.
The Corruption of Humanity
God originally created Adam and Eve in a holy and happy state after his own image and likeness: ‘So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female, created he them’ (Genesis 1:27).[20] Humankind was originally created with true knowledge, righteousness, and holiness – and yet was liable to fall by personal choice. Adam and Eve did not abide in this happy and holy estate but rebelled against God and fell into sin and disobedience.[21] As the writer of Ecclesiastes reminds us, ‘God made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions’ (Ecclesiastes 7:29). Humanity fell into a sinful and miserable estate through disobeying the commandment of God. According to Thomas Brooks, ‘There are five things we lost in our fall: (1) Our holy image and [we] became vile. (2) Our sonship and [we] became slaves. (3) Our friendship and [we] became enemies. (4) Our communion [with God] and [we] became strangers. (5) [And] our glory and [we] became miserable’.[22] The commandment originally given to Adam forbade him from eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, though every other tree in the garden was open to him for his sustenance, pleasure, and delight. According to Charles, ‘The man was beguiled by the woman, and the woman by the serpent’.[23] Though Adam had been created upright, yet he was liable to sin against God and acquiesce into temptation from Satan who is represented as a formidable serpent. Because of his disobedience, Adam died and lost the image of God in which he had been created. He died to God in three ways: spiritually (dead in trespasses and sins), naturally (in the separation of soul from body at physical death), and eternally (liable to the wrath of God forever in hell).[24] All humankind – represented federally by Adam – sinned and fell with him into an estate of misery and death. Humankind inherited the guilt and corruption of Adam and tarnished the image of true knowledge, righteousness, and holiness. God himself was greatly offended by the sin of humankind against his infinite majesty and glory and his wrath burns hot against those in Adam who rebel and sin against his holy word. In the words of the Apostle Paul, ‘The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men’ (Romans 1:18). There is no way of deliverance for humankind without the shedding of blood for the forgiveness of sin (Hebrews 9:22).[25] There is nothing in humankind deserving of deliverance or clemency from God. Humankind is wholly alienated from God and stands in enmity towards his justice, goodness, and truth. Such is his holiness that God would be perfectly justified in leaving all humankind in this miserable state for all eternity and his ‘righteousness would surely be glorious in the eternal punishment of sinners’.[26]
The Person of Christ and the Covenant of Grace
However, the Lord God was not pleased to leave humankind in that miserable estate into which he had fallen through sin and offer victory to the hand of Satan.[27] He had eternally chosen to rescue and deliver humankind by sending his Son Jesus Christ into the world to save sinners: ‘For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him, should not perish, but have everlasting life’ (John 3:16). This first Gospel promise or protoevangelium was revealed to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:15) in which the seed of the woman (Christ) would bruise the head of the serpent (Satan) who had deceived them. According to Charles, Christ was called the seed of the woman because he was to assume human nature and become a real man – a second Adam.[28] He was to be born of the virgin Mary, the mother of God, and become bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh, consubstantial with us according to the humanity. The serpent represents the devil or Satan in the narrative of Eden – a fallen and malicious spirit who deceived our first parents. He was called a serpent because of his deception, malice, and enmity towards God and his elect people, and because of his devices and craftiness to deceive all humanity.[29] This serpent Christ would utterly destroy by his death upon the cross (Colossians 2:15).
Jesus Christ is both God according to his divinity and man according to his humanity.[30] He is truly God and so mighty to save us, and he is truly a man and so fit to represent us. He was ever God in his eternal essence as the Apostle John reminds us in the prologue to his Gospel (John 1:1), and he was born of the virgin Mary and so consubstantial with us according to his humanity (Luke 1:35). According to Charles, ‘Unless He were God, He could not have saved us … Unless He were man, He could not have suffered and died for us’.[31] Some important theological points follow from these considerations with respect to the covenant of grace. Firstly, in the words of Thomas Charles, ‘God in eternity elected his Son to be a Covenant-Head and Surety for His people’.[32] With respect to eternal predestination, God first elected and chose His Son Jesus Christ and made him the representative of humanity. Secondly, ‘God gave to Him, in an invincible decree, His elect people to redeem and save’.[33] The elect were chosen in Christ and belong to Him as his special people whom he would effectually redeem by his blood and sacrifice upon the cross. Finally, according to Charles, ‘When the fulness of time was come, God sent forth His son to the world: “who verily was pre-ordained before the foundation of the world but was manifest in these last times for you” (1 Peter 1:20)’.[34]
The Two Covenants Compared
Thomas Charles identifies, compares, and contrasts two theological covenants in Scripture: the covenant of works and the covenant of grace. Thomas Charles omits any mention of the covenant of redemption as a possible third covenant revealed in Holy Scripture – which leaves the reader to speculate as to his views on the matter of a pactum salutis between the persons of the Godhead. According to Charles, Adam was our covenantal representative in the covenant of works and failed to obey the conditions set by God; but Christ is the head of the covenant of grace and fulfils all things needful to perfection: ‘For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive’ (1 Corinthians 15:22).[35] Under the covenant of works, Adam was to present his own righteousness and obedience as claim to justification and life – yet all he achieved was marred and broken by the Fall. The doctrine of human sinfulness was often the subject of scorn during Thomas Charles own lifetime as among his Puritan and Reformed forebearers, but as John Bunyan reminds us: sin has ‘a dagger up its sleeve’ [36]. It may seem attractive at first – a delight to the eyes – much as the forbidden fruit appealed to our first parents, but it is a deadly poison to humanity and leads us by the hand to a lost eternity. As our federal representative, Adam failed to do what God required of him by choosing to sin against his word and partake of the forbidden fruit. Under the covenant of grace, Christ offers eternal justification and everlasting life to all who believe upon His blood and righteousness – cleansing for all sin, even the sin of Adam. ‘There was no promise of forgiveness even for the least sin under the Covenant of Works; but the greatest sinners are called to receive forgiveness through Christ in the Covenant of Grace’.[37] Even the chief of sinners may find cleansing and peace in the blood and sacrifice of Christ.
The covenant of works was made with Adam before the fall of humanity into sin for the continued enjoyment of the happy life he possessed in the Garden of Eden. Adam’s perseverance in the covenant of works depended upon perfect and perpetual obedience of sheer natural strength; whereas in the covenant of grace, perseverance depends wholly upon the power, faithfulness, and intercession of Christ.[38] There was no priest in the covenant of works, but under the covenant of grace Jesus Christ was made a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek (Hebrews 6:20).[39] There was no mediator in the covenant of works, but Christ was appointed mediator of the new covenant between God and man under the covenant of grace.[40] There was no Surety in the covenant of works, but Christ was made a Surety of a better testament under the covenant of grace.[41] There was no prophet to teach us in the covenant of works, but Christ came teaching sinners the way of salvation under the covenant of grace and leading them by the hand to his heavenly Father.[42] He was a prophet greater than Moses; a priest greater than Aaron; and a King greater than David. And his covenant of grace was sure, free, everlasting, advantageous, and holy – and through it ‘we inherit God and all His attributes; Christ, and all the gifts of redemption; [and] the Holy Ghost and [all] His gifts; and all things contained in all the promises of God’[43].
The Offices of Christ
Jesus came into the world to save sinners (1 Timothy 1:15). This was his great mission and purpose in life.[44] He did not come as an adult human being as Adam was originally created, but as child in the manger in humility, poverty, and lowliness. Thomas Charles reminds us that Christ was born in Bethlehem of Judea – into the realities of geography and history.[45] In other words, this story is no myth. It is reality. He was formed without sin in the womb of the virgin Mary, the mother of God. And unlike the rest of human posterity descending from Adam, Christ was conceived in a sinless estate by the power of the Holy Spirit. He lived a perfect life free from all sin.[46] He loved God his Father with a perfect and holy love, and his neighbour as he loved himself. As Peter says, ‘He did not sin, neither was guile found in his mouth’ (1 Peter 2:22). There was never a bad word on the lips of Christ. His speech was always seasoned with grace and mercy. He was obedient to his parents (Mary and Joseph) and did not despise their poverty but was subject to them in all humility and grace. For this reason, children ought to obey their parents and all those in authority above them after the example of Christ. As the Apostle Paul says, ‘Children, obey your parents in the Lord; for this is right, and well-pleasing unto the Lord’ (Ephesians 6:1–2).[47]
What is the meaning of the name Jesus Christ? His name ‘Jesus’ means ‘Saviour’ for he shall save his people from their sins (Matthew 1:21). The name ‘Christ’ is not a surname, but a royal title. It means ‘the anointed one’ (Isaiah 61:1).[48] Jesus Christ was anointed by God the Father with the Holy Spirit to the royal offices of Prophet, Priest, and King – also known as the munus triplex or threefold office.[49] As a prophet, Christ teaches his people by his word and spirit the will of God for salvation. He teaches them to know God and Jesus Christ whom the Father sent into the world. He also teaches them to know his mind and will in his everlasting Gospel and to know themselves as sinners in need of mercy. He teaches by his word given in the Holy Scriptures and effectually in the heart by the Holy Spirit.[50] As a priest, Jesus Christ offered himself once upon the cross as ‘a sacrifice for His people’.[51] Notice how Charles is careful to say that Christ’s sacrifice is for his chosen people and not for all mankind generally – thereby affirming the doctrine of particular and sovereign redemption. The Lord Christ in his work as high priest makes continual intercessions for his chosen people in heaven. As a king, Christ subdues the rebellious and makes them obedient to his law, he rules sovereignly in the hearts of his people by his grace and mercy, and he defends and delivers his people from all evil and the wiles of Satan.[52]
The sum of Christ’s obedience is revealed in his magnification of God’s holy and sacred law which Christ made honourable by his life, death, and resurrection.[53] He obeyed its precepts and endured its curses. ‘He humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross’ (Philippians 2:8). The sum of the law is to love God with all our hearts, and our neighbour as ourselves – this Christ did unto perfection even as he suffered the extremities of the cross. He chose to magnify the law because it is holy, just, and good (Romans 7:12). And it was necessary for Christ to obey the law in all its parts so that the Scripture might be fulfilled in him, and all righteousness obtained for his chosen people. It was also necessary that he should suffer the curse of God for the sins of his people to remove the guilt of sin and the punishment due to unrighteousness.[54] Christ therefore suffered the accursed death of the cross to redeem his people from their sins and fulfil all righteousness before the holy law of God. Thomas Charles reminds us that the events of the crucifixion took place in the reality of history.[55] He was crucified with two thieves, one on the right hand, and the other on the left. He was condemned to die by Pontius Pilate, the governor of Judea. And this all happened in the reality of geography and history on mount Calvary outside the gates of Jerusalem.
The sufferings of Christ were a propitiation for our sins (Romans 3:25–26). According to Thomas Charles, they were ‘a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, offering, and satisfaction for all that believe in Him of the whole world’.[56] This is a carefully worded sentence in the catechism. Charles is saying that although Christ’s death was sufficient for all (in that he would not have needed to suffer any more for the redemption of humanity), it was only effective for those who believe and had been chosen and called by God before the foundation of the world. In other words, the atonement was efficient or effectual only for God’s elect people in Christ. His resurrection and ascension were the proof that his sacrifice had been acceptable to God the Father. ‘He was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification (Romans 4:25). Christ was crucified, dead, and buried – but on the third day he rose again and was seen by many witnesses. He also ascended into heaven from where he shall come again with glory to judge the living and the dead.[57] Christ was buried in the new tomb of Joseph of Arimathea – a tomb in which no other body had been laid. As Isaiah says, ‘And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death’ (Isaiah 53:9). Christ rose in the reality of spacetime ‘on the morning of the third day’.[58] In a way wholly mysterious to humanity, Christ was able to rise by himself from the dead. According to the Gospel of John, he had the authority to give up his life in death and the power to take it back again in new life (John 10:18). In a sense, all of Christ’s obedience was an active obedience since he gave himself voluntarily in death and brought himself back in the power of an endless life.
His resurrection from the dead was a clear proof of his divinity (Romans 1:4). He was stronger than death and broke its chains by his infinite power and glory as the Son of God. Death could not hold him. The grave could not hold him. He arose. He abolished death once and for all and destroyed him that had the power of death. Christ is the Lord of the living and the dead. He holds the keys of death and hell. According to Thomas Watson, ‘Christ did not rise from the dead as a private person but as the public head of the church, and the head being raised, the rest of the body shall not always lie in the grave. Christ’s rising is a pledge of our resurrection’.[59] Christ ascended into heaven at the end of forty days after his resurrection as a public person.[60] He ascended in the same body in which he had suffered and was translated to glory: high above all heaven, victorious over all our and his enemies, and with the authority to send the gift of the Holy Spirit in due course.[61] There is a man in glory – a real man who ever lives to make intercession for us. And Christ will come again from heaven at the end of the world to judge the living and the dead and ‘neither is there salvation in any other; for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved’ (Acts 4:14).[62]
The Doctrine of Faith and Justification
According to Thomas Charles, the only way a sinner can be justified before God is through faith in the righteousness of Christ: ‘Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith, without the deeds of the law’ (Romans 3:28; 10:3). This is the classic Lutheran and Reformed position on the doctrine of justification by faith alone (sola fide).[63] Charles says that it is impossible for anyone to satisfy the justice of God by his own righteousness or good works since even our very best deeds are as ‘filthy rags’ before a holy God (Isaiah 64:6), tainted with the guilt and corruption of sin.[64] The righteousness of Christ however consists in his perfect obedience to the law of God and the satisfaction he gave to the justice of God in his death. Charles is quite clear that Christ intended to die for the elect only and not for all humankind generally: ‘For whom did Christ die?’, he asks, ‘For His elect people, given to Him by the Father’.[65] As Christ says in the Gospel of John, ‘I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep’ (John 10:11). Christ does not lay down his life for all humankind generally, but for his sheep only – the chosen of his pasture. Christ died for his elect people as their Surety who pays their debts and dies in their stead. As Isaiah says, ‘He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes we are healed (Isaiah 53:5, emphasis my own). Penal substitution only makes sense within the context of Reformed orthodoxy and the doctrine of particular redemption. Christ died for us. There is a double imputation at the heart of the cross: the sins of God’s elect were imputed to Christ and considered as belonging to him, and the righteousness of Christ was imputed to God’s elect and applied effectually to them by the Holy Spirit.
What is justification and who is responsible for it? ‘It is God who justifies’ – as Paul says in Romans 8:33. Justification is a sovereign act of ‘God’s free grace, imputing the righteousness of Christ to a guilty sinner, by faith’.[66] It is a forensic or legal term and considers our right judicial standing before a holy God. Those who are justified by faith are declared righteous and acquitted before God as their judge and the sole arbiter of good – not on account of any work or merit of their own, but solely on the basis of the righteousness and sacrifice of Christ as their Surety and mediator. Moreover, the sinner is brought into a special or mystical union (unio mystica) with Christ himself ‘through the powerful working of the Holy Spirit generating faith in the soul to come to Christ, and to accept Him’.[67] Faith is the hand of the soul. In the words of Thomas Watson, ‘Faith is the golden clasp that knits us to Christ’.[68] It receives the gift of salvation freely offered in the Gospel. Faith means a certain confidence and trust in God’s testimony – especially as revealed in Holy Scripture. ‘Justifying faith is to believe God’s testimony concerning His Son in particular, and to rest upon Him for salvation’.[69] Faith clings to Christ. Even faith as small as a mustard seed or as thin as a spider’s web, if it is found in Christ then it is true and saving faith. Faith lays hold of a righteousness that is divine and godlike as it comes to us from the hands of eternal Son of God; a righteousness that is wholly sufficient and to which nothing need be added; an everlasting righteousness that will neither tarnish nor fade away; and a righteousness that is freely given to lost sinners – without money and without price.[70]
Our union with Christ is a real union (we become partakers of the divine nature); it is an exalted and mysterious union; an inseparable union (once in Christ, in Christ forever); and an advantageous union in the blessing and gifts we receive from being one with Christ.[71] Charles identifies several advantages and benefits that come from being mystically united to Christ by faith: Firstly, Christ himself becomes ours in all his relations and offices: such as a friend, a surety, a physician, a brother, a redeemer, a husband, a prophet, a king, a merciful high priest, and an advocate on our behalf before God.[72] And the righteousness of Christ becomes ours by faith, through which we are delivered from condemnation, and receive a title to eternal life.[73] According to Samuel Cradock, ‘It is a righteousness wrought by Jesus Christ, resulting from His active and passive obedience; it consists both of His active conformity and obedience to the law and also of His suffering the curse and penalty which the law required’.[74] In other words, we receive the whole Christ by faith. His righteousness become ours through faith. And through union with Christ, we are adopted to be the children of God – and if children then heirs of Christ and of his everlasting kingdom.[75] And through union with Christ, we receive our spiritual life and strength to bring forth good fruit in keeping with repentance. Those whom God saves; he also sanctifies. Those whom he chooses, he also changes to be conformed to the image of his Son.[76] And finally, through union with Christ, the saints will have a glorious resurrection, and will be made co-heirs with Christ in heaven. Christians united with Christ anticipate the resurrection of the body and the glorious life of the world to come.[77]
Thomas Charles closes this section by comparing our covenantal union with Adam and Christ respectively. According to Charles, we participate with Adam in his fall and punishment, and we are justly considered to be guilty sinners in him. When Adam fell, humanity fell. Through our union with Adam, we became corrupt and guilty sinners, polluted, and lost through sin; but with Christ as our federal head, we are cleansed and saved by grace through faith. Redemption is not simply a matter of turning back the clocks and restoring to humanity what was lost in Adam. There is much more in Christ for those who trust and believe in him:
We received through Christ the whole of what we lost in Adam, and much more; because the righteousness of Christ surpasses in goodness the evil that is in sin: “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly”; “Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound” (John 10:10; Romans 5:20).[78]
There are riches untold yet to be found in Christ and an eternity with him. We are not simply looking forward to the idea of paradise, but towards ‘a new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness’ (2 Peter 3:13).
The Work of the Holy Spirit
In terms of soteriology, the principal work of the Holy Spirit is ‘the sanctifying and changing of sinners into the image of God’.[79] Thomas Charles is careful to point out that only the elect people of God are chosen for sanctification by the Holy Spirit. They are ‘elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctification of the Spirit unto obedience, and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus’ (1 Peter 1:2).[80] We must be careful not to grieve the Holy Spirit through neglect of spiritual graces and duties and we must work out our salvation with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12). According to John Flavel, ‘You see [the Holy Spirit] is God, the Rock of Israel. God omnipotent, for He created all things (Genesis 1:31). God omnipresent, filling all things (Psalm 139:7). God omniscient who knows your hearts (Romans 8:27). Beware therefore of grieving Him, for in so doing you grieve God’.[81] It is the work of the Holy Spirit to cleanse and sanctify our hearts. This work is described in Scripture as the new birth or being born again; as a resurrection from spiritual death; and as a new creation in Christ Jesus ‘which nothing but the almighty power of God can accomplish’.[82] It is also described as the 'circumcision of the heart’ (Deuteronomy 30:6; 10:16); the giving of a new heart and a new spirit (Ezekiel 36: 25–27; 11:19; Jeremiah 32:39); and the putting of God’s holy law into the mind and writing it upon the heart (Hebrews 8:10).[83] These changes occur by the power of the Holy Spirit at work in the human heart. According to Charles, the Holy Spirit produces this change in the sinner’s heart ‘by uniting the soul to Christ; because through union with Christ we receive every grace and privilege’.[84] The Holy Spirit brings us to Christ via several means: though conviction of sin in the heart, though Jesus Christ as the all-sufficient saviour for the sinner, and by enabling sinners to rely on Christ for salvation.[85] ‘No man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost’ (1 Corinthians 2:3).
Thomas Charles opens the question of hamartiology under the subheading of pneumatology. This is an unusual place to consider the doctrine of sin but is perhaps related to Thomas Charles view that the Holy Spirit convicts the world of sin, righteousness, and judgement (John 16:8). Charles argues that ‘sin is the transgression of the law … [Such transgression is any] want of conformity with God’s law in thought, word, or deed’.[86] There are sins of commission in which we deliberately violate God’s commandments by lying or stealing for example, but there are sins of omission by not doing what we ought to do such as helping someone in need. The latter may be unconscious and unintentional – an omission, but the former is always deliberate and intentional – a personal choice to disobey or disbelieve God. Original sin is the ‘imputation of Adam’s first sin to us, and the curse on account of it, together with the total corruption of our nature in consequence of it’.[87] When Adam fell in sin, the entire cosmos was plunged into a curse from God. We inherit the guilt and corruption of Adam because of the Fall. Actual sins are the consequence of original sin. We sin because we are sinners by nature. When the Holy Spirit brings conviction of sin to the heart, there is a deep and abiding sense of the total sinfulness of our fallen nature; a sense of the great wickedness and evil of sin; and a confirmation of God’s righteous judgement against us because of our sin.[88] Let us be thankful for the grace and mercy of Christ who is able to redeem us from the guilt and corruption of sin. As Richard Sibbes reminds us, ‘There is more mercy in Christ than sin in us’.[89] If you feel the depth of your sin, fly to Christ for clemency and pardon. His arms are stretched wide to welcome sinners to himself. He runs to meet the penitent sinner and has nothing but mercy for those who sincerely call upon his name in true repentance. Thomas Charles reminds us that repentance implies a deep humility and sorrow for sin before God, a hatred of sin, a diligent endeavour to be free of it, a renewal in the spirit of the mind, a returning to God through the mercy of Christ, and a sincere desire to lead a new way of life.[90] When God forgives, he does so justly, freely, entirely, and eternally.[91] Once in him, in him forever.
The Holy Spirit tends to hide himself and magnify Christ: ‘He reveals Jesus Christ as a sufficient Saviour for sinners’.[92] The principal means whereby the Holy Spirit magnifies Christ are his word and the ordinances of the Gospel. Those who receive this revelation are truly convicted of sin and changed by the Spirit of God. In magnifying Christ, the Holy Spirit reveals several things concerning him: his pre-eminence, his majesty, and the glory of his person; his appointment by God to the office of mediator, the all-sufficiency of his sacrifice for human sin; the unsearchable riches of his grace; and his willingness to receive and pardon sinners.[93] The Holy Spirit softens our heart to welcome Christ and shows us the sweetest and most tender love which draws out our love for him: ‘We love him, because he first loved us’ (1 John 4:19). He causes us to abandon all other loves and rest upon him alone for salvation. He grants us peace with God and growth in true holiness.[94] Thomas Charles takes an excursus to consider the glory of God and Christ as revealed by the Holy Spirit. He argues that God’s glory is seen in the beauty and majesty of creation, in God’s sustaining power over all created things, in the mystery of his providence, in his holy and infallible word, and supremely in the face of Jesus Christ who bears all the attributes of God and shines with a matchless glory.[95] All the glory of God shines in the face of Jesus Christ. We see all the attributes of God in the person and work of Christ – especially the love of God towards lost humanity. We see the depths of the riches of the wisdom on God in the life and ministry of Christ. We see the pure holiness and infinite justice of God in the sufferings and sacrifice of Christ for lost humanity. And in beholding the face of Christ, we ourselves are changed and sanctified by the Holy Spirit. ‘By our looking at the love of God in the face of Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost sheds abroad the love of God in our hearts’.[96] Since Christ has shown such love and mercy to us, we ourselves show mercy, love, and forgiveness to others. The intensity with which God punished sin in the person of Christ will move us to hate sin in all its manifestations, love holiness, and pursue Christlikeness in all our thoughts, words, and deeds.
Charles returns to the work of the Holy Spirit in those who are being sanctified. He highlights several key aspects of the Spirit’s work in God’s elect people. The Spirit of God comforts his people in all the sorrows of life, he seals them and strengthens their faith and consecration to God, he dwells in them as the guarantee of their inheritance in Christ, he makes intercession for them with groanings that cannot be uttered, he guides and leads them in all righteousness, he teaches them the truths of the Gospel, he quickens and strengthens them to do the will of God, and he will raise their bodies and glorify them in Christ at the last day.[97] Similarly William Beveridge explained the work of the Holy Spirit in terms of his friendship and communion towards us: ‘God the Spirit is our friend: in the illumination of our understandings (Ephesians 1:17–18); [in the] conviction of our sins (John 16:8); [in the] mortification of our corruptions (Romans 8:13); [in the] sanctification of our natures (Ezekiel 36:25); [in the] direction of us in duty and [in] helping us (Romans 8:14, 26); [and in the] consolation of our hearts (John 14:16)’.[98] The Spirit operates in God’s people with an invincible power, with absolute sovereignty, and with perfect freedom.[99] Our duty is to pray for the Holy Spirit, to worship God in Spirit and in truth, to walk in the ways of the Spirit, and to thankfully acknowledge the Spirit in his gracious operations, gifts, and mercies towards us. We must beware of provoking and grieving the Holy Spirit by our sin, and must not quench the Spirit of God.[100]
Christians are to bear the fruit of the Holy Spirit and manifest his graces and mercies towards others. As the Apostle Paul reminds us, ‘The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance; against such there is no law’ (Galatians 5:22–23). Notice that the word ‘fruit’ is in the singular, meaning that Christians are to bear all this fruit collectively and not merely selected fruits of the Spirit. This is to be the whole character of the Christian life. Paul warns Timothy that some may have ‘the form of godliness but deny the power thereof’ (2 Timothy 3:5). Some may even manifest the gifts of the Spirit as many did in the Corinthian church, but without the effectual grace of the Holy Spirit in their hearts, they can never bear true fruit in keeping with repentance. As the Lord Christ says, ‘A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruits’ (Matthew 7:18). Unbelievers bring forth bad fruit. ‘The works of the flesh are manifest, which are these: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envying, murders, drunkenness, revelling, and such like’ (Galatians 5: 13, 19, 20, 21). Those who do such things will never inherit the kingdom of God without the cleansing of the blood and righteousness of Christ. Those rescued by the Holy Spirit – regenerated and sanctified by him – are wholly freed from the lordship and dominion of sin, though not from the presence of indwelling sin in their hearts and lives.[101]
The Law of God and Ten Commandments
There is a threefold division of the Mosaic law in Scripture into civil, ceremonial, and moral aspects. The civil and ceremonial laws have been abrogated in Christ (though they point to his person and work typologically). The moral law remains in force as a rule of life and holiness for the Christian and as a witness against the sins of the unbeliever according to which he shall be judged before God. Charles focuses on the moral law God as a rule of life for the believer and not as a means of obtaining redemption by good works. According to Charles, the only way in which a sinner can be justified before God is ‘through the obedience and death of Christ’ and not by his own merits.[102] The moral law is principally revealed in the ten commandments given to Moses on Mount Sinai in the context of Israel’s redemption from Egypt. Echoing Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion on the various uses of the moral law, Charles describes the decalogue as ‘a pure mirror’ in which is seen ‘the infinite holiness, justice, and goodness of God … the total depravity and guilt of man … the perfection of Christ’s righteousness in His obedience to the law for His people … [and] the nature of the Holy Spirit’s work on the heart of a sinner, in preparing him for glory’.[103] Calvin argues for a threefold use of the law in his Institutes: firstly, it reveals our sin as a mirror reveals spots of dirt upon our face; secondly, it restrains the outward manifestation of sin in terms of its civil and political use; and thirdly, it shows the Christian a way of life and holiness in the light of God’s grace – this being its principal use for the believer.[104] Charles reminds us that the Christian is no longer under the law as a covenant of works, but under the mercy and grace of a better covenant. He quotes from the robustly Calvinistic hymn by Augustus Montague Toplady (1740–78) – ‘The terrors of law and of God / With me can have nothing to do; / My Saviour’s obedience and blood / Hide all my transgression from view’ – reminding us as Christians that sin shall no longer be our master, for we are no longer under the law, but under grace (Romans 6:14).[105]
The sum of the law consists in love (Romans 13:10). We are called to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love our neighbour as we love ourselves (Matthew 22: 37–40). We should love God simply ‘because of the infinite loveliness of His perfections in Himself’, and because of his abounding love and goodness towards us in Christ.[106] Those who love God choose him forever to be their potion, they diligently worship him in spirit and in truth, they honour God in their conduct, and conscientiously set apart their time for the public worship of God – especially the Sabbath as the seventh day which God blessed and consecrated as a day of rest to his glory and honour.[107] We should love our neighbours because God commands it and because our neighbour who is made after the image and likeness of a holy God is equally worthy of being loved as we love ourselves.[108] We ought to love all human beings equally (even our enemies with a love of good-will), but we are especially called to love our brothers and sisters in Christ. As the Apostle Paul reminds us, ‘Let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith’ (Galatians 6:10).
It is the peculiar work of the Holy Spirit to move our hearts with love for God and for our neighbour.[109] Those who love God keep his commandments (1 John 5:3). They worship no other Gods. They make no idols. They revere the name of God. They remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. They honour their mother and father and all those in authority over them. They neither kill nor commit adultery. They do not steal or bear false witness. And they do not covet anything belonging to their neighbour.[110] Without love, there is no work of grace in the heart. ‘Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge … and have not charity, I am nothing’ (1 Corinthians 13:1–2). The love that God requires of us is absolute. We must love God at all times and in all places. Love must engage all our heart, all our soul, all our strength, and all our mind. Any failure to love God in this way is sinful. None but Christ has loved God as he ought to be loved. All have failed and fallen short of his perfection and glory (Romans 3:23). The only way lost sinners can be freed from the curse of the law is ‘through faith in Christ alone’.[111] In the words of Thomas Adams, ‘The law gave menaces; the Gospel gives promises. It was the condition of the law, “Do this and live”; [but] it is the promise of the Gospel, “Believe and thou shalt be saved” … the office of the law is to kill, [but] the office of the [Gospel] promise [is] to give life’.[112] According to Thomas Charles, ‘the Holy Ghost sheds abroad the love of God in the hearts of those who believe in Christ’.[113] The Gospel sweetens the law with grace. The Holy Spirit gives us a new heart with new desires ‘by circumcising the heart and subduing the enmity within us’.[114] He creates love in our hearts towards God and applies the healing balm of the Gospel to our souls. ‘The letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life’ (2 Corinthians 3:6).
The Means of Grace and Holy Sacraments
Thomas Charles begins his discussion of the means of grace with a consideration of the enemies that every true Christian must wrestle against. The threefold enemy of the Christian is the world, the flesh, and the devil.[115] By the world, Charles intends all those things in society and culture that estrange our hearts from God. By the flesh, Charles means our fallen and sinful nature in Adam. And by the devil, Charles means that fallen and evil spirit also known as Satan who lives in rebellion towards God and hatred of humankind. Though the world, the flesh, and the devil may tempt us, it is we who choose to sin again God. As Alexander Carmichael reminds us, ‘It is not Satan that thinks or wills in us. He may represent objects, but the acts are ours. He can dart in a temptation, but it is through our sin and corruption that it takes fire in the least’.[116] Christians are to overcome these enemies through faith in Christ, by avoiding every occasion of sin, by living in moderation and watchfulness, and by the diligent use of the means of grace.[117] The means which Christ has appointed for use in his church are: (1) the hearing of God’s word and the searching of the Scriptures; (2) diligent prayer in private and in public; and (3) the reverent and faithful use of the sacraments of baptism and Holy Eucharist.
Thomas Charles begins his examination of the means of grace with a consideration of prayer. He says that we are to pray in the Spirit and in the name of Jesus Christ without ceasing and with the full assurance of faith.[118] In the words of William Gurnall, ‘He is the best student in divinity that studies most upon his knees [in prayer]’.[119] We must be often in prayer with our families, privately in secret, and in public. There is no meeting more important to the life and wellbeing of the church than the prayer meeting. The second means of grace which Charles considers is the sacred word of God as given in the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments.[120] According to Thomas Charles, all Scripture is breathed out by God as Paul teaches in 2 Timothy 3:16: ‘All Scripture is given by the inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, [and] for instruction in righteousness’. God himself is the author of all Scripture: ‘Prophecy came not in old time by the will of man; but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost’ (2 Peter 1:21). We ought to hear the word of God publicly read and preached by ministers of the Gospel because it is the sacred word of God; because faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God (Romans 10:17); and because it is given for our instruction in all things pertaining to faith and salvation. In the words of William Gurnall, ‘That book must needs be worth reading which hath God for the author. That mystery deserves our knowledge which is the product of His infinite wisdom and love’.[121] The Bible is a love letter from God to lost humanity. It breathes life and love into all who partake of its riches by the Holy Spirit. It is a pearl of great price and a treasure worth hiding in the heart.
The final means of grace which Charles considers are the sacraments of baptism and Holy Eucharist. Contrary to the claims of the Roman Catholic Church, these are the only two sacraments ordained by Christ in Scripture (Matthew 28:19; Luke 22:19–20). The word Eucharist means ‘thanksgiving’ and is a reminder that we offer our thanks for the sacrifice of Christ during Holy Communion. According to Thomas Charles, Christ ordained the sacraments in his church to be signs and symbols of spiritual realities and to remind Christians of the great truths of the Gospel such as the washing of regeneration in baptism and the sufferings and sacrifice of Christ in Holy Communion. A sacrament consists of two parts: an outward visible sign and an inward, invisible grace. Baptism outwardly is the washing in water of penitent sinners in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19). Baptism is an outward sign of an inward grace in the heart and symbolises both regeneration and the mortification of sin. It is done in the name of the Holy Trinity since it was the Father who chose us from before the foundation of the world; the Son who redeemed us by his blood; and the Holy Spirit who regenerated and sanctified us according to his mercy. We should not receive baptism more than once since there is but ‘one Lord, one faith, one baptism, [and] one God and Father of all’ (Ephesians 4:5). This verse rules out the practice of re-baptism found among anabaptists who, though being baptised as infants, insist upon being baptised once more as believers. Such practices are contrary to the will of our Lord concerning the administration of baptism. We rightfully administer baptism to infants of believing parents as children of the covenant of grace because God is ready and willing to save them, because there is no evidence that they have been excluded under the Gospel administration, because baptism is the New Testament sign of circumcision, and because they are ‘fit subjects of grace and eternal salvation’.[122]
In the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist, according to Thomas Charles, we remember the death of Christ and all the benefits we receive from his grace and mercy.[123] According to John Owen, ‘There are three ways whereby God represents Christ to the faith of believers. The one is by the word of the Gospel itself, as written; the second is by the ministry of the gospel and preaching of the word; and the third is by this sacrament, wherein we represent the Lord’s death to the faith of our own souls’.[124] The outward signs of the Lord’s Supper are bread and wine (Matthew 23:26–28), but the inward reality presented in the sacrament is the body and blood of the Lord Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 10:16). The elements of Holy Eucharist are not literally the body and blood of Christ, masticated by the teeth as Roman Catholics teach, but rather represent a spiritual feast upon Christ as we remember his body broken for us upon the cross and his blood freely shed for the forgiveness of sins (John 6:54–55). We ought to frequent the Lord’s Supper in obedience to the command of Christ to remember his death until he comes again (1 Corinthians 11:24); in order to confess Christ before the world and proclaim his atonement as the only way of salvation; in order to feed upon Christ in faith and show our love and gratitude towards him; and in order to hold fellowship or communion with God in the sacrifice of his beloved Son.[125] Those who come to the Lord’s Supper ought to examine themselves as to whether they are truly penitent for their past sins; as to their intentions to lead a new way of life; as to whether they feel the sweetness of Christ’s offering for sinners; as to whether they trust in Christ alone and his cross for salvation; as to whether they come with thankful hearts in remembrance of his sufferings and death; and as to their love for lost humanity, for their brothers and sisters in Christ, and supremely for God himself.[126] Thomas Charles closes his discussion of the Lord’s Supper by reminding his readers of the danger of partaking of the sacrament unworthily and without true faith. However, the Lord’s Supper is an open table for sinners who truly repent of their sins and believe on Christ for their salvation.
Eschatology and the Second Coming
The Gospel is the good news that Christ lives. Though He was crucified, dead, and buried, yet he rose again on the third day. He broke the chains of death, rolled the stone away, left the fold graveclothes, and ascended into heaven. Christ was exalted by his resurrection and by his ascension into heaven. There is a man in the glory. He now sits and the right hand of God and will come again to judge the living and the dead. His resurrection and ascension show that the justice of God was fully satisfied, and that Christ was victorious over all our and his enemies.[127] He will most fully display his glory when he comes again to judge the world at the last day. ‘For it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this, the judgement’ (Hebrews 9:27). The dead will be raised from their graves on the day of judgement to face the Lord Christ. As the Gospel reminds us, ‘The hour is coming in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth: they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life: and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation’ (John 5:28–29). The righteous will have the place of honour in the resurrection in that they shall rise first and behold the wonderous sight of their glorious Saviour. They will be set at the right hand of Christ in the place of honour and esteem. They will judge the ungodly world by the holiness and purity of their lives in Christ. Their Gospel truths will judge those who disbelieved them. They will have bright and glorious bodies, perfect and incorruptible, strong, and united perfectly with their souls, without ever becoming weary. Their bodies will be spiritual, holy, and full of life and energy fit for the eternal service of God. Christ will openly acknowledge and own his people in the day of judgement and will wipe away ever tear from their eyes. The happiness of the righteous will be infinitely great and will consist in their likeness to Christ in body and soul, in their clear vision of God and his glory, in the joy and peace which they shall forever possess, and in the endless delight and pleasure they shall have in serving God and praising the Lamb who was slain from before the foundation of the world.[128]
Not so the wicked. They shall be raised in corruption and misery. ‘Their bodies, as well as their souls, will be corrupt, vile, and contemptible’.[129] The everlasting misery of the wicked will consist in their rejection by Christ who will deny that he ever knew them. They will not have the least degree of comfort for all eternity. They will – both body and soul – endure the wrath of a holy God for their sins. They will suffer blackest darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth, where the worm never dies and the fire does not go out, and where smoke of their torment rises for ever and ever. There will be no hope for them of deliverance or rest from their misery. They inherit a lost eternity.[130] We should learn from their misery something of the great evil of sin in that it deserves such awful punishment from God. We should see the wonderful mercy of God in providing Christ as a refuge for sinners to flee from the wrath to come. We should make the salvation of our souls in this life our utmost priority and we should labour for the conversion of lost sinners, freely inviting them to come and welcome Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour in this day of grace.[131]
The day of judgement will come at the end of this present age. The purpose of this great and terrible day will be for Christ to show himself victorious over sin, death, and hell in all his glory and majesty to be worshipped and admired by all the saints and angels. Christ will come in a most majestic and awful manner. His eyes will blaze like fire, and his feet will be as burnished bronze, and his voice will be like the roar of many waters. He will come suddenly and without expectation. We should not endlessly waste our time with speculation concerning numbers and dates regarding the end times. The Lord Christ says that no one knows the day or the hour when he shall return – not even the angels in heaven, nor the son of man, except the Father who is in heaven (Matthew 24:36). The Lord Christ will judge the fallen angels and all the children of men – none shall escape his judgement and watchful eyes. Every thought, word, and deed dishonourable to God will be revealed – even our secret sins, long buried, will become open and manifest to all. The godly will be known for their faith and fruits and supremely for their love of God and his beloved Son. The ungodly, even the very best of them, will manifest their lack of faith and their withered and corrupted fruit. Let us therefore labour to be found in Christ on that last day and to be rich in the fruit of the Holy Spirit. Our only claim to salvation on the last day will be the blood and righteousness of Christ as revealed in his holy Gospel. Let us therefore cling to Christ and his mercies in life that we might be ready to meet him in death and on the day of judgement.
Select Bibliography
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Charles, Thomas, Spiritual Counsels: Selected from His Letter and Papers by Edward Morgan (Edinburgh, 2021).
Charles, Thomas, The Christian Instructor or Catechism on the Principals of the Christian Religion (Caernarfon, 1867).
Davies, D. Eryl, No Difficulties with God: The Life of Thomas Charles of Bala (1755–1814) (Fearn, 2022).
Jenkins, D. E., The Life of the Rev. Thomas Charles, B.A., of Bala, 3 vols (Denbigh, 1908).
Jones, David Ceri, Boyd Stanley Schlenther, Eryn Mant White, The Elect Methodists: Calvinistic Methodism in England and Wales 1735–1811 (Cardiff, 2016).
Morgan, D. Densil (gol.), Thomas Charles o’r Bala (Caerdydd, 2014).
Murray, Iain H., ‘Thomas Charles of Bala’, in Heroes (Edinburgh, 2009), pp. 117–42.
Smith, Dale W., Ore from the Puritans' Mine: The Essential Collection of Puritan Quotations (Grand Rapids, MI, 2020).
[1]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor or Catechism on the Principals of
the Christian Religion (Caernarfon, 1867).
[2]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 3.
[3]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 3.
[4]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 3.
[5]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 3.
[6]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 4.
[7]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 4.
[8]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 4–5.
[9]
Patrick Gillespie, Ark of the Covenant Opened, p. 166.
[10]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 6.
[11]
Stephen Charnock, Selections, p. 84.
[12]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 6.
[13]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 6.
[14]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 6.
[15]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 6.
[17]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 7.
[18]
See Matthew Henry’s Bible Commentary on Genesis 2:21.
[19]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 7.
[20]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 7.
[21]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 7–8.
[22]
Thomas Brooks, Cabinet of Choice Jewels, p. 46.
[23]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 8.
[24]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 8–9.
[25]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 10.
[26]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 10.
[27]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 11.
[28]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 11.
[29]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 12.
[30]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 12.
[31]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 13.
[32]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 13.
[33]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 13.
[34]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 13.
[35]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 14.
[36]
John Bunyan, Complete Works, p. 1000.
[37]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 14.
[38]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 15.
[39]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 15.
[40]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 15–16.
[41]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 16.
[42]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 16.
[43]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 16–17.
[44]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 17.
[45]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 17.
[46]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 18.
[47]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 18.
[48]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 18–19.
[49]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 19–20.
[50]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 20.
[51] Thomas
Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 21.
[52]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 21.
[53]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 21–22.
[54]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 22.
[55]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 23.
[56]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 23.
[57]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 23–25.
[58]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 24.
[59]
Thomas Watson, Body of Practical Divinity, p. 204.
[60]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 25.
[61]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 25.
[62]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 25.
[63]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 25–26.
[64]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 26.
[65]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 26.
[66]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 27.
[67]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 27.
[68]
Thomas Watson, ‘A Christian on Earth Still in Heaven’, in Discourses,
1:280.
[69]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 28.
[70]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 28.
[71]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 29.
[72]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 30.
[73]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 30.
[74]
Samuel Cradock, Knowledge and Practice, part 2, p. 53.
[75]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 30.
[76]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 30.
[77]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 30.
[78]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 31. Emphasis my own.
[79]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 31.
[80]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 31–32.
[81]
John Flavel, Fountain of Life, p. 415.
[82]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 32.
[83]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 33.
[84]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 33.
[85]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 33–34.
[86]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 34.
[87]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 34.
[88]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 34–35.
[89]
Richard Sibbes, A Bruised Reed, pp. 31–32.
[90]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 35–36.
[91]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 36–37.
[92]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 37.
[93]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 38.
[94]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 38–39.
[95]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 39–40.
[96]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 40.
[97]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 41–42.
[98]
William Beveridge, Thesaurus Theologious, 4:27.
[99]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 43.
[100]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 43–44.
[101]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 44–45.
[102]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 45.
[103]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 48.
[104]
John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, II.vii.6–12.
[105]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 48–49.
[106]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 49.
[107]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 49–50.
[108]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 50.
[109]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 51.
[110]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 51–52.
[111]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 53.
[112]
Thomas Adams, Exposition upon Second Peter, p. 34.
[113]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 54.
[114]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 54.
[115]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 55–56.
[116]
Alexander Carmichael, Believer’s Mortification of Sin, p. 133.
[117]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 56.
[118]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 57–58.
[119]
William Gurnall, Christian in Complete Armour, p. 121.
[120]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 58–60.
[121]
William Gurnall, Christian in Complete Armour, p. 804.
[122]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 60–62.
[123]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 62–66.
[124]
John Owen, Twenty-Five Discourses, p. 52.
[125]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 63–64.
[126]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 64–65.
[127]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 66–69.
[128]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 69–73.
[129]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, p. 73.
[130]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 73–75.
[131]
Thomas Charles, The Christian Instructor, pp. 74–75.