Chapter VI: Letter VI: Valley of Achor, Sept. 1, 1818

M. A. HILL.

MY DEAR FRIEND,

I have many friends of your name, and thousands know I have also many enemies of the same name, though they never saw me; there are little hills of Zion, loved of the Lord, and hilly difficulties to encounter. I am sure you will smile, when I observe I have often noticed, that if God raises me up a friend, the Devil often raises me up an enemy of the same name; but this is the experience I have long had, of _mercies_ and _miseries_, dark _nights_ and cheerful _days_, heavy _losses_ and great spiritual _gains_, sore _temptations_ and seasonable _helps_; _tears_ and _smiles_, castings _down_ and liftings _up_, fits of _despair_ and lively _hopes_, the powers of _unbelief_ and the triumphs of _faith_, the heart at times _fretting_ against the Lord, then all at once sweet _submission_ to his will; a glorious _time_ in the pulpit, and the very next _time_, shut up, barren and dead: a sweet testimony from some poor soul of the Lord’s giving efficacy to the word of his grace, by my message, _another_ comes in directly after, to tell me some _one_ has turned an enemy. _Hearing_ the Lord has blessed some of my poor writings, and _presently_ the Devil has sent the baser sort to blow their horns about the streets, proclaiming my supposed infamy. Perhaps a precious soul-animating _letter_ is sent me, and while reading it, the post-man brings another, filled with the most abominable obscenity, written, no doubt, by an hypocritical professor—one part of the day enjoying the very life and _power_ of religion, the other part _lean_, _barren_, and _trifling_. I could enlarge on this, and fill a volume, but I must inform you I am reading the Pilgrims Progress, and find it very blessed; it is a glass, wherein I see much of the face of my own experience; I intend in many future letters to my friends, to quote and explain a part of it, especially those parts which are the most intricate, and perhaps the least noticed. It is an invaluable book; others have attempted to write similar books, but they are all very inferior to the Tinker’s Master-piece of Piety and Genius. Here I see the chequered scene the Lord generally leads _his_ people through, from conversion to glorification. Here we see the christian _burdened_ and _delivered_, _sighing_ and _singing_, on the _mount_ of communion and in the _shadow_ of death, loaded with _corruption_ and pardoned by _blood_, _condemned_ and _justified_, _happy_ and _miserable_, meeting a few real _pilgrims_ and plenty of _hypocrites_, _fighting_ and_ fainting_, _rising_ and _falling_, yet _kept_, _sanctified_, and _assured_ of glory. Sometimes _groaning_ under a body of death, then _soaring_ with the wings of a dove; brought out of _self_ and _living_ by faith, on the _person_ and _love_, the _work_ and _grace_ of Christ. I trust you will be led to seek Jesus the Pearl of great Price—never rest till you have found _him_, for it is life eternal to be favored with an experimental knowledge of _him_. May your heart be led from every thing else, and fixed _there_ alone; that you may know and enjoy all that is implied in this greatest of texts, “For thy Maker is thy husband, the Lord of Hosts is _his_ name.”

Your’s, truly,
_Ruhamah_.