A Visitation in Love To those of the People called BAPTISTS with whom the Lords Spirit yet ceaseth not to strive that have not slain the Witness by making War and contending against the Light who although they may think themselves Rich and increased with much goods yet are found to be Wretched and Miserable Poor and Blind and Naked With Councel from the Lord that they without delay before a farther day of Misery and Calamity overtake them come away from all blind Leaders and unprofitable Teachers who keep them alwayes learning but never bring them to the knowledge of the Truth unto the spirit of the living God the everlasting Teacher of his People that so they may cease from all their own works and labours and stand still and wait to know and feel the Lords work wrought in them by the Arm of Gods Salvation Christ Jesus the Light of the world the only way to the Father That they may no longer feed on words and seek after that food that perisheth But that they may all come to feed on the Word of Life on that Bread which came down from God out of Heaven That they may know the fountain of Life set open in themselves that out of their bellies may flow forth rivers of living Waters to the refreshment of their immortal Souls and the Heritage of God By one who travels in Spirit for their Souls good and by the everlasting Light of the Son of God is come to see and know that though Johns Ministration once committed to him in its time was Excellent and Glorious and he the greatest born of a woman yet a greater than John is come and that the least in the Kingdome is greater than John J. A. LONDON Printed for Robert Wilson at the Black-spread-Eagle and Wind-mil in Martins le Grand 1660. IN LOVE A Visitation to those of the People called Baptists with whom the Lords Spirit yet ceaseth not to strive that have not slain the Witnesse by making War and Contending against the Light c. Truly Friends HAving wandred in times past from Mountaine to Hill to find pasture and refreshment for my soul which is immortal and will not be satisfied but with that Food which Perisheth not when it was the earnest desire of my very heart to be delivered from the bondage of corruption and to be brought into the Liberty of the Sons of God for which the whole Creation groans daily panting and breathing after the waters of life that in the living Truth of God I might be set free to serve the living God And in this though my desires were pure yet I labouring for the accomplishment thereof in my own strength and way in all my performances and duties as I judged in imitation of what others hath done and performed in dayes of old and months past in the Power of Gods Spirit But I being not in and guided by the same spirit all my labour was in vain it being not in the Lord though in never so like imitation from the Letter of Scriptures wherein I strove long to overcome but in vain is salvation expected from the Hills or from the Mountains but from him who is mighty to save the Arme of Gods Salvation the Word of God which is nigh in the heart and in the mouth In him alone I found everlasting strength which giveth Victory and Dominion over sin and corruption which lodgeth in the heart of every man by nature wherein he is a child of wrath Out of which estate I verily believe it is the desire of many souls amongst you to know Gods Salvation and Redemption and that you might yet at length after a cloudy and dark day which hath been over you come forth to the new and living way to the glorious Light of the Gospel which is the Power of God unto Salvation that you henceforth might serve him no longer in the oldnesse of the Letter but in the newnesse of the Spirit which is only accepted by the Lord In whom my soul hath often travelled and seriously weighed your condition of Bondage under such Elements as must passe away and be consumed with the Spirit of burning which must passe upon all flesh that shall be saved Verily touching you I have had often thoughts of heart who sometime were a people that in a measure and in some things did run well but who hath bewitched you I may say that begun in the Spirit that now ye should think to be made perfect in the flesh in which ye will certainly end unless you come in every particular to be witnesses in your selves of the new Birth in the new and living way Christ iâ— you the hope of Glory And all your Ordinances as you call them and performances shall not cover you nor stand you in stead in the day of the Lord when nothing but the covering of the Lords Spirit shall hide you from the wrath of the Lamb Truly Friends my bowells yearn towards you knowing that there is a right Seed in some of you that groans to come forth out of the prison from under the bonds of the cruel Oppressor the enemy of your immortal soules Oh! that you would yet at length learn to be wise unto Salvation and no longer lay out your money for that which is no bread but that you might all come to him who is the way the truth and the life Christ Jesus the light of the world through the Cross to the Crown from things that fade and perish even with the use thereof unto that which is everlasting and never shall fade away Verily I have felt and born the burden of your Apostacy which hath grieved the good Spirit of our God that on the 14th day of the tenth month 1659. in the time of the late revolutions as I was passing on my way towards London this was the Lords complaint touching you in these words They have betrayed me into the hands of Sinners when you had a day time and opportunity put in your hands to do service for the Lord but you like fools had not hearts to make use of it And I know that you are not in the way that shall prosper neither are your Sacrifices or services accepted by the Lord you being gone back from that pure principle that sometime called you to repentance and to come out of the world and are gone after your own inventions and Imaginations from the Letter which killeth and come not to the Spirit which giveth life You cannot chuse but confesse that that savour that sometimes you might be sensible to be in your services is gone from you and what meaneth your stay any longer in that place or thing where God is not to be found And of this be assured the more you strive in your vaine minds to build up that which God pluck down and disownes the farther you go from the way of rest and peace and unless you repent and return you shall lye down in sorrow yea the
God whereby yee have gained it may be praise of men the which you would fain keep up above the Crosse of Christ But down you must bring all your glory and excellency under the feet of the Lamb if ever you expect to be crowned with him in glory everlasting in that Kingdome which is not of this world that consists not in meates and drinks not in words but in power in Righteousnesse Peace and Joy in the holy Ghost unto which the Light will shew you the onely way which shineth in the darknesse which is in the heart of man giâ—eth us the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ What think you of your Arguments Disputations and literall knowledge of the way of truth and the way of life what sins doth it give you victory over and what stands it you instead in the day of tryall is not all the excellency and glory thereof but a barren empty thing that refresheth not nor comforteth your immortal soules which onely with that bread of life which came down out of heaven are satisfied Try your selves have you that Life in you which is to be felt and handled in the presence of the Lord or else it is but a thing in notion that you feed upon which starves your soules I know you cannot but be sensible that you have lost that in your selves which sometime in a measure gave you the sence and savour of the things of God in the dayes of your infancy when the Lord was plucking down the lostinesse of man before you went about to set up a building after your own inventions and imaginations which will come to nothing It being not upon the Rock of Ages the foundation of many Generations as moved and directed thereunto by his eternall Spirit And now I believe as you deale faithfully and honestly with your own hearts you cannot but see and confesse that by all your hard labour study and performances of duties as you may call them from the letter of Scriptures and use of your ordinances you cannot again recover that which you have lost of the savour of life but grow dead yea wax worse and worse though it may be more frequent in your ordinances than ever you cry but God hears you not neither doth he regard the work of your hands which are abominable in his sight your sacrifices being not offered up in Abels nature from the new birth find not acceptance with God but are wholly adulterated from the present teachings of his Spirit as if the Scriptures were given forth to stop his mouth for ever so that you have lost your judgements and understanding in the things of God and know not the voyce of the true Shepheard from a Hireling a Wolf that comes to you in sheeps cloathing and shall never come againe to find that which you have lost nor to the knowledge of God and of Christ whom to know is eternall-life but as you come out of all your own wayes wills and worships unto the everlasting Light of the Son of God in your selves which will shew you the way to the Father and let you see how far wide you are of the straight and narrow way that leadeth unto the Kingdome of God unto that pure principle of God that will shew you all that ever yee have done must you be reduced which will bring you to the beginning of Gods Creation that the state of a little child you may come to know waiting in the filence of flesh to hear the Fathers voyce which will lead you to do his will in every particular that no longer your own wills but the will of God may be done in earth as it is in heaven that righteousnesse and truth may be made manifest in your mortall bodies which is Christ in us the hope of glory who is come to do the will of the Father in us And this is he that we have waited for and we know him to be our Saviour because he saveth us from our sins and not because he told the woman of Samaria all that ever she had done do we believe but because his wonderfull works done in us declare him to be the Son of God whose manifestation is to destroy the work of the Devill in the Creature and so set him free in Soul Body and Spirit to serve the Lord God of the Spirits of all flesh Come down from selfe-conceitednesse and all the Mountaines that you have set up and account it not much to be ashamed of all your hope which is but dead and to account all as dung and drosse that you may yet at length win Christ whose love is better than wine and though the world hates and scornes him yet he is the fairest of ten thousands and unto his Light in you must yee be turned from the darknesse if ever you expect to see his appearance and behold his glory to the comfort of your soules who is now appearing the second time without sin unto salvation what will it profit you to talk of his Reign and come not to the Kingdome wherein his power and glory is revealed that in the heart where Satans seat hath been you may witnesse all his and your soules enemies subdued and destroyed that you may know the Kingdoms come whereof Christ Jesus is the King and Law-giver unto whom the Father hath given all Power and Authority in heaven and earth unto whom all principalities and powers must how Stand no longer about needles questions but come to know Gods work wrought in your selves that the heir of life may be brought forth that your soules may inherit substance that you may eat his flesh and drink his blood and be guided by his Spirit who is the Son of God for ever that your souls may be satisfied that this is the man Christ Jesus whom ye have waited for and that you may see his salvation and say that this is he and that you look not for another of whose Power Kingdom and glory there shall be no end And now friends to you that yet retain some integrity and have longing desires after the way of Gods salvation it s the Lords Councell that you delay not but come away from all your blind guides and leaders which cause you to erre and wait upon the Lord to know the teachings of his pure Spirit which will bring you to the endlesse Fountain of life and to feed on that bread which will nourish your soules up unto everlasting life and dwell no longer in the tents of the wicked though never so fairly covered least your Talents be also taken from you and given to others And believe it it is far better to suffer persecution with the people of the Lord for righteousnesse sake than to enjoy the pleasures of sin in this world for a season which will end in sorrow and do not reject the light and make war against Gods witnesse as some have done and perished in their gainsaying least
you be also cut off from the Land of the living and the day of your visitation passe over your heads But come to the light that you may see to work out your salvation with fear and trembling while it is called to day for the night cometh wherein none can work Therefore prize your time for the Lord wil cut short the work in Righteousnesse for the Elects sake and be ye separate and come out from amongst the unfruitfull workers of darknesse that you may learn to walk in the way to ever lasting life in which it is the very desire of my soul to meet you even in the way of Gods salvation which is but one through the Baptisme of one Spirit into one Body whereof Christ is the head and strive no longer about words and formes but come to him who is the word of life that you may be brought from under Satans power into the power of God and in him live dwell and abide for ever that you may no more goe down again into Sodom and Egypt to feed on the flesh-pots thereof which will but make leane your soules and fatten you for the day of slaughter which is hastening upon the wicked And let not the faire and feigned words of some that even make merchandize of your soules any longer deceive you with the enticing words of mans wisdome to keep you in bondage but come to the Light in your own particulars that you may feele the Life without which you are dead and all your services are but abomination in the sight of the Lord who is the living God and the dead praise him not Seeke no longer for the living amongst the dead but to the Light to the Law written in the heart to the Testimony of Jesus the Spirit of prophesie that you may witnesse the true annointing in your selves which will teach you all things that you may not be foolish Virgins without oyle in your Lamps and so shut out of Gods Kingdome in which state the highest professors of the letter are that witnesse not the Life and Power in themselves Therefore redeem the time because the dayes are evill and cleave no longer to lying vanities and forsake your own mercies but repent and return to the Lord God withall your hearts withall your mindes and withall your soules that you may live for ever in the Lambs Light of life in which the Nations of them that are saved shall walk And sit down and consider whereunto have your teachers brought you in so many years but even into trouble and dissatisfaction not knowing whether to goe for rest to your pretious soules which are even languishing under deaths power and shall not find refreshment but in the presence of the Lord unto which the Light onely will bring you See you not how dead and dull your teachers are become striving to keep you in that which profits you not but starves your soules and how nigh they are come to be one with the hirelings who form weapons from the Scriptures to fight against the Lord of life pleading against perfection in this life because they cannot attain thereunto in their way laying hold on the sins of others that they themselves may continue sinners Crying out the word of the Lord and the Lord saith when the Lord hath not sent them nor spoken by them they knowing not his voyce neither have they seen his shape at any time who is full of grace and truth but feed people with imaginations in worshipping a God a far off ignorantly when indeed our God is not onely a God a far off but nigh at hand and that which may be known of him is manifest in man But here is the transgression from the beginning that man is not content with his Lot and gift that God hath given him but through lust covets after and eats of the forbidden fruit which brings death upon his soul and misery and disorder upon the Creation and from thence comes wars and fightings rents and divisions even because men abide not in the measure of Gods Spirit given to every man to profit withal but run out in their vain minds to follow their own hearts lusts and so strengthen the hands of the wicked against the just And many are ashamed through the Cross to return by which the enmity comes to be destroyed but go on untill their hearts are hardened unto destruction that they themselves standing not in that wherein God makes people free to serve and worship him but having lost the way and their wisdoms confounded they strive also to keep others with themselves still in bondage and even envy others in whom the power and Spirit of the Lord God is made manifest which commeth not in their way nor by observations but worketh in us freely both to will and to do according to the good pleasure of our Heavenly Father which is contrary to the will and wisdom of the flesh which pleaseth not God And let not the Spirit of bondage so prevaile in you any longer to envy the Spirit of prophesy in Gods people but come up to the help of the Lord against the mighty enemy of your Souls and give up all the materialls of your own buildings unto the fire of the Lord that your work may be tryed that your hearts may be purified and that you may be saved so as by fire for the Spirit of Judgment and burning must passe upon you before ever your bodies become the Temples of the holy Spirit and you become vessels of honour fit for the Masters use I say again and lay it upon you that you expect not Salvation from the Hills nor from the Moutains But wait in the Light for the coming of the Holy One in Gods own-way and the Resurrection of the Just out of the grave where he lyes buried in Sodom and Egypt spiritually so called under your lusts and corruptions which war against your Soules that you may know him the word nigh in the heart and in the mouth who is ready to helpe and mighty to save and that you may come to feel the Seed of Gods Kingdom in your own hearts working out the seed of corruption and all that worketh abomination and whatsoever loveth and maketh a lye which is for the lake of fire into which the Beast and false prophet is to be taken and cast a live That you may know the children of the Kingdom begotten of the seed of the bond-woman cast out that the right Heir and Seed may take his Possession and Inherit the Kingdom whose right it is to reign in the kingdoms of men and blessed are they that are become joynt heirs with him of that Inheritance which is everlasting and never shall fade away And thus Friends as from the Lord well knowing that you are not as you stand in the way of Gods Salvation have I written in the uprightnesse of my heart and in tender love to your souls and to that pure seed which yet breaths in
some of you after the living God that you may yet at length be turned from darknesse to the Light that so you may be brought from under Satans power into the power of God that you may no longer lye under that Yoak and spirit of Bondage which by your leaders is begotten amongst you and laid upon your Consciences to keep you from the Covenant of Light and Life but that you might come forth in the freedom of the Lords Spirit out of the house of Bondage into the liberty of the Sons of God in newness of spirit to worship and serve him all the dayes of your life It 's a strange doctrine that you must believe as your Teachers believe and do what they do as infallible whilst they themselves know not but deny the immediate or present teachings of Gods infallible Spirit amongst them and come not to feel and know in your selves the true Teachers the living Hope and the true Faith of Gods Elect which purifyeth the heart which God requires even truth in the inwards parts what are your Teachers more than others of the world that you should be so in bondage to them as to fear their threats of death and destruction or the like of that whilest they themselves are under the power thereof to whomsoever shall separate from them and turn from their pernitious wayes That many poor souls that have entred themselves in Covenant as it were with death under their beggarly and unprofitable Rudiments are affraid of their big-swelling words and excommunications to come our from amongst them and because of the Flood that proceeds out of the Dragons mouth against the woman that travells to bring forth the man Child that shall Rule the Nations you come not up to the war of the Lamb Though you may see and believe in your Consciences that there is a more excellent and living way known and set before you and are not satisfied with that food which perisheth but groan in your spirits for the bread of life And were it not for fear of persecution which follows the righteous Seed and the shame of the Cross on the one hand and the fear of your Teachers on the other hand would you not come out from amongst them Deal faithfully with your own souls and Gods witnesse in you and confesse the truth to Gods Glory and come away out of all that 's dead and carnal unto the living truth of our God For truly Friends this I verily believe as Gods witnesse comes again to be raised in you in whom he is not yet slain as some have done by warring against him that there will not be a time of disputing and halting left you but you must either come away to follow the Lamb the Light of the world or take your portion in that lake that burns with fire and brimstone where you shall know that worm that never dies that fire that never shall be quenched and there shall not be peace again saith my God to the wicked but torment day and night distraction horror and confusion shall be their portion that comes not out of Babylon at Gods Call which hath reached unto you therefore hasten to come away and follow the Lamb whithersoever he goes that with him you may reign in glory on Mount Sion for ever and ever And whether you hear or forbear whether ye believe or not this again I truly say and testify that in bowels of tender love to your pretâ—ous souls and the seed of God in discharge of my Conscience towards God and you that I may stand clear of your blood have I written knowing that the day of the Lord hastens wherein he will render to every man according to his deeds done in the body whether they be good or evil when many shall cry and call to the Rocks and to the Mountains to fall upon them and cover them But in that day none of your Coverings but the Covering of the Lords Spirit shall hide you from the wrath of the Lamb. And you shall certainly know that I speak the truth in Christ Jesus and lye not Bridgwater the 10th of the 5th month 1660. John Anderdon