Sell Him, Sell Him

Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not. LUKE 22:31–32

We now leave the dream for the dreamer. At the centre of Grace Abounding is a temptation so strange and so terrible that many readers find it hard to believe. It is also one of the most pastorally important passages in Christian autobiography, because it describes with complete honesty a torment that many sincere believers still endure in silence.

This chapter needs a word of care at the outset. If you are prone to anxious, obsessive fears about your salvation, read it slowly, perhaps with a friend, and keep going to the end. Bunyan did come out. And the way he came out is the point.

A year of one sentence

It began, Bunyan says, after God had settled him sweetly in the faith and given him strong consolation. Then the tempter came again with a more grievous temptation than before: to sell and part with Christ, to exchange Him for the things of this life, for anything. It lay on him for about a year, so continually that he was not rid of it one day in a month. He could not eat his food, stoop for a pin, chop a stick or look at anything without the thought coming: Sell Christ for this, or sell Christ for that; sell Him, sell Him.

He fought it with all his strength. Sometimes his very body moved with the effort, pushing and thrusting with his hands and elbows, while he answered as fast as the destroyer spoke: “I will not, I will not, I will not, I will not; no, not for thousands, thousands, thousands of worlds.”

Then one morning, lying in bed, assaulted again, he answered no twenty times together until he was almost out of breath. And at last he felt the thought pass through his heart, Let Him go, if He will! — and thought he felt his heart freely consent. “Now was the battle won,” he writes, “and down I fell, as a bird that is shot from the top of a tree, into great guilt, and fearful despair.”

Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears. HEBREWS 12:16–17

Two years under Esau

What followed was two years in which, he says, nothing would abide with him but damnation and the expectation of damnation. The verse about Esau lay on him all day, all week, all year. He was certain he had committed the unpardonable sin. He compared himself with Judas and was ashamed to be like such an ugly man. He could scarcely look at a good man without trembling. He was weary of his life and yet afraid to die.

If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. 1 JOHN 1:7

What was really happening

Read with modern eyes, much of what Bunyan describes looks like what doctors today would call obsessive-compulsive disorder in its religious form — often called scrupulosity. Intrusive, unwanted thoughts, horrifying to the person who has them; a desperate struggle to neutralise them; the conviction that a single thought has consented and all is lost; endless checking of one’s own heart for evidence. Bunyan even records the tempter urging him, as he sat at his meals, to leave his food and go and pray at once, or he would displease God — and then, when he refused, feeling as guilty as if he had broken God’s law. He calls that devil counterfeit holy.

We should be careful not to explain Bunyan away. He was a man in real spiritual conflict, and he interpreted it in the categories of his time. But it is a mercy to know that such torment is well understood, that it is not a sign of reprobation, and that it can be helped. If this describes you, please speak to a pastor who understands it, and do not be afraid to see a doctor as well. Your fear that you have committed the unforgivable sin is not evidence that you have. It is almost always evidence that you have not.

The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. MATTHEW 26:41

How the Scriptures changed their faces

How did Bunyan come out? Not quickly, and not by a single experience, but by the slow work of God’s word.

First, God sent him promises, and they fought with the threats. Once, in a meeting of God’s people, full of terror, he heard with great power, My grace is sufficient for thee, three times over, and it was as though he saw the Lord Jesus look down from heaven through the tiles upon him. For weeks the promise of grace and the verse about Esau hung in his mind like a pair of scales. One day, he says, he longed that both scriptures might come upon him at once, to see which would get the better. They did, two or three days later, and at last the Esau verse grew weak and withdrew, and the word of grace prevailed. Then Mercy rejoiceth against judgment came home to him.

For he shall have judgment without mercy, that hath shewed no mercy; and mercy rejoiceth against judgment. JAMES 2:13

Second, and crucially, he found the courage to look closely at the verses that terrified him. For a long time he could hardly bear to cast his eye on them, and had much ado an hundred times not to wish them out of the Bible. But when he finally read them with care, he says, he found their visage changed; they looked not so grimly on him as before. The falling away of Hebrews 6 was an open and absolute denial of the gospel. The wilful sin of Hebrews 10 was one that throws off Christ altogether with despite to the Spirit. And Esau’s sin was not a hasty thought against the continual labour of his mind, but a deliberate, public act, persisted in without regret. Bunyan’s passing thought, fought against with all his strength, was nothing of the kind.

Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men. MATTHEW 12:31

Third, he received a searching question. Walking in a good man’s shop, ready to sink with fear, he seemed to hear a voice asking, Didst ever refuse to be justified by the blood of Christ? His whole past was opened to him, and he saw that he never had. That was the question that mattered. Not how strongly had he felt, nor whether a thought had passed through him, but whether he had ever refused Christ.

Great sins to draw out great grace

When it was over, Bunyan did not regret the storm. “I never saw those heights and depths in grace, and love, and mercy,” he writes, “as I saw after this temptation.” Great sins, he says, draw out great grace; and where guilt is most terrible, there the mercy of God in Christ appears most high and mighty.

Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the LORD delivereth him out of them all. PSALM 34:19

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. If you have ever feared that you committed the unpardonable sin, ask Bunyan’s question: have I ever refused to be justified by the blood of Christ? If the answer is no, rest there.

2. If intrusive, unwanted thoughts torment you, tell a pastor who understands scrupulosity, and consider seeing a doctor. Seeking help is not a failure of faith.

3. Identify any verse you have avoided because it frightens you. Read it this week in its context, with a good commentary or a wise friend.

4. Memorise 2 Corinthians 12:9 and 1 John 1:7 as promises to set on the other side of the scales.

5. If God has brought you through a dark season, write down what He did, as Bunyan did, so that it may one day help someone else.

A PRAYER

Lord Jesus, You prayed for Peter when Satan desired to sift him, and You pray for me. When my mind is assaulted with thoughts I hate, hold me fast.

Where the enemy tells me I have sold You, remind me that I have never refused Your blood, and that You will in no wise cast me out.

Let Your grace be sufficient for me, and let Your mercy rejoice against judgement.

Deliver those who are tormented as Bunyan was. Give them wise friends and patient help, and bring them out, as You brought him, into the light. Amen.