The Penning Pastor: I Know because…

I know that I am a child, because he teaches me to say, Abba, Father. I know that I am his because he has enabled me to choose him for mine. For such a choice and desire could never have taken place in my heart, if he had not placed it there himself. By nature I was too blind to know him, too proud to trust him, too obstinate to serve him, too base-minded to love him. The enmity I was fined with against his government, righteousness, and grace, was too strong to be subdued by any power but his own. The love I bear him is but a faint and feeble spark, but it is an ema-nation from himself; he kindled it, and he keeps it alive; and because it is his work, I trust many waters shall not quench it. —John Newton, Works, Vol. 1