Henry Scougal

I'm currently reading "The Pleasures of God" by John Piper on recommendation by Pastor Stephen (my former pastor in TN, though in some ways he will always be my pastor). He was even kind enough to provide me with a copy of the book. Piper starts the book off with the quote by Henry Scougal that got him thinking about the pleasures of God: "The worth and excellency of a soul is to be measured by the object of its love." Scougal was referring to the worth of a human soul, but Piper applied it to God and thus reasoned that God must love himself most because he is most excellent. Without going more into the book (as I've just begun it, I heartily recommend it, as well as Desiring God, Don't Waste Your Life and probably everything else by Piper). But anyway, the purpose of this short blog is simply to enlighten you as to who Henry Scougal was. Born in 1650, he died in 1678 of tuberculosis before reaching twenty-eight years old. His greatest work by consensus is "The Life of God in the Soul of Man" from which the above quote comes (interestingly it was written as a letter to a friend explaining Christianity, but has become a classic, though not all together well-known). While mentioning him, he also mentions David Brainerd, the missionary to the Native Americans who died at twenty-nine years old, Henry Martyn, the missionary to India who died at thirty-one years old and Robert Murry McCheyne, who also died at twenty-nine years old. These men, one younger than I, were giants of the faith. They preached, wrote, evangelized and have inspired countless others to give themselves as missionaries, pastors and in general pursue God. Indeed, if God so blesses me by allowing me to in some way do mission work, it is these men whose legacies I want to carry on. Not that I at all compare myself to them. They had more biblical understanding and practical holiness at ten then I do now. But nevertheless, here are men, mere mortals, who God used in miraculous ways. They were bright and shining lights who, as was said of Scougal at his funeral, "truly lived much in a few years and died an old man in eight and twenty years." Oh that such a thing could be said of me. I fear many in our day the opposite could be said, "he truly lived little in many years and died a child in five and seventy years." May that not be prophetic of my life. I can never be a Brainerd. I'll never write like Scougal and know "Latin, Hebrew, Greek, and some of the cognate oriental languages". I'll never preach like McCheyne. At twenty-eight I feel like I am just beginning the Christian life. May God "restore to [me] the years that the locust has eaten." How many years were eaten by Nintendo, sports cards, athletics and even pure laziness? I am just now learning that, as Scougal said, "True religion is a union of the soul with God." It is more than knowing right doctrine. It is more than doing certain things. It is more than not doing certain things. It is, like God, knowable but incomprehensible. May I ever grow in that union.