Prudence, Piety and Charity

Piety: Come good Christian, since we have been so loving to you, to receive you into our house this night, let us, if perhaps we may better ourselves thereby, talk with you of all things that have happened to you in your Pilgrimage.

Christian: With a very good will, and I am glad that you are so well disposed.

Piety: What moved you at first to betake yourself to a Pilgrim's life?

Christian: I was driven out of my Native Country, by a dreadful sound that was in mine ears: to wit, that unavoidable destruction did attend me, if I abode in that place where I was.

Piety: But how did it happen that you came out of your Country this way?

Christian: It was a God would have it; for when I was under the fears of destruction, I did not know whither to go; but by chance there came a man, even to me, as I was trembling and weeping, whose name is Evangelist, and he directed me to the Wicket-gate, which else I should never have found, and so set me into the way that hath led me directly to this house.

Piety: But did you not come by the house of the Interpreter?

Christian: Yes, and did see such things there, the remembrance of which will stick by me as long as I live; specially three things: to wit, How Christ, in despite of Satan, maintains his work of Grace in the heart; how the man had sinned himself quite out of hopes of God's mercy; and also the dream of him that thought in his sleep the day of Judgment was come.

Piety: Why, Did you hear him tell his dream?

Christian: Yes, and a dreadful one it was. I thought it made my heart ake as he was telling of it; but yet I am glad I heard it.

Piety: Was that all that you saw at the house of the Interpreter?

Christian: No: he took me and had me where he shewed me a stately Palace, and how the people were clad in Gold that were in it; and how there came a venturous man and cut his way through the armed men that stood in the door to keep him out, and how he was bidden to come in, and win eternal Glory. Methought those things did ravish my heart; I would have stayed at that good man's house a twelve-month, but that I knew I had further to go.

Piety: And what saw you else in the way?

Christian: Saw! Why, I went but a little further, and I saw one, as I thought in my mind, hang bleeding upon the Tree; and the very sight of Him made my burden fall off my back (for I groaned under a heavy Burden), but then it fell down from off me. 'Twas a strange thing to me, for I never saw such a thing before; yea, and while I stood looking up (for then I could not forbear looking) three Shining Ones came to me. One of them testified that my sins were forgiven me; another stripped me of my rags, and gave me this broidered coat which you see; and the third set the mark which you see in my forehead, and gave me this sealed Roll: (and with that he plucked it out of his bosom.)

Piety: But you saw more than this, did you not?

Christian: The things that I have told you were the best; yet some other matters I saw, as namely I saw three men, Simple, Sloth, and Presumption, lie asleep a little out of the way as I came, with Irons upon their heels; but do you think I could awake them? I also saw Formalist and Hypocrisy come tumbling over the wall, to go, as they pretended, to Zion; but they were quickly lost; even as I myself did tell them, but they would not believe. But, above all, I found it hard work to get up this Hill, and as hard to come by the Lions' mouths; and truly if it had not been for the good man, the Porter that stands at the Gate, I do not know but that after all I might have gone back again; but now I thank God I am here, and I thank you for receiving of me.

Then Prudence thought good to ask him a few questions, and desired his answer to them.

Prudence: Do you not think sometimes of the Country from whence you came?

Christian: Yes, but with much shame and detestation: Truly, if I had been mindful of that Country from whence I came out, I might have had opportunity to have returned; but now I desire a better Country, that is, a Heavenly.

Prudence: Do you not yet bear away with you some of the things that then you were conversant withal?

Christian: Yes, but greatly against my will; especially my inward and carnal cogitations, with which all my countrymen, as well as myself, were delighted; but now all those things are my grief; and might I but choose mine own things, I would choose never to think of those things more; but when I would be doing of that which is best, that which is worst is with me.

Prudence: Do you not find sometimes, as if those things were vanquished, which at other times are your perplexity?

Christian: Yes, but that is seldom; but they are to me golden hours in which such things happen to me.

Prudence: Can you remember by what means you find your annoyances at times, as if they were vanquished?

Christian: Yes, when I thing what I saw at the Cross, that will do it; and when I look upon my broidered coat, that will do it; also when I look into the Roll that I carry in my bosom, that will do it; and when my thoughts wax warm about whither I am going, that will do it.

Prudence: And what is it that makes you so desirous to go to Mount Zion?

Christian: Why, there I hope to see Him alive that did hang dead on the Cross; and there I hope to be ridden of all those things that to this day are in me an annoyance to me; there, they say, there is no death; and there I shall dwell with such Company as I like best. For to tell you truth, I love Him, because I was by Him eased of my burden, and I am weary of my inward sickness; I would fain be where I shall die no more, and with the Company that shall continually cry, Holy, Holy, Holy.

Then said Charity to Christian, Have you a family? Are you a married man?

Christian: I have a wife and four small children.

Charity: And why did you not bring them along with you?

Christian: Then Christian wept, and said, Oh how willingly would I have done it, but they were all of them utterly averse to my going on Pilgrimage.

Charity: But you should have talked to them, and have endeavoured to have shewn them the danger of being behind.

Christian: so I did, and told them also what God had shewed to me of the destruction of our City; but I seemed to them as one that mocked, and they believed me not.

Charity: And did you pray to God that he would bless your counsel to them?

Christian: Yes, and that with much affection; for you must think that my wife and poor children were very dear unto me.

Charity: But did you tell them of your own sorrow, and fear of destruction? for I suppose that destruction was visible enough to you.

Christian: Yes, over, and over, and over. They might also see my fears in my countenance, in my tears, and also in my trembling under the apprehension of the Judgment that did hang over our heads; but all was not sufficient to prevail with them to come with me.

Charity: But what could they say for themselves, why they came not?

Christian: Why, my wife was afraid of losing this world, and my children were given to the foolish delights of youth: so what by one thing, and what by another, they left me to wander in this manner alone.

Charity: But did you not with your vain life, damp all that you by words used by way of persuasion to bring them away with you?

Christian: Indeed I cannot commend my life; for I am conscious to myself of many failings therein: I know also, that a man by his conversation may soon overthrow, what by argument or persuasion he doth labour to fasten upon others for their good. Yet, this I can say, I was very wary of giving them occasion, by any unseemly action, to make them averse to going on Pilgrimage. Yea, for this very thing they would tell me I was too precise, and that I denied myself of things (for their sakes) in which they saw no evil. Nay, I think I may say, that if what they saw in me did hinder them, it was in my great tenderness in sinning against God, or of doing any wrong to my Neighbor.

Charity: Indeed Cain hated his brother, because his own works were evil, and his Brother's righteous; and if thy wife and children have been offended with thee for this, they thereby shew themselves to be implacable to good, and thou hast delivered thy soul from their blood.

Now I saw in my Dream, that thus they sat talking together until supper was ready. So when they had made ready, they sat down to meat. Now the Table was furnished with fat things, and with Wine that was well refined: and all their talk at the Table was about the Lord of the Hill; as namely, about what He had done, and wherefore He did what He did, and why He had builded that House: and by what they said, I perceived that He had been a great Warrior, and had fought with and slain him that had the power of Death, but not without great danger to himself, which made me love Him the more.

For, as they said, and as I believe (said Christian) He did it with the loss of much blood; but that which put Glory of Grace into all He did, was, that He did it out of pure love to His Country. And besides, there were some of them of the household that said they had seen and spoke with Him since He did die on the Cross; and they have attested that they had it from His own lips, that He is such a lover of poor Pilgrims, that the like is not to be found from the East to the West.

They moreover gave an instance of what they affirmed, and that was, He had stripped himself of His glory, that He might do this for the poor; and that they heard him say and affirm, That He would not dwell in the Mountain of Zion alone. They said moreover, that He had made many Pilgrims Princes, though by nature they were beggars born, and their original had been the dunghill. Thus they discoursed together till late at night; and after they had committed themselves to their Lord for protection, they betook themselves to rest: the Pilgrim they laid in a large upper chamber, whose window opened towards the sun rising: the name of the chamber was Peace, where he slept till break of day, and then he awoke and sang,

Where am I now? Is this the love and care

Of Jesus for the men that Pilgrims are

Thus to provide! That I should be forgiven

And dwell already the next door to Heaven! :

Interpretation:

In the church, we need to be taught by ministers on three important aspects, which are piety, prudence and charity.

Piety: Our personal devotion by way of prayers and meditation of the Word of God is very important. At times, we should fast also. Many of us skip this spiritual exercise in our lives. "Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship" Romans 12:1. Our true and spiritual worship is to present our bodies a living and holy sacrifice acceptable to God.

Prudence: In our churches, we are not taught to discern the spirits or the messages being preached in Christendom. As a spiritual man, you should judge all things including doctrine, life, of any minister of God. It is the quality of being prudent; cautiousness.

Synonyms of Prudence are wisdom, judgement, good judgement, judiciousness, sagacity, shrewdness, advisability, common sense, etc. We need to exercise prudence in all important matters. A person who does not judge is a natural man or a carnal man. A spiritual man judges (prudence) what the truth is; how the truth can be distinguished from the false. “But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man” (I Cor.2:14-15).

Charity: In our churches, we are not taught to show compassion and love to others but to give our tithes to pastors or to churches only. “And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity” (1 Corinthians 13:13, KJV).

Christian, standing before Piety, Prudence and Charity testifies to the deliverance from the burden of the sin right from the time of his dream in his house till the time of his reaching the Stately Palace.

The table was furnished with all fat things and wine. Christian had peace in that night after supper. In our fellowship with the saints in our churches, the table on which we take our spiritual food should be furnished with all fat things and wine. Fat things are sound doctrines of the Bible. The Old Testament prophetic books need to be interpreted in the context of the New Testament truths. Wine is symbolical of the Blood of Jesus Christ which we consume during the Holy Communion. As we take this wine, we get healed in our sick bodies. Pastors should tell the congregation members that they would get healed when they partook in the Holy Communion.

Piety, Prudence and Charity discussed with Christian about the character of the Lord of the Hill. Though they were ministers, they did not give any sermon to Christian. They simply made provisions for fat things and wine which they all shared together as one body. They merely laid these on the table for the weary Christian. A local church has to help the saints study the Bible and take their spiritual food themselves. Saints should not be spoon-fed by ministers.

You can see the picture of Piety, Prudence, Charity and Christian studying together the Word of God as a small group. Read their conversation to see how they are glorifying God and His Son.

The ministers, Piety, Prudence and Charity took care of Christian and laid him in a large upper chamber for rest. Nowadays, ministers do not function as ministers but as preachers. The room was strategically positioned in such a manner that it faced the rising sun. Christian did not have any disturbance in sleep and he slept in peace. The name of the upper chamber was itself called Peace. The Lord's sheep should be so nourished in a local church that they find peace in their lives. They find peace within the four walls of the Stately Palace. Let every local church be likened to the Stately Palace in the Pilgrim's Progress with fat food, wine and peace.

Next.......Knowledge of the Son of God, His Pedigree, etc.