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A Note From
Jane Leade
A Writing
From an Anonymous Person "Yesterday evening, with devout prayer and praise to God in joyfulness and with a well-conditioned mind, I had gone to bed and had slept very well all the night. I awakened this morning about two o'clock, and then my spirit of Faith raised itself up immediately into a joyful eagerness to the Lord, giving thanks and praises unto Him. "And when in a continual prayer, I begged of the Lord instantly and especially for an increasing of the Resurrection power so that thereby that which is sinful and unholy might be destroyed more and more and the sanctifying work might be accomplished. The power of Faith increased in me until I became thereby exalted or lifted up quite above and out of myself. Finding myself as a pure spirit (or as only spirit) wholly in the spirit in an exceeding great liberty and in a true Almighty Divine power, I shouted therein for joy unto God, saying, 'That in such a Divine strength of spirit I would overcome Sin, Death, Devil, Hell and every opposition.' "Upon which (I was awake indeed but had shut my eyes), the devil appeared to me in the terrible shape of a dragon, having a long neck and dragon's head, four feet and a long, dreadful, thick serpent's tail. But with a great and incredible courage and strength of faith, I laid hold on him, taking hold of his neck with my right hand and cast him to the ground, trampling upon him with my feet and stamping him into a great opened hole or dungeon.(49) "And though there were many other horrible devils who presented themselves round about him in the shape of dreadful dragons and serpents which opposed themselves with a terrible moving and winding themselves in each other, yet, with an inexpressible heroical courage and strength I trampled them all down with my feet into that opened hole out of which a great astonishing multitude of fire-sparks fled up into the air. But at length this hole was shut of itself and I stamped upon it with my foot in an incredible power saying, "Hereby they are now sealed upon."(50) "When I raised up after this and displayed myself again in the Spirit and remembered immediately the Omnipresence of the eternal, infinite, invisible and incomprehensible God, I turned unto Him with the deepest and yet with a very joyful approaching or introversion and gave Him thanks for His great ineffable mercy and victorious overcoming, which now by His Omnipotent power He had made me to experience. "And besides this, I called with great power all the holy angels that stand before God, that they altogether with the spirits of just men made perfect, should assist me in adoring, honoring, praising, magnifying and giving thanks to the great, infinite, most holy and majestic Being as the Creator of us all (which word was so sensible and living in me that it is unutterable because of His great grace, deliverance, victory and liberty of spirit, wherein I now find myself). "But now, thereby this work and this grace of my deliverance became so living in my inmost mind that I said to the holy angels, with a great commotion, "O ye holy spirits. Ye can indeed praise with me and glorify the great, most holy God as the Creator of us all; for so far ye are obliged unto Him in the same duty, love and thankfulness in which men are. But, because ye always kept constantly to your holy station, ye cannot, therefore, know or be sensible so well as we of what the Divine mercy is which hath delivered us from our poisoned, corrupted and darkened state of sin and condemnation, and hath restored unto us the child-like state of the liberty of spirit, wherein I now do find myself with you again. "And therefore, we are infinitely more obliged than you to this most holy, loving and merciful God, and are bound to a far greater thankfulness and love. And I wish and desire, therefore, to be holy and most intimately united with and obliged to this most holy divine Being in such a resignation and obedience, as is vastly greater than yours can be." "In this inexpressible free motion of the spirit, I pressed inwards more and more unto God and especially to Christ, the Son of God, praying that I might be wholly His. He is my Saviour and Redeemer, who purchased with His blood me as a property of His own, and of whom I had received all this living beatitude and heavenly joy. And thereby I lost myself, nay even the very shape of my own spirit; so much that I retained no other object but a pure, infinite, incomprehensible, divine, spiritual being which was absolutely nothing and yet also all; all still and quiet and yet also all power and life. "In this most acceptable state I prayed to the Lord very earnestly that this, now so sensible and essentially experimented Resurrection and redemption-power, might not only be a transient and passing experience but a constant and abiding power in me. And when I remembered again my body which hitherto I had neither seen nor thought on, I opened my eyes a little and took notice thereof. I noticed that all this which had just transpired, notwithstanding, my body was not glorified. I prayed the Lord might not only, as I had prayed before, keep this power of His resurrection, of which I now was sensible, constant in me, but might also strengthen it more and more; that it might work even more powerfully until the gross mortal body might be thereby glorified and spiritualized through and through. "Upon which prayer, I felt myself immediately let down again from my former exaltation in spirit and observed that my eyes, because of this great joy, had shed an abundance of love-tears and devotions. But my intellectual part was immediately drawn up into a still attention wherein the Lord gave me to understand that this blessed state, wherein I now had been, was not yet that resurrection-state which could bring in along with it a glorification of the body. "It was the Internal Resurrection state of the soul, answering to the measure of the full Age of Christ wherein He stood when He was baptized in Jordan. And when I or others had attained to this, then (as it was also done with Christ in His baptism) the sealing of the Holy Ghost, or a greater, much higher and more powerful unction than this which we have now, should follow thereupon.(51) And thereby this Internal Resurrection-state should be sealed and confirmed in us so that we should sin no more, like unto Christ Himself. Then His seed should perpetually abide with us and through Him we should be enabled to overcome the sin, the devil and the world, and to discern exactly all the temptations, both within and without. "The Lord gave me to understand that the reason that I was introduced into this actual and essential sensibility and feeling of this Spiritual Resurrection-state (referred to in Phil. 3:11) was this; that I should (as a living and experienced witness and spy of the blessed land) not only for myself, be the more fully certified and convinced of what I had hitherto (from the testimony of the scripture and of the spirit), believed and hoped concerning it. "Namely, that it is such a state of sanctification as can be truly attained unto, even in a mortal and unglorified body as the example of Christ doth testify. He is our type and pattern unto whom we are directed. But also, that I should, by my own experience and feeling, the better know and understand the peculiar condition and property of that spiritual power and glory which is to be hoped for and expected therein. And that of all this, before my brethren and all them that run with me and press forward to this glorious mark of the perfect age of Christ, I should be able to give a certain and credible testimony for a powerful encouragement and confirmation of their hope and confidence. This is in order that they may not be discouraged but may firmly believe the Prize set before us is attainable in this mortal body and shall certainly be attained by them that abide faithful and go on constantly and diligently in their sanctification. "But concerning the desired glorification of the body, I was in memory directed to the eleventh chapter in the Revelation, and from that I was clearly instructed that before this (glorification) comes to pass, we must follow the Lord Jesus and be conformable unto Him in that whole process which is described in Revelation 11. Namely, when we first have attained to this internal and spiritual Resurrection state (measure of the full age of Christ), and then have been sealed and anointed with the Holy Ghost in a greater and special measure (like Him), then hereupon we must also witness and proclaim the truth of the kingdom of God. And this, as He hath done; for a time of a thousand two hundred and sixty days or three and a half years. After this we must be slain with Him and must abide in such a condition for another three days and a half. And then there shall at length follow such a Resurrection as will bring a glorification of the body and an ascension in the clouds like as it was done also with Him.(52) "All this was extremely clear to me and all irresistible, except only that I fain would have known whether this death of the two witnesses would be a corporeal death, and whether the three days and a half are natural days or whether both this and that might have another mystical sense. But when I for this reason turned to the Lord to have a clearer opening thereof, the divine light retired and drew back, and so this matter was left with me in doubt and without opening." End of Quote (This latter portion was written by a person other than Jane Leade whose name was not given.) THE END
50. It is to be our portion to bind and to trample underfoot the dragon and seal him in a bottomless pit so that his poisonous venom or defiling influences can no longer bring forth of their kind. This is usually thought of as being an historical occurrence which shall happen in the outward realm of a physical life, but in any case, it must take place within us individually before it can apply anywhere else. How can such benefits of a bound and sealed Satan accrue to me if he is not bound and sealed in me? 51. If I understand what this individual is saying, once we have arrived at this state of an internal resurrection, which is said to parallel the baptizing of Jesus and His full age, then comes a sealing of the Holy Ghost which surpasses our baptism of the Holy Spirit for it delivers from sin's power. Then, this internal life and resurrection goes on to assert itself upon the outward life and body as mortality is swallowed up of immortality. This agrees with the thought that only those living an inward sacrificial life shall hear and recognize the sound and intent of the last trump and be raised from the tomb of the mortal body. 52. If I have understood what was said; We must first by faith, walk in an inward spiritual resurrection which, when attained, pictures Christ Jesus at full age (Jordan baptism). Upon this, a great seal and sanctification is had from the Holy Spirit which seals and delivers one from the power of sin and, of course, also from any consciousness of sin. Upon this, there is to be a ministry of proclaiming this in the spirit and power of the Holy Spirit for 1260 days or 3½ years. (I would think these figures to be symbolic and not at all literal) After this is fulfilled, we must be slain with Christ and lay impotent in death for another 3½ days. After this comes the bodily resurrection, the putting on of immortality and the full entrance into incorruption. This is patterned after Revelation chapter 11, which in part concerns the two witnesses. No doubt the Lord shall give further light on this area.
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