Renew my heart by John Wesley - Research Paper Example

When He mercies us, it is His generosity. This grace, which is bestowed on upon man, has converted him from dust into the human form and hence imposed the mark of God’s image on the soul (breathed into the human form). All that human beings do and possess cannot deserve even the slightest blessing of God. He moves on to say that the faith in God is also the gift of God Himself and one can be saved with the help of faith. Salvation is derived from faith and grace is the ever-existent gift from God.

Hence faith without any pretence is able to secure heavenly grace and approval – human beings are “saved through faith”2. Therefore when an individual seeks union with God, it is his Faith, which in turn can save him from his sins and help him unite with Him. In Saint Augustine’s Confessions (an autobiography), concepts and experience regarding union with God and attempts towards salvation has found a refined outlet through his thoughts expressed in the vision at Ostia (a village in Italy) and the City of God which reveals the two worlds of man – that where he lives according to the human laws (according to man) and the world where he dwells according to God.

It is practically the idea of two different cities emphasized here – the City of Gods and the city of Man. The two attributes or guidelines that underlie human life and its conditions are predestination (fate is pre decided by God) and grace (God’s blessings and kindness). These two beliefs have been wonderfully portrayed by Saint Augustine in The City of God which also extends the different conceptualization endorsed in the vision at Ostia a little further to encompass the broader aspect of status of human life and livelihood.

When Saint Augustine’s family made a stop to rest at Ostia – a port in Southern Italy. It is here that Augustine experienced a union with God and realized that God is the object of knowledge and the mode of knowledge is realization of God without any