*LETTER FROM MR. C. A. COATES*, TEIGNMOUTH., JULY 22ND, 1916

LETTER FROM MR. C. A. COATES, TEIGNMOUTH., JULY 22ND, 1916

Mr. James Taylor.

Beloved Brother, — It was with much pleasure I had your letter this afternoon. I am glad to know of your good time in Edinburgh. I have seen and enjoyed some brief notes of what came before you.

Since seeing you I have had letters from J. S. Giles and Mr. Henderson. They both take the ground of James 2: 10 as proving that the fulfilment of responsibility is an impossibility, for ‘one flaw spoils all’.

I have written pointing out that the standard set up by them is pure law, and that all Christian responsibility is under grace — that we are judged by “the law of liberty”. Their standard is a yoke of bondage.

^[p. 123] I think this controversy will do good. I have felt for a long time that saints have been so habituated to connect the thought of responsibility with law and with man in the flesh, that it is difficult for them to entertain the thought of a new character of responsibility as under grace and a man renewed in mind so that he answers to it.

J S. Giles asks in reference to Romans 8: 4, ‘Where does Scripture express the thought, even characteristically, of saints doing it?’!! I have asked him, ‘When does Scripture express the thought of saints in normal Christian condition not doing it?’ I just mention this to show what is working. I have written to J. Henderson very plainly as to the elementary features of Christian responsibility, and I am awaiting with confidence (not altogether unmixed with anxiety) his reply.

I think it will be well for you to see J. S. Giles alone if possible. I do not believe he really holds what is conveyed and involved in his statements. But in his anxiety to maintain the statement in December Mutual Comfort, he is saying things more grave, and apparently without being conscious of it.

Miss Brown and the others are out or I am sure they would send love.

With much love in the Lord,

Yours affectionately in Him,

Charles A. Coates.