There is a Fountain filled with Blood.... it washes all my sins away!

William Cowper wrote There Is a Fountain Filled With Blood. He was an intelligent man who earned a degree in law and passed the bar exam. Cowper had high intellectual achievements, but was emotionally unstable at times in his life. He lost his mom at the age of 6 and was unable to deal with the grief that followed him through his adulthood. Feeling overwhelmed by life, Cowper tried to take his own life 3 times and was sent to an asylum because of his deep depression.

While in the asylum he spent much of his time reading the Bible. He remembered his spiritual upbringing and was concerned about the eternal destiny of his soul. He struggled with peace and questioned his salvation. One day, while reading in Romans, he came across the words of Paul saying:

For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; -Romans 3:23-25

The Holy Spirit pulled at his heart strings and he recognized his need of the Savior and called out to Jesus. At the age of 33 (in 1764) he accepted Christ as his Savior. Even after this life changing moment and after leaving the asylum, Cowper had times when he seriously doubted God’s love for him. He had spells of mental depression and emotional morbidity, but God sent him a great support system to help him through those times.

While sitting alone at his desk one day, with the words of Zechariah fresh in his mind, he wrote:

There is a fountain filled with blood

drawn from Immanuel's veins

And sinners plunged beneath that flood

Lose all their guilty stains

The dying thief rejoiced to see

That fountain in his day;

And there may I, though vile as he

Wash all my sins away

Dear dying Lamb, thy precious blood

Shall never lose its power

Till all the ransomed church of God

Are saved, to sin no more

For since by faith I saw the stream

Thy flowing wounds supply

Redeeming love has been my theme

and shall be till I die

When this poor lisping,

stammering tongue

Lies silent in the grave

Then in a nobler, sweeter song

I'll sing thy power to save

The poem was later made a song, but it is said that in writing these words his eyes were opened to the efficiency of Christ's complete atonement for his sins.

Cowper left this world in 1800 from dropsy (edema). When reading the history of William Cowper, I noticed one constant in his life, he held onto God’s word. In what would have seemed to be the bottoms of bottoms in his life, he went to the Bible and read until his answer came.  He knew the source of his help.  If we can hold onto the Word of God we can make it through anything. We can lay hold on the promises of God. We can cling to the Blood of the Lamb. There is only one 'fountain filled with blood flowing from Immanuel's veins and sinners plunged beneath that flood lose ALL their guilty stains.'
I find it amazing to see how God works.  God works and moves in circumstances that most of us would have walked out on.  But it's through the fire of life we are made strong.  It's through and out of the fire of life God is seen the most.

Most natural diamonds are formed at high-pressure high-temperature conditions that exist at depths 87 to 120 miles in the earth's mantle. Diamonds are brought close to the Earth surface through deep volcanic eruptions. And a diamond isn't pretty when it's taken out of the ground.  It has to be polished and cut.  Do you see where I'm going with this, child of God?  You are God's diamond and he knows exactly what's going on in your life.  The heat you're feeling in life is your purifier.  It's making you a stable, strong and pure.  Keep holding on to Jesus!

*Information gathered on William Cowper came from http://www.truthinhistory.org/there-is-a-fountain-filled-with-blood.html and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Cowper