this is the moving cause of all the mercy which he shews to a Sinner 1 That God is a God of Compassion appears 1. Because it belongs to his Attributes Exod. 34. 6 7. merciful and gracious forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin Hence his People ascribe this title to him Psal 86. 15. But thou oh Lord art a God full of compassion 2. Because his works declare him to be so his works of providence towards his visible Covenant people evince it Psal 78. 37. But he being full of compassion forgave their iniquity and destroyed them not His works of special favour towards his Elect in pardoning their Sins and accepting of them to be his Children do more notably confirm it 2. That this is the moving cause of alâ— the mercy which he shews to a sinner will appear 1. From the nature of God He is the first mover to his own actions and cannot possibly be moved by any thing out of himself Hence man's pity and God's differ in respect of the the moving cause Man hath such an affection habitually but it lyes still till an object excite it but God is otherwise it moves it self That which moves in us hath the respect of a cause and that which is a cause is in nature before the effect but the good will of God to man whence all his compassion flowes was from Eternity Jer. 31. 3. I have loved thee with an everlasting love therefore in loving kindness have I called thee 2. God renders this is a reason of all his mercy towards his Creatures When he speaks of pitying and relieving them he reduceth it to our good-wil and mercyful nature Jer. 3. 12 13. Hos 11. 9. Rom. 9. 15. Psal 78. 38. 3. Because there is nothing in the Creature can be rendred as a sufficient moving cause of his compassion towards it 1. Not the Creatures misery in it self For 1. The sinners misery is not a fortuitous thing or befalling an innocent person but it is the just penalty of his sin inflicted by God himself and that according to the equity of an holy and just Law Lam. 3. 39. A man for the punishment of his sin 2. Then must God be equally moved to compassion to all sinners who are alike miserable and alike need succour and then why are not all saved That compassion which saves one could as well save another but there are but some sharers in this saving compassion others suffer his rigour Rom. 11. 7. The Elect obtained it the rest were blinded 2. Not their legal convictions and tenors and confessions and softly walkings c i. e. No preparatory work For 1. The Son was for all them a great way off when his Father pittied him 2. There are that Call and God will not hear that seek him early and shall not find him Prov. 1 28 3. Not legal Repentance and Reformation turning from many sinful practises and doing many things For these are nothing but sin Esau repented and wept but it profited him not Heb. 12 17 Herod's reformation engaged not God to him In summ God's compassion is according to his will and that is absolutely free nor to be regenerated by the creature Rom 9 16 with 18 4. Because God's design in the Salvation of a sinner is the manifestation of his Grace which grace discovers it self in shewing him compassion Now this grace of God hath described its subjects from eternity and therein distinguishing Grace is made to appear when it falls upon a subject that hath nothing in it to engage him nor could of it self do any thing in the least to move him USE 1. Here we see how far the name and term of merit is a stranger from Gospel language and what care we ought to take that we do not entertain any thoughts of it God is no debter to his creatures except voluntarily as it was free to him to make them so also to assign them their end and use and it is certain that he designed or appointed no creature to any use but withal compleatly furnished it for that end and if through its own default that be lost it can claim no restitution at Gods hands hence let no man think that his misery should be a sufficient ground to engage Gods mercy to him no nor his acknowledgment of his sin and misery neither for if we stand at the tribunal of Justice unto which merit is properly reckoned it doth not deserve pardon for a delinquent to fall down at the Judges feet confess his fault and beg that it may be past by and not imputed to him if the Law condemns him and he stands guilty before the Bar it is only a free pardon that can acquit him Now though an humane Judge may be moved by the submiss and lamentable expressions of a justly condemned person yet God is capable of no such impressions but if he intends a soul good he puts this very frame into him and then accepts him in this way though not for this carriage but in all this there is not any room or occasion to speak of merit USE 2. Learn hence also not to be discouraged from going to God in the sense of your own misery Though you are altogether unworthy and have nothing of your own to plead with him which deserves to impetrate his mercy yet you see here that his own compassion leads him to be merciful and that the object which it hath chosen to express it self unto is miserable sinners such as are every way miserable helpless and hopeless creatures And if thou knowest findest and feelest thy self to be such an one there is no reason to be discouraged thou art one of such whom God hath chosen to express his compassion upon and he who knows thy condition if he will can have mercy on thee Such as are helpless he is ready to help Isa 63. 5. USE 3. It may be a ground of wonderful encouragement to poor sinners to go to God and to wait upon him for mercy to consider that God is a God of compassion and that this compassion is the originial of all the good which the creature receives 1. To consider that he is a God of compassion We have heard say they That the Kings of Israel are merciful Kings He is a God that delights to exalt and magnifie himself by those titles of Merciful Gracious Compassionate c. His bowels stir towards and he pitties dying sinners and therefore he comes to their Graves and bids them live The commendation of a pitiful and a compassionate nature in a prince wilbring in rebels apace to come and throw themselves upon his mercy sue for a pardon who if they knew him to be pityless and inexorable would run utmost adventures as those that know they can but dy and can hope for no better by submission 2. To consider that this compassion is the root and spring of the mercy he shews Hence we may silence all uprising of heart and discouraging temptations
is described by three things 1. By the leading cause or occasions of it with an awful effect vers 14. â— The sordid course which he took for the reâ—ieving of himself in his distressed condition vers 15. 3. The utter failing of all relief and supply even the poorest of all vers 16. of these in order 1. The leading causes or occasions of it c. vers 14. 1. The causes or occasions here mentioned are two 1. The first is from himself or his former prodigality when he had spent all 2. The other is from the place which he was then in there arose a mighty famine in that land 2. The effect of this noted in the vers is the distress which he was now brought to He began to be in want His misery began from himself his own riot had wasted his substance and now all was gone It was a sad alteration which befel this poor young man a few dayes ago he was swaggering and spending with thâ— best his Coffers full and he scattered it by handfuls but now nothing remains all is gone and that not by some unfore-seen inevitable providence there had then been some room to have pittied and excused him but by his own improvidence he had lived to be his own Executor He had spent all The Word in the Text signifies to consume a thing not in a way of prudent and frugal expense but in foolish prodigality That poor man is the blameable cause of his own misery though it be a plain conclusion from the words yet having hinted at it before I pass it over here The main thing I would now take notice of in the words is that his own stock failed him all his portion came to nothing Hence DOCT. All that which natural or unregenerate men place their confidence in will fail and leave them short of Salvation Let men have never so much of Gods common favours without saving grace all will come to nothing in the end Man may make a flourishing shew with these things for a while but they will not last There are things which the Scripture tells us perish with the using such are all the common gifts of God For clearing this truth observe 1. That is properly said to be spent which is laid out unprofitably What men lay out for advantage is not spent but improved but that which brings in nothing again is not only expended but mispended The Scripture expresseth it by labouring for the East-Wind by laying out mony for that which is not bread by labouring in vain c. For a man to give his Gold or Silver in exchange for Cockles Pearls for Pebbles Substance for Shadows this is that which is deservedly accounted spending 2. Nothing is profitably laid out but what is expended for Salvation This is the only saving purchase that any of the Children of men can trade for A part in Christ is the only Riches a Crown of Glory is the only honour a place in the Paradice of God is the only pleasure which is worthy a Man's laying out of cost and care for and other purchases are empty and will be found loss Eccl. 1. 3. What profit hath a man of all the labour which he hath taken under the Sun 3. Though all mankind are in some sense trading for Salvation or Happiness yet the greatest number are there trading for it where it is not to be found they are seeking the living among the dead they are seeking heaven in hell happiness among an heap of miseries One man's wealth is his God anothers pleasures are his felicity another climbs the Pinacles of honour to seek for the seat of happiness Nature leads men no higher than something under the Sun and therefore such as see no higher must of necessity spend their time their wit their estate their all 4. The best improvement that nature can make of Gods common favours cannot bring them to find and enjoy blessedness Let men use them never so frugally and prudently according to the measures which they take of prudence and frugallity yet they will fall short Nature could never by its own strength arrive at saving grace nor by the outward help of all the common blessings of God A man may have health strength understanding ordinances many advantages but let him make his best of them all will fall short It is not of him that wills nor of him that runs Rom. 9. 16 these all are either but nature which is in a man or but external things which he enjoyeth and man cannot climb up to Heaven on the rounds of such a Ladder 5. Hence when the natural man hath done his utmost and taken the greatest pains in laying out his time strength and estate he loseth his soul Nay it is very certain that though a man be never so proud and confident in those many blessings God which he hath conferred upon him yet sooner or later he shall have a through and sensible conviction of his poverty that he hath nothing which is saving that he hath wasted and missimproved that which he had to unprofitable mispense Job 27. 8. USE 1. Here we see what a poor Portion unregenerate men have and therefore what little cause have they of pride or the people of God of envy God gives his enemies a great deal but alas what is it Poor perishing stuff spending wasting substance not indeed worthy of that name Think of this you that are proud of your wits your wealth your honour your priviledges what it is that you pride your selves in or what will you do when all is spent and such is the miserable exit of all that you are boasting your selves of you now flourish and spread your selves ere it be long all will be gone and no where to be found Psal 37. 37 38. There are thousands of casualties to which the object of your trust is daily exposed you are sure of nothing nay there needs no more but your selves and your own folly to spend it You may for a while carry before you a breadth in the world and bless your selves in what you have but it will not be long ere your mouths shall put upon you the name and title of fools Prov. 5. 11 12 13. Your wit will not direct you to happiness your wealth will not purchase you honour and glory if not before yet certainly in a dying hour they will all leave you and then your naked soul passeth into eternity with nothing to live upon for ever But if God intend your souls good you shall before that time have your eyes opened to see that all this is nothing your dependence upon these things shall be broken and your hopes vanish Lift not then up the born on high nor speak with a stiff neck And you that are the Saints of God be not envious go with the Psalmist into the Temple see their end and then shall you find all that which your mistake hath called happiness and prosperity to be nothing
to be brought into straits Things are here expressed as we heard according to appearance a man is not pinched with want till he feels it and is oppressed with it Hence DOCT. When God intends saving Grace to any he first makes them effectually sensible of their own miserable and undone state God in the ordinary and usual method of converting sinners under the means of Grace begins with the discovery of their empty needy poor and miserable condition Here began the ground and motive of the young man's returning to his Father though it did not presently work to this end had he not been reduced to the greatest straits he had never thought of returning his being in want was that which set him to seeking relief and this is it which did at last though not immediately drive him home Among the works ascribed to the spirit of God there are some which are called common and preparatory common because they may be found in Reprobates preparatory because they are wont in the Elect to be steps towards conversion or works preparing the soul as a rational Agent to entertain Christ as he is tendered in the Gospel The first of these works is Conviction which hath two things for objects viz. Sin and misery one is the cause the other the effect Conviction usually proceeds Analytically it first discovers the effect and from thence searcheth after the cause The conviction of misery is that which here hath its consideration that of sin follows afterwards The first remove of the young man was he felt himself to be in want he found when the famine came and encreased that now he had nothing to live upon In the Explication we may consider 1. What is this conviction of misery 2. How it is wrought 3. The reasons of the Doctrine 1. What is this conviction of misery Answ It is the first legal work that is usually wrought in a sinner making him to apprehend his present state of perdition notwithstanding all that is either in himself or in the world It is though not the full of a lost estate yet leading to it or a step towards it In the Description observe 1. I call it a legal work now Divines are wont to call those works legal 1. Which are usually wrought by the application of the Law in which is the curse and by which is the knowledge of sin Rom. 7. 8. Misery ariseth out of the curse and the curse comes upon the breach of the Law Gal. 3. 12. The Law therefore firstly discovers it 2. Which are common works and not in themselves saving and so the word legal is often used in Divinity of which nature is this before us Conviction of misery may befal hypocrites Isa 43. 14. Yea of it self this is hell begun in the soul or conscience 3. I call it the first legal work my meaning is that God usually begins here and so man for the most part is made to look upon the effect before he discovers the cause yea is led by it thereunto he first sees and feels misery upon himself and thence is led to see sin as the blameable meritorious cause of all this misery Man usually apprehends that he is condemned before he apprehends sin to be the just condemnation he feels himself miserable before he justifieth God for though it be sin which the law condemns and hence he must so far see sin as to know that he hath broken this law yet he is not made to know sin in its just merit but rather counts it a rigour of the law which makes him angry with that and not with sin Rom. 7. 5. 3. The proper effect of this conviction is to make him know and feel his perishing condition at present that he is now going to perdition viz. that he is under the curse of the law bound over to eternal death and that he is in the way to it being held under the curse the young man found himself perishing with hunger 4. The efficacy of this conviction is that it unmasks the former delusion under which he lay making him to see that he hath no remedy against this misery either in himself or in the world In respect to himself he finds that he hath spent all in regard to the world he finds that there is a famine in that land and the conclusion that ariseth from hence is that he is sensibly in what i. e. he still wants that freedom from the curse notwithstanding all God's favours or his interest in the creature this is the summe of this conviction in which though we must confess that there is a change now made in the sinner yet it is not a saving change of his state For 1. His state was as bad before only the difference is he then saw it not but now he doth he thought himself rich and the world a trusty friend both these were mistakes and now he finds them so to be so that the substance of rhis charge is now he is convinced that before he cheated himself Hence 2. His state is not properly mended by this conviction for though he sees his misery in some degree yet this sight doth not free him from it Conviction is not Conversion though God can when he pleaseth make it a step towards it Conviction doth not make any man really better though it doth give us hopes that where the spirit begins he may carry it on for Cain and Judas fared never the better by it though many souls have by Divine Grace 2. How this conviction is wrought Answ 1. If we speak of the Author or efficient Cause of this work it properly belongs to the spirit of God who in a work of common grace brings the creature to the sense and apprehension of this misery I deny not but that rational conviction may be gathered and applyed from the rational consideration of things but that this sensible conviction depends on a special work of the spirit appears 1. Because the same means of conviction are used with others who yet are not thus convinced We preach sin and misery to a great many discourse with them of the distressed condition of the poor prodigal man but it is but now and then one that is touched with remorce and cries out of it or acknowledgeth it sensibly 2. Because the same means may have been formerly used with this person and yet did not gain their effect It may be he had heard the same thing many a time and his judgment assented to it to be truth but yet he regarded it not nor was affected with it yea possibly he had had it more urged with more strength of argument and pressed with more morally perswasive motives by others but yet it never gained upon or got within him till now and why now rather than at any other time there was as much to have driven it home before it must needs therefore proceed from the power of the Holy Ghost working when he sees meet But 2.
easily have seen plainly have discovered and so prevented that which now thou feelest they were words of weight which were spoken to thee but thou wouldest not hear nor consider and art therefore justly fallen into that pit from whence there is no recovery and drowned in that destruction from which thou mightest have been delivered And is it not better to consider now than to deferr it till then If now thou wilt consider it may tend to life and the saving of thy soul and so prove thy happiness but assure thy self hells considerations will be torments and fiery reflections yea that eating worm that dies not but shall pray upon the soul for ever Be wise then in time The matter of this consideration is the next thing to be taken notice of in the following words of our Text. SERMON XII HAving thus considered of the Prodigals deliberation in general we now come to look upon the motives themselves by which he argued himself into a resolution to return to his father and these are two which do comprize under them in general the two main heads of consideration the one respects his father the other himself The order of them is Rhetorically propounded where the first argument is last placed in the deliberation for doubtless mans necessity first drives him or else God's goodness would never draw him Proud man will live at home as long as he can The motives are joyned together because neither alone will do but both together are needful to make a full perswasive to a Sinner to return to God Man's misery throughly apprehended without the discovery of Gods mercy would drive to despair and Gods mercy propounded to a man that is insensible of his need of it would be slighted and refused But where these two meet in one the former drives a man out of himself and the latter draws him to God I shall endeavour to speak of them severally 1. The first motive is taken from the consideration of his own condition in these words I perish with hunger As the word bread is Synechdochically used to express all manner of necessary supplyes so is hunger for every want of what is needful for the comfort of man's life and here in a spiritual sense it intends the absence of all that might save the soul from destruction Hunger also is by a Metonymy of the effect put for famine which produceth hunger by taking away that which should prevent it The words express the deep distress which the young man was reduced unto sensibly apprehended by him and is Emphatically set forth 1. By the cause of it hunger or famine he hath nothing whereon to live 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 deficere there was a failing or want of provision 2. By the effect of it sensibly felt and personally applyed I perish The word in our text is of an harsh signification the best sense of it is to die but it signifies not death barely but Destruction it is q. d. this hunger will certainly destroy me I have no hopes to live in this famine I might here observe DOCT. I. The Soul of Man without sutable spiritual supplies must needs perish There is a natural consequence of dying upon a famine if no relief come and if the soul have nothing to live upon it must needs die for ever which might learn us USE 1. Their folly who take care only for their bodies and neglect their souls and truly every unregenerate man is such an one he takes heed to provide for the feeding and clothing of his body but layes in no provision for his better part and so much the greater is this folly in as much as ten thousand bodily deaths are not comparable to the death or loss of a soul Mat. 16. 26. USE 2. To teach us to prize the means and supplies which God affords for the relief of our souls That is a terrible famine mentioned Amos 8. 11 12. Not of bread nor of waters but of hearing the word of God Deprecate it as the sorest evil And having such provision made for your souls as God is pleased to give you in a place of such plenty of the means of grace labour to love to prize to feed and live upon it starve not in the midst of plentty lest you be found wilful self-murderers But I shall not insist on this the main thing follows therefore DOCT. II. In order to the conversion of a sinner God makes him deeply apprehensive that he is perishing with hunger We must carefully distinguish between the reality of a mans state and the sense that he bears of that state The famine was all over that land but none feels the distructiveness of it but this poor Prodigal All mankind whiles in a state of nature are famishing creatures but it is but some few among them that feel it the rest perish insensibly The work we are here speaking of is that which Divines call a lost state and it comprehends in it the first part of preparatory humiliation which is properly the beating of a sinner wholly off from himself and all that is in himself in point of sufficiency In the Explication of the Doctrine we may consider 1. Some thing of the nature of this work 2. The necessity of it in order to Conversion 1. Concerning the nature of this work of what it is for a Soul to be sensibly perishing with hunger and how he is brought unto this sense observe The Spirit of God raiseth in him a manifest and irresistable conviction of three things which laid together do reduce him to this exigency or distress and all this is the work of the Spirit in the means for all mens conditions being really one and the same by nature why else should not all that enjoy the same means of Conviction be alike apprehensive of it but the spirit imprints it upon some and not others Now the things are these 1 He kindles in him an eager and pinching hunger note that besides that spiritual and gracious hunger of the Soul after righteousness mentioned Mat. 5. 6. there is also a preparatory hunger which is oppressive to and grievously distresseth the soul see Isai 65. 13. My Servants shall eat but ye shall be hungry Now this hunger is made up of these two things Viz. 1. A deep apprehension of distressing misery lying upon him and making his spirits to fail and heart to faint God opens the Sinners eyes to see and find that which before he neither knew nor believed that the wrath of God is upon him that he is a cursed creature that he hath lost all grace and is in danger of the miseries of Hell he finds his Soul to be in a condition extreamly dangerous exposed to the executions of divine Vengeance he now believes because he feels that wrath is upon him sees a Sword of vengeance drawn against him 2. An earnest longing to be rid of and free from this distress as the hungry man longs that he may have some food
ordinances been constant in duties now you find grace coming in upon these Faith to believe in Christ and rely upon him an heart subdued to obedience say not now that this is your own work you saw not how it came in but by this effect you are led up to the cause and must say the finger of God was in it Others have done the like for the matter of it and never the near You see that your labours with your Children or your servants are blessed your reproofs and counsels take effect think not now that you have done the work or deserve the praise of it but consider it God's blessing upon your labours which havh done all others have been as careful and yet can see no fruit God so dispenseth himself to the Children of men as to take away all boasting and when we look upon all our gains attainments we must conclude with Paul it is by the grace of God we are what we are Had not he come home to us we had never gone forth to him had not he been gracious to us we had died in our sins Have you seen your sin and misery he opened your blind eyes have you arose and gone to him he saw you first and being moved with compassion came to you and took you up in his arms Study therefore to live to the praise of his Grace and still wait upon him for the continuance of it for the compleating of your Salvation and bringing of you to glory knowing that he who hath begun a good work in you must also perfect it to the day of the Lord if ever it be done and except he leads you can never follow SERMON XXI THus much for the season now let us consider the manner of the Fathers carriage to his Son according as it is described 1. By the cause of it 2. By the effect or carriage it self 1. The cause of it he saw and had compassion 2. The effect He ran c. 1. To begin with the cause his seeing his Son and having compassion on him do not decipher two acts but only one God chuseth miserable man to be a subject of his mercy and makes his misery an occasion of discovering it but mans misery is not the impulsive cause but Gods mercy the meaning of the expression is that he looked upon him with a compassionate eye when lying in his misery and his own pity moved him to do as he did Divine Attributes the declarative glory whereof God designs in the World have a subject in which they are pleased to discover themselves but this subject doth not move them but they incline themselves to the subject The word Had compassion comes from a root that signifies bowels and the English of it is his bowels did earn and the bowels being the seat of the affections especially of pity Hence the word is used to express great and active pitty Thence DOCT. The compassion of God is the only moving cause prompting him to shew favour to a poor perishing sinner In the former Doctrine we heard that Grace prevents here we see what grace it is that first moves viz. The fathers compassion when once this begins to set it self on work he can sit still no longer but riseth runs c. Here consider 1. What the compassion is 2. The evidence and reason of the Doctrine 1. What is the compassion of God which leads him to shew favour to a sinner Answ Compassion when it is attributed to men or reasonable creatures is a compound affection made up of love and grief and admits of this description It is an affection stirring up the soul to be grieved at the discovery of some miserable object and moving of him to endeavour its succour or relief Affections are the feet of the soul and prime mover of the will of man hence they are moved with reason either true or apprehended and lead unto actions suitable to that motion now though God be in himself 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not capable of being moved with any outward object and unchangeable in his will and hence never more propense to any thing at one time than at another but performes all things according to the everlasting counsel of his will which is unalterable Yet speaking of himself after the manner of man he assumes affections as love hatred joy compassion c. And that because in operibus ad extra or in the works of providence there are such manifest fruits as are wont in men to proceed from such affections so that we may see something resembling this description in the present case observe then 1. The object of compassion is a miserable thing A creature brought into distress groaning under his misery and standing in need of his succour Such an one is the sinner he is one famishing and ready to dy he is the forlorn creature a miserable wretch going without hope to the pit an helpless creature whom no created being can relieve and rid of his misery he is both poor and perishing as we before heard 2. The affections which go into compassion are two 1. Grief whereby the mind is moved and troubled at the creatures misery the sight of it oppresseth the heart when he sees it he cannot tell how to bear the sight of it hence also often proceed sighs and tears of pity over the object Thus God also speaking in our dialect seeing poor Sinners in their misery expresseth himself like one whose heart is ready to burst Hos 11. 8. How shall I give thee up how shall I deliver thee my heart is turned my repentings are kindled And after like manner Jer. 31. 20. in this grief also we are wont to be troubled at our selves if we have done any thing to bring the creature into such a miserable condition and hence we relent and repent and so God also speaks of himself in the forecited Hos 10. 8. 2. Love for without love there can be no compassion hatred is inexorable it rejoyceth and triumpheth in the misery of its enemy and the more miserable it sees him the more it can rejoyce in it but compassion argues good will hence God useth such expressions concerning Ephraim Jer. 31. 10. Is Ephraim my dear Son is he a pleasant Child c. 3. The natural operation of this affection in us is to stir us up to do what we can for the succour of the person thus in misery If we do indeed throughly pity the condition of one that is in sorrow we cannot sit still this affection will hale men to action they will certainly afford the best help they can thus God by vertue of this compassion of his succours saves delivers the Sinner frees him from misery restoreth him to a better state this affection sets him on work Jer. 31. 20. My bowels are troubled for him I will surely have mercy upon him 2. In the clearing up of the Doctrine consider 1. That God is a God of compassion 2. That
Reason of the sudden and strange alteration which we may sometimes see wrought in a sinner one whom the other day we saw bleeding to death in his sins rotting in his grave spending all in riot slighting all counsels and perswasions going in the ways of destruction now changed and become another man all new in him yea one that was wounded under amazement and terrours of conscience despairing and dying under convictions now rejoycing and ravished with the experience of the love of God These are strange alterations but not to be misbelieved if we consider the hast that God makes to find out and take into his arms dying sinners and the ravishing embraces he affords them When God comes he runs he may delay a while and let the sinner run himself out and not come presently to convert him but when he doth come he comes without delay nothing stops him Hab. 2. 2. Cant. 2. 8. USE 2. For Exhortation to the regenerate or such as have been converted unto God meditate much upon and labour to be deeply affected with the discoveries of God's wonderful love to you Think often 1. What hast he made I was dying despairing hopeless but he speedily came and put under an everlasting arm or ever I was aware c. 2. With what ardour of affection he fell upon thy neck Oh remember those embraces how he took thee up in his arms an unworthy filthy polluted armful how kind were those claspings which encircled thee those embraces which took thee out of thy pit 3. How he kissed thee breathing his soul into thee and filling thee with his love pardoning all thy sins taking thee to be his son again influencing thee with his grace in thy far Country speaking comfortably to thee Oh! love the Lord all ye his Saints and let your hearts boil over in ardent affections to him SERMON XXIII Vers 21. And the Son said unto him Father I have sinned against heaven and in thy sight and am no more worthy to be called thy Son VVE now come to observe the Son's deportment to his Father or how he carried it under these large and liberal expressions of his love to him and that is with all humble and penitent carriage The blotting out and pardoning of his sins doth not blot them out of his remembrance or make him ever the less apprehensive of his unworthiness no but it draws out his humble and penitent confession This acknowledgment is the same for substance which he had resolved upon vers 18 19. He purposed if ever he could meet his father thus he would say he now not only sees him but finds himself in his embraces and here he poures out his soul to him There is only the last clause omitted and why omitted is not essential to enquire divers reasons are given and that which seems most probable is that his father's kind carriage and abundant expression of his love had left him no room for it because he now found himself accepted in quality of a son The particular meaning of these words as they express the nature of true repentance hath been spoken to from vers 18 19. That which we have now to consider is only his expressing of them at this time viz. after his father had shewn himself fully reconciled and so signally testified it in his carriage to him Hence DOCT. When God manifests his special love to the soul of a sinner in Conversion it will draw forth the most kindly acts of true Repentance God's pardoning and accepting Grace sensibly apprehended will make a soul more to loth his sins accuse himself of them and be ashamed at them Though whiles God is kindling these resolves he comes in with them and â—rings his Salvation yet this shall not extinguish those resolutions but help them This is the season to express and act Godly sorrow humiliation and â—epentance We have David in this for an exe … nt example whom when the Prophet had convinced for his great sin he confesseth it but when he had witnessed from God that his sin was pardoned then he breaks forth in a penitential Psalm viz. Psal 51. wherein he humbleth himself into the very dust Reas 1. From the nature of true Repentance sound Humiliation and Godly sorrow which is such as before grace received from God cannot act kindly no not at all All that the man hath before he is converted is legal Take the force of the reason in these particulars 1. All acts presume their habits It is a principle in Logick that no effect exceeds the vertue of the cause The tree must first be made good before it can bring forth good fruit the thorn turned into a fig-tree if it bear figs. There must be an habit before there can be acts correspondent there must be an eye before there can be any sight So there must be habitual Repentance or a principle of it in the soul before there can be exertion of it Now this principle or habit is not in the soul before conversion Conversion is the turning of a Sinner from Sin to God this is done by changing his heart and all his faculties it is by making him a new creature and he is thus made by the infusion of the body of spiritual graces into him or laying the foundation of Sanctification in his soul Repentance is a grace a special gift of God and we in the former Doctrine observed that all graces come at once and then when God taketh a Sinner into favour then he furnisheth him with his grace hence being in Christ and being a new creature are convertible 2 Cor. 5. 17. 2. The act of Repentance is an actual turning from Sin and unto God and it hath both these parts in it as was before hinted at verse 18 19. If it wants one it wants all for man being a dependent creature must have will have some object Now here the soul utterly and everlastingly relinquisheth all its Sinful objects Hos 14. 8. It freely and willingly parts with them and it turns to God closeth with him as the only object on whom it can rest for Salvation this is the ultimate scope of Repentance Jer. 4. 1. Now such an act of chusing and closing with God which must needs accompany Repentance necessarily supposeth faith for a Sinner cannot close with God but by an act of faith and if there be an act of faith in Repentance then there was an habit whence that act flowed 3. Inasmuch as Repentance is a change of the affections which are the feet of the soul carrying it from and to its object and hence is a fixing them upon some other object than they formerly dwelt upon where also the prime affections mainly discover themselves viz. Love and hatred It necessarily prerequires to this act a gracious disposition infused into these affections In Repentance the soul is made to hate Sin which before it loved as its life and it loves God whom before it hated and the one of these