at in Isa 1. 14. Reas. 2. That the prophesies going before of this thing might be fulfilled Reas. 3. That Gods omnipotency in this so divine a mystery and principal a work of God might be evidently shewn Now it was not difficult to the power of God that a son should be born of a virgin For seeing all second causes act by their vertue which they received from God it is not to be doubted but that God can produce all these effects without this oâ—… that cause co-operating which otherwayes use to exist by them Yet not onely the power of God appeared in that work but also his wisdome to which it was most agreeable that so singular a substance of humane nature should in as singular a manner be brought to pass that differed from all others For in three manners all men were made before 1. Without the concurrence of either man or woman as in the creation of Adom 2. Without the concurrence of woman as in the production of Eve 3. By the concurrence of man and woman as in all ordinary generation afterwards And this onely is the proper and peculiar one of Christ by and of a woman without concurrence of a man Reas. 4. That it might easily appear how the contagion of sin might be removed from the humane nature of Christ. Use Is of Confirmation for strengthening of our Faith about the person of Christ to wit that he was both the Messias of old promised and the promised seed of the woman in that peculiar manner as that promise seems to have intended to wit the son of man that is of a woman descending of Adam and other men in ordinary way but made mother of a son not vulgarly or after the common manner but miraculously and without the company of a man begotten and born so that from his first conception all things were in him supernatural about which our mindes being busied ought alwayes to be lifted up to supernatural contemplations laying aside carnal and worldly thoughts Doct. 4. The Holy Ghost was the principal efficient cause of this generation It is from these words in the Text is of the holy Ghost the particle of denotes not any material cause but the efficient so that of the Holy Ghost signifies as much as if it had been said by the power of the Holy Ghost and his operation Now this is attributed to the Holy Spirit for these reasons Reas. 1. Because it was a miracle and all miracles by appropriation are attributed to the Holy Spirit Reas. 2. Because the principal work here was of Sanctification forasmuch as the lump of the humane nature which was to be assumed by Christ was in a singular manner sanctified and cleansed from all spot of sin and all Sanctification peculiarly attributed to the Holy Spirit Reas 3. Because the Holy Spirit was without measure to rest on to dwell in Christ. It 〈◊〉 but reason therefore that the Holy Spirit should prepare and make such a dwelling for himself as he also prepares his dwelling in the sons of God by adoption Quest. It may be thâ—…n questioned whether Christ may be called the Son of the Holy Ghost Ans It cannot be said 1. Because it would bring some confusion of relations and proprieties personal in God and in the persons 2. Because the Holy Spirit neither produced a new person when he made Christ to be begotten or generated neither produced the nature which he produced after his own nature or of the same essence with his own Use 1. Is of Direction in our Faith and in all our thoughts that we have of Christ that we admit of all that is in him to be spiritual holy and full of mystery nor that we ever doubt of any part of this mystery because all this as it is above common order so is it above the reach of common nature Yet we may always receive and conceive this that none of all these things are above the divine power of the Holy Spirit nor any thing impertinent or unfitting in that thing which is wholly mannaged by the Holy Ghost Use 2. Is of Direction in our practice as to the certainty of our salvation which depends upon this if we be sure that we are conformable to Christ in his nativity life death and resurrection And from thence is the beginning of this conformity to be taken if we be spiritually regenerated by the Holy Spirit as Christ was borne of Mary through the efficiencie and operation of the holy Ghost And this is the self same thing which the Apostle Peter admonisheth us to that we study to make our vocation and election sure The fifteenth Lords day 1 Pet. 3. 18. For Christ also hath once suffered for sinners the just for the unjust that he might bring us to God being put to death in the flesh but quickened by the Spirit AN argument is brought in these words whereby all Christians may be perswaded that undeserved afflictions are patiently to be born The argument is taken from the greater to the less in which also is contained the force and nature of a simily or example and also of some dissimilitude For such Logical assertions are oft joyned together in the same thing as they make to the same purpose The argumeat is this If Christ that was just hath suffered for sinnes and for unjust men then much more ought we to suffer afflictions imposed upon us but the first is true and therefore the latter also Christ considered in himself is the greater and his sufferings are the greater and so the argument is from the greater But considered as our head and Saviour he hath the place and nature of a simily or example to be imitated by us in tolerating afflictions so it is an argument from a like or from an example Lastly considered as just suffering for the sinnes of others that are uniust he is altogether unlike unto us and so also some force and emphaticalness of this argument is from the unlikeness They are ordered in this enunciation in which as the assumption of the Syllogism the cause is contained with the effect to wit Christ with his suffering For though suffering of its own nature be an adjunct of the sufferer yet as it 's voluntarily admitted and undertaken it is an effect Yet these arguments are so ordered that they have mixed with them the affection or property of the argument so called from diversit For Christ and his passions of their own nature are dissentaneous When therefore it is said Christ suffered it is as if he had said Though Christ were the Son of God yet was he not frâ—…e from 〈◊〉 That this may be the better understood it is to be known that suffering in this place and in such others is attributed to Christ by the 〈◊〉 of Synecdoche of the more general for the special and that it signifies the special suffering of a grievous evill Then are these two very dissentaneous between themselves that Christ should
suffer a great evill Now that he is said to have suffered for sinnes and for the unjust the particle for designes the cause of his suffering and that is threefold a meritory or material a formal cause and a final The meritory cause because Christ suffered for the things which the sinnes of unjust men had deserved The formal cause because for our sinnes Christ was induced as the form as of divine imputation as of that which by God was imputed so of the suretiship undertaken by Christ or that form which by Christ was undertaken or accepted to be accounted his when he underwent these sufferings Lastly also the final cause because for this end set before him or for this very purpose Christ suffered that he might take away the sins of unjust men and make unjust men to become just and so might bring them to salvation Doct. 1. Christ the Lord suffered all these evills of punishment which were due to us for our sins This is not so to be understood as if in kind and particularly he had undergone all the evills but in value onely and generally in the summe or upcast of all and in that which was equivalent and equipollent to all and so he is said to have suffered all the evills of punishment Reas. 1. Because he suffered generally all sorts of evill to wit as well spiritual in the agony and horror of his mind as corporal in his body and the extreme as well positive as privative both in a kind of loss and in kind of sorrow or feeling Reas 2. Because he suffered from all from whom any evill could be inflicted He suffered from men as well Jews as Gentiles as well his own domesticks as forrainers he suffered from the powers of darkness and Hell which were the murtherers from the beginning and the authors of all these evills which Christ suffered from them and their instruments lastly he suffered from God himself whose cup full of wrath he drunk out Reas. 3. Because he suffered in every part of himself every way that he could suffer For he suffered in his soul horrors and unspeakable sorrowes he suffered in his body hunger thirst nakednesse wounds spitting stripes and buffetings and whatsoever witty malice and cruelty could devise Use 1. Of Direction that continually in meditating on the passion of Christ we may look upon the singular and incomprehensible goodnesse grace love mercy justice and wisdome of God by which he sent his eternal Son to suffer such things for us and for our salvation and together also the abundant grace of our Lord Jesus Christ who was willing to it and did suffer so many and so grievous things for us Use 2. Of Exhortation that from the consideration of this suffering of our Lord and Saviour we strive to stir up our selves powerfully that we may daily have more faith and hope about grace and our salvation to be perfected by Christ and that our hearts may be kindled with greater heat of love towards God and Christ and with greater zeal of the glory of his name lastly that with more courage constancy and patience we bear all the troubles of this life for Christ's sake who suffer'd all things for us Doct. 2. Christ suffer'd all these things neither out of any necessity of nature neither by constraint neither by casualty and chance but of his own â—…ree choice of wisdome and will This is gathered from the Text in that it is put amongst Christ's praises as an example of obedience that he thus suffered But there is no place for praise nor obedience in such things as one suffers out of necessity or chance without the free consent of the will Reas. 1. Because this was the will of the Father whereunto he would conform his will in all things so far forth as he laid this charge upon him Reas. 2. Because this was the very thing for which Christ came into the world according to the form of covenant made between the Father and the Son Isa 53 10. Reas. 3. Because in this consisted the most perfect obediences which is the way to the most perfect glory Phil 2. 9. Object Every evill of punishment is against the will of the sufferer but what Christ suffered for us were very great evills of punishment They were therefore suffered against his will Ans. That evills of punishment are said alwayes to be against the will of the sufferer First Because they are against his natural inclination For therefore punishment is onely evill because it tends to the destroying of nature and so is against inclination of nature whereby every thing seeks the conservation of it self Secondly The evill of punishment is against the will of the sufferer conditionally to wit if by no other means the sufferer can attain to his wished end but it is not alwayes against his will absolutely The first had place in Christ because these passions were against the inclinations of nature since otherwise they had brought him no pain and they were also against his conditional will as appears by these words Father if it be possible let this cup pasâ—… from me But they were not against his deliberate determinate and absolute will The reason is because he suffered all out of obedience to the Father and of love to us and our salvation Use â—… Of Instruction how we may from this ground arme our mindes against those tentations that use to come by occasion of Christ's sufferings For in this respect Christ was a stumbling stone unto the Jewes and foolishness unto the Grecians But if we will well weigh with our selves that Christ suffered all these things not out of coaction or any necessity or any external violence but from the obedience of love towards mankind and that he might give us a most perfect pattern of obedience in his own person We shall be so far from finding any stumbling block or foolishness in these sufferings that on the contrary nothing could be found that was or is more suitable to the Saviour of the world Use 2. Of Exhortation that calling seriously to mind this grace of our Lord Jesus Christ out of thankfulness and mutual love to him we may be ready with all willingness and chearfulness of mind to undergo all sufferings and afflictions for his sake Doct. 3. Christ's sufferings were an expiatory Sacrifice for our sins This is it which is said in the Text That he suffered for sins for the unjust that is he had the virtue to take away the punishment from us the guilt also and the spot and to acquire to us the favour of God and righteousness and life eternal It is the same that useth to be signified by satisfaction by merit by redemption by restitution or restauration made by Christ. Reas. 1. Because this was the covenant between the Father and the Son that if he would undergo that obedience for us then we should be freed from our disobedience and death and should live thorough him Isa. 53. 10. For this
that there is no joy nor gladness in the practice of godliness and so they shun godliness and the care of it as that which is full of sadness and melancholy But the Scriptures teach otherwayes that the godly are called to this that they may alwayes rejoyce Phil. 4. 4. and that they alwayes are as it were feasting with all gladness according to that of Solomon Prov. 15. 15. The proper cause of this errour is ignorance a depraved sense of their sins 〈◊〉 in this like unto an herd of swine who make it their greatest pleasure and delight to wallow in the 〈◊〉 Use 3. Of Consolation for the godly in that 〈◊〉 their outward condition is yet they have 〈◊〉 of more true joy than can be either felt or understood by worldly men Use 4. Of Exhortation that striving with our utmost indeavour we must labour more and more to receive and be sensible of this joy Now the meanâ—… which we ought chiefly to use for attaining and 〈◊〉 thereof are these 1. We must in good 〈◊〉 remove all hinderances of this joy that is that by repentance a real amendment of life we 〈◊〉 cleanse and disburthen our selves of our sins 〈◊〉 We ought to have a true care that we daily make more sure and constant to our selves our union and communion with God by diligent examination and confirmation of our faith and hope 3. That we 〈◊〉 much and often exercised in the religious meditation of Gods Promises which promise all good things to such as have God for their God 4. Iâ—…â—…duceth much to this purpose if in our selves we exercise and excite this joy in and by the daily praise of Gods name that is as well in private as publick thanksgiving coming from the bottom of our heart for all those blessings with which God hath blessed us in Christ Jesus Doct. 5. That this joyâ—… and this comfort brings a certain holy security to the consciences of believers This is gathered from the last verse of the Psalm And this is that security wherein the Apostle â—…oasts and glories Rom. 8. If God be for 〈◊〉 who 〈◊〉 be against us c. For I am perswaded that nothing can separate me c. And David every where in the 〈◊〉 Why do I fear God is my rock c. This security differs much from carnall security wherein men of this world lye and sleep 1. Because true and prais-worthy security is grounded upon true faith and not upon vain imagination 2. Because it is bred in us by the Word and Promises and by the preaching and knowledge of the word of God It doth not proceed from traditions or mens dreams and customes in sin as that doth 3. Because this security relies alwayes upon Gods protection as it is in the Text Thou onely makest me c. it doth not rely on outward means or on our own strength and wisdome 4. Because this security is fed cherished and advanced by diligent use of calling upon Gods name and of all other means that God hath prescribed and appointed us Reas 1. Because Gods protection secureth believers from all evill at least from the sting of it by reason whereof it is onely truly evill for God hath all things both evill and good in his own power Reas 2. Because Gods presence brings all other good things with it for God is so good in himself that in himself virtually and eminently he contains all things that can be called good Reas. 3. Because Gods goodness towards believers is unchangeable so that there can be no danger of the changing of this happiness into misery Use The use of this Doctrine is for consolation to the faithfull to wit that from this ground they 〈◊〉 and ought to depend upon God and lay aside all those anxieties whereby they may be discouraged from adhering to God with joy and gladness The second Lords day Rom. 7. vers 7. What shall we say then Is the Law sin God forbid Yea I had not known sin but by the Law For I had not 〈◊〉 that concupiscence or lust was a sin unless the Law had said Thou shalt not covet THe Apostle that he might stir up the faithfull to a new obedience had proposed to them the difference of their condition that are under the Law and of them that are under Grace to wit that such as are under the law of the flesh and sin bring forth fruits unto death but such as are under the grace of the Spirit bring forth fruits in a new obedience unto life eternall But because of this opposition between the Law and Grace some might gather that there was then a very great agreement between the Law and sin therefore in this seventh verse this objection is preoccupated by the Apostle 1. Then the Objection is proposed What shall we say Is the Law sin 2. It is rejected with a certain kinde of detestation God forbid 3. The case is plainly set down and resolved in these words I had not known sin c. Where the singular effect and use of the Law is declared to wit that by forbidding and reproving is begotten in man a sense and acknowledgement of sin as of that which is contrary to its self and therefore it cannot be the cause of sin The Explication By the Law is understood in common a way and rule of walking Now this way and rule is imposed upon reasonable creatures by divine authority and the greatest obligations that can be And this is the Law to wit of God which the Apostle heer understands especially the moral Law By sin here is not onely understood the transgression of Gods will but also all those things that follow upon such a transgression which in this Chapter is defined by the name of Death and is called sometimes misery Sin is either known confusedly and speculatively onely or more exactly and practically Now the accurate and practicall knowledge of sin is here understood whereby it is efficaciously concluded in our consciences that sin is a detestable thing and by all means to be avoided Doct. 1. Men of their own nature are so blinded that although they be altogether drowned in sin and death yet of themselves they cannot know it This is gathered from these words I had not known sin Reas. 1. Because the very mind and conscience of man which is his eye and light is corrupted after a twofold manner 1. Privitively In that it is deprived of that light whereby it might rightly judge of it self and of such things as belong unto its spiritual life a. Positively In as much as it is possessed with a certain perverse disposition whence it often calls evill good and good evill For as the eye being put quite out feeleth nothing and as the eye infected with humours and depraved by the indispositions of the organe sees all things otherwise than they are presented so is it with the eye of the soul. Reas. 2. Because the whole man is possessed with a certain
spiritual distemper and as it were with a drunkennesse and lethargick stupidity whereby he is sensible of nothing rightly and spiritually Reas 3 Because we are so borne in sin that in a manner it becomes natural to us nor ever have had we experience of any other condition As those that are borne with deformed and crooked limbs and never saw aright and well proportioned disposition of all the members do not know that their own limbs are deformed and ill proportioned but esteem their distortion and disproportion to be the right proportion it self even so is it in this case of sin and corruption of nature Use 1. Of Admonition that for this cause we might more and more humble our selves before God seeing that we are so miserable that of our selves we can never know our own misery Use 2. Is of Direction to deny all our natural wisdome that so we may flie to God and seek wisdome from him that we may know our selves and him aright Doctr. 2. The onely way to know sin aright and the cause of our mysery is by the law of God It is gathered from these words For unlesse the law had said c. Reas. 1. Because the law of God doth in some way enlinghten the eyes of our minde Psal. 19. Reas. 2. Because the law of God is the rule of our life and is therefore the touchstone not onely of the straightness but also of all the obliquity and crookedness of it Reas. 3. Because the law of God is set before us as a glasse wherein we may clearly see our faces and quality Iames 1. 23. Now it performs this use of a glass to us by a comparison made between the perfection which the Law requires of us and the manifold defects and deformities that are found in our life Questions hence arising Quest. 1. Whether did not some wise men at least among the Heathen know sin without this Law of God I answer 1. That they were not altogether without this law of God because in part they had it written and ingraven in their hearts But yet 2. They knew not many sins which by the Law might easily have been known 3. They knew not sin under the first and most proper reason of it to wit as it was an offence against God but onely as it was repugnant to reason in man himself 4. They knew not those spiritual miseries which accompanie sin 5. They did not know sin practically and efficaciously so as to be by that knowledge driven to a spiritual humbling of themselves before God Quest. 2. In what manner doth this Law of God shew us our sin I answer 1. It sheweth us our duty or the will of God that we should do 2. It shews us our fault in transgressing of this will 3. It shewes us our guilt whereby for this guiltiness we are bound over unto punishment 4. It shewes also the punishment it self for the threatenings of the Law wherein the punishments are contained and denounced are parts of the Law and belong unto its sanctification or ratification Use 1. Of Direction that in passing judgement upon our lives we follow not either our own fancies nor the tenets and opinions of the vulgar but the law of God alone Use 2. Of Admonition that we often make trial of our life according to that law and that as well for time past for our greater humiliation as for the time to come for our caution and better direction in every part of our conversation The Third Lords Day Rom. 5. vers 12. Wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin and so death passed upon all men in whom all have sinned THe Apostles purpose in this place is to illustrate that Doctrine which he had before taught concerning justification by Iesus Christ for which end he makes a comparison of the likeness between this grace of our Lord Iesus Christ and the sin of Adam our first Father after the flesh And the comparison runs upon the efficacy and effects of each of them The Proposition of the Comparison is in â—… 12. and the Reddition to that is after explicated by way of Parenthesis In the Proposition Adam is set forth as the cause of a twofold effect to wit of the bringing in of sin and of the bringing in of Death And the reason of the Connexion of these effects with that cause is given in the last words of this verse to wit from the conjunction that all had with Adam in that first sin in these words In whom all men c. Doct. 1. Sin entered into the world not by Gods creation but by mans defection This is manifest in the Text by man not by God c. Reas. 1. Because God made man upright and after his own image that is not onely free from all sin which may in some sort also be said of all other Creatures but also adorned him with all those endowments and faculties whereby Gods nature might as it were in a pourtrait be expressed and represented and by help whereof in keeping of the law he might have attained unto a certain sort of divine blessedness or felicity For as there is no fault in a pourtrait so it be well drawn or made by a perfect workman unless the fault be in the Original from whence the pourtait is taken so also no fault could be in man created according to Gods Image and that by God himself unlesse some fault be attributed to God himself whose Image man is Reas. 2. Is because God did not onely prescribe a law unto man in the Creation but also engraved it upon his heart by which means it was that man had in himself a most certain Testimony of his uprightness in which and to which he was created and withall a most sufficient and ready means of living well and unblameably to God For the law of God perfectly purely written in the heart of man is as it were a solemn Testimony registred in a Table or Book that man was made fit and able to keep that Law It is as it were the voice of God sent down from Heaven whereby man was called and stirred up to observe that way of living which is taught thereby Reas. 3. Because God added thereunto a pledge and Sacrament in the Tree of Life whereby he would have that Covenant of the Law written in the heart more clearly confirmed also outwardly to wit that he would by the observation of his Law first perpetuate mans life in this world unto the solemn justification of him at his appointed time and then advance him to a further and heavenly Felicity And on the other side he threatens Death unto him in case he should depart from that Will and Law of God all which had been done to no purpose if man had been at first made by God himself in any measure or manner sinfull and perverse Reas. 4. So far was God from being the cause of sin in the first creation of
man that by no means it can be conceived how God at any time can be the cause of any sin because seeing sin is a defect it can have no other cause but a deficient one and God seeing he is perfection it self can no ways nor ever be deficient Use Of Direction that in all our speeches and thoughts we may keep Gods glory untouched and unspotted and confesse that all the good we have comes alwayes from him but that all the evill that either we doe or suffer ariseth not from him but from our selves Doct. 2. Through Adams first disobedience sin passed upon all his Posterity Nor did this happen onely by way of imitation as the Pelagians teach but also by way of propagation or natural descent This is proved by this Argument If this had onely come to pass by imitation then the Apostle might as properly have said that Adam with all his Posterity sinned in the Angels who first fell from God as to have said that all men sinned in Adam because they as much follow the example of the Angels as of Adam For it is expressely said vers 14. That death and so also sin reigned over them that sinned not after the similitude of Adam that is by the imitation of Adam therefore vers 19. men are said to be made sinners by Adams disobedience it self The manner of this propagation is taken up and understood 1. To stand in imputation because that first transgression was held as the transgression of the whole nature of mankinde For as in the receiving of the benefits and endowments that belonged to all mankinde Adam bore the place and person of all men so also it was but right and reason that he should maintain their place either in their conservation by obedience or losse by disobedience untill they were capable of standing to or falling from their primitive condition in their own persons Herein he was as it were the Surety of all mankinde so that what he did in this businesse was to be held valid by all as done in their names 2. The second degree of this Propagation stands in the derivation or traduction of that corruption which by our first transgression seised upon the person of Adam himself This corruption is usually called the languishing of nature the seed or tinder of sin the law of our members the law of the flesh lust and sin that dwels in us but most usually originall sin because it cleaves unto us even from our first original and is some way natural unto us to wit as in our nature corrupted also it is the original of all other sins for all actuall sins flow from this as from their fountain This corruption first and principally consists in the privation of original righteousness the absence whereof so far as it is penall is inflicted by God but as it is a privation having the nature of a fault to wit the losse of that rectitude or right constitution which we should have kept and preserved entire it depends upon that relation that all men have to Adam and to his first sin Now that such corruption naturally is found in all men is not onely proved from Scriptures but seems also to be confirmed by experience it self Reas. 1. For in all men there appears a manifest perversion of our wils and inward appetite as much as spirituall and truly good things are of no good relish to all animall and naturall men but the contrary evils which of their own nature have no good rellish seem to them most sweet Now as the perversion of the sensitive appetite doth denotate bodily sicknesse so the perversion of the inmost most spiritual appetite doth point forth unto us sicknesse that is inward and in the spirit The same also may be observed of the perversion of the judgement and understanding from whence come so many and shamefull errours whereby good is esteemed evill and evill good Reas. 2. It is manifest that there is in all men a certain rebellion of the inferiour and animall faculties and appetites against the superiour and most spiritual faculties of the soul which shews the ficknesse of the upper part as not having strength enough to govern the lower and again a disorder and confusion of the inferiour faculties whereby they will not be subject to their Superiour For as as every infirmity debility and perturbation in the body so also in the soul hath its cause of sicknesse disease or certain corruption from the depravation of other parts Reas. 3. There may be observed in all a certain natural crouching of our selves to things that are below us and a certain aversion and turning away from those that are above us and for which we were made so that there are few amongst men that live not more like beasts stooping naturally to their belly-food and bowing towards the ground than according to the nature of man whose body was erected to look up to heaven and seek after God Now as a crouching in the constitution and fashioning of the body is a sign of a bodily sicknesse so also this soul crouching of the spirit doth manifestly declare some foul sickness of the spirit Reas. 4. There appears manifestly in all men a certain insensibleness from nature it self in discerning of things truly good and truly evill howbeit there is a far greater sweetness in true spiritual good things than in corporall and a far greater bitterness and sowreness in spiritual than in carnall evils Now this insensibleness and spiritual blockishnes is a manifest defect and vice cleaving to us from our very original even as the want of any outward sense is a great defect and fault of the body Reas. 5. Experience teatheth with how great difficulty and slowness men are stirred up to things that are truly good therefore as it is the definition of a good habit that makes a man ready and quick unto good works so must it be an evill and corrupt habit whereby the contrary comes to passe because slowly and with difficulty men set themselves to any good endeavours Reas. 6. It is well enough known to all that man hath not the power to do so much good as he knows should be done and as he desires to doe Wherefore when one hath not the power to move the members of his body it is a manifest disease that hinders its motion so where one hath not the power to move himself spiritually it is a manifest spiritual disease as when there is difficulty of corporal motion and one moves his body with great pains it discovers a great weaknesse of his body even as this other doth a weaknesse of the spirit Use 1. For Humiliation by reason of this misery 2. Of Exhortation that we rest not till we perceive that by the grace of God we are freed from this misery 3. For Direction that in our Prayers before God and in all parts of our care for amendment of our life we may chiefly go about this that not onely in
our outward words and works as being but the rivulets and branches of our sin we be reformed but that in the fountain and root of this sin dwelling in us we may be cleansed and renewed The Fourth Lords Day Ephes. 5. 6. Let no man deceive you with vain words for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the children of disobedience IN these words is contained an argument whereby the Apostle labours to perswade all the faithfull that they may keep themselves from those sinnes whereof he had made mention a little before The Argument is drawn from an adjunct that follows upon sin to wit the wrath of God of which sinnes are not onely the antecedents but also meritory causes certainly procuring it as is intimated in these words For these things The connexion of this effect with its cause is limited and confirmed 1. It is limited by a description of the subject wherein Gods wrath doth alway pursue sin in these words upon the children of disobedience 2. It is confirmed by rejecting of all vain shifts in these words Let no man deceive you The Explication by the wrath of God 1. Is understood Gods vindicative justice 2. His will to inflict punishment according to that justice 3. The punishment it self that is so inflicted And in this place most properly the punishment is understood which in other places is often called death distress severities hot anger and the like This wrath of God is said to come against or upon men because as it were coming down from Heaven it suddenly fals upon and overwhelms and holds as intangled in a net the sinners so that by no means they can escape it In the same sense that not unlike phrase is used Rom. 1. 18. by the expression of the children of contumacie or stubbornness upon whom this wrath comes those sinners are understood which can by no means be perswaded to leave their sins and seek God by true faith and repentance where this is to be marked that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may be turned both children of incredulity and children of disobedience but it agrees better to this place to be turned children of disobedience and of rebellion because we read not this phrase the children of saith but of obedience 1 Pet. 1. 14. Doct. 1. Such mens condition is most desperate because they are not onely sinners but also stubborn in their sins It s gathered out of these words Upon the children of disobedience or stubbornnesse So they are named here as men whose condition is much to be abhorred and whose example and company is most to be shunned as appears from vers 7. be not therefore partakers c. Reas. 1. Because such men serve a most miserable servitude to a very base Master that is to sin for sin exercises a spiritual Kingly power and dominion over them because they do all that the lusts of sin commands them and can by no means be perswaded to shake off that slavish yoke and so much the lesse as they perceive that slavery by so much are they the more fully under its command because by this means it comes to passe that their very will it selfe and the spirit of their minde is possessed by this slavery and oppressed For as a brute or a man that comes neer to a brute serving some cruell Master takes no thought for that his condition because of his stupidity neither cares nor wishes for a better is a more full and perfect slave than some free-born and free-minded man who is by force constrained to serve one but yet under such servitude and force keeps a free minde even so it fares in this matter Reas. 2. Because such men are furthest off from repentance and so from the kingdome of God and from salvation For repentance doth most consist in the turning of the heart from sin to God by perswasion of the Word and holy Spirit And to this temper the obstinacy and unperswasibleness of such men is flat opposite who are not onely not perswaded to turn to God but are perswaded to the contrary that such perswasion of converting is not to be embraced or regarded for such are properly called the children of rebellion or disobedience As therefore those diseases are most mortal which admit of no cure and are but the more exasperated the more they are dealt with even so also is it with such kinde of men Reas. 3. Because these men do most grievously encrease their guilt in this that they withstand the means that God hath sanctified for procuring their salvation For while they will not suffer themselves to be perswaded to that conversion unto Faith and Repentance they directly fight against God and not onely so but in this very thing that he would and is some way striving as it were to save them Use Of Admâ—…nition That most of all we be carefull of this stubbornnesse or rebellion which is not onely to be understood in common of that conâ—…umacy whereby men refuse altogether to be converted but also specially and in every part of obedience For if we perceive that God calls us to this or that special duty t is then our part mainly to take care that even in that we present our hearts to God flexible and perswasible whereunto we are invited Doct. 2. Upon the children of disobedience certainly and unevitably the horrible wrath of God comes This is clear in the Text without any collection made from it That this wrath is horrible and altogether intolerable the Scripture every were testifies as Heb. 10. 27. Apoc. 6. 16 17. and elswhere And the thing it self doth sufficiently shew it if we consider Gods anger as to its intensness extensness and duration as to its intensnesse it is called in Scripture a consuming fire Heb. 12. 29. Now this fire of the wrath of God consumes not lightly or light things onely as in the superficies but as it is said Deutro 32. 22. Gods wrath set on fire will burn down to the grave c. Nahâ—…m 1. 6. Where there is a most likely pithy description By all which descriptions is signified that the wrath of God doth throughly peirce not onely into the body but into the soul and inward part of the spirit for which reason in many places of Scripture it is compared unto sharpe arrows peircing into the heart its self and consuming the spirit and life As to the extension this wrath of God contains in it all sort of evils whether corporal or spiritual whether in this life or at the end of it and in death or at death â—…ither belong those catalogues or inventories of curses that are found Deutr. 28. and Levit. 26. 3. As to the duration it remaineth upon impeâ—…ient sinners Iohn 3. 36. not for some short space but unto all eternity and without end For as that obligation whereby we are bound to render God all obedienees without end so consequently the transgression whereby sinners break that obligation is in a
manner infinite without end so also the punishment which taketh away its measure from the nature of the transgression will be without end infinite and that as wel in the privation of an infinite good as in the endles duration of this privation or losse Neither ought it to seem strange that for a sin which is committed in a short time an endlesse punishment should be inflicted because equity its â—…elf requires this that every one should be deprived of that good of which by his own fault he hath turned from But every â—…inner hath turn'd himself away from an endless good by a fault he can never come out of by himself and make an end of and therefore it is but reason that he be endlesly deprived of that good And moreover because he hath disturbed that order that God set appointed it is but juâ—…tice if he never be freed from the punishment of this fault untill he have repaired God his honor which an unrepenting sinner can never do unto eternity It ought not therefore to move any that sin which is but momentary should be punished eternally Reas. 1. The committing of it is as it were a spiritual wounding and yet a wounding in what â—…ort time soever done doth often leave behinde it a wound of long duration and often endlesse and eternal death Reas. 2. The committing of sin is as it were a spiritual fall or sliding and yet the fall in short time passed may be such that thereby for a very long time or without end the party may remain in the depth or pit whereinto he fell Reas. 3. The committing of sin is as it were a â—…ying with bands or thongs whose nature is that it may quickly be done and yet for ever keep the party bound as long as the bands themselves remain unloosed or unbroken Reas. 4. T is as it were a bargain in which the sinner for the enjoyment or use of some short pleasure out of a madnesse sells himself into slavery Now from a bargain of buying and selling though passed in a short time the right is conveyed to the buyer for ever and the alienation is eternal or endlesse in its own way Reason 1. It is as it were the putting out of a lamp for a sinner once drowning himself in the â—…ilth of sin puts out as it were the whole light of his mind and a lamp once put out though it be done in a moment yet by vertue of that putting out remains of its self endlesly extinct and put out Use 1. Of Condemnation against such as remain in their carnal security and please themselves in this condition over which perpetually hangs the so horrible wrath and anger of God Use 2. Is of Admonition that with all care above all things else we go about this to shew this wrath of God Matt. 3. 7. where also the way to shun it is shewed to be by repentance verse 8. And yet this is not so to be taken as if this shunning lay in our repentance as it is our action and as if that had some vircue of freeing from the wrath of God for Christ alone is our enfranchizer from the wrath to come 1 Thess. 1. 10. We therefore truly flee from the wrath of God when we flie to this mercy in Christ Jesus by true faith in him and repentance unfained Doct. 3. All such speeches as promise impunity of sin and indempnity from the wrath of God are but vain and seducing This is also cleare in the Text. Now that they are vain hence it appeareth because they are against his decree and his will clearly revealed and therefore can have no solid truth in them And that they are seducing is apparent enough also from the first author of such speeches For the devill when he would seduce our first Parents promised them this impunity in these words Ye shall not dye The Fifth Lords-day Rom. 8. 3. For what the Law could not doe in that it was weak through the flesh God sending his own Son in the likenesse of sinfull flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh THe Apostle in this place expounds why the faithfull may be freed from sin and death by Christ The reason is given as it were from the cause moving God to this giving of Christ. And this moving cause was the needinesse of our want which appears in the defect of power in any other means to produce such an effect as if the Apostle had said because it was needfull for us to be delivered from sin and death and yet this could be effected by no other means therefore God performed it by Christ. The strength and necessity of this consequence depends upon the will of God which tacitly supposeth that God would not have mankinde fall utterly to perish but to be restored again The whole syllogism or reason is this If by no other means faln men could be restored but by Christ then that way was to be taken because God would that some way it should be done but the first is true and therefore also the latter The assumption is proved to wit that man could be restored by no other means by the most likely instance of the law which once had been of great power and of force sufficient to bring man to happinesse For except Christ and the Gospel never any thing was given of God to man that was more perfect and divine than the Law That therefore which the Apostle says here of the law hath the force of such an argument as this If by vertue of the Law man could not be restored than by no other means could he be but by Christ but the first is true and therefore the latter also The Apostle both proves and expounds the Assumption at once from the reason or cause of this defect or weakness of the law to restore man that it is not properly inherent in the law it self but in our flesh or corruption whereby it is that we cannot fulfill the law that so it might save us much lesse by the Law rise up again from Death to life Doct. 1. It is the will of God that miserable men may be delivered from their misery and restored to life eternal This is here presupposed by the Apostle as granted and is used by him as the ground of his reasoning Reas. 1. Is taken partly from Gods mercy partly from his wisdome partly from his power and partly from the stability of his decrees from his mercy God would relieve miserable men therein to shew the glory of his grace and free mercy as it is called Ephes. 1. 6. the riches of his mercy his great love and the supereminent riches or treasures of his grace and bounty Ephes. 4. 7. for unlesse God had helped miserable men that were all drown'd in sin and death he had not accomplished above the half of his goodness and bounty towards mankind For that bounty that was manifested in the creating of us was neither fully
are made partakers of this mystery by eating and drinking 2. Is about the manner of this action which is specified to us in the word 〈◊〉 And this manner is again contained in three acts whereof the 1. is that which is set in the last place that every communicant discerne the Lord's body 2. Is that he try himself 3. Is that he furnish himself with such a disposition as is worthy of so great a mystery And these three acts are set down in these three words discerning the Lord's body let a man examine himself and he that eats 〈◊〉 drinks unworthily Doct. 1. All our work that is ours onely in the Lord's Supper is to eat and to drink the body and blood of Christ. It is gathered from these words Let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup and not discerning the Lord's body Reas. 1. Because this is the Sacrament of our spiritual nourishment in and by Christ. Reas. 2. Because in the very institution of this Sacrament no other thing is prescribed but that we should take eat and drink to wit as the signs with our bodies so the body and blood of Christ spiritually or by faith to the nourishment of our soules Reas. 3. Because nothing else is represented in the external signes and actions but this nourishment on Christ which by the institution of Christ is in this Sacrament used Use Of Refutation against Papists What the difference is between the Supper and the Popish Mass because Papists have taken away the Sacrament that was instituted by Christ and have set up in its place the Sacrifice of the Mass that was devised by men And this is the difference between a Sacrament and a Sacrifice that the formal reason of a Sacrifice consists in this that in it men offer something to God and God receives something from men But the formal reason of a Sacrament is in this that God offers something to men by visible signes and men receive it from God on the conditions and manner that he offers it In this Supper God offers Christ unto us for our spiritual nourishment and we receive Christ as the food of our soules by eating and drinking of him by faith Hence the popish Mass is a meer stranger to Christ's institution while they make its principal use to be a Sacrifice for the quick and the dead and while they officiate their private Masses wherein the people neither eat nor drink while in the publick Masses they take away the cup from the people so that though they eat in some sort yet they drink in no manner while they hold up the Host or Sacrifice that is the consecrated bread and wine rather to be adored and worshiped than to be eaten or drunk while lastly they do all this in an unknown tongue so that the people cannot understand either what or how they should eat or drink Doct. 2. That we may rightly partake in the Lords Supper it is chiefly required that we rightly discerne the Lords body By this discerning of the Lords body is understood an act of the understanding whereby we observe the difference between this bread thus consecrated to be a signe and exhibitive seal of the Lords body that is of all his benefits and graces to our faith and common bread Or it is that judgement of our mind whereby we have a right apprehension and pronounce right sentence concerning this whole mystery or business The want of this discerning is that which is reproved here by the Apostle Reas. 1. Because without judgement and prudence agreeable to the thing undertaken nothing can be rightly or perfectly done or performed Reas. 2 Because in the Sacraments where the external appearances are bodily and gross and yet a spiritual mystery or secret as to sense lies hid in them there is need of spiritual heed and judgement that we may rightly pierce and dive into that spiritual secret it self Reas. 3. Because the want of this discerning brings with it a prophanation of this holy feast as appears by the example of the Corinthians For who so discerne not what it is about which they are busied can never fit themselves so as to behave themselves arightly in handling of such a business Use Is both of Direction and Exhortation together that every one earnestly set his mind and iudgement arightly to discerne before he come to the table of the Lord what it is that is there done and what it is that himself should there do Now the special points that ought by all communicants to be discerned are these 1. The occasion and necessity that there was that Christ should be broken and given for us and to us which was no other but the deepest guilt of our sin heaviest punishment due to it and the misery that to us would thence have followed 2. The proper cause and reason of this donation which was the infinite mercy of God towards us 3. The manner in which Christ was given for us which was both in body and soul to the sufferance of death though they were the soul and body of God personally that by this his obedience we might be both freed from death and the consequent of its misery and made partakers of all the blessings of grace and glory and happiness which were in him prepared for us and he had deserved to us 4. The meanes by which Christ is thus applied unto us and made ours as in this Sacrament externally by the signes of eating of bread and drinking of wine and internally by the operation of the Holy Ghost and our faith stirred up by him to rely upon Christ for life and nourishment and growth unto life eternal and all the blessings aforesaid Doct. 3. The second duty required unto a right communicating or partaking of this Sacrament is that we seriously examine or try our selves The object of the former duty was the Supper it self instituted of God The object of this is our selves wherein by a reflex act we behold and consider our selves that we may understand how our disposition and condition agrees or disagrees with the nature and use of this institution And this inquiry should be made with greatest care and diligence as the word used for it doth sufficiently express wherein is properly expressed the Goldsmiths pains in diligently trying of silver and gold that he may know true coyne from false Reas. 1. Because it would be in vain to discerne the Lords body unless we discern aright also how our selves agree with or disagree from the Lords body and whether we have such requisites as necessarily we must for the saving participation of his body For in the Sacrament there is a mutual relation between the gift offered and our receiving of it nor doth it bestead us at all to know of what sort and how precious the gift is unless we know also that our selves are such as to whom this gift doth belong Reas. 2. Because great is the deceit of mans heart whereby men
this prayer Reas. 2. Because God according to his infinite wisedome hath so ordered things in Christ that he can with safety to his justice of his free mercy forgive us our sins Reas. 3. Because this mercy being infinite farre surpasseth our sins though in themselves they be horrible Use Of Exhortation that with all our hearts we fly to this mercy and rest in it and on it Doct. 4. Unto remission of sins together with â—…aith is required a confession of them and repentance or a change of minde and amendment This followes from the nature of the petition Reas. 1 Because none can earnestly desire the blotting out of his sins unless he both confess and also hate and detest them Reas. 2. Because otherwise he can by no meanes rightly magnify the mercy of God whereunto he flies but rather goes about to prostitute it and make it a Pander or Baud to his sins Reas. 3. Because without these none is fitted for receiving comfort from the mercy of God in remission of his sins Use Of Reproof against such as presume on the mercy of God though they never thus seriously repent of their sins nor can be brought to confess or acknowledge their cruell dispositious to men Doct. 5. Mercy and love to our brethren is a signe of the mercy and love of God to our selves From these words As we forgive our debtors Reas. 1. Because the mercy and love of God shed abroad in our hearts begets mercy in us to our bretheren as heat begets heat Reas. 2. Because this mercy and love towards men is for its conformity thereto and suitableness to it a special condition of obtaining the mercy of God and so is declared to be tied to it Mat. 6. 14. If ye forgive men their trespasses your Father also that is in Heaven will forgive you Reas. 3. Because this forgiving of all injuries and wrongs done to us by others is taken of the special and free mercy of God communicated unto us and this grace is the effect of Gods mercy forgiving us our sins Use Of Admonition that we deceive not our selves and promise to our selves the mercy of God whilst we nourish in our own hearts hatred and ranâ—…our against our brethren The fifty second Lords day On the sixth petition of the Lords prayer 〈◊〉 uâ—… not into temptation c. IN this petition the business is about the evill of sin in respect of its dominion which it uses to have over men concerning which we have first the petition and secondly its declaration or opposition In the petition we pray against this evill in its twofold cause whereof the first is the proper cause of sin intending it which is the temptation of the Devill or the Devill tempting us to sin Now temptation is nothing else but an argument proposâ—…d to us whereby we are induced to be perswaded and drawne into sin The other cause that is looked at in this petition is not properly the cause of the sin nor any efficient or author of it but a governour and orderer as well of the sin it self as of the tempting to sin and of the effects of both but the true cause of the evill of punishment that followes sin And this is Gods effectual and powerfull way of working about sin or exercising of his providence which usually is called Gods permission although it be more than a bare and an idle permitting The explication of this petition is in praying for the contrary to this evill that we prayed against in the words going before which is prayed against from Gods gracious acting towards us contrary to that which before was called a leading into temptation For it is called a delivering or plucking of us out of temptation Doct. 1. The guilt of former sins committed deserveth altogether at gods hands that we should be quite given over to temptations and sins This is gathered from the connexion wherein first forgivenesse of sins is sought and then deliverance from temptations and evill for sin Reas. 1. Because sin being an aversion or turning away from God therefore it deserves that he should turne away himself and his grace from us Reas. 2. Because for sin we both give our selves up as it were servants to sin and to him that tempts to sin We deserve therefore directly and very rightly that we should be given to such masters as we our selves have chosen Reas. 3 When we rush into sin we neglect that grace of God by which we might have been preserved from sin and therefore we deserve to be deserted by him Use 1. Of Admonition that we so much the more take care to keep our selves from sin Use 2. Of Direction that we daily seek from God the forgivenesse of our sins even for this end that we be not further given up to sin and to temptation but that we may be preserved from both Doct. 2. Whosoever have forgivenesse of sins or seriously seâ—…k after it they have a desire and true purpose to abstain and keep themselves from sinning in time to come This is also clear from the connexion of these two petitions Reas. 1. Because otherwayes they would not truly abhor sin and so would shew themselves altogegether indisposed and not qualified for remission of sins Reas. 2. Because else they would not be thankfull to God that forgave them their sins Reas. 3. Because else that forgivenesse would be in vain if they should again purpose to themselves to returne to the like condition wherein they were before Use Of Reproof of such as seem to wish for forgivenesse of sin but in the mean time have no care to fly from sin Doct. 3. Who so desires to keep himself from sin ought also to keep himself from all temptations and occasions that lead into sin It is clear from the petition which prayes against temptations to sins Reas. 1. Because the end of such temptations is sin and the misery that followes upon sin Reas. 2. Temptations are so many so subtile and so powerfull that unless with great care we take heed to our selves it cannot be but they lead us into sin Reas. 3. Because of our selves we are carried that way and incline unto this that by giving place to temptations we may betray our owne soules to the tempter Use Of Admonition to such as from too much security and boldness rashly expose themselves to the danger of diverse temptations and inticements to sin for temptation is not to be desired and sought after but as wisely as we can to be shunn'd and where that cannot be stoutly and couragiously to be repulsed Doct. 4. Our Father that is in Heaven disposeth also of our temptations according to his owne good pleasure For thus it is here held out to us that it is he that either leads us into temptation or causes us not to be brought into it but kept from it Reas. 1. Because he exercises his providence in guiding and measuring of every temptation Reas 2. From him depends the