the Dead by the Glory of the Father and that the Father raised him It is easily answered This was not by way of supplement to make up any defect of power in Christ but only by way of consent to Christs own Power and Action that so men might Honour the Son and the Father John 5.19,26 Or else by the Glory of the Father we may understand that Glorious Power which the Father gave unto the Son in the Flesh to have life from himself because that holy Spirit which immediatly quickned him was both his and the Fathers and so the Action was common to both Thus like the Pâ—…enix he goeth out of the Sâ—pulcher in the day of his Triumphs al lighted and environ'd with Flames of Triumphant Glory 3. Assuring others by his lights and sâ—…en or that they shall rise again 1. Cor. 6.14 He is called the first Fruits of them that Sleep The Triumphant Resurrection of our Lord is the Root and Hope of ours with this he sweetens the acerbities of our present life and replenisheth Hearts with the Antipast of their Immortality for he arose not barely in a Personal but Publick Capacity and though it were a Damnable Heresy of Hymeneus to say That the Resurrection was past already Yet it is a truth to say that it is begun He first and we at his coming 1 Cor. 15.25 By what is past in the head we are assured of what is expected in his Members for his Resurrection is a Pledge and Earnest of theirs He having paid our Debt Death cannot detain us in Prison for it Yea it is a beginning of ours as before is noted he being raised who is the Head the Body must also follow If the Elder Brother be sprung out of the Dust the Younger Brethren shall not stay there The Vine-Plant being in Heaven there the Branches must receive their Eternal Flourish Object 1. Is it not said 1. Cor. 15.2 By man came the Resurrection of the Dead A. It is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 such a man as is God also from whose Will this large Soul of Nature had its motion and who therein commandeth so universally as he seems to hold the Heaven and Elements under here to be instruments of his Wonders it is he that lighted Stars at his Birth and Eclipsed the Ancient Sun at his Death and walked on the waters as on a Pavement of Marble It is he that causeth the Earth to cast out her Dead Object 2. Have not men done it Answer 1. Stories of Men Raised by Men are either Lies and Illusions as the Pythonist of Endor raised the Devil in Samuels Shape and the Church of Rome maintain many Idle Stories of Dead men Raised to Walk and Live after Death Otherwayes Dead Men neither walk nor appear in Body or Soul after Death Or if there are any such They are extraordinary Permissions for Secret Ends only known to him that Permits them 2. The Prophets and Apostles have done it but in the Quality of Ministers So Elisha raised the Shunamites Son 2. Kings 4.34 And Peter raised Dorcas Acts 9.40 But not by their own Power It only belongs to Christ to do this work with an Original Power which hath its Fountain in his Bosom with an Absolute Command which receives no Modification in all Nature with a Simple Will which needs no other Instrument It was by Divine Influence and Assistance in those Prophets and Apostles to confirm their Doctrine and to draw the Church sooner to believe 3. It is the Divine Nature that is the Fountain of Life he gives takes restores to whom when and how he pleaseth As it is with the Sea for water and the Sun for light in the former all the waters are gathered together into an Ocean where they grow into swelling heaps and are the source of all the Streams that refresh the Earth and in the latter that great Luminarie is the Vessel wherein the Lord hath gathered all light which before was sattered in the Heavens but is now united in that bright Lamp which running like a fiery Chariot might rule the day and illustrate the earth making it fruitful Thus it is with the Deity for life John 6.63 The Spirit quickneth the Flesh profiteth nothing The words that I speak unto you are Spirit and Life And by this power he quickneth the Dead So that it 's clear the work is his who is Lord of nature and holds the Keys of life and death in his own hands His light only can dispel the darkness and his voice only can break the silence of the Grave The second Doctrine comes now to hand viz. Doct. 2. That this Divine Priviledge should be to us a ground of Faith Gen. 17.1 I am God all-sufficient walk before me c. Walk before me who am all-sufficient self-sufficient Original Universal Good the Pillar of Abrahams Faith And the Apostle speaks by way of wonder that any should not believe it Acts. 26.8 Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you That God should raise the Dead Therefore it is that the Sacred Scripture doth frequently mind us of his power to help our incredulitie Numb 23.19 God is not as man that he should lie nor the Son of man that he should repent hath he said it and shall he not do it or hath he spoken and shall he not make it good And again Is there any thing too hard for God So Math. 19.27 With God all things are possible A main prop to an humble Suppliant That seeing his own vileness and the Divine Excellencies which are warming and enlightning cryeth out Lord if thou wilt thou canst make me clean as it is recorded Math. 8. â— 2. This is the Rock on which the weak Anchor of a Christians Faith may firmly fix You know Sampsons Riddle Out of the Eater cometh forth Sweet The reason why Christians should consider the power of God out of this strong comes forth sweetness In the application hereof may be found Vse 1. Matter of Correction and that of two sorts First of such that make it too hard denying the Resurrection in opinion As Pearls are dissolved in Vinegar so is Truth in hearts made bitter with Corruption Thus we find many wicked and irregular Spirits who having renounced the blessings of the other life against the voice of nature in the order of the World wherein we have the New Birth of Stars days Seasons Plants and Birds who make a perpetual Image of the Resurrection in the World nay against the touch of God and impressions of verity on the very Gentiles who have professed the happiness of the Soul in the other life and the Resurrection even on their Tombs to deny the Resurrection So the Saduces of old Acts 23.8 Hymeneus and Philetus 2 Tim. 18. which you may easily perceive is not only to crack the eye of a reasonable judgment but also to pull out the eye of Faith all pure and caelestial as it is Or in practice Let us eat
and drink for to morrow we shall die 1 Cor. 15.32 Of those I mean who drown their Souls in their Bodies and would have no time to live longer than they have to sin and when there is an end of sinning wish there would be an end of living And well it would be for them if living like Beasts they might be annihilated like Beasts Thus men do err not knowing the power of God That God who out of nothing Created all things can certainly reduce many things into one When the Body is gone into a thousand substances he can easily make an abstraction and bring that Body together again as a Chymist out of several Metals mingled together can abstract one from the other the Silver from the Gold and the Alchimy from the Silver and reduce every Metal to its own kind Thus should we much more believe of God that he is able to extract and reinvest every Soul with its own Body though they are mingled and confounded with many other Substances The Persecutors of the Primitive Christians burnt their Bodies into Ashes and cast them into the River and all ad tollendam spem Resurrectionis but all in vain for even they also shall arise to a better Resurrection for at the Shrill Voice of the last Trumpet the greatest Jaylors shall surrrender up all their Prisoners all the scatter'd Dust of Adams Seed shall ride upon Windy Wings till it meet together in a collected Body All the Creatures in the world that have made their Meat of mans flesh shall finde that they have eaten Morsels too hard for the digestion of their weak Stomach Isa 26.19 The earth shall cast forth her Dead as a woman doth an untimely Birth the Grave shall be in travel with the Dead and shall be delivered of them Secondly Such as make this work too easie saying they can quicken themselves against all sense and common reason It is to maintain a proposition ridiculous to all humane understanding Can any thing make it self neither can any reasonable Creature raise it self to an higher rank of being than it is A Stone cannot make it self a Tree to have growth and life nor can a Tree make it self a Beast to have sense nor a Beast make it self a man to have Reason nor a Rational man make himself a Saint Or else ascribe it to the Ordinary course of Nature depriving the Lord of his Royal Prerogative Vse 2. Here is matter offered of strong consolation and encouragement to the holy seed of Abraham you believe in him who can quicken the dead For your sakes let me take leave a little to open this Cabinet that you may view the excellency of this powerful God in whom you believe and be sure the prospect will be very pleasing Death and so the Dead may be considered three ways 1. Politice There is a Death of Kingdomes and States as there is a rising and flourishing so there is a decaying and dying they spring flourish and dye the goodliest and stateliest Politick Bodies that ever the earth bore though animated with the searching Spirit of the most profound Policie strengthned with the resolution and valour of the most Unconquer'd sighted with Eagles eyes of largest depths and comprehensions of States and Crowns adorned with never so many prosperities and Triumphs yet like the natural Body of a man they have their revolutions and decays Most apparent in the ruines of the Roman Empire once a glorious Body and the once splendor of the Turkish Monarchie and the Venetian Aristocracy which sprang from the most contemptible beginning with the Spanish State which once appear'd like a Comet threatning destruction anâ— giving Laws to all the Nations round about her The Beams and Rasâ—ors of a State may be so linkâ— together so tenton'd and set into one another as might embolden a bare Politician to determine it an indissoluble Constitution But God undermines all with the Breath of his Mouth And Politicians have observed that the longest liv'd State on Earth suffers great alterations and Periods within the compass of four or five hundred years This decay is 1. In matters Ecclesiastical concerning Religion As the Church prays Psalm 80.18 Quicken us we call upon thee And the power of Christ Shines marvellously in the great Empire of his Church which the Father hath put into his hands to build raise and cement with his Blood illuminate with his Light and nourish with his Body To confirm which the Historian hath observ'd how the Doctrine of the Albigensâ—s was preserved notwithstanding all enemies and he hids all the Privy Counsellours of Nature who can tell where the Swallows lie all the Winter and how at the Spring they have a Resurrection from their seeming deadness Let them sâ—iâ—h he also inform uâ— in what invisible Sanctuary this Doctrine did lurk in spice of â—ll opposition and Persecution and how it reviv'd out of its Ashes at the coming of Luther And withal he observes that in those parts of France where the Albigenses were most cruelly handled now the Protestants the Heirs of most of their Tenents most Flourish 2. In matters Civil touching the Law and matter of Government as the Lord promised Isa 26.19 Thy Dead Body shall live c. Before they complained of very hard labour and that they brought forth nothing but Wind now thy Dead Body shall Live Which some refer to the Babylonâ—sh Captivity wherein they were as Dead Bones in the Grave without any Strength Wisdom or visible hope of being delivered yet though they seemed so very much decayed as if they were quite withered and Consumed with Calamity and Death he promised to raise them again and Cloâ—h them with Beauty and Glory Thus the Lord quickens the Dead If he burn his Phenix out of the very Ashes he will raise another 2. Physice And that is the Death of the Body of which we have spoken already The Eâ—rth shâ—ll cast forth her Dead This is easie to God to whom Miracles are as easie as natural operations A Miracle being nothing else but a new Creation 3. Ethice Which is the Death of the Soul Two fold First Temporary either by the absence of Grace or Divine Discretion when Man is indeed Dead or as a dead thing in his own apprehension the Lord quickneth You who were Dead he quickneth Man is Impotent and weak like a dead Member in the Body he is in himself without Strength And as the Organs can make no sound unless Breath be caused to enter into them so neither can a dead Soul make any Harmony till God breathe into it by his Blessed Spirit Secondly Eternal when the person is actually cut off from all hope and irrecoverably shut up in the eternal Abyss So the Lord doth not he will not quicken Luke 16.26 There is a great Gulf a Diamond Wall between Hell and Paradice so that they who pass from earth to Hell cannot return c. Tali privatione non Datur Progressus That Gulf being
not Dispair looks on things through black Spectacles and gives all for lost Hope doth the contrary Q How is it possible to hope against Hope Answ 1. Because of the Power of Christ upon which the Soul doth in great Straits rowl it self Whatever Lets and Impediments do arise between the Promise and the fulfilling of it though they be as high as Mountains and as the Gates of Hell yet the Believer can by Faith look upon them all but as Difficulties which cannot check the Power of Christ but only Magnifie it For as jealous Thoughts of the Divine Arm or fear that it may be encountred with some insuperable opposition makes the Hope of Promised Good to be weak and uncertain so the faithful and serious consideration of Gods Power a resting upon it produceth Hope against Hope it turns every Valley of Achor into a door of Hope administers Manna in the Wilderness and draws water out of the Rock brings light out of darkness comfort out of every Tryal Thus Miconius wrote to Calvin upon view of the Churches Enemies reflecting upon the Power of Christ Gaudeo quod Christus Dominus est alioquin totus Desperassem I am Glad that Christ Reigns otherwise I should utterly despair So the Believer in the midst of Straits rejoyceth in the Power of Christ who lives and Reigns for ever and ever 2. The Spirit of Christ inwardly works and nourisheth some Sparks of Hope always in the Hearts of his people Thus it was with Job David Paul and a vast number of other faithful Souls who sparkling with the lightning Rays of Hope have lift up their Palms in the midst of Hazzards and Gain'd Heaven by Violence still laying the degrees of their Honour in the depth of suffering This like an Anchor holds the Ship of the Soul in her greatest Storms and like an Helmet keeps off the Blows of the Sword or Arrows from entring 1 Thessal 5.8 Let us who are of the day be sober putting on the Breast-Plate of Faith and Love and for an Helmet the Hope of Salvation In time of publick Calamities the Righteous have Hope Joel 3.16 The Lord will roar out of Zion the Heaven and Earth shall shake but the Lord will be the Hope of his People So that if all outward hope be taken away their hope in God is not taken away Upon this account it was that the Jews being Prisoners in Babylon are called Prisoners of Hope Zech. 9.10 If Heaven and Earth be ready to come together yet through the strength of the Divine Spirit working in their Hearts Believers have Hope which as a Bow in the Heavens all furnished with Emeralds never loseth it force 3. Their former Experiences are a Foundation of Hope against Hope Rom. 5.4 And Experience Hope Hos 2.5 I will give the Valley of Achor for a door of Hope This Valley of Achor so called from Achans Sacriledge to deter men from Sin some think to be the same with Engeddi mentioned so often in the Canticles however both are neer to Jericho and in it they tasted the first Fruits of Canaan as an earnest of the rest in it they saw abundance of Plenty and were Delighted and Refreshed therewith all that the Lord did then for his People and now saith he will give it to the Church for a door of Hope A Believer brings in a Catalogue of Experiences Psal 119.65 Thou hast dealt well with thy Servant In how many Cases hath he had Experience of God when Sin and Temptation have been strong he hath come in with Auxiliary Forces and his Grace hath proved sufficient When the poor Soul hath been even sinking under Fear God hath recovered him out of the Quick-Sands and lifted his head above the deep Water Psal 33. O Lord thou art my Glory and the lifter up of my Head When David was in the Mouth of Danger the Lord delivered him I was pluckt out of the Mouth of the Lyon so Saint Paul The Believer hath many Experiences and these beget Hope Thou hast and wilt Deliver saith Experimental David 4. By looking on things not as they are at present or in their own power but as they shall be by the Lords promise Surely saith the poor Believer He is faithful that hath promised As he is able to fulfil the least Iota of whatever he hath spoken so he is infallible in what he promiseth As no impediment can arise to hinder his Power so no contingency can fall out to alter his Will all his Promises being in Christ Jesus yea and Amen 2 Cor. 1.20 These and such like Meditations serve to uphold and keep Believers from being injurious to God or themselves and to believe in Hope against Hope Vse 2. This Doctrine administers incomparable Comfort whosoever is Christs is enabled to believe in Hope against Hope When Comfort can neither be seen felt nor apprehended when Fears and Distresses are on every side and all hope of safety is taken away when nature affords no ground of Hope or encouragement to expect the fulfilling of a Promise but suggesting many posing arguments to impede and gainsay the Truths of it and to make Faith as feeble as their Bodies when old and Crazy then to hope against Hope 1. That the Church shall be raised and preserved from so many Enemies is against Hope 2 Chron. 20.12 O our God wilt thou not judg us for we have no Might against this great Company that cometh against us neither know we what to do but our eyes are upon thee 2. That a Wound shall be Healed It is against Hope Prov. 18.14 A Wounded Spirit who can bear 3. That many and strong Lusts shall be vanquished and subdued Rom. 7.24 O Wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this Body of Sin and Death 4. That an impure Soul shall be prepared for and received into Heaven it is against hope yet see Isa 1.18 Come let us reason together saith the Lord though your Sins be as Red as Crimson I will make them white as Snow To day shalt thou be with me in Paradice Oh strive for this Heavenly Hope Q. How may it be Attained A. As other Graces are wrought so is this It is the work of God wherefore he is called The God of all Grace 1 Pet. 5.10 He is the first Planter the Promoter and Finisher of Grace God is called the Father of Lights and he must light up this Candle in your Souls More particularly it is obtained 1. By Experience Rom. 5.4 as David argued 1 Sam. 17.37 And Holy Paul 2 Cor. 1.20 Experience breeds Confidence Thou hast thou shalt is the ordinary argument used by the Psalmist And so the Church comforted her self and Nourisheth her Hope Lament 3.21,24 This I Recalled to mind therefore I hope in thee And The Lord is my Portion saith my Soul therefore will I Hope in him The observation of Gods Merciful Acts of Providence to his Church in general as to any of his People in