loved from the grave for so it is in the Hebrew Isa. 38. 17. Thou hast loved my soul from the pit of destruction To be loved out of a danger and loved out of a sickness oh that 's a blessed thing USE 1. To acknowledg the Lords goodness in these common mercies We did not give life to our selves and we cannot keep it in our selves God made us and God keepeth us It was not our Parents that fashioned us in the womb they could not tell what the child would prove male or female beautiful or deformed They could not tell the number or posture of the veins or bones or muscles it was all the curious workmanship of a wise God and it is the same God that hath kept us hitherto Isa. 46. 3 4. By me ye are born from the belly and carried from the womb even to old age I am he and even to hoar hairs will I carry you c. We have been supported and tenderly handled by God as Parents and Nurses carry their younglings in their arms Many times wanton children are ready to scratch the faces of those that carry them so have we put many affronts upon him yet to the very last doth he carry us in the arms of his Providence In infancy we were not in a capacity to know the God of our mercies and to look after him but nevertheless he looked after us Afterwards we knew how to grieve him and offend him long before how to love and serve him Oh how early did our naughty hearts appear and all along how little have we done for God in whom we live and move and have our being He is not far from us in the effects of his care and Providence but we are far from him by the distance of our thoughts and affections by the carnal bent of our hearts It is a good mornings-exercise for us humbly and thankfully to consider of his continual mercies For Gods compassions are new every morning Lam. 3. 22. as fresh as if never tired with former acts of grace nor wearied with former offences It is some recompence for the time of sleep half our time passeth away and we do not shew one act of love and kindness unto God therefore as soon as we are awakened we should be with God Psal. 139. 18. How many are gone down to the Chambers of death since the last night 2. It quickneth us to love and serve God who is the strength of our lives and the length of our days Deut. 30. 20. Thy life is wholly in Gods hands Man cannot add a cubit to his stature nor make one hair white or black at his own pleasure It is the Lords Providential influence that keepeth thee alive in point of gratitude thou shouldst serve him Deal bountifully with thy servant that I may live But I may urge also in point of hope Gods servants can best recommend themselves to his care and keeping by prayer and expect to walk continually under divine protection Those that provoke God continually they may be continued by the bounty and indulgence of his providence but yet they can look for no such thing and in the issue it proveth to be in wrath for their sins are more and judgments greater it is but to treasure up wrath to the day of wrath 3. If life temporal be the fruit of Gods bounty much more life eternal Rom. 6. 23. The wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life One is wages the other a gift 4. It informeth us that we may lawfully pray for life with submission to the will of God and that death may not come upon us suddenly contrary to the ordinary course of nature I was loth to make a distinct doctrine of it yet I could not decline the giving out of this Truth How will this stand with our desires of dissolution and willingness to depart and to be with Christ which certainly all Christians that believe Eternity should cherish in their hearts To this I answer 1. by concession That we are to train up our selves in an expectation of our dissolution that we may be willing when the time is come and God hath no more work for us to do in the world we are to awaken our desires after the presence of Christ in Heaven to shew both our faith in him and love to him Since Christ was willing to come down to us though it were to meet with shame and pain why should we be loth to return to him Iacob's spirit revived when he saw the Waggons which Ioseph sent to carry him Death is the Chariot to carry you to Christ and therefore it should not be unwelcome to us 2. By correction though it be lawful and expedient to desire death yet we are not anxiously to long after it till the time come there may be sin in desiring death as when we grow weary of life out of desperation and the tiresomeness of the Cross and there may be grace in desiring life that we may keep his word longer express our gratitude to him here in the world to mourn for sin to promote his glory More fully to make this evident to you I shall shew how we may desire death how not To answer in several propositions 1. There is a great deal of difference between serious desires and passionate expressions The desires of the children of God are deliberate and resolved conceived upon good grounds after much strugling with flesh and blood to bring their hearts to it Carnal men are loth that God should take them at their word as he in the Fable that called for death and when he came desired him to help him up with his burden Alas they do not consider what it is to be in the state of the dead and to come unprovided and unfurnished into Gods presence We often wish our selves in our graves but if God should take us at our word we would make many pauses and exceptions Men that in their miseries call for death when sickness cometh will run to the Physician and promise many things if they may be recovered None more unwilling to dye than those that in a passion wish for death 2. We must carefully look to the grounds of these wishes and desires Carnal wishes for death arise either 1. out of violent anger and a pet against Providence as Jonah 4. 8. The Sun beat upon the head of Ionah that he fainted and wished in himself to dye and said it is better for me to dye than live The children of Israel murmured when they felt the Famine of the Wilderness Exod. 16. 3. And the children of Israel said unto them Would to God we had dyed by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt c. When men are vexed with the world they look upon death as a relief to take vengeance upon God to deprive him of a servant 2. In deep sorrow as Iob 3. 3. Elijah 1 King 19. 4. He requested for himself that
24. 5. given to the children of men Psal. 115. 16. Here God will shew his bounty to all his creatures to beasts and all kind of men 't is sometimes the Slaughter-house and Shambles of the Saints They are slain upon earth Rev. 18. 24. a receptacle for elect and reprobate therefore here they have not their blessing our inheritance lyes elsewhere 3. There are all our kindred Ubi pater ibi patria where our father is there our Countrey is Now when we pray we say to him Our Father which art in heaven There are we strangers where we are absent from God Christ and glorified Saints and while we are here upon earth we have not such enjoyment of God There 's our Father it is his house Heaven is called our Fathers house and there 's our elder brother Col. 3. 1. Set your hearts upon things above where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God And there 's the best of our kindred and Family They shall sit down with Abraham Isaac and Iacob Mat. 8. 20. Well then the children of God they count themselves to be strangers here because their kindred are elsewhere 4. There they abide longest That we account our home where we abide An Inn cannot be called our home where we come but for a night and away but now there we are for ever with the Lord. Here we are in motion there is rest The world must be surely left If we had a certain term of years fixed yet it would be very short in comparison of Eternity All the time we spend here it is but a night but a moment in comparison of Eternity We live longest in the other world and therefore there 's our home Mic. 2. 10. Arise depart hence this is not your rest God speaks it of the Land of Canaan when they had polluted it with sin It is true of all the world Sin hath brought in death and there must be a riddance it is but a passage from danger Israel dwelt first in a wandring Camp before they came to dwell in Cities and walled Towns and the Apostle alludes to that Here we have no abiding City we look for one to come As the Israelites did look for walled Towns and Cities of the Amorites to be possest by them so here we have but a wandring Camp we look for a City And mark as it was with them in their outward estate so in the mysteries of their Religion they were first seated in a Tabernacle and then in a Temple in a Tabernacle which was a figure of the Church then in a Temple which was a figure of Heaven for you know as in the Temple there were three partitions the outward Court the Holy place and the Holy of holies so there are three Heavens the third heaven Paul speaks of the heaven of heavens and there 's the Starry heaven and the Airy heaven the outward Court This life being so frail so fickle we cannot call our abode here our home What is your life saith the Apostle it is but as a vapor Jam. 4. 14. a little warm breath turn'd in and out by the nostrils Job 7. 1. Is there not an appointed time for man upon earth his days are as the days of an hireling A hired servant you do not intend should live with you for ever you hire him for a day or two and when he hath ended his work he receives his wages and is gone so all our days are but a little while we do our service and then we must be gone Actors when they have finished their parts are seen no more they go within the Curtain so when we have fulfilled our course God furnisheth the world with a new Scene of Acts and Actors 5. The necessary exercise of their graces doth make them count their lives here but a pilgrimage and themselves but strangers upon earth viz. Faith Love Hope 1. Faith shews the truth and the worth of things to come Faith will make them strangers Heb. 11. 13. They saw these things and were perswaded of them and they counted themselves pilgrims and strangers O! were we perswaded of things to come we would be hastning towards them We cry home home we talk of heaven and eternity but we do not believe them Sense and reason cannot out-see time nor look above the clouds and mists of the lower world afar off in the Apostles phrase 2 Pet. 1. 9. but Faith shews the truth of things to come We that are here upon earth when we look to heaven the Stars seem to us but so many spangles O! but when we get into heaven and look downward the world then will seem but as a mole-hill that which now to sense seems such a glorious thing will be as nothing 2. The Love of Christ which is in the Saints makes them to account themselves as strangers A child of God cannot be satisfied with things here below because his love is set upon God Two things the heart looks after as soon as it is awakened by grace and Love puts us upon them both viz. a perfect enjoyment of God and a perfect obedience to God 1. That they may be with God and Christ. The Saints have heard much of Christ read much of him tasted and felt much of him they would fain see him and be with him Phil. 1. 23. If they had the choicest contentment the world could afford this will not satisfie them so much as to be there where Christ is and to behold his glory The Apostle thinks this to be motive enough to a gracious heart to seek things above for there Christ is at the right hand of God Love will catch hold of that Col. 3. 1. The place is lovely for Christs sake Love will not suffer them to count this to be their home Though Christ is present with them now spiritually while they are here yet the presence and nearness is but distance but a kind of absence being compared with what is to come and therefore this very presence doth not quench their desires but kindle them and sets them a longing for more All the presence the communion the sight of Christ they get now it is but mediate through the glass of the Ordinance 1 Cor. 13. 12. and it is frequently interrupted his face is many times hidden Psal. 30. 7. and it is not full as it shall be there Psal. 16. 11. But now in Heaven there it will be immediate God will be all in all and there it will be constant they shall be ever with the Lord and there they shall be satisfied with his likeness Psal. 17. 15. then they enjoy his presence indeed So that Love upon these considerations sets them a longing and groaning 2. As Love makes them desire the company of Christ so intire subjection to God they would have perfect grace and freedom from sin therefore are ever groaning O when shall we be rid of this body of death Rom. 7. 23. There is a final perfect estate
6. 16. Know ye not that to whom ye yield your selves servants to obey his Servants ye are whom ye obey whether of sin unto death or of obedience unto righteousness Now Man rightly constituted his Actions are thus governed The Understanding and Conscience prescribe to the Will the Will according to right Reason and Conscience moveth the Affections the Affections according to the command and counsel of the Will move the bodily Spirits and Members of the Body But by Corruption there is a manifest Inversion and Change Pleasures affect the Senses the Senses corrupt the Phantasie Phantasie moveth the Bodily Spirits they the Affections and by their violence the Will is carried captive Man blinded and so Man goeth on headlong to his own destruction The corrupt Passions are like wild Horses that do not obey the Driver but draw to Precipices for his destruction Therefore Basil of Seleucia calleth a carnal Man a Slave that runs after the Chariots of his own Passions and corrupt Affections 3. Consider the great tyranny and power of Sin it leaveth us no right and power to dispose of our selves and our Actions and so Men cannot help themselves when they would as is sensible in them that are convinced of better and do worse they see what they should do but do not do it being drawn away by their own Lusts. Video meliora proboque Deteriora sequor Sin hath gotten such a deep interest in their Actions and command over their Affections that they cannot leave what they know to be naught or follow that which they conceive to be good And this Bondage is more sensible in them that have some kind of remorse and trouble with their Convictions either from temporal inconvenience shame or loss and yet cannot leave their Lusts and so in despair resolve to go on and make the best of it Ier. 18. 12. And they said There is no hope but we will walk after our own devices and we will every one do the imagination of his evil heart Jer. 2. 25. Thou hast said there is no hope no for I have loved strangers and after them will I go Yea further that have a kindly remorse from the conviction of the Spirit Ier. 31. 18. I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus Thou hast chastised me and I was chastised as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke And so Paul Rom. 7. 14. I am carnal sold under sin 4. Consider how this Bondage is always increased by Custom which is a second Nature or an inveterate Disease not easily cured Ier. 13. 23. Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the Leopard his spots then may ye also do good who are accustomed to do evil The more he continueth in this course the less able to help himself the more he sinneth the more he is inthralled to sin as a Nail the more it is knocked the more it is fastned in the Wood. First a man yields up himself to Sin as a Servant by Covenant Rom. 6. 16. Know ye not to whom ye yield your selves servants to obey his servants ye are to whom ye obey that is gives up his principal Time Actions and Employments Then a Servant by Conquest 2 Pet. 2. 19. While they promise them liberty they themselves are the servants of corruption for of whom a man is overcome of the same is he brought in bondage A Sinner is under the dominion of Sin as an hired Servant and a Captive We first willingly and by our own default run into it and after cannot rid our selves of it Ligatus eram non ferro alieno sed mea ferrea voluntate velle meum tenebat inimicus me mihi catenam fecerat constrinxerat me Lord I am bound not with Iron but with an obstinate Will I gave my Will to mine Enemy and he made a Chain of it to bind me and keep me from thee Quippe ex voluntate perversa facta est libido dum servitur libidini facta est consuetudo dum consuetudo non resistitur facta est necessitas Aug. Confes. lib. 8. cap. 5. A perverse Will gave way to Lustings and Lustings made way for a Custom and a Custom let alone brought a Necessity upon me that I can do nothing but sin against thee And after that Reformidam quasi mortem consuetudinis mutationem Aug. Confes. lib. 8. cap. 7. Thus are we by little and little enslaved brought under the power of every Toy Things are lawful as subordinate helps but we contrary to the Law of Reason and the Inclinations to true Happiness immoderately desire them and these Desires being excessive get a compleat Victory over our Souls and at length we are brought under the power of every Creature 1 Cor. 6. 12. All things are lawful but I will not be brought under the power of any 5. There is one thing more that maketh the Carnal Life to be a meer Slavery and that is the Fear and Terror which doth arise from the consciousness of Sin the fear of Death and Damnation and Wrath to come which doggeth Sin at the heels When Adam sinned he was afraid Gen. 3. 7. And carnal Men are all their life-time subject to bondage through the fear of death Heb. 2. 15. There is a Fire smothering in the bosom of a Sinner and sometimes it flashes out in actual gripes and horrors they have grievous damps of heart so that Sinners are so far Bond-men that they dare not seriously call themselves to an account for the expence of their Time and Employments which every one should do nor think seriously of Death or God's Judgment or Hell He that is always under the check of a cruel Master cannot be said to be a Freeman Now so is every Man that is not in Christ let him be never so great and mighty and powerful he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 subject to bondage in danger of hidden fears easily awakened in his heart Well then call you this a Free Life As jolly and jocund as wicked Men seem to be or as great as they are it is a liberty of the Flesh taken by Men not given by God the quietness of the Flesh but bane of the Soul 2. On the contrary The true Liberty is in the ways of God 1. There we are directed how to attain to our great End which is true Blessedness Mat. 7. 14. Strait is the gate and narrow is the way that leadeth unto life and few there be that find it A way of Sin seemeth broad and easie to the Flesh but it is strait and hard to the Spirit and the way of Duty strait and narrow to the Flesh but because it is to Life it is broad to the Spirit or new Nature I shall walk at liberty To a renewed Heart the Divine Commandments are not grievous 1 Iohn 5. 3. for by this means they come to enjoy God and walk to their own Happiness and attain to the End for which they were made A poor heart goes home chearfully
compose and purifie the Mind and make Sin more odious and fortifie us against the Baits of Sense which are the occasion of all the Sin in the World All our Joy is to be considered with respect to its Use and Profit Eccles. 2. 2. I said of laughter It is mad and of mirth What doth it The more a Man delighteth in God and in the Ways of God the more he cleaveth to him and resolveth to go on in this Course and Temptations to Sensual Delights do less prevail for the joy of the Lord is our strength The safety of the Spiritual Life lieth in the keeping up our Joy and Delight in it Heb. 3. 6. Whose house are we if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoycing of the hope firm unto the end Isa. 64. 5. Thou meetest him who rejoyceth and worketh righteousness But now Carnal Delights intoxicate the Mind and fill it with Vanity and Folly The Sensitive Lure hath more power over us to draw into the slavery of Sin Tit. 3. 3. For we our selves were also foolish deceived serving divers lusts and pleasures Surely then the healing Delights should be preferred before the killing wounding Pleasures that so often prove a snare to us 2. The Object is to be considered thy commandments Here observe 1. David did not place his Delight in Folly or Filthiness as they do that glory in their shame or delight in Sin and giving contentment to the Lusts of the Flesh as the Apostle speaks of some that sport themselves in their own deceivings 2 Pet. 2. 13. that do not onely live in sin but make a sport of it beguiling their own hearts with groundless apprehensions that there is no such evil and hazard therein as the Word declareth and Conscience sometimes suggesteth they are beholden to their sottish Error and Delusion for their Mirth Neither did he place his Delight in Temporal trifles the Honours and Pleasures and Profits of the World as bruitish Worldlings do but in the Word of God as the Seed of the New Life the Rule of his Conversation the Charter of his Hopes that blessed Word by which his Heart might be renewed and sanctified his Conscience setled his Mind acquainted with his Creators Will and his Affections raised to the Hopes of Glory The Matter which feedeth our Pleasures sheweth the Excellency or Baseness of it If like Beetles we delight in a Dunghil rather than a Garden or the Paradise of God's Word it shews a base mean Spirit as Swine in wallowing in the mire or Dogs to eat their own Vomit Our Temper and Inclination is known by our Complacency or Displacency Rom. 7. 5. For when we were in the flesh the motions of sin which were by the law did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death Therefore see which your hearts carry you to to the World or the Word of God The most part of the World are carried to the Pleasures of Sense and mastered by them but a Divine Spirit or Nature put into us makes us look after other things 2 Pet. 1. 4. Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises even of the great blessings of the new Covenant such as Pardon of Sin Eternal Life c. 2. Not onely in the Promissory but Mandatory part of the Word Commandments is the Notion in the Text. There is matter of great Joy contained in the Promises but they must not be looked upon as exclusive of the Precepts but inclusive Promises are spoken of Psal. 119. 111. Thy testimonies have I taken as an heritage for ever for they are the rejoycing of my heart They contain spiritual and heavenly Riches and so are matter of Joy to a believing Soul but the Commandments call for Duty on our parts The Precepts appoint us a pleasant Work shew us what is to be done and left undone These Restraints are grateful to the New Nature for the compliance of the Will with the Will of God and its conformity to his Law hath a Pleasure annexed to it A renewed Soul would be subject to God in all things therefore delights in his Commandments without limitation or distinction 3. It is not in the Study or Contemplation of the Justice and Equity of these Commandments but in the Obedience and Practice of them There is a pleasure in the Study and Contemplation for every Truth breedeth a delectation in the mind Psal. 19. 8. The statutes of the Lord are right rejoycing the soul. It is a blessed and pleasant thing to have a sure Rule commending it self with great evidence to our Consciences and manifesting it self to be of God therefore the sight of the Purity and Certainty of the Word of God is a great pleasure to any considering Mind no other Study to be compared with it But the Joy of Speculation or Contemplation is nothing to that of Practice Nothing maketh the Heart more chearful than a good Conscience or a constant walking in the way of God's Commandments 2 Cor. 1. 12. Our rejoycing is this the testimony of our conscience that with simplicity and godly sincerity not with fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God I have had my conversation in the world Let me give you this Gradation The Pleasures of Contemplation exceed those of Sense and the Delights of the Mind are more sincere and real than those of the Body for the more noble the Faculty is the more capable of Delight A Man in his Study about Natural things hath a truer pleasure than the greatest Epicure in the most exquisite enjoyment of Sense Prov. 24. 13 14. My son eat thou honey because it is good and the honey-comb which is sweet to thy taste so shall the knowledge of wisdom be unto thy soul when thou hast found it then there shall be a reward and thy expectation shall not be cut off But especially the Contemplation of Divine things is pleasant the Objects are more sublime certain necessary profitable and here we are more deeply concerned than in the Study of Nature Surely this is sweeter than Honey and Honey-comb to understand and contemplate the way of Salvation by Christ This is an Heaven upon Earth to know these things Iohn 17. 3. This is life eternal to know thee the onely true God and Iesus Christ whom thou hast sent As much as the Pleasures of the Natural Mind do exceed these Bodily Pleasures so much do these Pleasures of Faith and Spiritual Knowledge exceed those of the Natural Mind These things the Angels desire to pry into Now the Delights of Practical Obedience do far exceed those which are the meer result of Speculation and Contemplation Why Because they give us a more intimate feeling of the Truth and Worth of these things and our Right in them thereby is more secured and our Delight in them is heightned by the supernatural Operation of the Holy Ghost The Joy of the Spirit is said to be unspeakable and full of glory 1 Pet. 1. 18. In short
carowsing dancing all the warnings of Parents the good counsel of Tutors and Governours the grave exhortations of Ministers and Preachers will do no good upon them they are alwayes wandring up and down from God and from themselves cannot endure a thought of God of Death of Heaven of Hell of Judgment to come but when God casts them once into some grievous disease or some great trouble they begin to come to themselves and then they that would hear nothing understand nothing despised all grave and gracious counsel given as if it did not belong to them scoffed at admonitions thought the day lost in which they had not acted some sin or other when the Cross preacheth and some grievous calamity is upon them then Conscience beginneth to work and this bringeth to remembrance all that they have heard before then they come to themselves and would fain if they could come to Christ. Sharp Affliction is a sound powerfull rouzing teacher Iob 36. 8 9. And if they be bound in fetters and be holden in cords of affliction then he sheweth them their work and their transgressions that they have exceeded Grace worketh in a powerfull but yet in a morall way congruously but forcibly and by a fit accommodation of Circumstances One place more Ier. 31. 18. Truly I have heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus thou hast chastised me and I was chastised as a bullock unaccustomed to the Yoke turn thou me and I shall be turned for thou art the Lord my God Affliction awakeneth serious Reflections upon our wayes therefore take heed what ye doe with the Convictions that arise upon Afflictions to slight them is dangerous Nothing breedeth hardness of heart so much as the smothering of convictions Iron often heated grows the harder On the other side see they do not degenerate into despair either the raging despair which terrifieth or the sottish despair which stupifieth Ier. 18. 12. They said there is no hope but we will walk after our own devices and we will every one doe the Imagination of his evil heart The middle between both is an holy sensibleness of our condition which is a good preparation for the great duties of the Gospel The work of Conversion is at first difficult and troublesome but pass over this brunt and all things will be sweet and easie the bullock at first yoaking is most unruly and fire at the first kindling casts forth most smoak so when sin is revived it brings forth death Rom. 7. 9. For I was alive without the Law once but when the Commandment came Sin revived and I died But yet cherish the work till God speak peace upon sound terms 2. It is a great help to those that are converted already How many are reduced to a more serious lively practice of Godliness by their troubles We are rash inconsiderate unattentive to our duty but the rod maketh us cautious and diligent We follow the world not the word of God the vanities thereof take us off from minding the Promises or Precepts of the word till the affliction cometh In short there is none of us so tamed and subdued to God but that we need to be tamed more We are all for carnal liberty there is a wantonness in us We are high minded earthly minded till God come with his scourge to reclaim us he chasteneth us for our profit that we may be partakers of his holiness Heb. 12. 10. Some lust still needeth mortifying or some Grace needeth exercising Our Pride needs to be mortified or our affections to be weaned from the world The Almond Tree is made more fruitfull by driving nails into it because that letteth out a noxious gumm that hindereth its fruitfulness So when God would have you thrive more he makes you feel the sharpness of affliction You have heard Plutarch's story of Iason of Choerea that had his Imposthume let out by a casual wound There is some corruption God would let out We are apt to set up our rest here and therefore we need to be disturbed to have the world crucified to us Gal. 6. 14. that the cumber of the world may drive us to seek for rest where it is only to be found and to humble us by outward defects that we may look after inward abundance that by being poor in this world we may be rich in Faith Iames 2. 5. and having nothing in the Creature we may possess all things in God 2 Cor. 6. 10. and be inlarged inwardly as we are straitened outwardly In short that we may be oftner with God God sent a tempest after Ionah Absalom set Ioab's barley-field on fire and then he came to him 2 Sam. 14. 30. Isa. 26. 16. Lord in trouble have they visited thee they poured out a prayer when thy chastening was upon them Hosea 5. 15. In their affliction they will seek me early It were endless to run out in discourses of this nature 5. The Affliction of its self doth not work thus but as sanctified and accompanied with the Spirit of God If the Affliction of its self and by its self would doe it it would doe so alwayes but that we see by experience it doth not in its self It is an evil and a pain that is the consequent and the fruit of Sin and so breedeth Impatience Despair Murmuring and Blasphemy against God as it is a legal curse other fruit cannot be expected of it but reviving terrours of heart and repinings against the Sovereignty of God We see often the same Affliction that maketh one humble maketh another raging the same Poverty that maketh one full of dependance upon God maketh another full of shifts and evil Courses whereby to supply his want No it is understood of sanctified Crosses when Grace goeth along with them to bless them to us Ier. 31. 19. Surely after that I was turned I repented and after that I was instructed I smote upon my thigh I was ashamed yea even confounded because I did bear the reproach of my youth After God had wrought a gracious change in him by his afflicting hand and Spirit working together So Psalm 94. 12. Blessed is he whom thou chastenest and instructest out of thy Law The Rod must be expounded by the Word and both must be effectually applied by the Spirit Grace is God's immediate Creature and Production he useth subservient means and helps sometimes the Word sometimes the Rod sometimes both but neither doth any thing without his Spirit 6. This Benefit though gotten by sharp Afflictions should be owned and thankfully acknowledged as a great testimony and expression of God's Love to us So doth David to the praise of God It is a branch that belongeth to the Thanksgiving mentioned v. 65. Thou hast done well with thy Servant according to thy Word The first of this octonary We are prejudiced against the Cross out of a Self-love a mistaken Self-love we love our selves more than we love God and the ease of the Body more than the welfare of the Soul and
resigned our selves to Christ and the hands of Consecration have passed upon us When Ananias had dedicated that which was in his power and kept back part for private use God struck him dead in the place Acts 3. 5. And if we alienate our selves who were Christs before the Consecration of how much sorer vengeance shall we be guilty Gods Complaint was just Ezek. 16. 20. Thou hast taken thy sons and thy daughters whom thou hast born unto me and these hast thou sacrificed unto them to be devoured And if Satan hath a full interest in you by doing his lusts as he had in them by that Rite of Worship is not the wrong done to God the same 2. It is a sure note of a carnal heart For it is not only incongruous that a renewed man should let sin reign but impossible De jure it ought not de facto it shall not be The exhortation and promise Rom. 6. 12. with 14. verse 12. Let not sin reign in your mortal bodies There is the exhortation while you have these mortal bodies sin will dwell in you but let it not reign over you God suffereth it to dwell in us for our exercise not our ruine Then the promise Verse 14. Sin shall not have dominion over you for ye are not under the Law but under Grace Let not shall not It is true sin remaineth in the godly but it reigneth not there 'T is dejectum quodammodo non ejectum tamen Cast down in regard of regency not cast out in regard of inherency Like the Beasts in Daniel Dan. 7. 12. They had their dominion taken away though their lives prolonged for a season Some degree of life but their reign broken The Israelites could not wholly expel the Canaanites yet they kept them under There will be pride earthliness unbelief and sensuality dwelling moving working in them but it hath not its wonted power over them Christ will not reckon men slaves to sin by their having sin in them nor yet by their daily failings and infirmities or by their falling now and then into foul faults by the violence of a temptation unless they make a constant trade of sin and be under the dominion of it without controul and set up no course of mortification against it 3. The reign of sin is so mischievous Sin when it once gets the Throne groweth outragious and involveth us in many inconveniences e're we can get out again Therefore they that know the service of sin as we all do by sad experience should use all caution that it never bring them into bondage again The work and wages of sin are very different from Gods work and wages The Apostle compareth them when he disswadeth them from the reign of sin Rom. 6. 21 22. For when ye were the servants of sin ye were free from righteousness What fruit had you then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed for the end of those thing is death But now being made free from sin and become servants to God ye have your fruit to holiness and the end everlasting life You have had full experience of the fruits of sin of Satans work what fruit then before you had tasted better things before you had a contrary principle set up in your hearts you are ashamed now to think of that course now you know better things But what fruit then Satans work is drudgery and his reward death The Devil hath one bad property which no other master how cruel soever hath To plague and torment them most which have done him most continual and faithful service Those that have sinned most have most horror and every degree of service hath a proportionable degree of shame and punishment He is an unreasonable Tyrant in exacting service without rest and intermission The most cruel Oppressors Turks and Infidels give some rest to their Captives but sin is unsatisfiable Men spend all their means and all their time and all their strength in the pursuit of it yet all is little enough And what is the reward of all but death and destruction Now judge you to whom should we yield obedience and who hath most right to be Sovereign He who made us and redeemed us and preserveth us every day none but he can claim title to us he to whom we are Debtors by so many Vows so many Obligations Or else Satan our worst enemy who is posting us on to our own destruction 4. It is so uncomely and misbecoming the new estate wherein we have so many helps and encouragements to resist sin First For helps you have an opposite principle to give check to it the seed of God or new nature Since Christ hath put Grace into your hearts to resist sin 't is your Duty not to suffer it to be idle and unfruitful Rom. 6. 11 12. Reckon your selves to be dead indeed unto sin but alive unto God through Iesus Christ our Lord. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof You want no ability to encourage you have an observing witness to give check to it the Spirit of God who will help you in this work Rom. 8. 13. He will be your Second neither we without the Spirit nor the Spirit without us There is a life and power goeth along with every Gospel-Truth Laziness pretendeth want of power but what is too hard for this Spirit Then Secondly For encouragement In every war are two notable encouragements goodness of the Quarrel and hopes of Victory as David 1 Sam. 17. 36. We have these in our Conflict and Combat with sin First Our Quarrel and our Cause is good 't is the Quarrel of the Lord of Hosts which you fight We stand with Christ our Redeemer who came 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that he might destroy the works of the Devil He hath begun the battle we do but labour to keep under that enemy which Christ hath begun to slay and destroy Sin is not only an enemy to us but to him 'T is against him and hindreth his Glory in the World and the subjection of his Creatures and Servants Were it not for sin what a glorious Potentate would Christ be even in the judgment of the world Secondly Hope of the Victory Our strife will end and it will end well Those that are really earnestly striving against sin are sure to conquer Rom. 6. 14. Let not sin reign c. And it shall not If there be but a likelihood of Victory we are encouraged to fight here a Christian may triumph before the Victory Non aequè glorietur accinctus ac discinctus 1 Kings 20. 11. Let not him that girdeth on his harness boast himself as he that putteth it off There will come a good and happy issue in the end even a Conquest of sin For the present we overcome it in part it shall not finally and totally overcome us in this World and shortly all strife will be over Rom. 16. 20. The God of
peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly 'T is but a little while and we shall receive the Crown and triumph over all our enemies III. Why the Saints should deprecate this evil 1. Because there is sin still in us all 'T is a bosome enemy that is born and bred with us and therefore it will soon get the advantage of Grace if it be not watched and resisted As Nettles and Weeds that are kindly to the Soil will soon choke Flowers and better Herbs that are planted by care and grow not of their own accord when they are neglected and not continually rooted out We cannot get rid of this cursed Inmate till this outer Tabernacle be dissolved and this House of Clay crumbled into dust Our old nature is so inclinable to this slavery that if God substract his Grace what shall we do 2 It is not only in us but always working and striving for the mastery it is not as other things which as they grow in age are more quiet and tame but Rom. 7. 8. Sin wrought in me all manner of concupiscence the Spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy It is not a sleepy but a working stirring principle If it were a dull and unactive habit the danger were not so great but it is always exercising and putting forth it self and seeking to gain an interest in our affections and a Command over all our actions and therefore unless we do our part to keep it under we shall soon revert to our old slavery Sin must be kept under as a Slave or else it will be above as a Tyrant and domineer Once more The more it acts the more strength it gets as all habits are encreased by action for when we have once yielded we are ready to yield again Therefore any one sin let alone yea that which we least suspect may bring us into subjection and captivity to the Law of sin Rom. 7. 23. It doth not only make us flexible and yielding to temptations but it doth urge and impel us thereunto Again This bondage is daily encreasing and more hard to be broken for by multiplied acts a custome creepeth upon us which is another Nature And that which might be remedied at first groweth more difficult Diseases looked to at first are more easie to be cured whereas otherwise they grow desperate So sins before hardned into a custome before they bring us under the power of any Creature or Comfort which we affect 2 Cor. 6. 12. For then afterwards it cometh to a compleat dominion and slavery so that if a man would he cannot help it It behoveth then every Child of God to do his part that sin may not reign for where care is not taken it certainly will reign Use. To reprove the security and carelesness of many David suspected himself else he would never have made this prayer to God Lord keep me Let not any iniquity have dominion over me And we should all do so that would be safe Prov. 28. 14. Happy is the man that feareth alway but he that hardneth his heart shall fall into mischief A constant watchfulness and holy jealousie and self-suspicion will be no burthen to you but a blessing Sin deceiveth us into hardness of heart for want of taking heed Many that are secure do not consider their danger and therefore they are not so careful to watch over themselves nor so humble as to implore the Divine assistance because they do not consider how soon they may be transported by a naughty heart and brought under the power and reign of sin Surely were we as sensible of the danger of the inward man as we are of the outward we would resist the first motions and not nourish and foster a temptation as we do The Saints do not tarry till the dead blow cometh but resist the first strokes of sin they do not tarry till it pines to death but resist the first inclinations An evil inclination if it be cherished and gratified gets ground the longer we let it alone the harder will our conflict be for sin secureth its interest by degrees 2. It sheweth the fearful estate of them that lye under the dominion of sin But who will owne it First It is certain that all men in their natural estate are in this condition Sin doth reign where there is no principle of Grace set up against it The Throne is always filled Mans heart cannot lye empty and void If Grace doth not reign sin reigneth Natural men are under the power of darkness Acts 28. 18. and Col. 1. 13. living in a peaceable subjection to sin till Christ come to trouble it all is quiet Wind and Tide go together Secondly It appeareth by your course Many will say There is not a just man on earth that doth good and sinneth not You are Sinners as well as we Answ. There is a difference though there be not a good man upon earth that sinneth not Eccl. 7. 20. yet there is a difference Some have not the spot of Gods Children Deut. 32. 5. There is a difference between sins Levit. 23. 24 27. God gave the Priest under the Law direction how to put a difference between leprous persons So still there is a great deal of difference between numbness and death and between dimness of sight and blindness want of sense and want of life between stumbling into a Ditch and throwing our selves headlong into an Ocean And so there is a difference between infirmities and iniquities a failing out of ignorance and weakness or some powerful temptation and a running headlong into all ungodliness Gods Children have their failings but a burning desire to be freed from them Though others wallow in their sin without any care of a remedy In the one there is a failing in point of Duty in the other a Rebellion Take Iudas and Peter both sinned against their Master the one denied the other betrayed him the one denied him out of fear the other betrayed him out of covetousness and greediness of gain the one plotted his death the other was surprized on a sudden There is a great deal of difference between purpose and a surprize the one wept bitterly the other is given up to a raging despair David did not make a trade of Adultery and bathe himself in filthy lusts Noah was drunk but not knowing the power of the juice of the Grape They dare not lye in this estate but seek to get out by repentance Thirdly Some things may beget caution and move you to suspect your selves that is when your souls readily comply with the temptation you are at sins beck If it saith Go you go if it saith Come you come It is of great concernment to know what goes to the determining a mans condition to know at whose beck he is whether he is at the Fleshes or Spirits beck Psal. 103. 20. The Godly are described that they hearken unto the voice of his Word so the wicked are those that hearken to the voice
wholly neglectful of him and think they do not want God Psal. 14. 2. There is none that understands and seeks after God They have no affection or desire of communion with God They seek such things as their hearts lust after but it is not their desire or care to enjoy God But when the conversion of the Iews is spoken of Hos. 3. 5. it is said They shall return and seek the Lord their God At first conversion men are sensible of their great distance from God and are troubled they have been so long strangers to him Go to another sort of seekers they are sensible of the same thing in case of desertion it is clear Cant. 5. 6. My beloved had withdrawn himself and was gone I sought him but I could not find him They never begin to recover until they are first sensible of their loss when they see Christ is gone they are left dead and comfortless yea all believers their seeking or looking after communion with God is grounded upon a sense of want in some degree and measure it is little they have in comparison of what they want and expect and therefore still the children of God are a generation of seekers that seek after God Psal. 24. 6. whatever they enjoy they are still in pursuit of more They are always breathing after God and desire to enjoy more communion with him A wicked man is always running from God and is never better than when he is out of Gods company when he is rid of all thoughts of God he runs from his own conscience because he finds God there he runs from the company of good men because God is there holy conference is as a prison he runs from Ordinances because they bring God near to his Conscience and put him in mind of God He avoids death because he cannot endure to be with God But men that have a sense and want of God upon them will be enquiring and seeking after him 2. This seeking may be known by the things sought What do we seek for Union and communion with God Psal. 105. 4. Seek the Lord and his strength seek his face for evermore It is an allusion to the Ark which was a pledg of Gods favourable and powerful presence so that which we seek after is Gods favourable and powerful presence that we may find the Lord reconciled comforting and quickning our heart Communion with God is the main thing that we seek after as to the enjoyment of his favour in the acceptance of our persons and pardon of our sins This is that the man of God expresseth in his own name and in the name of all the Saints Psal. 4. 6 7. Lord lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us That God would display his beams of favour upon the soul. So Psal. 63. 3. Thy favour is better than life And then his strength too that he may subdue our corruptions temptations enemies Mic. 7. 19. and that he may supply our wants inward and outward by his all-sufficiency Phil. 4. 19. God telleth Abraham I am God all-sufficient walk before me and be thou perfect 3. The formality of the duty may be explain'd with respect to Graces and Ordinances It consists in the exercise of grace and in the use of Ordinances 1 The Exercise of Grace Faith and Love Faith is often exprest by terms of motion coming running going seeking Thus is the whole tendency of soul towards God exprest by terms that are proper to outward motion Coming notes our serious resolution and purpose to make after God Going notes the practice or progress in that resolution Running notes the fervor and earnestness of the soul to enjoy God And seeking that notes our diligence in the use of means That faith is implied in seeking appears by comparing these two Scriptures Isa. 11. 10. To it shall the Gentiles seek Now when this is spoken of in the New Testament it is rendred thus Rom. 15. 12. In him shall the Gentiles trust So that it notes confidence and hope 2 It notes Love which is exercised herein which puts upon Sallies and earnest egressions of soul after the party loved Psal. 63. 8. My soul follows hard after thee It is grievous to those who love God to think of separation from him or to forbear to seek after him The great care of their souls is to find God that he may direct comfort strengthen and sanctifie them and to have sweet experience of his grace Thus the Spouse sought him whom her soul loved and gave not over till she found him 2. Again it is exercised in the use of the Ordinances as the Word and Prayer God will be sought in his own Ordinances Christ walks in the midst of the golden Candlesticks If you would find a man mind there is his walk and usual resort When Christ was lost his Parents sought him in the Temple there they found him If you would find Christ look to the shepherds tents in the assemblies of his people Cant. 1. 7 8. there shall you meet him Only let me tell you in these Ordinances it is not enough to make Christ the object of them to worship Christ but he must be made the end of them To serve God is one thing to seek him another To serve God is to make him the object of Worship to seek God is to make him the end of Worship When we will not go away from him without him Gen. 32. 16. I will not let thee go unless thou bless me It is not enough to make use of Ordinances but we must see if we can find God there There are many that hover about the Palace that yet do not speak with the Prince so possibly we may hover about Ordinances and not meet with God there To go away with the husk and shell of an Ordinance and neglect the kernel to please our selves because we have been in the Courts of God though we have not met with the living God that 's very sad A Traveller and Merchant differ thus a Traveller goes from place to place only that he may see but a Merchant goes from Port to Port that he may take in his lading and grow rich by Traffick So a formal person goes from Ordinance to Ordinance and is satisfied with the work a godly man looks to take in his lading that he may go away from God with God that he may meet God here and there in this duty and in that and go away from God with God A man that makes a visit only by constraint and not by friendship it is all one to him whether the person be at home or no but another would be glad to find his friend there so if we from a principle of love come to God in these duties our desires will be to find the living God Again if God be not found in an Ordinance yet we must continue seeking you may find him in the next Sometimes God will not be found in publick that
will he would fain know what is Gods mind in every particular case Psal. 119. 161. My heart standeth in awe of thy word To offend God and to baulk the direction of God's word that 's the greatest terror to him greater than all other dangers Now such a man is less apt to misearry by the rashness and impetuous bent of carnal affections And he that fears God he aims at Gods glory rather than his own interest and so is rather sway'd by reasons of Conscience and Religion than of carnal concernments Many times the doubtfulness that is upon the spirit is because of conflicts between lust and knowledg our light is weakned by an inordinate affection to our own Interest otherwise we would soon come to the deciding our case by the word of God Now he that would fain know God's mind in every thing this is the man whom God will direct The 2. Qualification is the meek Psal. 25. 9. The meek he will guide in judgment and the meek he will teach his way By the meek is meant a man humble that will submit himself to God whatever condition he shall appoint This man God in his word will teach and direct The 3. Qualification mentioned in order to this is a constant dependance upon God Prov. 5. 6. Trust in the Lord with all thine heart and lean not unto thine own understanding In all thy ways acknowledg him and he shall direct thy paths O! when a man is brought off from this spiritual Idolatry of making his bosome to be his Oracle and his own heart to be his Councellor when he doth in the poverty of his spirit humbly and intirely cast himself upon the help of God and acknowledg him in all his ways then he shall see a clear direction what God would have him to do You have another place to this purpose Psal. 143. 8. Cause me to know the way wherein I should walk for I lift up my soul unto thee O! when a man goes every morning to God and desires the direction of his spirit and professeth to God in the poverty of his own spirit that he knows not how to guide his way for that day then God will teach him the way he shall walk So Psal. 25. 4 5. Shew me thy ways O Lord teach me thy paths what 's his argument on thee do I wait all the day When you live in a constant dependance upon God then will the Lord undertake to direct and guide you 4. Obedience or Christian practice that 's one of the qualifications that makes you capable for direction from the word of God Joh. 7. 17. If any man will do his will he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God A man does not know whether this opinion or that be according to God's mind when there are plausible pretences on every side he that maketh conscience of known truth and walketh up to his light he that doth not search to satisfie curiosity but out of a through resolution to obey and submit his neck to the yoke of Christ whatever he shall find to be the way of Christ that man shall know what is the way in times of controversie and doubtful uncertainty he that will say as a famous German Divine If we had six hundred necks let us submit them all to the yoke of Christ he that is resolved to submit to the mind of Christ how contrary soever to his interest to the prejudices and prepossessions of his own heart he shall know the doctrine that is of God SERMON XXVI PSAL. CXIX 25. My soul cleaveth unto the dust quicken thou me according to thy word THE man of God in this Psalm had spoken before of the common and universal benefits of the word as it agreeth to all times and conditions of believers for it belongeth to all in what state soever they are to look upon it as a direction in the way to get true happiness and to stir up sutable affections in their hearts Now he sheweth what use the word hath in each special condition especially in the time of great afflictions David did often change states but his affection to the word never changeth Here is 1. a representation of David's Case 2. His supplication or petition thereupon Wherein 1. the Request it self 2. The Argument to inforce it 1. The representation of David's Case My soul cleaveth unto the dust The speech is Metaphorical expressing the depth of his misery or the greatness of his sorrow and humiliation 1. The depth of his misery with allusion to the case of a man overcome in battel or mortally wounded and tumbling in the dust or to a man dead and laid in the earth as Psal. 22. 15. Thou hast brought me to the dust of death Sure we are the expression importeth the extremity of distress and danger either as a man dead or near death 2. The greatness of his sorrow and humiliation and so the allusion is taken from a man prostrate and grovelling on the ground which was their posture of humbling themselves before the Lord or when any great calamity befell them Ioseph lib. 19. cap. 7. As when Herod Agrippa dyed they put on sackcloth and lay upon the earth weeping The same allusion is Psal. 44. 25. Our soul is bowed down unto the dust our belly cleaveth to the earth Suitably to which allusion the Septuagint render it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the pavement And we read in Theodoret That Theodosius the Emperor when reproved by Ambrose for the slaughter at Thessalonica he lay upon the ground and humbly begged pardon using these words Adhaesit pavimento anima mea The meaning is then that in his dejected condition he would lye prostrate at Gods feet as a poor Supplicant and dye there The Point is That Gods children may have such great afflictions brought upon them that their souls may even cleave to the dust These afflictions may respect their inward or outward condition 1. Their inward condition and so through grief and terrors of conscience they are ready to drop into the grave That trouble of mind is an usual exercise of Gods people see Heman's complaint Psal. 88. from v. 3. to the end of v. 7. My soul is full of troubles and my life draweth nigh unto the grave I am counted with them that go down into the pit I am as a man that hath no strength free among the dead like the slain that lye in the grave whom thou remembrest no more and they are cut off from thy hand Thou hast layed me in the lowest pit in darkness in the deep Thy wrath lyeth hard upon me and thou hast afflicted me with all thy waves Selah 'T was in soul and it was in his soul by reason of the wrath of God and that in such a degree of vehemency that in his own judgment and the judgment of others he could not expect to be long a man of this world little differing from the dead yea the damned So
Here 's 1. The sin deprecated Remove from me the way of Lying 2. The good supplicated and asked Grant me thy Law graciously In the first clause you have his Malady David had been inticed to a course of lying In the second we have his Remedy and that 's the Law of God First let me speak of the evil deprecated there Observe 1. The Object The way of lying 2. Gods act about it Remove from me c. First for the Object The way of lying It is by some taken generally by others more particularly 1. For those that expound it more generally they are not all of a mind Some think the way of lying is meant Corruption of Doctrine others of Worship others apply it to disorders of conversation some take it for Error of Doctrine false opinions concerning God and his Worship which are called lying and so opposed to the way of truth spoken of in the next verse I have chosen the way of truth Heresie and false Doctrine is called a lye Ezek. 13. 22. Their diviners speak lies So John 2. 21. A lye is not of the truth and the word used The way of lying is elsewhere rendred a false way v. 104. and 128. there is the same expression Now this he desires to be removed from him because it sticks as close to us as our skin Error is very natural to us and man doth exceedingly please himself with the figments of his own brain All practical Errors in the world are but man's natural thoughts cryed up into a voluble opinion because backed with defences of Wit and Parts and secular Interests and other advantages they are but our secret and privy thoughts which have gotten the reputation of an opinion in the world for we speak lyes from the womb even in this sense we suck in erronious principles with our milk Nature carrieth us to wrong thoughts of God and the ways of God and out of levity and inconstancy of spirit we are apt to be carried about with every wind of Doctrine by the sleight of men Now to this sense the latter clause will well agree Keep me from a way of lying that is keep me from falling into error and mistakes about Religion for he begs that the law may be granted to him or a certain stated rule without which all things are liable to deceit and imposture And according to this sense Austin beggeth that he may neither be deceived in the Scriptures nor deceive out of them Nec fallar in iis nec fallam ex iis let me never be mistaken my self nor cause others to mistake Again By a way of lying some understand false worship for an Idol is a lye Isa. 44. 20. Is there not a lye in his right hand meaning an Idol By others a course of sinning for a way of sinning is a way of lying for it deceives us with a conceit of happiness which we shall never enjoy therefore Eph. 4. 22. Put off the old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts Lusts are called deceitful because they promise what they never perform they flatter us not only with hopes of impunity but much imaginary comfort and satisfaction O but it 's a lye Satan deceived our first Parents pretending to shew them a way of Immortality whereas that brought death to the world Most go this way Remove from me the way of lying that is the way of sin and the rather because the Septuagint translation read it thus Remove from me the way of Iniquity and Chrysostom in his gloss He means Every evil deed should be removed from him or it proves a lye in regard of all those flatterings and blandishments by which it enticeth the soul. Nay there 's a parallel place seems to make good this sense Prov. 30. 8. When Agur prays against sin Remove from me vanity and lies meaning a course of sin Thus it is taken more generally 2. Those that take it more particularly for the sin of lying or speaking falsly in commerce they again differ Some take it passively keep me from frauds or deceits of other men because it seems to be a hard thing to ascribe a way of lying to a child of God therefore they rather take it passively But this is to fear where no fear is But David begs that he might be kept from a way of lying that it might not settle into a way that 's his meaning Therefore I rather take it actively that he might not run into a false and fallacious course of dealing with others Now why would David have this way of lying removed from him Three Reasons 1. Because of the inclination of his corrupt nature We had most need pray to be kept from gross sins as Psal. 19. 13. Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins We need not only pray against lesser sins or spiritual wickednesses but from gross sins carried on presumptuously against the light of Conscience So Col. 3. 5. Mortifie your earthly members c. What members doth he speak of not worldliness and unbelief only but he speaks of adultery uncleanness inordinate affections and the like and the Children of God if they do not deal with God for grace against their gross sins they will soon know to their costs Jesus Christ warned his own disciples those that were trained up in his School those that were to go abroad and deliver his Gospel to the world Luke 21. 34. Take heed lest your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness c. A candle newly blown out easily sucks light and flame again and we that are newly taken out of the dominion of sin into a state of grace may suck light and flame again therefore we had need pray against gross sins 2. Because he had been tripping and guilty in this kind In the story of David you may trace too much of this way and vein of lying as his feigning to Abimeleck the Priest 1 Sam. 25. 8. and to Achish 2 Sam. 27. 8. compar'd with vers 10. his perswading Ionathan to tell his Father he was gone about such a business Now this we may learn when we are foiled by any sin we should take heed lest we settle into a way and course of sin for in every sin as there is culpa the fault or the transgression of the Law and reatus the guilt or obligation to punishment so there is macula the blot an inclination to sin again in like manner as a brand once on fire is more apt to take fire again By every act of sin the Law of God is lessened our carnal inclination is increased therefore we had need be earnest with God Lord keep me from a way of lying 3. Man is strongly inclined to lying it sticks close to our nature so that God must remove it from us as more fully afterwards Thus for the Object a way of lying Secondly Gods Act about it Remove from me Sin is removed either in a way of Justification when the guilt of
Prayers should be mingled with a thankful sense and acknowledgment of his mercies Psal. 4. 6. In every thing let your requests and supplications be made known with thanksgiving Do not come onely in a complaining way Col. 4. 2. Continue in Prayer and watch in the same with Thanksgiving They are not holy requests unless we acknowledge what he hath done for us as well as desire him to do more Nothing more usual than to come in our necessities to seek help but we do not return when we have received help and relief to give thanks When our turn is served we neglect God Wants urge us more than Blessings our Interest swayeth us more than Duty As a dog swalloweth every bit that is cast to him and still looketh for more We swallow whatever the bounty of God casteth out to us without thanks and when we need again we would have more and though warm in Petitions yet cold rare unfrequent in gratulations It is not onely against Scripture but against Nature Ethnicks abhor the ungrateful that were still receiving but forgetting to give thanks It is against justice to seek help of God and when we have it to make no more mention of God than if we had it from our selves It is against Truth we make many promises in our affliction but forget all when well at ease 3. God either takes away or blasts the Mercies which we are not thankful for Sometimes he taketh them from us Hos. 2. 8 9. I will take away my Corn in the time thereof and my Wine in the season thereof and I will recover my Wool and Flax why She doth not know that I gave her Corn and Wine and Oyl and gave her Silver and Gold Where his kindness is not taken notice of nor his hand seen and acknowledged he will take his benefits to himself again We know not the value of Mercies so much by their worth as by their want 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 A thing too near the eye cannot be seen God must set things at a distance to make us value them If he take them not away yet many times he blasts them as to their natural use Mal. 2. 2. And if you will not hear and if you will not lay it to heart to give glory to my name saith the Lord of Hâ—…sts I will even send a curse upon you and I will curse your blessings yea I have cursed them already because you do not lay it to heart The Creature is a deaf-nut when we come to crack it we have not the natural blessing as to health strength and chearfulness Acts 14. 17. or if Food yet not gladness of heart with it Or we have not the sanctified use it is not a mercy that leadeth us to God A thing is sanctified when it is à bono in bonum if it cometh from God and leadeth us to God 1 Cor. 3. 22 23. All things are yours whether Paul or Apollo or Cephas or the World or Life or Death or things present or things to come all are yours for you are Christs and Christ is Gods You have a covenant right an holy use 4. Bless him for favours received and you shall have more Thanksgiving is the kindly way of Petitioning and the more thankful for Mercies the more they are increased upon us Vapours drawn up from the Earth return in showrs to the Earth again The Sea poureth out its fulness into the Rivers and all Rivers return into the Sea from whence they came Psal. 67. 5 6. Let the People praise thee O God yea let all the People praise thee Then shall the Earth yield her increase and God even our own God shall bless us When Springs lye low we pour a little water into the Pump not to enrich the Fountain but to bring up more for our selves It is not onely true of outward increase but of Spiritual also Col. 2. 7. Be ye rooted in the Faith and abound therein with thanksgiving If we give thanks for so much Grace as we have already received it is the way to increase our store We thrive no more get no more victory over our corruptions because we do no more give thanks 5. When God's common Mercies are well observed or well improved it fits us for acts of more special kindness In the story of the Lepers Luke 17. 19. thy Faith hath made thee whole he met not onely with a bodily cure but a Soul cure Luke 16. 11. If therefore ye have not been faithful in the unrighteous Mammon who will commit to your trust the true riches When we suspect a vessel leaketh we try it with Water before we fill it with Wine You are upon your tryal be thankful for less God will give you more Means or Directions 1. Heighten all the Mercies you have by all the circumstances necessary to be considered by the nature and kind of them spiritual Eternal Blessings first the greatest Mercies deserve greatest acknowledgment Eph. 1. 3. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Iesus Christ who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Christs Spirit Pardon of sins Heaven the way of Salvation known accepted and the things of the World as subordinate helps Luke 10. 20. Notwithstanding in this rejoyce not that the Spirits are subject to you but rather rejoyce because your names are written in Heaven Then consider your sense in the want of Mercies what high thoughts had you then of them The Mercies are the same when you have them and when you want them onely your apprehensions are greater if affectionately begg'd they must be affectionately acknowledged else you are a Hypocrite either in the supplication or gratulation Consider the Person giving God so high and glorious A small remembrance from a great Prince no way obliged no way needing me to whom I can be no way profitable a small kindness melts us a gift of a few pounds a little parcel of land Do I court him and observe him There is less reason why God should abase himself to look upon us or concern himself in us Psal. 113. 6. He humbleth himself to behold the things that are in Heaven and in the Earth We have all things from him Consider the Person receiving so unworthy Gen. 32. 10. I am not worthy of the least of all the mercies and of all the truth which thou hast shewed unto thy servant 2 Sam. 7. 19. Who am I O Lord God and what is my house that thou hast brought me hitherto Consider the season in our greatest extremity is Gods opportunity Gen. 22. 14. In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen when the knife was at the throat of his Son 2 Cor. 1. 9 10. We had the sentence of death in our selves that we should not trust in our selves but in God which raised the dead who delivered us from so great a death and doth deliver in whom we trust that he will yet deliver us Consider the end and
may discern much of faithfulness in their Afflictions this will appear to you by these Considerations 1. In the Covenant of Grace God hath promised to bestow upon his People real and principal Mercies those are promised absolutely other things conditionally God doth not break his Covenant if he doth not give us temporal Happiness because that is not absolutely promised but onely so far forth as it may be good for us but eternal Life is promised without any such exception unto the Heirs of promise Eternal Promises and Threatnings being of things absolutely good or evil are therefore absolute and peremptory the Righteous shall not fail of the Reward nor the Wicked escape the Punishment but temporal Promises and Threatnings being of things not simply good or evil are reserved to be dispensed according to God's Wisdome and good pleasure in reference and subordination to eternal Happiness It is true 't is sad 1 Tim. 4. 8. That godliness hath the promise of this life and that which is to come but with this reference that the less give place to the greater if the Promises of this life may hinder us in looking after the Promises of the life to come God may take the liberty of the Cross and withhold these things and disappoint us of our worldly hope A man lying under the guilt of Sin may many times enjoy worldly Comforts to the envy of God's Children and one of God's Children may be greatly afflicted and distressed in the World for in all these Dispensations God looketh to his end which is to make us eternally happy 2. This being God's end he is obliged in point of fidelity to use all the means that conduce thereunto that he may attain his eternal purpose in bringing his holy ones to glory Rom. 8. 28. All things shall work together for good to them that love God Good what good it may be temporal so it falls out sometimes a man's temporal good is promoted by his temporal loss Gen. 50. 20. Ye thought evil against me but God meant it for good they sold their Brother a slave but God meant him to be a great Potentate in Egypt It may be spiritual good Psal. 119. 71. 'T is good for me that I have been afflicted but to be sure eternal good to bring about his eternal purpose of making them everlastingly happy And in this sense the Apostle saith all things are yours 1 Cor. 3. 22. Ordinances Providences Life Death all dispensed with a respect to their final Happiness or eternal Benefit not onely Ordinances to work internal Grace but Providences as an external help and means for God having set his end he will prosecute it congruously and as it may agree with man's nature by external Providences as well as internal Grace see Psal. 125. 3. The rod of the wicked shall not always rest upon the back of the righteous God hath power enough to give them grace to bear it though the Rod had continued and can keep his People from iniquity though the Rod be upon them but he considereth the imbecillity of man's nature which is apt to tire under long Afflictions and therefore not onely giveth more Grace but takes off the Temptation He could humble Paul without a Thorn in the Flesh 2 Cor. 12. 7. but he will use a congruous means 3. Among these means Afflictions yea sharp Afflictions are some of those things which our need and profit requireth they are needfull to weaken and mortify Sin Isa. 27. 9. By this shall the iniquity of Iacob be purged to increase and quicken Grace Heb. 12. 10. But he chasteneth us for our profit that we might be partakers of his holiness Without this Discipline we should forget God and our selves therefore that we may return to God he afflicts us Hos. 5. 6. In their afflictions they will seek me early and come to our selves Luke 15. 17. The Prodigal came to himself Afflictions are necessary for us upon the former Suppositions namely that God hath ingaged himself to perfect Grace where it is begun and to use all means which may conduce to our eternal welfare that we may not miscarry and come short of our great hopes 1 Cor. 11. 32. When we are judged we are chastened of the Lord that we may not be condemned with the world The carnal reprobate World are left to a looser and larger Discipline Brambles are not pruned when Vines are New Creatures require a more close inspection than others do Self-confidence and spiritual Security is apt to grow upon them therefore to mortify our Self-confidence to awaken us out of spiritual sleep we need to be afflicted and also to quicken and rouse up a spirit of Prayer We grow cold and flat and ask mercies for forms sake Isa. 26. 16. Lord in trouble have they visited thee they poured out a prayer when thy chastening was upon them And that we may be quickened to a greater mindfulness of heavenly things the best of us when we get a carnal Pillow under our heads are apt to sleep secure God will not let us alone to our ruine but afflicts us that we may be refined from the dreggs of the Flesh and that our gust and relish of heavenly things may be recovered and that we may be quickened to a greater diligence in the heavenly Life Look as earthly Parents are not faithfull to their Childrens Souls when they live at large and omit that Correction which is necessary for them Prov. 29. 15. The rod and reproof give wisdome but a Child left to himself bringeth his Mother to shame The Mother is mentioned because they are usually more fond and indulgent and spare many times and marr the Child but our heavenly Father will not be unfaithfull who is so wise that he will not be blinded by any passion hath such a perfect love and does so fixedly design our eternal welfare that he rebuketh that he may reform and reformeth that he may save 4. God's faithfulness about the Affliction is twofold in bringing on the Affliction and guiding the Affliction 1. In bringing on the Affliction both as to the time and kind when our need requireth and such as may doe the work 1 Pet. 1. 6. Ye are in heaviness for a season if need be When some Distemper was apt to grow upon us and we were straggling from our Duty Psal. 119. 67. Before I was afflicted I went astray Some disappointment and check we meet with in a way of Sin which is a notable help in the spiritual Life where God giveth an heart to improve it 2. As to guiding the Affliction both to measure and continuance that it may doe us good and not harm 1 Cor. 10. 13. God is faithfull who will not suffer you to be tempted above what you are able to bear but will with the temptation also make a way to escape that ye may be able to bear it Violent Temptations are not permitted where the Lord seeth us weak and infirm as Iacob drove
nor forsake thee And 1 Cor. 10. 13. God is faithful who will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able to bear but will with the temptation also make a way to escape that you may be able to bear it To the eye of sense we are lost and gone and have no helper but God is never wholly gone Hagar set herself over against the Lad would not go too far from him God seems to throw us away but he keeps himself within sight he will not totally or finally forsake us 6. That God's usual way is by Contraries The Gospel-way to save is to lose Ioh. 16. 25. Mat. 16. 25. He that will save his life shall lose it and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake shall find it Ioseph was made a Slave that he may be made Governor of Egypt His Brethren sell him that they may worship him And he is cast into Prison that he may be preferred at Court Thus God by Shame bringeth to Honour by Misery to Happiness by Sorrow to Comfort and by Death to Life to teach us to hope against hope Rom. 4. 18. and to trust in him though he kill us Job 13. 15. For Death is ours as well as other things If Calamities shorten our lives they hasten our glory Persecution is the nearest way to Heaven in the eye of Faith and the Sword of the Enemy is but the Key to open the Prison doors and let out the Soul which hath long desired to be with Christ. 7. That 't is better to suffer than to sin In suffering the offence is done to us in sinning 't is done to God The evil of suffering is but for a moment the evil of sin for ever In suffering we lose the favor of men in sinning we hazard the favor of God Suffering bringeth inconveniency upon the Body but sinning upon the Soul The sinful estate is far worse than the afflicted Heb. 12. 28. The evil of Sufferings for the present the evil of Sin for afterwards 8. That Holiness Faith Meekness and Patience are better Treasures than any the world can take from us Certainly a Christian is to reckon himself by the inward man if he hath an healthy Soul he may the better dispense with a sickly Body 3d Epist. Iohn 2. If the inward man be renewed 2 Cor. 4. 16. If sore Troubles discover reality of Grace Sound and saving Faith discovered to the Soul is better worth than the worlds best gold 1 Pet. 1. 9. If carnal sense were not quickest and greatest we would judge so and not look to the sharpness of the affliction but to the improvement of it If the bitter water be made sweet if you be more godly wise and religious 't is enough Heb. 12. 11. No affliction for the present seemeth joyous but grievous nevertheless afterwards it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness to them that are exercised thereby If the loss of worldly comforts make us apply our selves to heavenly consolations if being disburdened of worldly incumbrances we go on in our way of serving God with more liberty and delight and when our dangers are greatest we draw near to God and adhere to him most closely and being persuaded of his love vigilancy and power with these and such kind of thoughts will a man be stocked who is with seriousness and delight conversant in the Scriptures and so will go on undisturbed in the course of his obedience 2 These things must be improved by meditation so saith David I will meditate on thy precepts 1. Sleepy Reason is unuseful to us and Truths lie hid in the heart without any efficacy or power till improved by deep serious and pressing thoughts Non-attendency is the bane of the world Mat. 13. 19. When any one heareth the word of the kingdom and understandeth it not then cometh the wicked one and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart Those invited to the Wedding Mat. 22. 5. made light of it Men will not suffer their minds so long to dwell upon holy things as to procure a good esteem of them then in seeing they see not and in hearing hear not as when you tell a man of a business whose mind is taken up about other things A sudden carrying a Candle thorough a Room giveth us not so full a survey of the Object as when you stand awhile beholding it A steady contemplation is a great advantage Attending is the cause of believing when we grow serious Acts 16. 14. Whose heart the Lord opened that she attended to the things spoken by Paul Acts 17. 11. And these were more noble than they of Thessalonica in that they received the word with all readiness of mind If People would often return to cosinder they would not be hardned in sin Psal. 4. 4. Commune with your own heart upon your beds Hagg. 1. 5. Now therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts consider your ways God's complaint was They would not consider his ways Job 34. 27. Isa. 1. 3. My people doth not consider Running thoughts never work upon us nor leave any durable impression like the glance of a Sun-beam or a Wave When the Soul is besieged by a constant battery of Truths it yieldeth but a mind scattered upon impertinent Vanities groweth not up to any considerable strength of faith or joy or comfort or holiness 2. God will not be served by the bie and at hap-hazard David taketh a resolution to study his duty The more deliberate our resolutions are the better Psal. 119. 59. I thought on my ways and turned my feet unto thy testimonies We shall never stumble upon a good course by chance Isa. 56. 4. And choose the things that please me Not take them upon some sudden motion but after mature and serious deliberation 3. To divert the mind from other things Afflictions and Troubles stir up a multitude of thoughts in us Psal. 94. 19. In the multitude of my thoughts Sometimes self-oppressing thoughts carking thoughts envious thoughts and repining at God's Providence the object of our trouble is ever before us Now there is no way to get rid of these but by exercising them upon better things Troubles make us concerned about matters of weight they employ our minds usefully which before were scattered to impertinent vanities Psal. 39. 3. My heart was hot within me whilest I was musing the fire burned That our minds may not be a prey to inordinate passions we pore upon the trouble and the heart is heated like an Oven stopped up and therefore keep the mind well employed 4. Frequent meditation keepeth our principles in view and memory We are apt to forget in our sorrows Heb. 12. 5. And ye have forgotten the consolation 'T is not ready at hand to support us in the time of Trouble A seasonable remembrance of Truths is a great relief to the Soul 't is the Spirit 's office 3 That Afflictions and Molestations have a great tendency and subserviency to promote and advance these
useful and refreshing when used in the day but if kept all night it perished and was useless It was useful in the Wilderness but ceaseth when they came to Canaan Uses are many First comfort to the Godly for their own particular He is an eternal God that ordereth and guideth all things that he may bring them to their eternal felicity and will in time admit them into it Psal. 48. 14. For this God is our God for ever and ever and he will be our guide even unto death After death he will be their God still death doth not put an end to this relation for God is Abraham's God when he is dead Matth. 2â—… 32. God is the same still both in himself and to those that believe in him he will constantly guide them all the days of their life and after death receive us to the everlasting enjoyment of himself and revive our dust Oh what a blessedness is this to have an interest in such an eternal God! 2. As to the Community and Society to which they do belong God's Eternity is the Churches stability and so 't is urged in Scripture Mal. 3. 6. For I am the Lord I change not therefore ye sons of Iacob are not consumed Psal. 102. 27 28. Thou art the same and thy years shall have no end The children of thy servants shall continue So when the flourishing of the wicked is spoken of when they spring as grass Psal. 92. 8. But thou O Lord art most high for evermore If they be high God is higher and they are but upstarts to him their power is of a late rise and short continuance So Psal. 93. 2. Thy throne is established of old thou art from everlasting God's Throne is as eternal as his Being So Lam. 3. 17. Thou O Lord remainest for ever and thy throne from generation to generation Is the life of thy Enemies long God endureth for ever Is their power great 't is but dependent God had power before them and will have power when they shall be no more Second Use Is Terror to the wicked Heb. 10. 31. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God They may out-live other Enemies but they cannot out-live God who abideth for ever to avenge his quarrel against them and judge you if his Controversie against them be not just since they are such impious Fools and Brutes as that they prefer the creature before the Creator and chuse temporal things rather than everlasting and prefer Earth before Heaven and the satisfaction of their bodily lusts before the saving of their souls Can you blame God of any injustice in dooming them to everlasting misery What part of the punishment would you have relaxed the Loss or the Pain the Loss is double of God's favor or their natural comforts Would you have God admit those to the sight and everlasting fruition of himself who never cared for him Or return again to their natural comforts that they may eternally run Riot with them or abuse them to an occasion of the flesh Or is it the pain Would you have God take off that when the sin and impenitent obstinacy doth still continue since they preferred a temporal good before that which is eternal and would sell their birthright for one morsel of meat Heb. 12. 16. How just is it for God to make them everlastingly to lie under the fruits and effects of their own evil choice Third Use. Is to press us to seek after the everlasting fruition of this blessed and ever glorious God because many live as if they had never heard of things eternal most live as if they did not believe any such thing the best do not improve those things as they ought therefore I shall a little insist upon a quickening exhortation to stir you up to seek an eternal happiness in God 1. As we are reasonable Creatures we were made for Eternity for God hath given us an immortal spirit and there is no proportion between an immortal soul and temporal things it cannot be content with any thing that shall have an end for then we may survive our happiness if we had souls that would perish it would be more excusable to look after things that perish What will you do when your Souls shall be turned out of doors when ye fail Luke 16. 9. To what Region will the poor shiftless harborless Soul betake it self when you dye All your thoughts that concern the present world perish and if you did perish too it were no such great matter But you shall live and what will you have to comfort your selves if you have not an interest in the Eternal God in whose hands will you be if you have slighted him while you were upon earth and the eternal happiness he offereth to us and could not find enough in God and his Eternal Salvation to take off your hearts from the pleasures and vanities of the world Can you expect that he will favour you and be kind to you 2. Eternity is made known to us Christians and clearly set before us in the doctrine of the Gospel 2 Tim. 1. 10. he hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel Nature hath but guesses at it the Law but shadows but here 't is clearly certainly and fully revealed You know that you have an Eternal God to please and an infinite and eternal reward to expect The whole drift of our Religion is to call us off from Time to Eternity from this world to a better Christ came not to settle us here in a state of prosperity nor to make this world our Rest and Portion but to draw us up to God and Heaven 3. The same Religion sheweth that we are already involved in an Eternal misery and stand under a sentence binding us over to the Curse and Everlasting wrath of God Ioh. 3. 18. He that beleiveth not is condemned already and this is the Condemnation that light is come into the world and men love darkness more than light because their deeds are evil God hath offered Life and Immortality to them who have so miserably lost it and involved their souls in Eternal death Therefore if we know what it is to be liable to the wrath of an eternal God and to be interessed in the hopes of eternal glory we should awaken and be more serious in a business of such concernment 4. You will shortly be summoned to give an account Luke 16. 2. You have received so much from me such Riches Honours Parts Sufficiencies such Invitations to draw you home to me what will you answer Nay there is not only a little time between you and Judgment but a little time between you and Execution nothing but the slender thread of a frail life which is soon fretted asunder and will you can you sleep in sin so near Eternity and laugh and dance over the brink of Hell you cannot soon enough flee from wrath to come 5. Consider what poor deluded
them afar off were persuaded of them and embraced them Secondly That the same common promises have been fulfilled to the Faithful in all Ages there is but one and the same way to eternal life in necessary things and the dispensations of God to every Age are still the same and so in every Generation the promises of God are still fulfilled as if they were directed to that time only God's Faithfulness hath been tryed many ways and at many times but every Age furnisheth examples of the truth of his promises from the beginning of the world to the end God is ever fulfilling the Scripture in his Providential Government which is double External or Internal 1. External in the deliverance of his People the answers of Prayer and manifold Blessings vouchsafed to Believers and their seed See Psal. 22. 4 5. Our father 's trusted in thee they trusted and thou didst deliver them They cryed unto thee and were delivered they trusted in thee and were not confounded The Godly in former times trusted God and trusted constantly in their Troubles and in their trusting they cryed and did never seek God in vain which should support us in waiting upon God and to depend on his mercy and sidelity For they that place their full affiance in God and seek his help by constant and importunate addresses shall never be put to shame 2. Internal in conversion to God the comforts of his Spirit establishment of the Soul in the hopes of the Gospel as to the pardon of sins and eternal life Certainly God that hath blessed the Word thoroughout many Successions of Ages to the converting and comforting of many Souls sheweth that we may depend upon the Covenant for pardon and eternal life How many have found comfort by the promises Now as the Apostle speaketh of Abraham It was not written for himself alone but us also Rom. 4. 23 24. So these comforts were not dispensed for their sake alone but for our benefit that we might be comforted of God having the same God the same Redeemer the same Covenant and Promises and the same Spirit to apply all unto us if they looked to God and were comforted why should not we his faithfulness is to all generations he is alike to Believers as they be alike to him Rom. 3. 22. there is no difference 5. That the experience of God's Faithfulness in former Ages is of use to those that follow and succeed to assure them of God's Faithfulness for God's wonderful and gracious works were never intended meerly for the benefit of that Age in which they were done but for the benefit also of those that should hear of them by any creditable means whatsoever 't is a scorn and a vile contempt put upon those wonderful works which God made to be had in remembrance if they should be buried in oblivion or not observed and improved by those that live in after-ages yea 't is contrary to the Scriptures 〈◊〉 Psal. 145. 4 One generation shall praise thy works to another and shall declare thy mighty acts Joel 1. 3. Tell ye your children of it and let your children tell their children and their children another generation Joshua 4. 6 7 8. That this may be a sign among you that when your children ask their fathers in time to come What mean you by these stones then shall you answer them That the waters of Iordan were cut off from before the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord your God So Psal. 73. 3 4 5 6 7. That which we have heard and known and our fathers have told us We will not hide them from their children shewing to the generations to come the praises of the Lord and his strength and his wonderful works that he hath done For he established a testimony in Iacob and appointed a law in Israel which he commanded our fathers that they should make them known to their children That the generation to come might know them even the children which should be born who should arise and declare them to their children that they might set their hope in God and not forget the works of God but keep his commandments From all which I observe 1. That we should tell generations to come what we have found of God in our time and more especially Parents should tell their children they are bound to transmit this knowledge to their children and they to improve it either by word or deed by word by remembring the passages of providences and publishing his mercies to posterity Psal. 89. 1. I will sing of the mercies of the Lord for ever with my mouth I will make known thy faithfulness to all generations Or by deed putting them in possession of a pure Religion confirmed to us by so many providences and instances of God's goodness and truth 2. That this report of God's gracious works and owning his Covenant is a special means of Edification why else should God enjoin it but that the Ages following should receive benefit thereby Surely 't is an advantage to them to hear how God hath owned us in Ordinances and Providences 3. And more particularly I observe that this Tradition is a great means and help to Faith for 't is said Ver. 7. That they may set their hope in God 6. That to be satisfied in point of God's Faithfulness is of great importance to Believers Partly because their fidelity to God is much encouraged by his fidelity to us They that do not trust God cannot be long true to him Heb. 3. 12. Take heed lest there be found in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God And Iam. 1. 8. A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 one that doth not stick fast to God and is ever unresolved being divided between hopes and fears concerning his acceptance with God A wavering Christian that is divided between God and some unlawful course for his safety divided between God's ways and his own and cannot quietly depend upon his promises but is tossed to and fro doth not intirely trust himself in Gods hands but doth wholly lean upon his own Carnal confidence And partly because God is Invisible and dealeth with us by proxy by messengers who bring the word to us We see not God in person Heb. 13. 7. Remember them which have the rule over you who have spoken to you the word of God whose faith follow considering the end of their conversations Their manner of living their perseverance till death in this faith and hope And partly because the Promises are future and the main of them is to be accomplished in another world Now nothing will support us but the faithfulness of God Prov. 11. 18. The wicked worketh a deceitful work but to him that soweth righteousness there shall be a sure reward Men think to be happy by their sin but find themselves deceived at last but none can be deceived that trust in the living and true God Partly because
then 't is broad for its duration and continuance First 'T is broad for use A Man may soon see to the bottom of the Creatures but the wisdom and purity and utility of the Word of God and the Mysteries therein contained and the spiritual Estate that we have thereby you cannot see to the end of that it extendeth to all times places persons actions and circumstances of actions it hath an unconceivable vastness of purity and spirituality But you will say there is a set number of Precepts how say you then 't is exceeding broad Their use is large and 't is here put for the whole Word of God Adoro plenitudinem Scripturarum tuarum saith Tertullian Here are Remedies for every malady and a plentiful Storehouse of all comforts satisfaction to every doubt nothing pertaining to the holiness and happiness of Man is wanting nothing requisiter to direct comfort and support men in all conditions prosperity adversity health sickness life death what shall I say 'T is the Word that sanctifies all our comforts 1 Tim. 4. 5. 'T is the Word that maintaineth our lives Mat. 4. 4. 'T is the Word that fitteth us to an immortal being 1 Pet. 1. 23. We cannot easily express the comprehensiveness of it and the benefit that we have by it When all earthly things fail the Word will be a sure Comforter and Counsellor to us it doth not only tell us what we should do but what we shall be In short the Word of God describeth the whole state of the Church and the world and what shall become of it in the world to come There is a foolish curiosity that possesseth many in the world who desire to know their destiny and what is in the womb of futurity as the King of Babylon stood upon the head ways to make divination Now let this curiosity be turned to some profitable use nothing deserves to be known so much as this what shall become of us to all Eternity If the question were Shall I be rich or poor happy or miserable in this world it were not of such great moment for these distinctions do not out-live time but the question is of great moment Whether I shall be eternally miserable or eternally happy 'T is a foolish curiosity to know our earthly state the misery of which cannot be prevented by our prudence or foresight but it concerneth much to know whether we are in a damnable or saveable condition while we have time to remedy our case and this the Word of God will inform you of assuredly Well the Commandment is exceeding broad This is the Word that discovereth to you the nature of God and the holy Angels the souls of men the state of the world to come who is the Author of Scripture God thy Commandments the matter of Scripture God 't was not fit that any should write of God but God himself What is the end of this Word God Why was this Word written but that we might everlastingly enjoy the blessed God As Caesar wrote his own Commentaries so God when there was none above him of whom he could write he wrote of himself by Histories Laws Prophesies and Promises and many other Doctrines hath he set himself forth to be the Creator Preserver Deliverer and Glorifier of Mankind and all this is done in a perfect manner Men mingle their imperfections with their Writings though holy and laudable for their names yet they discover themselves in all they do their words and speeches are never so perfect but there is something wanting and here you can find nothing but God here God hath written a Book whose works are perfect nothing can be added nothing taken away To say there is an idle word in Scripture is great blasphemy saith Basil. We have no reason to run to humane inventions for the Word prescribeth every duty every thing that is to be believed and done in order to salvation Open the Gap once and there is no end one brings in one thing and then another and from hence comes all the Ceremonies that do abound in the Church 't is not only most perfect but most profitable and containeth all kind of learning Common Crafts will teach us how to get our Bread but this how to get the Kingdom of Heaven Law preserveth Estates the Testament of Men this the Testament of God the Charter of our inheritance Physick cureth diseases of the body this afflicted minds and distempered hearts Natural Philosophy raiseth Men to the contemplation of the Stars but this to the contemplation of God their Maker By History we come to know of the rise and ruine of Kingdoms States and Cities by this the Creation and Consummation of the world Rhetorick serves to move affection this to kindle divine love â—…oetry causeth natural delight this delight in God no writing like this Secondly As it hath a breadth for use so for duration and continuance 't is the eternal truth of God that shall live for ever Mat. 5. 18. Heaven and earth shall pass away but not one jot or tittle of the law shall fail So Mat. 24. 35. Heaven and earth shall pass away but thy Word shall not pass away But how doth the Word continue for ever Not the Word it self but 1. The Obligation and Authority of the Word continueth for ever 't is an eternal Rule of Faith and Righteousness to the Church that 's more stable than Heaven and Earth Let me shew you how the Doctrine is perpetual The original draught is in God himself the substance and matter of the Moral Law is perpetual viz. namely the perfect love of God and of our Neighbor but the form is not we shall have no need of precepts and prohibition and promises and threatnings in the light of Glory which we have need of in the light of Grace Fierce Horses need a Bridle and there is other kind of Discipline for Children when grown up than when young When they are young we correct their bodies but when they are grown up we correct and punish them by disinheritance The Prop is removed when the thing standeth fast upon its own Basis when we come to Heaven we have intuitive apprehensive knowledge we shall have no other Bible but the Lamb's face many things that are necessary by the way are not necessary when Faith is changed into Vision and Hope into Fruition Scripture is necessary as letters to the Spouse from her Beloved while absent when present there is no such need We need not a Bond when payment is made so Scripture is the Indenture between us and God here but when that is past we shall not need Scripture 2. 'T is eternal in the â—…ruit it bringeth forth the blessing of eternal life to them that keep it and obey it 2d Epistle of Iohn chap. 2. For the truths sake that dwelleth in us and shall be in us for ever So Iohn 8. 51. He that believeth in me shall never see death Why holy men dye as well
as others but they have a being in the world to come and therefore the Word of God is called the Word of eternal life John 6. 68. that is the end and use of it it maketh them capable of eternal life that obey it So 1 Pet. 1. 25. The Word of God abideth and continueth for ever 'T is the seed and principle of eternal life 't is the Charter of their everlasting priviledges they shall enjoy in the world to come But how doth the Word endure for ever 'T is not meant subjectively but effectively because it assures us of eternal life upon obeying it and threatens eternal death to all that reject it Use 1. Oh then let us be much in hearing reading studying and obeying this Word that makes us everlastingly happy if the commandment be so exceeding broad why do we make no more use of it 1. Let our hearts be more taken up about it that should be our main care wherein to busie our selves day and night Psal. 1. 1. Our delight should not be in vain Books and empty Histories but in the Law of God we should often look into the Charter of our great hopes 2. Be directed by the Word of God 't will direct you in every business Psal. 119. 105. Thy Word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path Here is direction for you in prosperity and adversity 3. Study it that you may be sanctified by it Iohn 17. 17. Sanctifie them by thy truth thy Word is truth This is the great benefit that we have by the Word 't is the instrument of sanctification 4. Be much in the study of the Word that you may be assured by it that you may make out your own qualification to the Kingdom of Heaven Acts 13. 46. Since you put away the Word of God from you you judge your selves unworthy of eternal life When you let God's Book lie by neglected and never hear it nor read it nor mediate on it the thing is past all question you judge your selves unworthy of eternal life Use 2. Let this commend the Word of God to us that eternal life is in it other writings and discourses may tickle the ears with some pleasing eloquence but that is vanishing like a Musician's voice other writings may represent some petty and momentary advantage but how soon shall an end be put to all that so that within a little time the advantage of all these Books shall be gone The Statutes and Laws of Kings and Parliaments can reach no farther than some temporal reward or punishment their highest pain is killing of the body their highest reward is some vanishing and fading honour or perishing riches but God's Word concerning our everlasting estate our eternal well or ill being eternal life and death is wrapt up in these Laws and Commandments these are rewards and punishments suitable to the Eternal Majesty of the Lawgiver Here is life and immortality brought to light and offered to them who have so miserably lost it and involved their souls in an eternal death therefore let us have a precious esteem of the Scripture which shews us the way of escaping that misery into which we have plunged our selves and a way of obtaining eternal blessedness Do not then go to a wrong Guide and Rule nothing more necessary to be known than what our End is and the way that leadeth to that End The most part of men walk at random and run an uncertain Race they have neither a certain scope nor a sure way Mens particular inclinations and humors are an ill ill Guide for they incline us to please the flesh and so we shall miss of everlasting blessedness and wander in a bie-path that leadeth to destruction Naturally Man is more addicted to temporal things than spiritual and to worldly vanities than to spiritual enjoyments and it is in vain to persuade Men to look after better things till the carnal affections be mortified and one way and great means to mortifie carnal affections and inclinations is to consider the vanity of the Creature and when our affections are weaned from the world we must look after some better things to set our hearts upon That good which satisfieth all the desires and capacities of Man had need to be an infinite and an eternal good Now these better things are only discovered in the Word of God the Word of God discovers that there is such an estate as everlasting glory and blessedness The Word telleth us plainly and peremptorily who shall go to Heaven and who to Hell well then if you would have this comfort you must see whether you have embraced it with that reverence faith and obedience which the importance of it doth require SERMON CI. PSAL. CXIX VER 97. O how love I thy law it is my meditation all the day IN this Psalm you have a perfect character of a Regenerate Man what he is and what he ought to be in his Meditations his Exercises his Affections and all this recommended to us from the frame of David's heart and example and course of his way Men of spiritual experience can best judge of these affections for as face answereth face in a glass so doth the heart of one Believer to another In these words you have 1 His love asserted 2 Demonstrated from the effect 1. His love asserted O how love I thy Law 2. Demonstrated from the effect of it It is my meditation all the day This is an effect for we are wont to muse upon what we love therefore David loving the Law of God is always thinking of it First For the Assertion Observe the matter asserted and the vehemency of the Assertion The matter asserted is love to the Law The vehemency of the Assertion O how I love thy Law It is an Admiration with an Exclamation David is not contented with a naked affirmation I love thy Law but useth a pathetical protestation of it How love I thy Law The Interrogation expresseth wonder How I love thy Law And the Exclamation O how that gives vent to strong affection as if he had said It is more than I am able to express The Law is taken for the whole Scripture as often in this Psalm Secondly For the demonstration of this affection It is my meditation all the day that is I do often meditate thereof and can spend whole days therein The words may signifie frequency of such thoughts they were not such as did come now and then but all the day his heart was working on holy things as the blessed Man is described Psal. 1. 2. that is every day he is working something out of the Word of God Or 't is my meditation all the day it may note the depth and ponderousness of these thoughts his mind did not run out upon the Law with slighty sallies but he had such thoughts as were solid and serious and did abide with him The Points from hence are two 1. That God's People have a great love to his
Iam. 1. 2. So Christian courage and resolution that 's tried in deep affliction when we are slain all the day long Heb. 11. 35 36. Rom. 8. 37. In all these things we are more than Conquerors The strength of a man's back is not tried by a small weight but by a heavy burden how much he can bear so the sharper the affliction the greater the trial 3. That they may have the more experience of God for the sharper the affliction the sweeter their comfort and the more glorious their deliverance Psal. 71. 20. Thou which hast shewed me great and sore troubles thou shalt quicken me again and shalt bring me up again from the depths of the earth God's power in raising them up is more seen 2 Cor. 1. 10. Who delivered me from so great a death Use 1. If we be under sore troubles let us not faint remember 't is no more than we have deserved God will not afflict a man above his deserts he cannot complain of wrong Ezra 9. 13. It is never more it may be less when our afflictions are great our deserts are far greater Isa. 40. 1. Comfort ye comfort ye my people saith your God Why For she hath received of the Lord's hand double for all her sins God saith double he relents presently 2. Consider the degree of affliction it is not measured out by your selves but measured out by a wise God though afflicted very much and very sore the measure it is ordered by God as well as the kind of it If it were measured out by our selves it would be too light it would be too gentle The Patient must not be trusted in searching his own wounds and if it were left to our Enemies they would know no bounds Zech. 1. 15. I was but a little displeased and they helped forward the affliction But it is left to the wise just and gracious God and Father he tempers the Cup in his own hand and therefore when the affliction is grown sore and strong it comes not only from a wise God but a tender Father that best knows what is good for us Iob 34. 23. That 's a notable place For he will not lay upon man more than right that he should enter into judgment with God That is the party afflicted hath no just complaint against God can take no exception against God's proceedings for he perfectly understands our need and understands our strength God perfectly understands our need 1 Pet. 1. 6. If need be ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations And understands our strength 1 Cor. 10. 13. Faithful is he who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able Many Parents do not correct their children in measure being ignorant of their nature and disposition Many Physicians mistake their Patient's constitution therefore the Physick may work too strongly and too violently for them but God understands our need and our strength and so suits all his remedies accordingly Use 2. To reprove those fond complaints that are extorted from us in deep and pressing afflictions as if 1. Sometimes there was never any so afflicted as I am God's people have been sore troubled Lam. 1. 12. Is it nothing to you all ye that pass by behold and see If there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me Yes others have been afflicted in the same kind and degree if not worse 1 Pet. 5. 9. All these things are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world You think 't is such as the like hath never been known or heard of for every Man 's own pain seemeth most grievous Lam. 3. 1. I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his wrath Other Prophets foretold them I see them executed The best of God's people have their measures of hardships you are not singular do not stand alone This is one of Satan's deceits Satan will suggest this to a Child of God that he may question his Fathers affection lose the comfort of his Adoption and put your selves out of the number of God's Children your lot is not harder than the rest of God's Children all that are in the world have the same trials troubles pressing evils upon their hearts now and then 2. Another you find complaining taxing God of unfaithfulness as if he would break trust and lay upon you more than you are able to bear and you deceive your selves for if you cannot bear your present burden you would bear none you do not improve Christ's strength Phil. 4 13. I can do all things through Christ which strengthneth me Christ doth not help us in such a degree or one trouble and no more but in all 3. Another we find complain I am cut off God will be merciful and gracious no more Psal. 77. 8 9 c. He hath forsaken me and forgotten me God's Children have been brought thus low yet have been raised as the Church Psal. 118. 18. Lord thou hast chastened me sore yet hast not given me over unto death Within a little while he will shew this was but our infirmity this would stop these idle complaints by which we give vent to our daily impatience We have seen David s case but what doth he do he goes to God about comfort and relief I am afflicted very sore O Lord quicken me according to thy Word There observe 1. That he prays and makes his addresses to God 2. For what he prays Doct. First That he prays Observe Affliction should put us upon Prayer and serious address to God Thus God's people are wont to do Isa. 2. 16. Lord in trouble have they visited thee they poured out a prayer when thy chastening was upon them They that have neglected God at other times will be dealing with him then and this God expects Hos. 5. 15. I will go and return to my place till they acknowledge their offence and seek my face in their affliction they will seek me early 'T will be the first thing they will do the greatest thing they will take care off as that which we most care for most is thought of in the morning Nay it is that which God enjoins Psal. 50. 15. Call upon me in the time of trouble Some might hang off when God's Rod is upon their backs or be discouraged by the bitter sense of a trouble therefore God doth not only give us leave but commands us to call upon him This is the special season when this duty is performed with life and vigor Is any man afflicted let him pray Jam. 5. 13. Let him thus give vent to his trouble it doth mightily ease the heart An Oven stopt up is the hotter within the more we keep down grief and do not unburden our selves the more it presseth upon the heart Wind imprisoned in the bowels of the Earth makes a terrible shaking there till it gets vent so till our sorrow gets a vent it rends and tears the heart The Throne of Grace was appointed
but this is a continual Feast a Dish we are never weary of Now who have this Feast the crooked the subtle the deceitful No but those that walk with a simple and plain-hearted honesty 2 Cor. 1. 12. This is our rejoycing the testimony of our Consciences that in simplicity and godly sincerity we have had our conversations in the world They have comfort in all conditions Acts 24. 16. Herein do I exercise my self always to keep a Conscience void of offence towards God and towards men Others are like Trees of the Forest every wind shaketh them but they are the Garden of God Cant. 4. 16. Awake O North Wind blow O South Wind upon my Garden that the Spices thereof may flow out Out of what Corner soever the wind bloweth it bloweth good to them Secondly Partly from the many promises of God both as to the world to come and this present life For the world to come the Question is put Psal. 15. 1. and it were well we would often put it to our hearts Lord who shall abide in thy Tabernacle Who shall dwell in thy Holy Hill 'T is answered He that walketh uprightly and worketh righteousness and speaketh the truth with his heart that backbiteth not with his tongue nor doth evil to his neighbour nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour A man that maketh conscience of all his words and actions So the Apostle telleth us in the new Heavens and new Earth there dwelleth righteousness 2 Pet. 3. 13. Secondly For this world there are many promises take a taste this bringeth profit and is only profitable Prov. 10. 2. Treasures of wickedness profit nothing but righteousness delivereth from death Men think to do any thing with wealth and that naked honesty may be a cold they have food and Physick and friends and Honour alas how soon can God blow upon an Estate and make it useless to us make a man vomit up again his ill-gotten Morsels Iob 20. 15. He hath swallowed down riches and shall vomit them up again God shall cast them out of his Belly As a man that hath eaten too much though God permit him to get he doth not permit him to hold what he hath gotten unjustly There is a flaw in the Title will one time or other cast them out of possession Well then Riches profit not but what is profitable 1 Tim. 4. 8. Godliness is profitable to all things And this part of godliness righteousness that will prolong life and bring a blessing upon the soul of the righteous Prov. 10. 3. The Lord will not suffer the soul of the righteous to famish but he casteth away the substance of the wicked Another promise it bringeth preservation in times of difficulty and danger he that hath carried it righteously they know not how to lay hold upon him and work him any mischief Prov. 11. 3. The integrity of the upright shall guide him but the perverseness of transgressours shall destroy them So again Prov. 13. 6. Righteousness keepeth him that is upright in the way but wickedness overthroweth the sinner 'T is God keepeth us but the qualification of the person kept is to be observed 't is he that is just and honest We think 't is the way to danger because the eye of the flesh is more perspicuous than the eye of the spirit or mind and we are more apt to see what is and who is against us than what and who is for us Psal. 25. 21. Let integrity and uprightness preserve me for I wait on thee That which in the judgment of the flesh is the means of our ruine is indeed the means of our preservation So Isai. 33. 15. He that walketh righteously and speaketh uprightly c. Again for recovery out of trouble Pro. 24. 15 16. Lay not wait O wicked man against the dwelling of the righteous spoil not his resting place for the just man falleth seven times and riseth up again but the wicked shall fall into mischief They may be persecuted but not forsaken cast down but not destroyed There are strange Changes of Providence we are up and down but shall rise again with the wicked 't is not so Again for stability Prov. 10. 4 5. As the whirlwind passeth so is the wicked no more but the righteous is an everlasting foundation Wicked men being great in power rend and tear all things and bring down all things before them but they have no foundation the one is fleeting as the Wind the other is settled as the Earth So Prov. 12. 3. A man shall not be established by wickedness but the root of the righteous shall not be moved Wicked men get up seem high for the time but they have no root therefore soon wither they have no root as that Ambassadour when he saw the Treasure of Saint Mark said This hath no root All their policies secret friendships shall never be able to keep them up Ahab was told that God would root out him and all his Family he thought to avoid this threatning gets many Wives and Concubines by whom he hath seventy Children hoping that one of them would remain to succeed him he committeth their tutelage and education to the choicest of his Nobility Men of Samaria a strong Town but you see all this came to nought 1 Kings 10. So Prov. 10. 36. The righteous shall never be moved but the wicked shall not inhabit the earth Every man that is in good estate would fain make it as firm and lasting as he can these settle Polities contract friendships use all means to make their acquisitions firm and secure but pass by the main care which is to settle things upon a righteous foundation and therefore they shall not flourish So for posterity Prov. 11. 21. The seed of tho righteous shall be delivered So Prov. The wicked are overthrown and are not but the house of the righteous shall stand Prov. 20. 7. The just man walketh in his integrity his children are blessed after him All our care is for posterity man multiplied continued In short all manner of blessings Prov. 21. 21. He that followeth after righteousness and mercy findeth life righteousness and honour He findeth life Prov. 11. 19. As righteousness tendeth to life so he that pursueth evil pursueth it to his own death Prov. 12. 28. In the way of righteousness is life and in the path-way thereof there is no death Righteousness he shall have have righteous dealing from others Honour he shall have a good name in the world and be preferred when God thinks fit Use. Is to press us to do Judgment and Justice First As to our private dealing with others carry your selves faithfully and make conscience of justice and equity 1. Propound to do nothing but what is agreeable to righteousness and honesty Prov. 12. 5. The thoughts of the righteous are right but the counsels of the wicked are deceit Our evil purpose spoils all A good man erreth sometimes through ignorance incogitancy or violence of
found out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a first mover and a first cause but when and how the world was made they were left in uncertainties which was first the Egg or the Hen the Oak or the Acorn Heb. 11. 3. Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God so that things which are seen were not made of things that do appear A child is taught more than they could find out by their profound researches So concerning the Fall of Man Conscience will inform us of a distinction between good and evil and Heathens by the light of Nature could speak of Vertue and Vice as moral perfection and a deordination but nothing of sin and righteousness relating to a Covenant and whence this mischief began they knew not They complained of Nature as of a Step-mother observed an inclination to evil more than to good that vices are learned without a Teacher that man is born into the world crying beginneth his life with a punishment but the first spring and rise of evil was a secret to them but clearly discovered to us Rom. 5. 12. Wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world and death by sin and so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned Mans restitution and redemption by Christ is wonderful indeed 1 Tim. 3. 16. And without controversie great is the mystery of godliness God was manifest in the flesh justified in the spirit seen of Angels preached unto the Gentiles believed on in the world received up into glory This could not be found by man how could they know the free purposes of Gods Grace unless God revealed them This is the Mystery of Mysteries which Angels desire to pry into 1 Pet. 1. 12. So excellent and ravishing a Mystery is this plot of salvation of lost sinners by Christ incarnate that the very Angels cannot enough exercise themselves in the contemplation of it So union with Christ and communion with him a Mystery that Nature could never have thought of Gods keeping a familiar correspondence with his Creatures Gods dwelling in us our dwelling in God 1 Iohn 4. 13. Hereby we know that we dwell in him and he in us because he hath given us of his spirit Words we should not dare to have used if God had not used them before us it would have lookd like blasphemy to speak so if we had not the warrant of Scripture So the resurrection of the body and life eternal they are all wonders 2 Tim. 1. 10. But is now made manifest by the appearance of our Saviour Iesus Christ who hath abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel Heathens might dream of a life after death but could never understand it distinctly It is brought to light Their wise men saw it like the blind man who saw Men walking like Trees or a Spire at a distance no clearness no certainty Lord thy testimonies are wonderful Thirdly It is wonderful for purity and perfection The Decalogue in ten words compriseth the whole Duty of man and reacheth to the very soul and all the motions of the heart All the precepts of morality are advanced to the highest perfection Those fragments and sorry remainders of the light of Nature that have escaped out of the ruines of the Fall will shew us the necessity of a good life But the word of God calleth for a good heart a regeneration as well as a reformation not only abstaining from acts of sin but lusts 1 Pet. 2. 11. Dearly beloved I beseech you as Strangers and Pilgrims that ye abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul. Not only the outward work but the spirit that is weighed in the ballance of the Sanctuary Prov. 16. 2. All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes but the Lord weigheth the spirits It mightily establisheth faith fear and love to God as the essential Graces When we consider Duty in the lump we have no admiting thoughts but when we look abroad into all the parts and branches of obedience whereunto the Law diffuseth it self then the holiliness which the Law requireth is admirable then we see it no easie matter to serve this holy and jealous God it is no easie matter to go to the bottom of this perfection Fourthly It is wonderful for the harmony and consent of all the parts All Religion is of a piece and one part doth not interfere with another but conspireth to promote the great end of subjection of the Creature to God The Law hath a mighty subserviency to the Gospel and the first Covenant shutteth up the sinner immediately under the curse that mercy may open the door to him The Gospel is first darkly revealed and still it groweth as the light doth till noon-day At first an obscure intimation The seed of the woman to Abraham In thy seed which after was repeated to Isaac to cut off Ishmael then to Iacob to cut off Esau yet not what Tribe Gen. 49. 10. The Scepter shall not depart from Iudah nor the Lawgiver from between his feet till Shilo come yet not what Family of Iudah to David 2 Sam. 7. 13. I will establish the Throne of his Kingdom for ever then Isai. 7. 14. Behold a Virgin shall conceive and bear a Son and call his name Immanuel then Iohn the Baptist Iohn 1. 29. Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world points with a finger to Christ. This while in short the Scriptures do so set forth the mercy of God as that the duty of the Creature is not abolished so offers Grace as not to exclude our care and use of means Justification and Sanctification promote one another all is ordered with good advice 2 Sam. 23. 5. Although my house be not so with God he hath made with me an everlasting Covenant ordered in all things and sure Thus the wonderful harmony order and consent of all the parts with respect to the great end which was the glorifying of God and the subjection of the Creature demonstrate the wonderfulness of Gods testimonies The glorifying of Gods Grace and Mercy in those that are saved and his Justice in those that are damned With respect to this God made man upright furnished with abilities to do his will but mutable and in case of a Fall to begin with a new Covenant He will have his mercy honoured without prejudice to his justice the comfort of the Creature established so as Duty not abolished not all of commands nor all of promises but these interwoven that they may serve one another A Promise at the back of a Command to make it effectual Command besides a Promise to cause humbling neither looseness nor rigour If the Covenant had been left to our ordering it had been a confused business Now it is wonderfully suited God keepeth up his Dominion and Sovereignty notwithstanding his Grace and condescension Justice hath full satisfaction yet Grace glorified Fifthly Wonderful for the
seen in their deliverance and therefore before God doth appear for his Children he bringeth them very low Thus Paul 2 Cor. 1 9. We had the sentence of Death in our selves that we should not trust in our selves but in God which raised the dead and Psal. 136. 23. He remembred us in our low estate for his mercy endureth for ever His Mercy and Power is the more glorious in our rescue All that I shall say by way of Use on this point is this 1. That when we are a small people and persons of no Interest we have a liberty to use it to God you may make use of your weak and low Condition as an Argument of Pity so doth the Prophet Amos Iacob is small so doth David here and elsewhere Psal. 109. 22. But I am poor and needy deliver me for thy Names sake and Psal. 69. 29. But I am poor and sorrowful let thy salvation O God set me on high It is some ease to acquaint a friend with our griefs that can onely pity us much more when we have liberty to go to God who can and will help us and will allow us to complain to him though not of him 2. When God's ends are accomplished there is hope Isa. 10. 12. When the Lord hath performed his whole work upon Mount Zion when he hath chastised his People and brought them to his purpose then he will reckon with his Enemies When Heaven is minded more and Earth less We naturally mind earthly things and please our selves with the dreaming of an happy estate in the World The Appetite of Temporal dominion and Wealth and Honour and Peace is natural to us and very hardly subdued and therefore we would fain flourish here and do not comfort our selves in our Crosses with the Meditation of the Glory of the World to come but are alwayes feeding our selves with desires and hopes of earthly happiness and of turning the Tide and Current of Affairs that things may again smile upon us and when frustrated and disappointed of this hope our Soul fainteth Your Worldly Happiness will be a snare to you while you are thus affected Matth. 6. 33. Prepare for Heaven and God will give you so much Happiness by the way as will be needful and fit for you Again when we are Mortified and the Cross hath purged out sin Isa. 27. 9. the Cross hath done its work So when we are humble Lev. 26. 41. If then their Uncircumcised hearts be humble and they accept of the punishment of their iniquity to be meek in Spirit and to trust in the Lord is a fore-runner of Mercy Zeph. 3. 12. I will also leave in the midst of thee an afflicted and poor People and they shall trust in the Name of Lord. When you bring honour to God by your Sufferings Iam. 1. 4. but let patience have its perfect work that ye may be perfect and intire wanting nothing When 't is most for Gods Glory to 〈◊〉 Deut. 32. 36. For the Lord shall Iudge his People and repent himself for his Servants when he seeth that their Power is gone and there is none shut up or left 2. Doctrine Gods people when they are brought low are usually a very despised people the most despised people under Heaven Here I shall shew 1. That this is the usual Lot of an Afflicted people 2. But especially of the people of God 3. The Tryal is very grievous to them 1. An Afflicted People are usually a despised People Psal. 123. 4. Our Soul is exceedingly filled with the scorning of those that are at ease and with the Contempt of the Proud They that are proud and have all things flow in upon them according to their own will contemn and slight others and take no notice of their burdens unless it be to increase them they pour vinegar on the wound The Heathens had a reverence for places stricken with thunder because the hand of God had touched them but here 't is not so Iob 12. 5. he that is ready to slip with his feet is as a lamp despised in the thoughts of him that is at ease While we are burning lamps shining in Riches and greatness we shall have enough to look after us but a poor broken dying lamp a snuff that is ready to go out every body holdeth their nose at it Whilst the enemies are Honourable Great tumble in Wealth and the excess of Carnal delights they despise those that are mean and low and faln under God's hand 2. The People of God much more common sufferers may meet with some pity in their Calamity but the godly are subject to reproaches and mockings in their troubles and this many times proveth the heaviest part of the Cross and maketh it most grievous to be borne 'T is so partly because faln from their great hopes carried on in a way of Religion Where is their God Their fasting prayer As if all were now delusions and phantastical Impressions And partly because the presence of God is sensibly gone from them The presence of God among his people maketh them Wise Couragious Prosperous How should one chase an hundred and a hundred put a thousand to flight But when God leaveth them they grow despicable and ridiculous above all others Hosea 14. 2. Return to the Lord thy God for thou hast fallen by this iniquity All that honoured her shall despise her because her nakedness is seen Lam. 1. 8. A dispirited Judgment-blasted people shall be contemned And partly because the cause for which they suffer may be strangely disguised and ill-represented to the World Satan was first a Liar and then a Murtherer Ioh. 8. 44. Elijah was thought the troubler of Israel They may not only persecute but say all manner of evil against us falsely for Christs sake Matth. 11. 19. Christ is called a Glutton a Wine-bibber and Stephen a Blasphemer And partly by Satans instigation by this means he maketh the despisers increase their sin and hasten their Judgment and so he disswades and discourages many weak Christians from owning the despised wayes of Christ yea it taketh off much of the cheerfulness and Courage of the strong in the profession of Godliness 3. 'T is very grievous Contempt maketh our other tryals more sharp Every man thinketh himself worthy of some respect and would be somebody in the World and therefore when we are laid aside as if dead and useless the temptation is the greater Saul could better bear death than contempt 1 Sam. 31. 4. Draw thy sword and thrust me thorough lest the Uncircumcised come and abuse me Zedekiah was afraid of mocking Ier. 38. 19. Lest they deliver me into the hands of the Chaldeans and they Mock me but not only as we are men it is grievous to us but also as Christians because this contempt reflecteth upon our hopes and the Worship of God it hindreth our service while we were esteemed we did more good and had greater advantages It may revive the sense of guilt God saith
which importeth his Integrity and Sincerity in Praying Doctrine Our Prayers to God must be Sincere as well as Fervent The Heart must be in them and the whole Heart This noteth 1. Seriousness that we heed what we say otherwise we do not pour out our Hearts before God 'T is so far from being a Spiritual act that it is not a Rational act but like the Parrots speaking by Rote or as Children say their Prayers and we must not be always Children Surely we do not speak to God as God as an All-seeing Spirit if we do not mind what we say Ioh. 4. 24. And Prov. 28. 23. Burning lips and a wicked heart are as a pot-sheard covered with silver Dross 2. A hearty Desire or Affectionateness Praying from Memory and Invention and praying from Affection are two distinct things yea praying from Conscience and praying from the Heart Many times the Mind is in prayer when the Heart is not in it The mind or Conscience dictates what is fit to be asked but the heart doth not consent or not urge it to make any such suit to God and so the prayer is repeated in the very making Psal. 66. 18. If I regard iniquity in my heart God will not hear me The Understanding Judgeth that a meet prayer but the heart is byassed the contrary way to some known sin Therefore as David calleth all that is within him to bless God Psal. 103. 1. so to pray to him Memory Understanding Conscience Will Affections all that is within us must attend upon this work that which God heareth is Desire Psal. 10. 17. Lord thou hast heard the desire of the Humble Thou wilt prepare their Heart thou wilt cause thine ear to hear So Psal. 145. 19. He will fulfil the desire of them that fear him he also will hear their Cry and will save them 3. The Prevalency of these Affections That God and his Interest be uppermost in the Soul and the Heart be effectually bent towards him for prayer is not a work barely of our natural Faculties but of Grace guiding ordering and inclining those Faculties not onely a work of Understanding and Will but of Faith Love Fear Zeal Hatred of sin Temperance Patience and other virtues which do bend the Heart towards God and draw it off from other things and without them the understanding will not be clear and have any deep sense of the worth of spiritual things 2 Pet. 1. 19. without these The Will is remiss and they never pursue them in good earnest we may wish for them but shall not Will them As Balaam Oh that I might die the death of the righteous But he loved the wages of iniquity 2 Pet. 2. 15. and so spake words which his Heart allowed not The Affections will be diverted to other things and we cannot have those Longings and strong Desires after Grace Psal. 119. 36. And Col. 3. 2. or at best but a little passionate earnestness for the present 4. An Universal Care to please God in all things without harbouring any known sin in our Hearts Psal. 66. 18. And Psal. 17. 3. Thou hast proved mine Heart thou hast visited me in the night thou hast tryed me and shalt find nothing Nothing contrary to the new Covenant no Guile nothing in his heart contrary to what was in his Mouth So no insincerity found Iob 11. 13 14. If thou prepare thine heart and stretch out thy hand towards him If iniquity be in thy hand put it far away and let not wickedness dwell in thy Tabernacles If you mean to call upon God with any Confidence all that is displeasing to him must be cast out of the Heart This is the best preparation all filth must be swept out when you come to the Holy God for he will not do us good till we are fit to receive good Therefore if you mean to stretch out your hand in prayer thus you must do then may you lift up your Face without spot have boldness and Confidence in Prayer but when the Heart is wedded to any vanity God will not hear Iob 35. 13. Surely God will not hear vanity neither will the Almighty regard it Use. Is to perswade us to pray with our whole Hearts For 1. God will not be mocked Gal. 6. 7. that is in vain you may venture to mock God put him off with vain pretences but it will cost you dear He knoweth the thoughts afar off Psal. 139. 2. And Heb. 4. 12 13. The Word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than aâ—…y two-edged Sword piercing even to the dividing asunder of Soul and Spirit and of the Ioints and Marrow and is a discerner of the Thoughts and Intents of the Heart neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight But all things are naked and open unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do Though Man cannot find you out yet God can 2. God hath expresly told you the prayer of the Upright is his delight Prov. 15. 8. He will pardon many defects but he will not pardon want of Sincerity either in the Person or prayer Though you cannot bring the Pomp of Gifts or exact Righteousness yet if sincere God will delight in you he measureth your prayer by that 3. Where there is a Moral Integrity you do not dissemble God can find the defect of supernatural Integrity Deut. 5. 29. I have heard the voice of the words of this People which they have spoken unto thee they have well said in all that they have spoken Oh that there were such an heart in them c. Therefore be sure your lips do not feign Psal. 17. 1. and pretend more grace than you have so that for the main your hearts be upright seriously readily bent to please him in all things To this end 1. the Tongue must not only pray but the Heart How dare you tell God to his face that you love him and fear him and trust in him when there is no such matter No such Forgery as Counterfeiting the Voice of Gods Spirit The Heart should be first and chief in prayer Psal. 41. 1. And Lam. 3. 4. Lift up your Hearts with your hands to God in the Heavens There is the chief Voice the hand without it is nothing 2. You must make Conscience of Graces as well as Gifts yea more than Gifts 1 Cor. 12. last verse But covet earnestly the best gifts and yet shew I unto you a more excellent way with 1 Cor. 13. 1 2. And bewail unbrokenness of Heart more than brokenness of Expression if you chatter like Cranes yet if there be a holy desire in it God will hear 3. You must pray earnestly in secret as well as in Company Matth. 6. 5 6. When thou prayest thou shalt not be as the Hypocrites are for they love to pray standing in the Synagogues and in the Corners of the Streets that they may be seen of men But thou when thou prayest enter into thy Closet and when
shall be established unto thee and the light shall shine upon thy ways Decree and it shall be established speak the word and it shall come to pass Is it for us to enact Decrees to appoint what shall be Their Prayer is a duplicate or counterpart of Gods Decrees God guideth their hearts to ask such things as are pleasing to him God is ready to help us to give supplies in all our Necessities he is remembring us for good upon all occasions especially in our low Estate when we have none to help he will help Isa. 59. 16. And he saw that there was no man and wondred that there was no Intercessor therefore his arm brought salvation unto him and his righteousness it sustained him It was when he that departeth from evil maketh himself a prey he cannot be safe unless he be wicked and none will bestir himself in the behalf of Truth and Right or own the good Cause by speaking a word for it therefore God himself would take the business in hand Psal. 105. 14. He suffered no man to do them wrong They that are Gods Confederates he hath a watchful Eye over them they are under his Defence and Protection an afflicted People are more sensible of God's Presence Help and Assistance than others are for streights and troubles are means to open mens eyes and waken their senses now you will ever find God with you when he seemeth most to forget you But especially in Duties of Worship the Visits of Love there and the entertainment at Gods Table Psal. 65. 4. Blessed is the man whom thou choosest and causest to approach to thee that he may dwell in thy Courts we shall be satisfied with the goodness of thy house even of thy holy Temple They have many sweet experiences of God which they find not elsewhere there he doth Comfort Quicken and Revive them Psal. 36. 8. They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of thy house thou shalt make them drink of the rivers of thy pleasures God biddeth them welcom to this Table and will not send them away empty indeed there they come to feel joyes unspeakable and glorious Not that we should build always on sensible experiences or tye God to our time or make an Essay of Curiosity but if they humbly resolutely wait upon God according to the incouragements of his Promise first or last they shall have a full meal and God will own them and fill their hearts with goodness Thus in answering their Prayers helping them in streights visiting in Duties 2 On our part it is delightful to Converse with God 1. In Holy Duties Isa. 26. 16. Lord in trouble have they visited thee they poured out a prayer when thy chastening was upon them Iob. 22. 21. Acquaint now thy self with him and be at peace thereby good shall come unto thee We have no Reason to be strange to God for if we were acquainted with our selves we should find daily and hourly some errand to the Throne of Grace To forget him dayes without number sheweth we have little knowledge of God or of our selves Be sure to look after a desire to enjoy God in the Duty My soul longeth yea even fainteth for the courts of my God my flesh and my heart cryeth out for the living God Psal 84. 2 3. To rest in an empty Ordinance sheweth we do what we do rather to pacifie Conscience than satisfie spiritual desires God is to be our End and Object whom we are to seek and serve abs te sine te non recedam 2. In a course of Holiness how can two walk together except they be agreed Amos 3. 3. Loveth what he Loveth Hateth what he Hateth Suitableness of disposition is the ground of intimacy 1 Ioh. 1. 7. If we walk in the light as he is in the light we have fellowship one with another God saith I will dwell in them and walk in them walk as ever before God Gen. 17. 1. I am the Almighty God walk before me and be thou perfect Secondly How we come to be brought into this nearness The Reason of doubting is because every man is born a stranger to God Psal. 58. 3. The wicked are estranged from the womb they go astray as soon as they be born speaking lies Sin causes a distance between God and us Isa. 59. 2. But your iniquities have separated between you and your God and your sins have hid his face from you that he will not hear Man is averse from God without God Christ Covenant or Hope or any good from him Christ represents our Apostate Nature by the Prodigals going into a far Countrey the breach groweth wider every day and the distance is increased by actual sin The wicked are far from God Hos. 7. 13. Wo unto them for they have fled from me destruction unto them for they have transgressed against me While matters stand thus between us and God there is no Hope the rigour of Divine Justice and the Terror of a guilty Conscience will not give us leave to look for any Communion with God Ans. In this hopeless and helpless estate the Lord Jesus had pity on us the great End of the Mediator is to bring us to God 1 Pet. 3. 18. For Christ hath once suffered for sins the just for the unjust that he might bring us to God And therefore he is said to be the way to the Father Ioh. 17. 6. I am the way the truth and the life no man cometh unto the Father but by me He hath taken our case into his own hands and doth partly by his Merit and partly by his Spirit bring about this nearness and fellowship between God and us 1. By his Merit he bringeth us into a state of Favour he opened the door by his death Eph. 2. 13. But now in Christ Iesus we who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. To go to God offended and appeased by no satisfaction is terrible to the guilty Creature but Christ hath made our peace so that we have access into this Grace wherein we stand Rom. 5. 1 2. Therefore being justified by Faith we have peace with God through our Lord Iesus Christ. By whom also we have access by faith into the grace wherein we stand This door which he hath opened by his death he keepeth open by his constant Intercession Heb. 7. 25. Wherefore he is able to save unto the uttermost all those that come unto God through him seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for us which our repeated provocations would otherwise daily and hourly shut and close again 1 Ioh. 2. 1. These things I write unto you that you sin not and if any man sin we have an advocate with the Father Iesus Christ the righteous and so all distance is removed and poor Creatures may comfortably come to God 2. There is a great averseness in our hearts and we need not only leave to come to God but an heart to come to God we
the Necessity 2. From the Congruity and Conveniency 3. From the Utility and Profit of it 1. The Necessity of it It must needs be so that Gods wayes must be taken up upon choice because there are several Competitors that bid for the heart of Man where there is but one thing there is no choice There is the Devil by the World through the Flesh seeks to get in and reign in your Hearts and there is God Christ and the Spirit Now there must be a casting out of one and putting in the other Look as in the 9. Prov. the whole Chapter there Wisdom and the foolish woman are brought in pleading to draw in the heart of unwary man to themselves Wisdom is pleading and the foolish woman is pleading In the beginning of the Chapter Wisdom tells what Comfort what Peace they shall have if they will take her Institutions Wisdom offers solid Benefits but Folly offers stolen waters and bread eaten in secret some carnal Mirth when Conscience is asleep ay and the dead are there too The intoxicating Pleasures of this World bring Death along with them when they can choak the sentiments of God that are in his heart Whoso is simple let him turn in hither saith Wisdom and who is simple let him turn in hither saith Folly As the Poets feign of their Hercules that Vertue and Vice appeared to him and the one shewed him a rough and the other a pleasant way Certainly as soon as we come to years of discretion we come to make our choice either to go on in the ways of death or to choose the ways of God either to give up our selves to the Pleasures of sin or else to seek after the comforts of the Spirit Now since there are two Competitors for the heart of man and his love cannot remain idle it must be given to one or another Love and Oblectation cannot lie idle in the Soul either it must leak out to the World or run out to God There is a necessity of a choice of renouncing the bewitching Vanities of the World that we may seriously betake our selves to the service of God 2. Consider the Congruity and Conveniency of it both to the honour of God and nature of Man that no man should ever be happy or miserable but by his own Choice 1. 'T is not for the Honour of God that a man should be Happy or have such great Priviledges setled upon him without his own choice such great benefits as Justification Sanctification and Eternal Glory On the other side that a man should be Miserable without his knowledge or against his will or besides his purpose and consent that God should give Eternal Life whether men will or no. It is not agreeable to the Honour of God to inflict Eternal Death upon them without their consent unless they choose the ways of death Mans Heart else would have a Plea against God Certainly the wise God will never make any happy without their own consent and never make any Miserable but their Destruction is of themselves Hos. 13. 9. 2. Neither will it agree with the Nature of Man who is a reasonable rational Creature or any agent capable of Election or Choice The Brutes are rul'd with a rod of Iron God guides all things by his Providence inanimate Creatures by meer Providence Brutes by their own instinct and Man as a free Agent capable of knowing and prosecuting his Chief End Now every Creature of God is governed according to the nature which is put into it and therefore since man is a free Agent God expects in submitting to his service the Creatures consent and choice and before we can submit to his service before he will admit us to the benefits there must be a choice and an actual will on our parts Rev. 22. 17. Whosoever will let him take the water of life freely The business is brought home to us and left with our will If we miss of happiness it is because we would not choose it and the way that leads to it The Lord chargeth it still upon mans Will Iohn 5. 40. Luke 19. 14. Matth. 23. 37. Psal. 81. 11. our Misery is from our wilfulness But in all that are brought into Grace there is a Will 't is true but God prevents them and inclines their Will Psal. 110. 3. Thy people shall be willing in the day of grace and power You have a grant and an offer of mercy from God and then he inclines and moves you to make a right choice So that of the good and bad it may be said they have their choice If you neglect and refuse holiness you choose your own destruction and neglect life your Hearts must tell you this Thou hast been the fault of it as Plutarch brings in one Apollodorus that dreamt one night that he was boyling in a Kettle of scalding Lead and that his heart cried out to him I have been the cause of all this This Heathen improves it to shew there is a Vengeance that attends sinners I mention it only allusively Now it was your own perverse Choice and Will that made your Hell thou hast but the fruit of thine own choice Indeed as to what is good if you have chosen the Precepts of God there God must have the Glory you must say not I but Christ as the Apostle Ay but there you come in there 's an Act of your Will but as disposed and rightly enclined by God You come both to the Duties and Priviledges of Religion by a choice also though not of your selves but of God 3. Let me reason from the Utility and Benefit A man that takes up the wayes of God upon Choice 1. He is able to justifie the wayes of God for he seeth a Reason for what he chooseth When Temptations come strong there will be many mis-giving thoughts ay but then Wisdom should be justified of all her Children Matth. 11. 19. A blind accidental Love is the fruit of chance but a Love that is grounded upon knowledge and Judgment that 's choice this is so grounded therefore he seeth Reason for what he doth Phil. 1. 9 10. I pray God that your love may abound in all wisdom and understanding That ye may approve things that are excellent They see a Reason for they took it upon choice The Lord hath shewed them the worth and excellency of his wayes therefore they can better justifie God against all their prejudices 2. Such will be more firm and stedfast The cause of all halting in Religion is is the want of a Choice of a purpose resolutely set A wavering double-minded man that is half off and half on will be unstable in all his ways Iames 1. 8. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a two-soul-man a man that seems to have a soul for God and a soul for earthly things and the heart hangs sometimes for one and sometimes for another A scoff or scorn or a little inconvenience a little fear a little enticement or stirring of