cutting them again off from his living body as unprofitable branches fit to be cast into the fire Joh. 15. 6. These are they considered in the exercise of this kind of life and holy operations that are as the fruitful married wife unto Christ under the first Covenant and over whom the Law hath dominion while they are in this life short of and unacquainted with an implantation into Christs dead body not having the similitude and conformity unto his death so much as in the seed of it brought forth in them The answer which these have of a good conscience towards God under the Law is particularly stated Rom. 7. where they are in Pauls own person represented as having that workmanship set up in their hearts and minds which stands in an exact conformity to the Law or image of Christs natural righteousness and perfection which is holy righteous spiritual and good and so having that heart-work in them whereby they adhere to and approve the Law and the goodness and righteousness thereof in opposition to the contrary body of sin and death which is still in being and exercise in them and with them ready upon all occasions to return with prevalency whilst they are but upon this tenure of the Covenant of works and in the wavering unconstant principles thereof by reason of which they find by experience no good thing dwelling in their flesh that is abiding and of a continuing residence with them but such as comes to them as a stranger or a sojourner for a night or short duration and is ready upon their miscarriage to be gone and leave them again estating them but in such a wavering condition as whilst with their mind they serve the Law of God they are ready with their flesh to serve the law of sin and the good that they would do that they do not and the evil which they would not do that they do By all which uncertainty and slipperiness of this their state Christ would teach them to see the need of following the Lamb whither soever he goes and to experience themselves to be most miserable if they advance no further but abide here thinking themselves rich and encreased with goods and wanting nothing whilst they are ignorant that they are miserable and poor and blind and naked as wanting that top-stone which must compleat the whole building And therefore the right frame of spirit in the faithful subjects of Christ under this dispensation is to find no Rest here but to see that this Earthly Jerusalem is no abiding City and to cry out miserable man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death wherein is not only comprehended the corrupted but the corruptible state of mans nature after that he hath been renewed in this life of COMMON SALVATION by vertue of the blood of Christ From this experimental sense God would teach us patiently to lie down under the power of the cross of Christ whose saying then we shall acknowledge to be most faithful and true that if we die with him we shall also live with him and if we suffer with him we shall also reign with him our fellowship with him in his death being the only means by him appointed to translate us out of all death into life eternal and to bring us under that Law of the spirit of life Rom. 8. 2. which hath power absolutely to free us from the law of sin and of death in all the branches of it This is the spirit and conscience and these the principles of the children of the first covenant under the Dominion of the law in which while they continue using of it lawfully they are knit unto Christ by his taking unto him his two staves BEAUTY and BANDS Zach. 11. 7. signifying the fruits of his presence with them and amongst them as he is their husband by this covenant until by slighting his greater glory and selling him for thirty pieces of silver they come to discover themselves to be the flock of slaughter and such as he at last departs from and leaves to draw back unto perdition whilst he carries on the poor of the flock that bear him company in his sufferings unto the saving of their souls keeping them through the power of faith unto his Heavenly Kingdom This generation of men are witnessed unto by the Scriptures under a twofold consideration First as they were under the Law as the Law was the figure and shadaw of the good things to come consisting in meats and drinks and divers washings and fleshly rites ceremonies and divine Ordinances under Moses his ministry imposed until the time of reformation or to the coming of Christ in the flesh who in that sense was the end of the Law and of the observance of it as considered in that fleshly commandment and Mosaical administration that pointed at the very image itself that was to be manifested in the flesh of Christ where the same Law was to begin again and become the holy commandment spoken and delivered unto men by the son himself requiring a conformity in and from all men unto the natural righteousness and perfection of man shining forth in his flesh who was made like unto us in all things sin only excepted In this second sense as the Law is now given by Christ the true MINISTER OF CIRCUMCISION Rom. 15. 8. Issued forth by his first appearance immediately written in the fleshly tables of the heart by his spirit whereby the children of it are taken into marriage-union and made one flesh with himself branches of this vine Joh. 15 are we to understand the subjects of this kingdom of Christ that live under this dispensation in the times of the Gospel since his coming in the flesh and putting down the Temple-worship and Service Acts 7. that was in force before his incarnation introducing in the room thereof a spiritual Temple-worship and Service in the conformity which he takes them into with himself in his flesh and living body making them his own Temple house and habitation the first Tabernacle or worldly Sanctuary built up together with him in his natural righteousness and perfection Such principles and such a birth as this of holy and righteous operations and actings are required in him and of him that is made by Christ under the law or a child of the first covenant which Deut. 32. Jer. 3. 21. compared with Chap. 11. 15. and Isa 5. and Ezek. 16. do in express terms testifie shewing how perfect they are as they come out of his hands to whom he is a Father and Redeemer in this covenant planting them wholly a right seed and that together with the choisest vine causing them to grow together for a while in himself the true vine John 15. and thereby renewing in them and upon them a state of holy flesh natural righteousness and holiness and as thus qualified taking them into his own house as his beloved spouse and married wife who yet after all this
the grass withereth the flower fadeth away because the spirit of the Lord blows npon it surely the people is grass The grass withereth the flower fadeth but the WORD of our God shall stand for ever ver 7 8. So then at length the believing part in the Saint cometh to see and experiment the emptiness nothingness and fading of the best natural perfection and fleshly purity not only in legal worldly rudiments and principles but even in Evangelicals so far as they consist in the knowledge of Christ himself but according to the flesh Whereupon the believer becomes willing to be crucified to all confidence esteem or desire of Rest and abode in them seeing a patern left by Christ himself herein when he suffered in the flesh that we also might be armed with the same mind and by being crucified in the flesh may come at last to cease from sin attaining a perfect freedom there-from by the resurrection from the dead And now what high thoughts and proud imaginations do rise up in the heart fit to be brought down and subdued by the cross of Christ then which nothing is more grievous to the soul which loves this Absolon it s own uncrucified fleshly mind and the enlightned reasonings thereof in their very rebellion and endeavours to out it of the everlasting kingdom yea it struggles hard and wrestles vehemently to keep its Isaac from being offered up in sacrifice Oh! how with Zipporah doth the flesh cry out against faith as a bloody husband thus to require the full resignation of the judgement will and desire of the pure holy natural man as well as that of the corrupt All this it doth require and no less will serve its turn then the bringing of the exercise of these natnral senses as they are contesting with and resisting the workings of faith into perfect captivity to the obedience of faith and into perfect rest and silence in the grave of Christ where they are to be bound as in chains and fetters utterly disabled for ever acting more in any resisting or contradicting way unto the power and life of faith and so indeed are set free and have their truest liberty given to them to act more fully then ever in harmony with and subserviency unto the workings and life of faith Thus Rom 8. it is said If Christ be in you the body or flesh is dead because of sin but if the spirit of him that raised up Christ from the dead dwell in you he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies or crucified fleshly senses by his spirit that dwelleth in you to the bringing them forth in a better and more excellent way of operation then ever they had before For these fleshly senses as they are planted into the likeness of the death of Christ are made one dead body with him and so are shut up for ever in an everlasting impossibility to act against the truth but only for the truth to act in a way of resisting and contradicting the workings of faith but in subjection and subordination to â—â—em This is that we mean by the obedience of faith and keeping of the word of Christs patience which is required by the law of the new covenant the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus as it frees us from the law of sin and death which is so far from destroying the law that it fulfils it and so far from abolishing the good works required by the law that it disannuls only the unlawful use of them setting them up in their right and lawful exercise not single and alone without the faith that is saving or in resistance and contradiction to that faith nor so mixing them with a faith that fails whereby both faith and a good conscience may come to shipwrack but making them in such manner the fruit and children of the operation of the faith of Gods elect as that against such there is no law This is the gathering together into one dead body with Christ wherein all his elect must be found as fashioned into a similitude with him in his death and that for the filling up of the measure of his sufferings in the whole number of his beloved ones that so at last they may arise likewise with his dead body and be gathered together into one glorified body with him or into a similitude with him in the glory and power of his resurrection when they shall be like him and see him as he is when at this appearing of Christ who is their life they also shall appear with him in glory The hope and expectation hereof grounded upon the promises made to this purpose in Col 3. 4. 1 Joh. 3. 2. Phil. 3. 21. and many other places of Scripture is that that hath born up the spirits of his people and faithful ones in all ages that have been made willing to follow this Lamb whithersoever he goeth from desponding and sinking away under all those insolent affronts and contradictions they have met with in their several generations from their insulting unreasonable adversaries the inhabitants of the earth who flourish prosper in the world while they are chastened every morning disciplined under the cross of Christ miscarrying as to all that 's visible and overcome in those hot contests oppositions and assaults which the seed of the Serpent lusting to envy will not fail to exercise them with who indeed could have no power against them unless it were given them from above as Christ the head of this spiritual seed told Pilate in his own personal case Ioh. 19. 11. and as power was given from above against that great Master Lord so is it also given to them to make war with the Saints and to overcome them Rev. 13. 7. but though at present they be so overset by worldly powers that they cannot work any deliverance in the earth neither do the inhabitants of the world fall before them Isa 26. 18. yet at this second coming of Christ he will call up the dead bodies of these his crucified Saints and faithful witnesses not only into a state of security from the destroyer but into a singing and triumphing condition ver 19. Thy dead men shall live together with my dead body shall they arise awake and sing ye that dwell in dust Both these states of the true Saint are most lively described Isa 54. which we shall endeavour to give some short tasts of for our clearer enlightning in the present truth specially as to what concerns the former branch the Saints conformity with Christ in his death The other consisting in a conformity to him in his Resurrection-state we shall reserve for the latter end and conclusion of this discourse CHAP. XVIII Concerning the Saints conformity with Christ in his death particularly opened and cleared from those mistakes which the enemies to the Crosse of Christ are apt to brand it with BY conformity with Christ in his death which some have been
had followed the directions given him by God For in this natural constitution of spirit soul and body which man obtained by creation his understanding will and affections were all placed in their true rectitude and proper subordinations his rational and his sensual mind were set in right tune and harmony together disposed and fitted to the bringing forth of all manner of righteous and holy operations answerable to the image of God wherein he was created which contained as much of divine light and manifestation as man in his earthly capacity and first make could take in amounting but to a shadowy representation of Gods mind and a sight of it but in part in order to prepare him to receive more by a second and new creation on the seventh day when he should have been admitted within the veil to have beheld Gods very similitude open and bare-faced conversing with him as friend speaks with friend Now man being thus furnished with a reasonable soul and all the excellencies of its operations before described with freedom of will to choose the good and refuse the evil honoured also with a soveraignty over the creatures in this fair posture of preparation to receive more was nevertheless seduced ensnared and made a prey of by Sathan sin and death to the rendring as it were abortive all that work which was already passed upon him and to the letting in of sin and death with the deserved curse and wrath of God through him as through a door upon all his posteritie The occasion of this was twofold First the present enjoyment of good from God under the ministry of the first covenant the fruit of which to the eye of flesh and blood even at its best was so glorious and appeared so beautiful and desireable that man was easily perswaded that it was the best and highest attainment hee needed to look after and thereby through Sathans subtilty rendred secure and negligent as to the use of means given by God to carry him on pass him through and conduct him out of this his corruptible state as from glory to glory into the power of an endless life without the intervening of sin to the full and perfect securing of mans nature from all prevailing power of fins assaults for ever which was not done by creation The second occasion of mans fall was the freedom of his will wherein the judging and desiring faculties of his mind were entirely committed by God to his own free motion and operation upon the terms of the covenant he was brought into with God which was to be dealt with according unto his works to be rewarded with life or with death as he should rightly order or abuse this liberty of action with which God had invested him by way of tryal and probation That man had such a power of free-will as this First the nature and tenor of the Covenant he was taken into doth demonstrate which is conditional in reference to the works of man And God throughout deals with man under that Covenant according to his works strongly thereby asserting them to be mans own so as the very reward which comes thereby is accounted to him of debt even the thing which his own action as left alone unto himself therein hath brought upon him and entitled him unto Secondly without such a power of free-will mans first estate could not have been mutable at least could never have changed into corruption for if it had been necessary to him to have stood he could not have fallen and if it had been necessary to him to fall God had thereby made himself the Author of sin which could not be Now the power itself wherein mans free-will consisted was the free use and exercise of his judging and electing power of mind either in reference to good or evil as it should be presented to him and come before him in a way to be by him decided and determined as his deliberate act and resolution which Paul calls 1 Cor. 4. 3. mans judgement or mans day Adam had then this honour given him by creation to exercise his humane judicature or mans day not only upon all the works of Gods hands already made in the six daies and presented before him in Eden the garden of God but he had also as in prospect and contemplation what was yet behind and to come both which being the object or subject matter that Adam was to pass his judgement upon God was pleased by way of precaution and premonition to forbid him to fix his eye and his desire upon things seen which are temporal and fading there being a reserve of unseen things as an enduring substance to be imparted and communicated to him on the seventh day That which Adam was forbidden was not simply to forbear the use of his free-will but the evil and unlawful use of it as through an unwise discerning and erroneous judging between the present temporary good which he saw and the future durable excellency of the things unseen and but in hope there did spring up an inordinate coveting and desire in him after the retaining of the first to the despising and rejecting of the second preferring the vision of God in part and as under a vayl before the full and compleat view of his glory unvayled To induce man unto this the Serpent employed all his power and subtilty contributing all the influence he could from his and the fallen Angels example herein which together with the aptness in the natural desire of man to be enticed this way to serve his own belly rather then the Law and Command of God and to gratifie his natural appetite rather then shew his obedience to Gods voice did prevail with him to eat the forbidden fruit whereby the door was set open for sin and death to enter upon himself and all his posterity That which remains yet to be declared on this subject is the possibility which Adam had in the state of innocency to have made a right use of his free-will so as thereby to have done what God required him to do by the first Covenant And by the way when we speak of this Covenant in reference to the state of innocency it is to be understood for the same thing with the law of nature under which Adam was created and hath this difference in it from what it was afterward when dispensed by the name of the Law under Moses ministry and called Heb. 9. The first Testament receiving its renewal from the blood of Christ that as it is the law of nature it requires mans personal righteousness and holyness to be continued in even the preservation of mans nature in the sinless state wherein he was created as the condition of keeping up and maintaining that sort of union and communion between God and him though not therein to rest but to be ready to be carried on by God into a sure unmovable and fixed state of life from whence there is no possibility of falling Whereas the
Jesus our Lord. But the justification and sanctification received upon the terms of the first covenant which are conditional and depending upon the creatures continuance are subject in a time of tryal to fail the persons concerned therein unto whom through the common relation which all mankind is taken into with Christ as he is flesh of our flesh bone of our bone like unto us in all things sin only excepted there is given as in a way of common grace and salvation first a relative holiness and righteousness in ballance to the relative unholiness and unrighteousness derived to the first Adams posterity as they stood related to him their common parent in his fallen state which is freely conferred upon them with offer and promise to bring them out of the bondage of corruption they are in by nature if they will hear and obey Secondly there is an actual exercise of long-suffering and patience put forth towards them freely on Gods part by vertue of the satisfaction he hath received on their behalf in the sacrifice of Christ by reason whereof he declares himself willing not to impute unto them sins past or present if through obeying Christs voice they shall render themselves capable of such benefit and shall not by their wilful personal sinning against the grace offered them and persisting therein so far abuse the benefit of Christs sacrifice as wholly to render themselves unworthy thereof Thirdly there is an actual imputation of Christs legal righteousness to all such as obeying his call in the first-covenant are thereby made the seed which is of the Law born after the flesh and become actual members of his natural body From what then hath been said concerning Christs active and passive obedience we may discern how far Christ therein wrought out mans redemption as he stood in the relation of a common person and parent to both seeds and as their surety undertook on their behalf to fulfill the righteousness of both Covenants in himself and this after such a manner as to be able to derive and communicate the benefit thereof unto them in a way of the Justification and Sanctification required by either of the two covenants respectively and this either singly and apart each from other or joyntly and together to the rendring those righteous in him that were helpless sinners and wretched ones in themselves Christs obedience then hitherto treated of in the two forementioned branches of his active and the first branch of his passive though it doth procure all that which is needful to make man righteous and holy according to what is required by both covenants yet it is not that properly which expiates the guilt of sin already committed nor frees from the curse of the Law in order to which Christ was made a Curse for us and did bear the punishment due to our sins which without blood could not receive remission at the hands of Gods Justice Heb. 9. There is then yet remaining a second part of Christs passive obedience to be opened wherein this did consist and in respect of which it behoved Christ to suffer as a Malefactor without the Gate a reproachful accursed bodily death with all the heightning circumstances accompanying the same from God Angels and men to the bruising of his heel in which also the Scriptures are very plain and express saying that upon him God laid the iniquity of us all Isa 53. who were as sheep gone astray and 1 Pet. 2. 24. he himself bare our sins in his own body on the tree and chap. 3. 18. it is said that he being put to death in the flesh but quickned in the spirit hath once suffered for sins the just for the unjust and 1 Tim. 2. 4 6. Who gave himself a ransom for all as willing to have all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth Christ by being made thus a curse for us redeemed us from the curse of the Law or did that in way of satisfaction to Gods Justice by reason whereof God thinks fit and finds it just to acquit and discharge sinners from the curse and wrath of God due unto them by the Law Which benefit is either renewed to us conditionally and in reference to the first Covenant-obedience by us engaged in to live and be tryed by or is given unto us absolutely and in reference to the second Covenant-obedience as living by faith and interested in the sure mercies of David that never fail Those that partake of this benefit in the first sense are spoken of Heb. 10. unto whom having been once enlightned and then sinning willfully after the knowledge of the truth to the treadding underfoot the Son of God accounting the blood of the Covenant wherewith they were sanctified an unholy thing and doing despight to the Spirit of Grace there remains no more sacrifice for sin but they fall again not only under the first curse but the second death or final ministry of Gods fiery vengeance which no sacrifice of Christ will be admitted to atone on their behalf for ever Psal 49. 8. but like sheep they are laid in the grave for death to feed on they go to the Generation of their Fathers and never see light But those that partake of this benefit of Christs sacrifice in the latter sense have at once a perfect and absolute remission of all sins vouchsafed to them never to be recalled more as it is written Their sins and their iniquities I will remember no more This being laid down we shall now proceed to shew first the particulars wherein Christ did undergo Gods wrath and was made a curse on our behalf by way of satisfaction and ransome for the sins of all mankind which properly was our due to have undergone in our own persons and secondly to open the nature of that wrath from God which Christ was capable of undergoing and that was thought meet and required by God to be executed upon him and undergone by him in the work of our Redemption For the particulars wherein Christ underwent the wrath of God and did bear the punishment which was due only unto sinners the Scriptures declare them to be these First Christ was exposed as a mark which was aimed and shot at all the daies of his flesh by the rage and malice of wicked Angels and men and as a spectacle of open scorn and reproach to be trampled upon by his insulting adversaries as if he had been a worm and no man unto all which God was thus far contributing as to suffer it and sit silent as a Spectator yea by his providences and outward dispensations rather furthering then hindring it and this in persuance of his declared mind herein even unto the Serpent himself Gen. 3. 15. when he told him speaking of Christ the seed of the woman he shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel For the exercise of all this rage of Devils and men against him did bring to pass no other thing but
the natural will or judgement in all the power and light thereof at best whilst unregenerate have no skil in nor know how to set about but as fools and little châ—ldren men must be found at the feet of Christ that he may give them a new birth and so teach and enable them thereunto But now these that thus have a right litteral knowledge of the Gospel are necessitated as to the life and power of their inward principles to fall in with and agree upon the same natural righteousness holiness and perfection in kind with their opposers and make use of their weapons to fix the truth of their witness taken up by them from theletter of the Scripture in such expressions as belong to the new-covenant-life in the second Adam upon those principles of the first Adams purity and perfection or the life of the covenant of Works as restored in and by the blood of Christ which the Scripture never intends if rightly understood but indeed on this account doth undeniably cast the cause upon those that are for the common and general Redemption who are not to be blamed for what they assert as to the extent of the benefit of Christs death to all men but for denying the truth of that witness held forth by the other which ought to have its due place and to be owned by them as consistent with theirs if they understood it yea as that which alone can give perfection and stability thereunto which therefore if rightly stated and acknowledged by them would return shame sufficient upon their adversaries discovering them to be self-condemners as opposing that very thing in the spirit and truth of it the grace faith and principles of the second-covenant-life which they do so zealously contend for in the Letter as to the peculiarity and durableness of the benefit which the true Saint receives by the death of Christ and as agreeing with that in spirit and truth the single activity and life of first-covenant-principles which they implacably oppose in the letter These are the contradictions that with great confidence and censoriousness are maintained on both sides in this our age whilst truth it self suffers every way and is unacceptable to either none being more ready then these to lay Heresie Blasphemy and high Notions at the wrong door of others in hopes to make themselves appear the sound and good Physitians Thus we see under the shadow and letter of the covenant of Grace the truth and spirit of it opposed and kept out and those that do it miserably tearing out their own bowels and pleasing themselves with names for things Whence it is that none are more confident of their being within the covenant of Grace freed from any danger of the covenant of Works then this latter sort of men who do that honour and right to the covenant of Grace as to be for it in their mouths but remove their heart far from it and hug in their bosoms the principles and life of the covenant of Works as that which they will not part with by any means but in such case will rather as with weeping may be said of them become enemies to the Cross of Christ whose God is their belly whose glory is in their shame who mind earthly things Phil. 3. 19. And herein they are hardned also two waies First by considering those that are behind them who maintain the doctrine of works against the litteral witness which they give unto the covenant of grace whence they conclude themselves free from any danger of being comprehended under a covenant of works Secondly by the consideration of their witness that pretend to be above them and to hold forth a Kingdom that consists not in word only but in power who under pretence of spirit and power do either with those called Ranters set up the doctrine and inspiration of devils in opposition to the truth of their witness that is but in the letter introducing again the filthiness of the flesh whereby to destroy the righteousness and holiness of the natural man which is not done away as some falsly and scandalously affirm we say by conformity with Christ in his death but is thereby fulfilled for that garment is made yet more pure and white by the blood of the Lamb and is kept spotless by this means to the second appearance of Christ or else they do annihilate the creature-being and assert perfection to consist in a swallowing up thereof into the pure being of God even in that glory wherein he is in communicable and saith I am and there is none besides me as the Familist and such who gather up all at last into a state of eternal salvation or rather into no state of creature-being at all and so in effect making neither heaven nor hell The contrary unto both these opinions is freely and fully asserted in this treatise in the believers conformity to Christs death and resurrection a doctrine which nevertheless in the true and full extent of it is accounted very offensive and scandalous in these daies of ours even amongst those that are most zealous for it in the letter who possibly may oppose it ignorantly for a season but when it comes to wilful sinning in this case it carries its own fire about with it whereby to devour the adversaries This little excursion I judged not unuseful for the cleerer and fuller asserting of the doctrine of the cross and death of Christ as it operates upon and is mis-judged by those that are yet under the first covenant considered as dispensed by the Son himself in his first appearance wherein he is a minister of the circumcision in the truth of it the righteousness and holiness of his flesh or natural man being the law or covenant of works in its highest and most glorious administration In this respect Christ is said himself to be made under the Law who also doth effectually teach those that follow him in the power of his death and resurrection how the Law may be used lawfully and according to the true intent of the giving of it So that Christ by coming in the flesh and considered as giving himself singly in and by the means of his first appearance doth beget unto himself children of the law or first covenant whose knowledge of him is only after the flesh and who though they be taken by him in to his house and built up with him in his flesh as one Tabernacle and habitation unto God yet attain no higher thereby then to be in the holy place and to minister and serve before the Lord there in a state figured out by the charge of the Levites under the Law who notwithstanding their officiating and performing service unto God in the Temple are capable of being for ever excluded from coming into the holiest of all there to do the office of a Priest or to come neer to any of those holy things which are within the veil in the most holy place and to be made
their own righteousnesse not submitting to the righteousnesse of God and so prove deceived and seduced through an unskilfulnesse of discerning in that which is good to the despising and refusal of that which is a more excellent and enduring substance for the fading glory of flesh and the morning dew of natural righteousnesse wanting that wisdome which teaches to distinguish betweene the lawful and unlawful use that is to be made of the Law and the eating and drinking of the body and blood of Christ worthily or unworthly Behold then the evil desire and lust that may and doth spring up in mans pure holy and righteous nature as by being under the dominion of the Law and living in subjection and conformity thereunto he is striving to separate them whom God has joyned together in Christs second appearance and to uphold competition and opposition betweene those that should dwell together as brethren in unity in the communion of the holy Ghost which counsel of God carries much contrariety in it to mans natural desire and lust which would faine get away with Gods first word the word of the beginning Heb. 6. 1. wherewith God at first visits man refusing to stay to the end and to hear and obey the second word which God is pleased to have with him whereby he finishes and compleats his first operations in him declaring to him his whole counsel whereunto the first dispensation is appointed only as a fore-runner and therefore must needs be short as to that which is the work of the second being no otherwise intended from the beginning but as a messenger or preparer of the way Hence we may see what it is Paul means Rom. 7. and ch 8. when he acknowledges that the Law through the weaknesse of the flesh though it have nothing in it which causes or is the author of sin yet it hath that in it which sinne takes occasion by to set up it self anew and blossome forth againe in mans nature when renewed and restored to a conformity with the Law which is spiritual holy righteous and good for lust is capable to conceive in Adams posterity thus renewed and set up afresh as well as it did in himself at first and lust when it hath thus conceived brings forth sinne or an envying and contesting against the glory of Christs second appearance which sin being perfected or come to its fixing of the mind in an unchangeable and implacable enmity thereunto brings forth death even that death which is spiritual and eternal so Rom. 8. such a carnal mind as this is called death as it stands in such an enmity to the spiritual mind that it is neither subject to that Law of God which is the Law of the Crosse and Spirit of life nor indeed can be Thus saith the Apostle by the coming of the Commandment sin revived and 1 died and what was ordeined for life I found unto me to be unto death sin getting into its vigour and strength thereby assuring the soul that it is here out of all danger being begotten againe into Gods own likenesse wherein man was at first created and having the visible characters thereof shining forth in it written not with inke and on tables of stone but with the Spirit of the living God and on the fleshly tables of the heart shewing it self a right change and a real heart-work above and beyond all that is accounted civility and morality and above all notion and spirituality that is but head-work and fancy What is now to be done sayes the Tempter to this sort of men but to perswade them torest here and praise and blesse Gods Word that by this first visit and beginning hath made so beautiful glorious a change in their hearts nature as this is wherof the experiences are so lively and refreshing especially when reflection is made upon what they are changed from when brought to this and the way and means of attaining it which hath also the approbation and praise of visible Churches and Saints and of the best men so judged by mans day which makes them say Let us tabernacle here with Moses and Elias especially if we be upon the Mount and brought thither by Christ himself transfiguring himself there before us In this earthly building of the renewed natural man let us fix and resist all dawnings and approachings of any higher or better state Let this our Ishmael live was once the voice of Abraham himself that afterwards was perswaded to offer up his Isaac that was but according to the flesh If we be prevailed with to fix here and live after the flesh we shall die Rom. 8. 13. or enter and abide in those wayes of death which make us enemies to the Crosse of Christ and cause him in the end to swear we shall never enter into his Rest As man therefore in the purity and holinesse of his natural will may be using the Law of God lawfully as we have shewed so also he may exercise himself in his own holy and righteous operations of mind and nature in such manner as may be quite contrary to the mind of God and the true end of such conformity wrought in him unto the Law experiencing by this means the evil that is incident unto a pure and uncorrupt state of being and that lust that is to be known only by the coming of the Law Which evil desire or lust of man in this state is a covetousnesse which sets up idolatry in the highest streine endeavouring to oppose Christ in the Spirit by Christ in the flesh by exalting the glory of his first appearance above that of the second Sin in this sense hath for the Mother and Nurse of it mans natural righteousnesse wherein he is apt to glory and be puffed up without cause contrary to the true meaning of the Law which requires him indeed to cherish and maintaine the natural righteousnesse and holinesse therein and thereby ministred whether considered as it shines forth in the flesh of Christ or in their own hearts and consciences in opposition to that which is the filth of the flesh or to the resting in our own personal morality and vertue before the Law came to us but authorizes him not or warrants him to oppose herewith the Crosse of Christ and the excellency of the knowledge of him crucified or to resist upon pretence of keeping that up the coming in of the better and more excellent glory When once therefore such a frame of spirit as a root of gall and bitternesse is springing up in men and that wilfully against manifest conviction and long contestation and patience on Gods part to bring them to another mind at last they are brought by sad experience to find that in their flesh dwells no good thing but such as will be leaking out of this fleshly building of the first Adam at its best if rested in and subject to corrupt So that whilst with the mind they serve the Law of God with the flesh
they serve the Law of sin finding sin so farre from being perfectly overcome and subdued as once they supposed that by degrees it returnes upon them with greater force then ever making them miserable men as abandoned and left to its inroad and violence without any possibility of being delivered from this death and wrath that comes upon such wilful sinning in which case there remains to them no more sacrifice for sinne but an expectation of fiery wrath Howbeit to repair this losse unto them whilst they have their abode in this world the Devil lets them have as their reward the praise of one another and enables them to carry the world clear before them to the oppressing and trampling down the righteous and spiritual seed wringing out waters of a full cup to them These are they who prosper in the world and encrease in riches who have no bands in their death but their strength is firme who are in no trouble nor are plagned like other men but have their eyes standing out with fatnesse enjoying more then their hearts can wish They set their mouths against the heavens and their tongue walks through all the earth under the universal Dominion and Rule which Satan as God of the world hath from one end of the earth unto the other This great City or universal worldly spirit and rule under Satan sits as Queene alone and knows no sorrow but with her fornications and sorceries bewitches the world and the inhabitants thereof exercising her universal Rule and Dominion over them under various formes and administrations of government till he come whose right it is and cast downe these Thrones before him receiving to himself Dominion Glory and a Kingdome that all people Nations and Languages should serve him in a Kingdome that is never to be destroyed The principal means which God uses to bring in his Kingdome and oppose these Counter-workings of Satan is his setting up in the person of Christ a bruised broken crucified man that humbled himself to the death of the Crosse suffering without the gates of Jerusalem as the mighty power of God by which to destroy the power of the Devil and bring to nought the wisdome of the wise and the understanding of the prudent as those foolish and weak things of God in mans eye which he hath chosen to confound the great and mighty things of the world and as those base and despised things that are not which he hath chosen to confound the things that are fairest in shew and appearance Which weapons of Christs warfare though mighty through God yet being despicable and weak in the eye of Satan and to the discerning and judgement of men they are thereby the more harden'd and encouraged to contest it out with Christ till at last they come to be trampled under his feet like mire in the streets CHAP. XX. Concerning death to sinne and life to righteousnesse considered as well in the distinct Branches and Parts thereof as in its full extent and comprehensivenesse together with the discovery thereby of that which is counterfeit hypocritical or otherwise defective THe summe of what we have beene Treating of in the preceding Chapters that concerne the Work and Rule of Christ whether in the Natural Legal or savingly beleeving Conscience as also the Saints conformity with Christ in his death the discovery wherof this chapter had immediately and more orderly succeeded but that I was unexpectedly prevented in it by the Presse may very well be reduced unto the two general termes of Mortification and Vivification or of our dying unto sin and living unto righteousnesse Rom. 6. and this according to the kind and measure of Grace received whether common or special temporary or everlasting For in what ever conscience Christ works and gains so farre reception as to be hearkened unto and obeyed in the Voice or Ministery he holds forth himself by whether upon the termes of the first or second Covenant the necessary consequent thereof is a departing from sin and an eschewing of evil as saith the Scripture Rom. 6. 16. Know ye not that to whom ye yeeld your selves servants to obey his servants ye are to whom ye obey whether of sinne unto death or of obedience unto righteousnesse so as the service and obedience ye yeeld unto the one frees and delivers you from the subjection ye were held in unto the other For those that are servants of sinne are free from righteousnesse or dead to it as on the contrary those that are servants unto righteousnesse obeying from the heart the teachings of Christ in any of his Three-fold dispensations before mentioned are free from sinne and become dead unto it according to the Law they are under or the manner of the working thereof in several measures and degrees experienced in any such conscience Now that which we are to understand by righteousnesse whose servants we ought to be and whereunto we are to yeeld our subjection is the Image of God formed and set up in the second Adam or Person of the Mediator propounding it self to be received and entertained by man since the Fall upon the foundation of a new entercourse and converse betweene God and Men which he hath obtained freely through his owne blood shed as a ransome for all whereby also the natural conscience is purged from dead works and fitted againe for the service of theliving God This Image of God consisting in righteousnesse and true holinesse hath power as it lives and dwells in Christ to dispence and give the communication of it self in part or in whole according to the nature of the Ministery and the manner of administration by which it is conveighed into the heart and conscience So as if this Image of God be but as the Word and Voice of God in the mouth only of servants whether Angels or Men unaccompanied with the personal presence of the Sonne himself it hath one kind of operation and effect intimated Esay 40. 3 4 5. by that Voice of the Lord or Word of God in the mouth of servants only Crying in the Wildernesse-condition of mans corrupt nature and degenerate state as he is dead in trespasses and sinnes Prepare ye the way of the Lord make streight in the desert a high way for our God and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together declaring herein this preparatory dispensation which tends and leads unto Christ in his first appearance as he is God manifested in flesh in which respect it is that all flesh can see him together for as to his second appearance he dwells in that light and immortality which no flesh can approach unto which no man hath seen or can see as he is a meer natural man This forerunning Ministery unto Christ we may also take notice of Luke 10. 1. After these things the Lord appointed other seventy and sent them two by two before his face into every City and place whither he himself would come saying unto
pieces of silver stumbling at that stumbling stone and going about in the meane time to establish and keep up their owne righteousnesse in its credit and authority not only against the filthinesse of the flesh which lawfully they may but in opposition also unto the righteousnesse of faith which is highly displeasing to the Father who calls for this Isaac to be offered up and warns that this earthly Canaan is only to be sojourned in and that therefore a more heavenly Countrey should be in our eye and desire even a City that hath foundations and immutability in it whose builder and maker is God From this legal or first-Covenant frame of spirit as exalting it self in opposition to the life of faith do arise and spring forth the sinnes of unbelief to the resisting of the Ministery of Faith or the new Covenant endeavouring either to keep out the life and light of the Righteousnesse of Faith or if the dawnings thereof break in upon them whether they will or no to crucifie and trample it under foot as an unholy thing and to oppose to the utmost the life and power of Christs second coming though by so much as is witnessed in the first they may discerne as in a Type and Figure that glory that excels and is to follow and that this second dispensation or first appearance of Christ in its proper use and tendency is ordained as a preparatory and forerunning help and furtherance thereunto This sort of sins are properly sins of unbelief or against the life of Faith called the hidden works of darknesse 1 Cor. 4. 5. that may lie undiscovered and unsuspected under the purest forms of godlinesse and a very fair shew in the flesh of a Practical blamelesse Righteousnesse according to the Law By the very good works and consolations such consciences experience under the Law sinne works death in them more easily even a fixed enmity against the righteousnesse of Faith becoming thereby exceeding sinful Of this sort are the sins that revive and get strength by the coming of the Commandment and die not till we become dead to the Law by being crucified with Christ which till the Law come are unknown as to any experimental discerning of them by those that remaine under the first Ministery who in the utmost of their transgressings do sinne only against the Sonne of man or Christ in his first appearance but these sinne against the Holy Ghost or Christ in his second appearance and by such sinning forfeit the benefit of all their enjoyments The third and last Ministery then in and by which everlasting righteousnesse is conveighed and the Image of God set up in the heart in an immutable and incorruptible state is that wherein is exhibited to us the glory that follows that is to be beheld with open face the seed of Promise borne of the free-woman which is the younger and comes after both the former dispensations as the end for which they were given and are kept on foot This Ministery is exercised by the mouth of the Sonne himself speaking from heaven to the shaking and removing of the former heavens and earth as of things that are made that this Kingdome that cannot be shaken may remaine into which Christ is ascended as received up into glory made higher then the Heavens and set downe on the right hand of the Majesty on high in that light and immortality which no man hath seene or can see but those only who are admitted to enter within the veile through their conformity with him in his death Those that are under this Ministery do stand possessed of farre higher and richer benefits and priviledges then any do arrive unto under the first Covenant having also all that they have under that Ministery being joyned so near unto the Lord that they two are but one spirit 1 Cor. 6. 17. or heavenly manhood the one in the Relation of the Husband the other of the Bride the Lambs wife who hath made her garments the sine linnen which is the righteousnesse of the Saints white in the blood of the Lamb which Robes are neither given unto nor put on by any but the hundred fourty four thousand Rev. 14. that are the true Virgins and followers of the Lamb whither soever he goes leading the true immaculate unchangeable life of righteousnesse which is peculiar unto them from all the world besides The benefit of these Robes they have in a twofold consideration first as they are worne by Christ in his owne person made white by himself in his owne blood when he offered up himself without spot unto God by the eternal Spirit which is imputed to them for justification irrevocable and never to be blotted out over and besides the benefit of his legal righteousnesse for their justification upon the tenour of the first Covenant and secondly as they are worne by themselves for their owne personal inherent righteousnesse and sanctification as washed againe in the blood of Christ by a sprinkling thereof upon every one of their hearts to purge them from all evil conscience as they become planted into a likenesse with him in his death over and beyond the washing of their bodies with pure water from the filthinesse of the flesh which is the first-Covenant-sanctification purging them only from the evil conscience opposite to that Ministery This then is the Righteousnesse of Faith or of the second and New Govenant consisting as we have shewed in that newnesse of life and operation which never leaves untill it hath brought downe mans first activity or way of acting by himself alone into the very grave of Christ And we are farther to consider that this Righteousnesse of Faith may have a hidden and relative Being only in the heart of the Elect separating them unto God from the womb and not yet bring them into reall and actuall union with Christ in his spiritual headship nor appear for a long while in its own proper manifestation or be so much as an operative seed of life taking the soul in any active way into co-operation with it self but at most is only comprehending and preserving it from the evil of falling into the GREAT TRANSGEESSION or sinning the sin unto death So then whilst this holy seed thus lies at the bottome as it were the person in whom it is may be carried forth in the life of other Principles to the exercise of all good conscience from first to last under all the three Ministeries as it was with Paul whether considered as in those Principles wherein he was alive before the Law came or those wherein he lived under the Law in a conformity to it or those wherein he lived by Faith in newnesse of life and operation after he became dead to the Law counting all things lesse and drosse and dung Phil. 3. which he had till then experienced how great and glorious soever his receivings and attainments had beene as fit to be left behind that he might presse forward through a
to a more safe and un-erring intuition into the whole Fabrick If the newness of many things thou meetest with offend thee consider with thy self what unsearchable riches are to be found in the WORD of God whose best wine is kept for the last when Christ shall be admired in all those that do believe amongst whom he that is feeble at that day shall be as David and the house of David shall be as God as the Angel of the Lord before them Zach. 12. 8. and this by the means of the WORD who as a mysterie has lain hid in God from the foundation of the world and is no new Commandment but that which was in and from the beginning the old Commandment appearing only new because the darkness in which it hath been a long time veiled is passing away and far spent so as the true light now shines in Iesus Christ according to the revelation of the mysterie which was kept secret since the world began but is now made manifest and by the Scriptures of the Prophets according to the Commandment of the everlasting God made known to all Nations for the obedience of Faith Rom 16. 25 26. Again if thou findest the language rough tedious and unapt to convey the discovery of such excellent glory as is shining forth in the face of this living WORD of God quarrel not with the treasure for the earthliness of the vessel through which it passes but allow something as remembring that thy self also art in the body and confined and be ready and willing in thy place to supply what is deficient my design having been more to intend the knowledge of things then the elegancy of words Lastly if in the opening of mystical and dark prophesies that which principally is aimed at and applied throughout in this Discourse be the inward and spiritual meaning of them Know that it is not to exclude thereby their literal and historical sense but to shew how well both may stand together In which case such Essays deserve to be born with considering how much of the one sort is made extant by many pens already and how little of the other Farewel I am thine in the love and service of the truth H. V. From Belleau April 20. 1655. A TABLE OF THE Chapters Chap. I. Wherein is shewed that the foundation and first Rule of all true and right knowledge of God is seated in Christ the living WORD as the blessed Trinity by their own immediate operations do make themselves personally visible therein Chap. II. Concerning the holy Scriptures their authority and use with the harmony and analogy which they hold with the living WORD Chap. III. Concerning the creation of all things by Jesus Christ who is the mystery that lay hid in God from the beginning and makes himself manifest as well by the works of creation as of redemption Chap. IV. Concerning the creation nature and ministry of Angels Chap. V. Concerning the creation of man on the sixth day Chap. VI. Concerning the fall of man the steps and degrees to it with the bitter fruits and consequents thereof Chap. VII Shewing that God on the seventh day ended the works which he had made and produced the Rest and fixed state appointed to the first creation which Christ the Medidiator as he is the minister of Gods second appearance is the Author and accomplisher of Chap. VIII Shewing the conviction and judgement that came upon men and Angels for their sin and disobedience by the shining forth of the al-searching light of Gods second appearance in the WORD before which every creature stands naked and discovered Chap. IX Concerning the WORDS being made flesh for the performance of the whole will of God in reference to mans redemption and salvation Chap. X. Concerning the benefits that do inseparably accompany Christs person where he is received either by the first or second Covenant according to the tenour of both which there is vertue in his blood to reconcile and bring men to God Chap. XI Shewing the subordinate use that the elect Angels are of unto Christ in his bearing up the pillars of the creation that else had been dissolved through the fall and the place which they have in the threefold general administration of his mediatorial Kingdome set up in the world Chap. XII Shewing wherein the three rules and formes of administration in Christs mediatorial Kingdome do differ one from another and maintaine an entire jurisdiction within themselves but in due subordination and subserviency still of the lower to the higher over the respective subjects that live under them Chap. XIII Shewing the fixed enmity and warre that is maintained and kept up by Satan against the Rule and Kingdome of the Mediator in the world in order to make of none effect unto men the inestimable price and usefulnesse of Christs blood in their fallen state Chap. XIV Shewing the continuance and progresse of the war between the subjects of Christ and Antichrist and the terms and issues upon which they joyn Chap. XV. Shewing more particularly the bounds of that Rule and Government which is set up by Christ in the natural conscience together with the answer of a good conscience thereunto in those that are under this first dispensation Chap. XVI Concerning the Rule and Dominion which by the Law Christ exerciseth in the minde of those that are made children of the first Covenant together with the answer of a good conscience thereunto in such as are subjects unto Christ under this second dispensation Chap. XVII Shewing the nature of that Kingdome and Rule of Christ in the Saints which consists not in word and in the forme of godlinesse only but in power and in the life of saving faith the first fruits whereof appear in those that are made conformable to Christ in his death Chap. XVIII Concerning the Saints conformity with Christ in his death particularly opened and cleared from those mistakes which the enemies to the Crosse of Christ are apt to brand it with Chap. XIX Giving a general view of the counterworkings of Satan to the Government of Christ in all the forementioned administrations thereof Chap. XX. Concerning death to sin and life to righteousnesse considered as well in the distinct Branches and parts thereof as in the full extent and comprehensivenesse together with the discovery thereby of that which is counterfeit hypocritical or otherwise defective Chap. XXI Shewing particularly the evil seed that is sowen in the natural conscience by Satan through which he works men off from their subjection to Christ in his first dispensation and fixes them in rebellion against him Chap. XXII Shewing in particular the workings of the mystery of iniquity in the consciences of the children of the first Covenant to the ripening of them unto perdition and finall falling away from God Chap. XXIII Concerning the common interest wherein the Devils subjects meet and correspond under both the dispensations before mentioned which yet by the wisdome and power of Christ
and immortal life but by faith in Jesus Christ who was from the beginning the right object of faith unto Angels and men to have lead translated them into the true Rest Eternal life without the coming in of sin between if he had been received and believed on when he caused his second voice and heavenly testimony to be heard on the seventh day But forasmuch as the word then preached to them did not profit them because it was not mixed with faith Christ finding this his testimony thus sleighted and resisted by Angels and men resorts to the other part of the power that is in this heavenly voice which is to judge and condemn in righteousness those that shewed themselves disobedient to it and neglecters thereof And here behold the goodness and severity of God severity to them that fell and fell wilfully as did the Serpent and the wicked Angels by plain direct disobedience and down-right opposition to their Head as also yet further by enticing and seducing man also to his sin and fall but goodness to man unto whom he made sin and the judgement declared by reason of the same to be the occasion in all likelyhood of his and Eves conversion and the reason is given why God thus distinguished his way of dealing with Angels and men For the Angels in what they had done sinned wilfully moved by their own malice in a self-hardning fixed way manifestly quitting their Head and their fellow Angels that followed him to the place whither he looked or intended to go whilest they forsook and turned off from him But for Adam and Eve they were seduced and beguiled as over-reached by the Serpent wherefore as the Apostle Paul said in the like case when in zeal he persecuted the Church The Lord was merciful unto me because I did it ignorantly so aso the Lord was merciful unto our first parents that were seduced and beguiled by the Serpent and was pleased to renew his Covenant with them in that blessed and most excellent remedy the blood of Christs sacrifice whose vertue now appeared to be as well of force to make up and restore what was lost by sin and the fall as to bring man into a better state then he had at first which might as we have shewed have been done without sins ever entering or making of this breach and so the instability of those first principles might have been removed that wavering condition might have been fixed against all the assaults of sin or Sathan whatever and secured from all danger of miscarrying through the comming of the same Jesus in the flesh and his entring within the veil by death and the resurrection from the dead without being exposed to the shameful and accursed part of the death of the cross which was properly that which was occasioned by the Fall And although it be the secret counsel of God which makes the true and general discrimination between the objects of his mercy and his severity wherein he freely hath mercy on whom he will have mercy and shews severity on whom he will shew severity yet in the revealed and declared dispensation of his will herein unto Angels or men when he comes to deal and proceed with them either in the way of his mercy and favour or severity and displeasure he alwaies observes a method of proceedings with them most exactly consonant unto his justice and consistent therewith so as he proceeds not actually to a final rejection and casting off the vessels of wrath till they have ripened themselves for the same through their own unworthiness and long abuse of his patience under full and sufficient means of light disswading and warning the contrary Nor doth he suffer those that he intends for objects of his mercy to sin the sin unto death or to arrive at that height of unworthiness as willfully to resist the light of his love but alwaies prevents this extremity of sin in them with seasonable discoveries of mercy and manifestations of his free grace which surely was the meaning of the aforesaid place of Paul when he said because I did it ignorantly I found mercy as much as if he should have said The Lord in mercy would not suffer me to come to that height of sinning for which he swears in his wrath those that do arrive thereunto shall never enter into his Rest which is to do that which all those in some sense or other are guilty of whom God hath determined for ever to exclude from partaking of that union through which only they can enter into the true Rest forasmuch as they have thereby wilfully rendred themselves unworthy and uncapable thereof We are therefore to acknowledge righteousness and truth to be the pillars that bear up the judgements and determinations of God in his most secret counsels when from all Eternity he predetermines and designs Angels and men to their use and service in his house either as vessels of honour or dishonour as objects of his love or hatred For God is true and righteous altogether and will appear and be found so when he is judged and when he comes to declare and lay open the grounds of his proceedings toward his creatures shewing himself willing to be argued with concerning the same but however the secret of these things belongs to God who is best able to give his own account of them in his own time yet what he hath already revealed and so made appertaining unto us to cast our eyes upon we may and ought to take notice of the better to settle our minds in duty and subjection unto him who is the Father of our spirits This then he gives us to understand that he hath supplied and provided against the faultiness and waveringness of the creatures standing by the first covenant in the seventh daies rich grace that was to follow so that what the Law could not do in that it was weak through the fleshâ— God by giving the promised seed in the light and power of the new and second appearance fulfilled that which the first was not able to carry through by reason of the weakness of the flesh or readiness which is in all natural beings to prefer the light and glory of Gods first appearance before his second and to refuse the hard condition which appears to flesh and blood in the observation of the duty of the true Sabbath or cessation from its lawful works when ever it is called thereunto though the penalty annexed in case of wilful refusal and disobedience be the utter exclusion of the creature from the blessed end for which it had any being given unto it at all Upon this consideration it is that God who from all eternity doth foresee all things and foreknow how universally all Angels and men will conclude themselves under sin and do as much as in them lies utterly to exclude and debar themselves from the priviledge and mercy of that manner of conversing with him and enjoying of him which is accepted
and so agreeing with the pure natural heart of man In the exercise of this second and new-covenant-life Christ was enabled to offer up himself in the flesh through the eternal spirit as a Lamb without spot and guile unto God to bring in everlasting righteousness and that subjection of heart and brokenness of spirit in man which God requires by the law of faith or tenor of the second and new-covenant answering to the law of the new-creature-being and life whose original pattern was hereby set up in Christ as the first fruits in that image of the first-born from the dead wrought out in him unto whom all the rest of the adopted children whose names are written in the Lambs book of life from the beginning of the world were predestinated to be made conformable Jesus being thus qualified in the same nature and person even as the son of man to be as well a high-Priest as a sacrifice proceeds to fulfill the will of his father that is herein given him to do even to perform that obedience that is required of him as Surety and Mediator of both Testaments standing in force by vertue of his death This obedience is the second general particular which we have propounded to treat of consisting in the right use and mannaging of those powers and senses of mind that by the WORD were formed and set up in Christ for the performance of the will of God as to all that he required from man in and by the Rule and law of the first and second covenants the righteousness of both which laws he was to fulsil even all righteousness which accordingly he did as himself declares Heb. 10. 7 9. where he saith Lo I come in the volume of the book it is written of me to do thy will O God and this by taking away what was faulty in the first covenant and establishing the good and righteousness of both in the second For he came not to destroy the Law but to fulfil it so as the very righteousness of the Law which as upon its first bottom passeth away as a morning dew and waxeth old is fulfilled in the new-covenant-obedience by those who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit and was so fulfilled to the utmost in and by the man Christ Jesus who as the second Adam did all that was needful and which God required to be done for the remission of sin and the utter abolishing and removal of it out of mans nature with an absolute incapacity of ever returning more upon the true and right heirs of salvation In respect whereof it is said Rom. 5. 19. That as by one mans disobedience many that is all were made sinners so by the obedience of one many that is all shall be made righteous Having that ransom paid and means provided in him to make them righteous so that there shall be no necessity remaining upon any to perish forasmuch as sufficient provision is made to bring all men to repentance and to the knowledge of the truth that as in Adam all died so in this sense all again in Christ are made alive that is capable of receiving life from God upon the terms of one of the two Covenants For if through the offence of one many be dead and judgement was by one to condemnation much more the grace of God and gift by grace which is by one man Jesus Christ hath abounded unto many to the justification of many offences v. 15 16. God esteeming it just that by the righteousness and obedience which is performed according to his will by one man Jesus Christ the free gift should come upon all men unto justification of life as well as that by one mans offence and disobedience death should raign over all This one righteousness and obedience performed by Christ is that which not only answers by way of satisfaction unto all that was occasioned and brought forth by the offence and disobedience of Adam but where sin hath abounded grace hath abounded much more that as sin raigned unto death grace might raign through righteousness unto eternal life by Iesus Christ the second Adam Which eternal life sin shewed it self able to hinder the first Adams attainment of upon his first principles The obedience then which Christ performed we are to consider under a twofold respect First that which is usually called his active obedience whereby he was in his own person legally righteous and perfectly holy according to the tenor of the first covenant as made under the Law and rendred in the natural powers of his mind exactly conformable thereunto This conformity in Christ to the righteousness of the Law qualified him to be the Lamb without spot or blemish which God required to be offered up and slain as a sacrifice for sin which conformity may be considered either as inherent in him qualifying him thus for sacrifice or Secondly as coming into actual exercise by the proper activity of his living soul or natural man if left alone therein or Thirdly as being brought into exercise by the Fathers indwelling presence teachings not suffering him to speak or do any thing of himself or in the single activity of his natural principles as himself saith Ioh. 14. 10. The words that I speak unto you I speak not of my self but the Father that dwelleth in me doth the works In which third and last consideration Christ was made active through the exercise of a newness of life and operation set up in him in the way of faith flowing from that second seed and union begotten in him by the WORD as we have already shewed In which activity he did not only perform the righteousness and obedience required of man by the Law or first covenant but that also which is required of him by the new second covenant Without which second branch of his active obedience there could have been no sacrifice nor shedding of blood no Lamb slain nor feast of passover as it is written 1 Cor. 5. 7. Christ is our passover who was slain for us for there would have wanted the priest or sacrificing power to offer up the same according to the will of God declared in the new and second covenant Heb. 10. 9. For though it be most true that Christ through the righteousness of the Law and this considered chiefly as inherent in him is thereby the pure and spotless Lamb of God the male of the flock without blemish which it was needful for him to be as prepared for sacrifice and to be offered up it being requisite not only to be but to continue Holy harmless and separate from sinners throughout the whole course of his life and sufferings in the flesh yea and in the grave iâ—self not to see corruption otherwise he had not answered and fulfilled the righteousness of the Law nor been in his own person legally righteous such an one as justice it self upon that account could take no exception against yet this made him not high Priest
what his hand and counsel had before determined to be done For they that dwelt at Jerusalem and their rulers because they knew him not nor yet the voices of the Prophets they have fullfilled them in condemning him Acts 13. 27 29. And when they had fullfilled all that was written of him to be done by them upon him as instruments of vengeance they took him down from the tree In all which proceedings of God Angels and men Christ the just suffered for the unjust the innocent and righteous had the due reward of the guilty transgressor so that he being thus made the punishment for our sins it seemed good unto God to make us righteousness in him and to become capable of the reward contained in the promises due unto the same upon the terms of the first or second covenant Secondly whilest thus the wrath and rage of man in all the circumstances thereof was as it were armed by God to shew it self in open violences and injuries against him God was also in a more immediate way exercising him inwardly with all manner of desertions and withdrawings of his presence with the fruits and comforts thereof from his natural man denying and with-holding the reward due to him as a righteous and holy man according to the Law and instead thereof recompencing unto him the punishment due unto the worst Malefactor appearing to the eye of flesh and blood in him and to the judgement and perswasion of him as he was a natural man in the posture and with the face of an enemy lively declared to be so apprehended by him in those dying words of his My God my God why hast thou forsaken me which is also most affectionatly and prophetically expressed Lam. 3. 1 c. not only in the person of Christ but also of his suffering Saints who drinking of the same cup of spiritual desertions and sufferings with him are those that in a sense also do bear the indignation of the Lord Micha 7. 9. not by way of satisfying Gods Justice and atoning his wrath which is peculiar only to Christ in his own personal sufferings but as such sufferings are requisite to the bruising of their heel subduing their natural man to a conformity with Christ in his death and to the filling up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in their flesh The Prophet in the place mentioned on this account Lam. 3. 1 c. complains after this manner I am the man saith he that have seen affliction by the rod of his wrath He hath led and brought me into darkness but not into light Surely against me he is turned he turneth his hand against me all the day My flesh and my skin hath he made old he hath broken my bones He hath set me in dark places as they that be dead of old He hath hedged me about that I cannot get out he hath made my chain heavy Also when I cry and shout he shutteth out my prayer He was unto me as a Bear lying in wait and as a Lyon in secret places He hath turned aside my waies and pulled me in pieces he hath made me desolate He hath bent his bow and set me as a mark for the arrow He hath caused the arrows of his quiver to enter into my reins I was a derision to all my peeple and their song all the day He hath filled me with bitterness he hath made me drunken with wormwood He hath also broken my teeth with gravel stones he hath covered me with ashes And thou hast removed my soul far off from peace I forgat prosperity And I said my strength and my hope is perished from the Lord remembring mine affliction and my misery the wormwood and the gall My soul hath them still in remembrance and is humbled bowed or bruised in me The remembrance which Christ had under all this dispensation of wrath from God to the sense and discerning of his natural man of what was due unto sinners and what they had done to whom he was given for a Head Surety and Redeemer added as it were the sting to all these his sufferings setting before him the very form and ministry of that wrath from God which man fell under by reason of sin contained in that threatning In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely dye Thus we are come to the second thing which is to open the nature of that wrath from God which Christ was capable of undergoing or that was needful to be poured out upon him in reference to the work of redemption Wrath properly is not to be found in the nature of God simply considered for God is love who therefore saith Fury is not in me but wrath as God is capable of exercising it consists in that posture of an enemy and face of displeasure wherewith he cloths and arms himself in Christ the Mediator in his intercourse with the creature Angels or men as the contrary form visage and appearance to that wherein he comes forth towards them as he is their God and husband upon the terms of either covenant first or second The ministry of which wrath is exercised therefore by God in a suitableness to the nature of the covenant it accompanies and is annexed unto and accordingly admits of a differing consideration For the ministry of Gods wrath contained in the threats of the first covenant is but temporary and conditional admitting of atonement remission and reconciliation by sacrifice ransome and intercession which being provided the benefit thereof obtained and applied redeems the sinner from under this curse and displeasure of God which is therefore called Gal. 3. 13. our redeeming from the curse of the law through Christs being made a curse for us Secondly then there is a higher and more fiery ministry of Gods wrath contained in the threats of the new and everlasting covenant which is eternal final and irrevocable never to be drawn in again when once gone forth because it never comes forth till the sinner hath been tryed and proved to the utmost and having abused all Gods patience and long-suffering treasuring up unto himself wrath against this day of wrath fixes at length in that remediless posture of defiance and enmity against God as is exclusive to all sacrifice or intercession of the Mediator as to any benefit thereby to him for ever Psal 49. 8. called Rev. 20. the second death which is everlasting for there remains no more sacrifice for his sins nothing now but fiery indignation reserved for implacable adversaries and wilful obstinate sinners Heb. 10. This ministry of wrath is mentioned also 2 Thess 1. 8. as that flaming fire wherein vengeance is taken on them that know not God and that obey not the Gospel or new Testament of our Lord Jesus Christ Gods wrath in this second sense the damned and reprobate Angels and men are the objects of This is the lake of fire and brimstone they shall be cast into which shall never be quenched and therefore
that which Christ in no sort or sense was capable to undergo being every moment of his sufferings the most perfect object of Gods eternal love doing that all along which was most perfectly welpleasing and lovely to the Father even whilst his natural man was the object of his temporary wrath and displeasure But Gods wrath in the first sense hath for its object all sinners whatsoever they be whether elect or non-elect whether such as shall be finally saved or finally damned consisting in that discountenance and rebuke which God hath resolved to put upon sin wheresoever he finds it yea though in his own dear children which therefore is consistent with his peculiar love as himself saith speaking of the spiritual seed to whom the sure mercies belong and with whom his covenant stands fast for ever Psal 89. 30 31 32 33. If his children forsake my law and walk not in my judgements if they break my statutes and keep not my commandments then will I visit their transgression with the rod that is of this wrath and their iniquity with stripes Nevertheless my loving kindness will I not utterly take from him nor suffer my faithfulness to fail With this rod and with these stripes was Christ himself smitten and we healed Isa 53. to the marring of his visage more then any mans and his form more then the sons of men Chap. 52. 14. leaving in him no form or comeliness to the eye of the natural man who therefore when he thus seeth him saith there is no beauty that we should desire him Chap. 53. 2. c. looking on him as despised and rejected of men and therefore hiding the face from him as not valuing or esteeming him at all but judging him as one stricken smitten of God and afflicted or as as one whose name is blotted out of Gods book a phrase usual in scripture to describe those that are under this first dispensation of wrath as accursed and separated from God Rev. 3. to whom God doth in this temporary ministry of wrath attending the breach of the first covenant declare himself as an enemy Thus it was with Christ not only to the judgement and discerning of others whether of his own people the Jews or of the heathens but thus he stood represented to himself in his own natural judgement and sense as a meer man who lay really under this wrath of God as the object of it for the sins and on the behalf of all mankind which seems to be intimated by Moses when in the person of Christ he was mediating with God Exod 32. 32. in behalf of the transgressing children of the first covenant bringing this as his last argument Blot me saith he out of thy book if thou wilt not forgive them as if he should have said Am not I willing to be blotted out of thy book that thou mightest forgive them have not I thus been wounded for their transgressions that by my stripes they might be healed under this wrath or curse Paul also in imitation of Christs affection declares himself willing to fall if thereby he might benefit his brethren his kinsfolks according to the flesh This then is the only sense wherein Christ is capable of bearing Gods wrath and of being made a curse for us And now how innocent and spotless is this precious and most profitable doctrine of Christs sufferings or passive obedience as to the calumnies and unworthy reproaches of those who take upon them to brand it with Popery Socinianism and how unjustly doth this proceed out of their mouths who state the point of justification so as to make it little other or better then that of works or of the first covenant having the imputation of no higher an object then Christs active obedience or legal righteousness singly considered for the matter of it whereas by this doctrine of Christs death and passive obedience we see something farther required by the law of the new covenant over and above the former which as a higher and more acceptable object of imputative righteousness is given to the true and right heirs of salvation viz. that of Christs broken meek crucified spirit the true Isaac as offered up which is before God of great price In this everlasting righteousness all the spiritual seed obtain at once an absolute remission and freedom from sin standing before the throne of God without blame in their spiritual Head the spotless Lamb in whom is no guile to the obtaining an eternal redemption peculiar to themselves from amongst all others the sons of men And forasmuch as herein is asserted that the sinner is thus justified in the spirit and righteousness of his head imputed to him as soon as he is made actually a believer and of that one blessed seed it doth avowedly decry Socinianism which makes the personal obedience of the Saint in conformity only to the death of Christ as his pattern and this but litterally also understood to be that alone which is thesinners justification which withall excludes the secondbranch of Christs passive obedience here asserted as it is the satisfaction to Gods justice and the atonement for the appeasing of his wrath on the behalf of sinners And as thus the true believers have a higher and more excellent objective righteousness offered and imputed to them so have they also a more excellent and precious faith then the other to receive and apply it founded in the spirit of true son-ship and adoption as the spring of that newness of life and operation which the law of the new covenant requires This faith we say is saving and to be of it is inconsistent with our being of works singly considered so that to be and live by this grace is no more to be and live by works otherwise grace is no more grace and if it be of works then is it not of grace otherwise work is no more work Rom. 10. 6. which with what else hath been said on this subject of Christs obedience doth suffiicently bear witness against the Romish doctrine of works Thus we have treated of the obedience of Christ both active and passive through which he fulfilled all righteousness and underwent all things written of him needful to be by him performed and suffered for the compleating mans redemption and salvation without having inflicted upon him the pain of the damned or the wrath of God in that sense as some groundlesly and without warrant from Scripture do affirm And as thus we have seen Christ mystically as well as litterally laid in the grave and rendred obedient to the death of the Cross so in the third and last particular he remains to be considered as through the progress which the witness and teachings of the Father made in him he comes at length to be declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead the holy one which was so far from being left in the grave or suffered to see corruption that his crucified natural man or dead
an union between the Word and Christs manhood as we have already shewed in the precedent Chapter that in a threefold respect according to one of w th his manhood is found in the form of God and as the son of man he accounts it not robbery to be acknowledged equal with God the man that is his fellow Thirdly there is a union between the manhood of Christ who in the sense before declared is made Gods equal and fellow and the whole spiritual seed in general and each of them in particular who are as the Bride and wife to this Lamb and so in a sense are his fellows and consorts heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ where the Spirit and the Bride say come living together in this unity as Bride and Bridegroom and so intimated Eph. 5. 32. where the natural marriage is made a type of it and the Apostle saith this is a great mysterie But I speak concerning Christ and the Church And now what is more evident then that the Saints by this union with Christ are not deifyed nor Christed but have the place only of his Bride and spouse as the Queen who is all glorious within and who is one the only of her mother To be therefore a member of this Heavenly City a living stone in this divine building is that which we are to understand by this second sort of calling wherein our Election is made sure to us and a new name given us that none can read but those that have it Secondly through this unity of the faith of the Son of God whereby those that are called are placed in the relation of members to Christ as he is the Head of the Church and the first-born from the dead they are for ever justified receiving this further benefit as they stand related to Christ in this his second Headship beyond those that are singly related to his first and obtain thereby but the common and conditional justification For this everlasting justification extends to sins past present and to come absolutely and at once discharging from all sin that their iniquities may be remembred no more and presents them faultless and without guile before the Throne of God as the objects of his eternal love and favour unto which they are entitled in right of their being made his first-born from the dead whose names are written in heaven adopted into his own line family and descent by this their marriage-union with Christ who according to his heavenly manhood is the immediate off-spring of the WORD and eternal Son of God without Father without mother without descent other then that of the very Son of God into which he is adopted and taken by marriage-union which dignity and grace he freely bestows and conveys in a secondary way upon his whole spiritual seed and in this neer union keeps them from ever departing from him Thirdly these unto whom Christ is thus made their righteousness and justification he is made also their sanctification to the purifying of their hearts through believing and cleansing them from all evil conscience as well that which consists in the filthiness of the flesh as that which lies in the filthiness of spirit renewing them in their minds through the putting on of the new man to the exercising as well their spiritual senses in likeness and conformity to Christs actings and life in that unity wherein he and his Father are one whereby he crucified and kept under his natural man as to the exercising of their natural powers and faculties in likeness and conformity to the actings of Christs natural man making them herein subject to the Father of spirits and to live acceptably and work holiness in his sight as renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created them or according to the pattern of the new man in the holy and righteous actings thereof set up in the person of Christ where Christ is all and in all which good works the Saints are fore-ordained of God to walk in as their true Evangelical and new-covenant obedience Fourthly and lastly those unto whom Christ is thus made sanctification he is made also redemption or glorification to the changing them throughout in spirit soul and body into a likeness with his spirit soul and body as he is declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead at such time as our vile bodies shall be made like unto his most glorious bodie by that mighty power of his whereby he is able to subdue all things unto himself which is to be brought to light in his times when he shall be admired in all them that believe and answer the expectation of the creature in delivering it from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the sons of God at their manifestation and the compleating of their adoption by this redemption of their bodies These are the benefits in short and in general that inseparably accompany the guift of Christs person to the soul as he ministers himself in the two Covenants respectively and are the fruits of his presence there Which will serve as a key to open many things in the following discourse when we come to speak of the practical conscientious part that is begotten in and exercised by the subjects of Christ as they live under his Rule and dominion in the world and are therein contesting and warfaring with the adversary the devil and his instruments CHAP. XI Shewing the subordinate use that the elect Angels are of unto Christ in his bearing up the pillars of the creation that else had been dissolved through the fall and the place which they have in the threefold general administration of his mediatoriall kingdom set up in the world THough sin entred upon all men and death by sin through the act of one mans disobedience and judgement came upon all men because in one man all had sinned yet by the obedience of one and his righteousness the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life Rom. 5. and where sin abounded grace did abound much more by reason whereof the whole first creation in all the parts of it is made Christs by the price of his blood which was made Sathans and sins by the fall that as the soul of the Father is Christs so also is the soul of the Son and he only that personally transgresses shall die Ezek. 18. 4. God having been pleased to find a ransom in Christ for atonement and propitiation to the forbearance of sins that are past and to the admitting of man to a new treaty of reconciliation and trial by vertue of the first covenant renewed in and through the blood of Christ whereunto the ministry of the good Angels serves and is made use of by Christ the KING OF RIGHTEOUSNESS who employs these his ministers of justice as the higher powers over the world committed by him to their charge to mannage order and govern in all the affairs thereof under him
them to be Abrahams fleshly seed but saith he ye seek to kill me and therefore ver 39. he denies them in effect to be Abrahams spiritual seed or of the faith of Abraham for if ye were thus the children of Abraham saith he ye would do the works of Abraham and this did not he he did not become an enemy and seek to kill men for speaking the truth which they have heard of God ver 40. If therefore you desire to know what Father youbelong to I tell you plainly you are of your father the devil and the lusts of your father ye will do he was a murderer from the beginning and abode not in the truth because there is no truth in him when he speaketh a lye he speaketh of his own for he is a lyar and the father of it ver 44. So then although God gave to Angels and men at first the goodness and perfection of natural beings and doth freely offer a renewal of the same to men in the blood of Christ by the first covenant made again in force by vertue of his death as the first Testament Heb. 9. 15 16 17 18. yet this image and likeness of God wherein they were made and whereunto they are again renewed as it stands single and alone without the other is a mutable and corruptible seed the children whereof are therefore capable to turn again into degenerate plants and into the wild olive tree For God comes down in the ministry hereof as under a veil to the creatures sight and enjoyment in which man fixing and taking up his abode waiting for no further discovery nor expecting or listning after that second voice of him that speaketh from heaven may for ever stand excluded from entrance into or converse with the glory that is within the veil where God is to be seen and enjoyed by the creature face to face By the blood of Christ then man is first made capable to be taken out of the wild degenerate state of nature and to be planted into the good Olive tree the flesh or natural man in the person of Christ and when he comes to partake of the fatness thereof as it singly gives forth Christ in his first appearance or a knowledge of him only according to the flesh which Paul grew a stranger to as he came to be more acquainted with the Cross he is still but in a capacity to stand or fall again as upon his second proof and trial in the renewed exercise of his free will and rectified natural abilities of mind he demeans himself according to which he proves the womb whereinto is received either a divine seed and birth whereof the mediator in his death and resurrection is the author and parent or else a devilish seed and birth whereof the Serpent and old Dragon is the Father growing up into a wilful and fixed enmity against the Cross of Christ One or other of these two seeds all sorts of men do become by the evil and unworthy or the good and worthy use of Christs blood and the benefits of his death and so are either the seed of the woman and of promise or the seed of the Serpent lying children born from beneath of the father of lyes in comparison of the divine birth of the true seed that in the other sense are born of God and from above This latter is attained unto through Gods bounty and free love the Mediator adopting them into oneness of seed with himself as he is the only begotten Son in whom God is well-pleased The other through Gods just permission and Satans prevailing power and influence upon their lust and natural will at its best are changed and corrupted into likeness and oneness of seed with the old Serpent By reason of which different dispensations the innocent good righteous and perfect state of mans nature communicated to him by vertue of the first covenant comes either to grow up into that which is much better even into the power of an endless life or else to degenerate and sink down into that which is much worse even eternal enmity and opposition of mind unto God which is the second death That then which fixeth man in his unchangeable and permanent state of everlasting blessedness or misery is the bringing him forth out of his first wavering and changeable state into oneness of seed with Christ the Mediator in his second appearance wherein he is made to bear the likeness of his death and resurrection or the leaving him to be transformed into oneness of seed with the destroyer and thereby to become a child of perdition The first of these changes mans natural will at its very best lusteth against as the greatest cross that can be brought upon it until by regeneration and the baptism of fire it be prepared broken and subdued into a meet subjection thereunto And the latter change cannot be obtruded by the devil or forced upon mans will but is brought upon him by and with his own free consent which was not found difficult to be gained in the state of mans innocency and purity in Paradise and is not more since Here then we see the seat and original of this enmity between the two seeds springing up in the manner before expressed in their respective heads and roots who are thus to be found as they are in their heads and first principles before they flow forth in the off-spring and are discerned in their distinct operations in the particular beings of men here in this world as deeds done in the body whether they be good or evil for which all men are rendred accountable when they come to stand before the judgement seat of Christ In order therefore to their own voluntary actings herein they are endued with the exercise of a freedome of will which by creation was perfect absolute and uninterrupted and which by the ballance that God since the fall keeps up by the ministry of the holy Angels with their influence and impressions upon the natural enlightned conscience as also by the work of the spirit himself upon those farther illuminated minds under the first covenant against the power and influence of the devil upon mans corrupted and depraved state is so far and truly exercised by man in the several measures and degrees thereof as will render him inexcusable for not hearkning to the light and means tendred and afforded to him through the blood of Christ revealed by the Gospel in one or other of the three forementioned branches of his kingdome So that now upon Gods making man on the sixth day of the creation forming the first Adam of the dust of the ground and breathing into him the breath of life he became a living soul was set up in the first image of God brought forth in the same kind of mutable perfection with the Angels and in all the glory and accomplishments of this first state was a fit subject brought upon the stage capable to be attempted by both these great
Captains and competitors Michael in the person of the blessed Mediator and the old Dragon in the person of the devil And this last seems to get the start of the other at first on set forasmuch as by means of the womans weakness who was first in the transgression he makes a great advance towards his design supposing he had neer attained his end for he had prevailed so far as to bring Adam and Eve into the transgression and forfeiture of all the natural good they were by creation made possessours of And then further in prosecution of the same design upon this breach made between God and them he endeavours to cast in the seed of alienation and fixed enmity between them and God in order to set up his abiding Throne and seat in the fallen nature of man whereof the first Adam was the earthly head in whom the door was set open whereby sin entred into the world and death by sin Thus things were brought into a most hopeful way in the eye of the devil to disappoint and defeat the design of the Mediator as to the safe conducting the promised seed through all this disadvantage and opposition into the desired place of the true Rest Whence it is that the Mediator and Lamb slain from the beginning did hereupon think it high time to make discovery of himself and of the means for the accomplishing and bringing of his designs to pass in despite of the Serpents subtilty and in downright opposition to the very gates of hell By way of promise therefore he declares and engages himself to set up another man a second Adam Jesus the Son of Mary to be born of the seed of the woman who by being bruised in his heel and undergoing all the rage and enmity that the devil and his instruments could exercise upon him should arrive at such a neerness and intimacy of converse with God in the glory within the veil as that by the joy thereof set before him and the power thereof conveyed into him in the seed of it when he was laid hold on by the WORD in the womb of the Virgin he should be enabled to offer up himself in sacrifice to the Fathers will without spot to God through the eternal spirit enduring the Cross and despising the shame and so through his sufferings entring into the glory that was to follow he is for ever set down upon his Throne at Gods right hand expecting till his foes be made his foot-stool Hence it is that as through man came death so also by man comes the resurrection of the dead and the same man or first Adam who was of the earth earthy becomes the subject matter for both these seeds to work upon the seed of the promise and seed of the Serpent both being to be sown in this earth influenced and managed by these two grand competitors Michael and the Dragon in order to engage and fix the particular men and women of Adams posterity either in their true Rest or in an everlasting enmity thereunto and exclusion from it as they are either begotten of God and born of the spirit whereby they become children of the promise and heirs of salvation or left in the state of their natural beings voluntarily to drink in the seed of the Serpent and thereby to become hardned and prove finally children of wrath and sons of perdition as born after the flesh and as by a fair shew in the flesh they do exercise and manage the fiercest persecution against the true spiritual seed So then according to the birth which they are of they are either measured out with a line of life unto life or a line of death unto death answering the two great ends whereunto we shall find all things serve in this world and in the kingdom thereof This is that being of this world or from beneath spoken of by Christ in the Gospel which though in its rise and beginning as hath been shewed it be of God yet in its progress and end through the unlawful use thereof it comes to be of the devil who is the head and father unto that state spirit and interest which stands in direct contradiction and enmity to that of Christ and the promisedseed as they are the Jerusalem that is from above and are not of this world For in this Serpentine seed there is comprehended an irreconcileable enmity and opposition to the power and excellency of the Cross of Christ In which contrariety and opposition to the Cross all natural perfection and goodness is looked upon by God as considered only in its single seed and as the enjoyers and possessors thereof are left by God to their own natural senses capacities and powers of mind assisted with all needful helps and means proper and suitable to that state without the addition of a higher and more excellent birth reserved by God as a fruit of his bounty and free grace unto his chosen and beloved ones By what hath been said we may plainly see that although Gods own chosen vessels are determined from all eternity and fixed in such a neerness of union with God in their head that they can never be moved but are preserved by the power and influence thereof from all possibility of miscarying so as to fall short of true blessedness yet those that are in the number of the non-elect are not necessarily determined so much as in the means leading them to their destruction but have the free use of their own natural abilities to prevent the same assisted with all suitable requisite helps and means from God to keep them from it who omitteth nothing that is to be done on his part conducible hereunto which is consistent with the freedome of mans will and doth not offer violence to the principles which himself chooseth to joyn issue with God upon besides all which he that is faithful and cannot deny himself is pleased to be in the posture of one that is not yet risen up to shut the door finally upon them but leaves open a possibility of graffing them into an oneness of seed with the right heirs if at his coming he shall find them making a right and lawful use of the blood of Christ required by that first covenant renewed thereby upon them since the fall and not voluntarily rendring themselves uncapable of such favour by their needless provocations in hardning their hearts against the voice and teachings of the Cross and rejecting that counsel of God against their own souls God then is so far from looking upon the fall of man in the first Adam and the act of disobedience by him committed as the fixing of him and his posterity in an incapacity of returning unto God and of being made the true and right heirs of salvation that he is pleased through the blood of Christ to declare himself reconciled to the whole race of mankind as beholding them in a new head in the seed of the woman or second Adam a truth at
the gates of hell to prevail against the very elect themselves that are built on the Rock and are out of his reach to annoy in reference to the certainty of their salvation finding therefore little hopes or likelihood to frustrate them in that he makes it his business to render them of all men most miserable as to any hopes or enjoyments in this life wherein he finds latitude given him in the power allowed to him to bruise their heel Secondly he useth all the means-that lie in his power by subtilty or force so far as Gods permission gives way to him to assault the will and judgement of man how highly enlightned and how far quickned soever upon his single natural root in order to entice and draw him away from his subjection unto God in the natural service and worship that is due from him never leaving till he hath prevailed with and over him to provoke God so highly notwithstanding all his goodness patience and long-suffering to him extended through the blood of Christ as thereby to render himself unworthy of any further love or favour and to move God to swear in his wrath that he shall never enter into his REST. Under these two general heads we shall find as in a constant track throughout the whole Scripture the workings and counter-workings that are kept on foot and maintained between the MAN CHRIST JESUS who would have all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth and the MAN OF SIN and grand deceiver Satan who would have no man to be saved but all to be made children unto him who is the father of lyes The means used by Christ to produce renew and maintain the workings and operations of light and life from him in the hearts and consciences of fallen mankind is by setting on foot as hath been already shewed the threefold law and government given and erected by him at the beginning over all the sons of Adam upon the fall through the power and exercise whereof First he doth that to and in the hearts and consciences of the very heathen which fits and qualifies them to live answerable if the fault be not in themselves to the law and government they are under according to the measures of attainment which the meer natural man may have The like he doth unto the children of the first Covenant unto whom he is much more bountiful sutably to the state he farther leads them into And thirdly he exceeds what he doth to both these in the communications of himself unto the spiritual seed whom he suffers not to destroy themselves but takes a course to cross their own wils and desires when they are hearkning to the temptation of their own lust or Satan to draw them away This threefold conscience and spirit of man in the proper principles and operations of each of them whether they are to be found single or all of them together as in sweet harmony thus set up in the spiritual seed our purpose is to treat of and that as particularly and distinctly as we can to fall in with the experiences of all that may be therein concerned looking upon this as the best method we can take for the clear opening and stating the several dispensations of Christs three-fold government and Kingdom already entred upon And therefore we shall consider the principles and operations of each of these consciences either First as they are Christs own workmanship in and upon the heart and spirit of man as the beginning and foundation of those holy and righteous actings by him required under the dispensation whereinto each of them is brought by God or Secondly as they are the lawfull and righteous workings of the spirit of man enabled hereunto by free gift from Christ and in dependance upon him yet as the fruit and travel of his own proper judgement and will rectified in the use of those means prepared and laid before him by Christ to bring him to the right end of all motion which is the true REST whilst as yet he is under works and not under grace or Thirdly as they are the unlawfull and forbidden fruit of mans spirit qualified and enabled from Christ as before expressed when through his own lust he is enticed and through the subtilty of Satan he is ensnared so as lust when it hath thus conceived is the root of all evil operation bringing forth fruit unto death even death eternal in the end if the Lord upon the grounds of his new and everlasting Covenant do not pluck such souls out of this danger and lead them to such a state as contains in it a perfect security and freedom from the re-entry of sin with its prevailing power over them Through the right and distinct consideration of these principles and operations of conscience in the sons and daughters of men we may come to find our selves where we are and whose subjects whether Christs or the Devils and to what Kingdom or dispensation we belong in reference to the one or the other to the Kingdom of Christs marvellous light or to the power of Satans accursed darkness and upon what terms we stand in the one or the other whether in a wavering state consisting in a capacity and possibility of removal out of the one into the other or in a fixed determined state upon which it is impossible for any change to be brought either in a good sense or in a bad in which men are reserved and kept fast either in the bonds of perfect love light and freedom that casteth out fear as the elect or in chains of darkness and captivity unto the judgement of the great day as the non-elect who will be destroyed by the brightness of Christs coming when he shall appear the second time without sin to the salvation of his People And this we shall do if God permit as a service to these present times wherein like little children most are tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine by the slight of men and cunning craftiness whereby men and devils lie in wait to deceive and lead on the ignorant to the Chambers of death CHAP. XV. Shewing more particularly the bounds of that Rule and Government which is set up by Christ in the natural conscience together with the answer of a good conscience thereunto in those that are under this first dispensation IT is most evident by the Scriptures that amongst the nations who are said to be without law as distinguished from the Jews that were under the law there were found doers of the law by nature who shewed the work of the law written in their hearts their consciences bearing them witness and their thoughts mean while accusing or excusing one another Rom. 2. 14 15. Of such Peter speaketh Acts 10. 34 35. where he saith Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons but in every nation he that feareth him and worketh righteousness is accepted with him according as David
as in common with the other the very same benefit absolutely and unchangeably Of this generation of men in a state of fleshly Saint-ship Paul speaks when he intimates Rom. 9. that they are not all Israel which are of Israel neither saith he because they are the seed of Abraham are they all children but in Isaac shall thy seed be called that is they which are the children of the flesh these are not the children of God but the children of the promise are counted for the seed v. 6 7 8. The true seed even according to the flesh must be comprehended in Isaac as he is the figure of Christ coming in the flesh And not only this but when Rebecca also had conceived by one even by our father Isaac it was said unto her the elder shall serve the younger ver 10 12. the one representing him that was born after the flesh the seed and children of the earthly Jerusalem engendred from Mount Sinai the other him that was born after the spirit the seed that are begotten of the Ierusalem that is above which is the mother of all the right â—â—â—irs of the promise By this there is presented to our view First the natural fleshly seed of Israel that were only so outwardly whose circumcision was that only which was outward in the flesh which Rom. 2. is counted as no circumcision nor were the persons thereby really differenced at all from Heathens but were inferiour to such of them as by nature were doers of the law ver 25 26 27 28. Secondly here is described to us the true seed of Israel as they are the children of the first covenant and make up the earthly Jerusalem the proper subjects of Christ under this second dispensation as he hath Rule and Dominion over them by the law and is a husband to them by the covenant of works These are at large set out and particularly described Ezek. 16. ver 1. to the 15. Thirdly here are made known to us the true Iacobs those that like Princes wrestle with God and prevail who are the seed that overcome and though they be the younger in birth yet supplant the elder and of last do become the first being preferred before the children of the first covenant how glorious and excellent a shew soever they may make in the flesh for they are circumcised with a further circumcision made without hands in the death of Christ to the taking them out of the life of Christs natural body as it is the keeping up the first Tabernacle or Sanctuary and to the planting them into similitude with him in his dead and crucified body to open thereby unto them the way into the holiest of all the glory that is within the veyl and life that is from the dead Which circumcision Rom. 2. ver 29. is said to have its praise of God in distinction by way of eminency from the two former Now the second sort of Israelites whose Circumcision is inward to the doing away the filth of the flesh only and whose praise is of men are those the Scripture intends by the children of the first Covenant those upon whom the living WORD of God hath had such effect as to write out in the fleshly tables of their hearts a conformity to that image of God that shines forth in the flesh of Christ wherein his natural righteousness and perfection singly considered doth consist as the Rule and holy Commandment which they are to follow and be conformed unto for their sanctification whilst he himself is made their head and covering as to their justification through their actual implantation into the same living natural body or flesh with him or by the marriage union with him into which they are taken by the first Covenant Through which operation and change of condition brought upon them they are very much differenced from the doers or workers of righteousness by nature under the first dispensation for these are taught as to their justification before God and drawing near into communion with him to look at themselves as represented in their head and as having their plantation and abode in him which was figured out by the Shew-bread under the Law by their laying their hands on the head of the sacrifice upon which God had laid all their sins so as they are made righteous not in themselves thus considered but in another even through the Mediatorship of the Man Christ Jesus as their Head in whose natural righteousness and perfection they stand blameless before God wherein all their peace is founded and the comfort of all their communion And secondly as thus they are differenced by this state of their justification which the others are not acquainted with so also the image of God unto which they are to be conformed for their sanctification to the likening them in all things unto the pure and spotless natural man of Christ is that which exceeds and is superiour to the righteousness and perfection of the first Adam as the original pattern is above and before the first Copy though it be of the same nature and kind with it And such is the glory and excellency of this state that God thinks fit to lead the true heirs through this into the glory of their inheritance that is to follow and to give it them in common with those that are children of the first Covenant suffering them for a season to remain together with them as fellow-servants in the house and to live in the form and fashion of servants undifferenced in any thing from them though they be Lords of all Yea farther this first work and change as it is accompanyed with the seed of saving faith Heb. 6. 9. is the beginning of the new creation in the true heirs unto whom Christ is not only the beginner but the finisher of their faith not only the WORD that begins with them in the glory of his first appearance but the WORD that ends with them in the glory of his second whereas those that are the children of the first Covenant singly considered as left alone without the things that accompany salvation as Heb. 6. 1. to 9. though by the word of the beginning they attain great reformation and enlightnings yet after all they prove as the ground that is near to cursing whose end is to be burned falling away after all such enlightnings so that it is impossible to renew them any more unto repentance according to what is also spoken by Jeremiah Chap. 11. 15 16 17. What hath my beloved to do in mine house seeing she hath wrought lewdness with many And the holy flesh is passed from thee the Lord called thy name A green Olive-tree fair and of goodly fruit but now he that planted thee hath pronounced evil against thee and kindled a fire upon thee and thy branches are broken So then to such there remains no more sacrifice for sin but the very justification it self which they were admitted into is denyed them by Christ
a Name given him above every name either in this world or in the world to come according to that description we find of him Isaiah 4. 2. c. where Christ the BRANCH is held forth in both these capacities called also Zach. 4. the two olive trees or sons of oyl that stand by the Lord of the whole earth by means of the one emptying out the golden oyl of all natural perfection as he is the Son of man singly considered Christ according to the flesh Head and Root of the renewal of natural purity and perfection by vertue of his blood unto Adams fallen posterity and by means of the other emptying forth the oyl of Gods new Name and of all Spiritual perfection as he is the beginning and first born from the dead made Head to the Heavenly body the Church that general Assembly of the first-born whose names are written in Heaven In both these respects this BRANCH of the Lord is to be made beautifull and glorious so as the very fruit of the earth or the earthly Adam shall be excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel Isa 4. 2. For in them the very being of the first Adams perfection considered as built up again in fellowship and harmony with the second Adams perfection through the Resurrection of the dead is as the Ark of the Testament which is to be seen in this Temple whereby the Song of Moses shall be sung as perfectly as the Song of the Lamb as the musick and harmony requisite to be made by the inhabitants of the NEW JERUS ALEM those that are left in Zion and that remain in Jerusalem when God shall have cleansed them and purged them by the spirit of Judgement and burning by the baptism of the fire of the sacrifice of Christs death wherby they are written among the living in Jerusalem that is do become a Heavenly Tabernacle as built up into a life from the dead for a shadow in the day time from the heat and for a place of refuge and for a covert from storm and from rain in which dwelling places of Mount Zion and upon her Assemblies the Lord will create a cloud and a smoke by day and the shining of a flaming fire by night for upon all the glory shall be a defence ver 3 4 5 6. From this Scripture it appears that after men have had that work pass upon them which baptizeth them into one living Body with Christ making them living Members of his fleshly Manhood and enabling them to bring forth the excellent comely fruits of the renewed earthly Adam ver 2. unless they yet further abide the trial of fire which is to pass upon them by the Spirit of Judgement and burning of the day of Christs second appearance they will not continue long in ZION nor remain members of this earthly Jerusalem but will defile and pollute the Temple and Tabernacle of God set up in them in conformity to the flesh of Christ and so make themselves fit subjects for God to destroy and to swear in his wrath that even this Generation thus far advanced out of Egypt toward the Land of Promise shall never enter into his Rest as those that are but after such a manner Christs house as is intimated Heb. 3. 6. whose house are we if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoycing of the hope firm unto the end And as those Paul speaks of amongst the Corinthians that walked like men 1 Cor. 3. 3 17. If any man defile the Temple of God him shall God destroy for the Temple of God is holy which Temple ye are Those then are the Children of the first Covenant who are Christs seed and off-spring as he is the Head of the first Adams natural perfection and doth renew the Spirit and power of that perfection in the purity thereof as a seed in fallen man that shall grow up and prosper even into a Kingdom in the soul so as to be the prevailing principle there and carry the Rule and sway over the corrupt and prophane part causing men clean to escape the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of him after the flesh only and with this flesh as the true Manna and bread given them from heaven nourishing them up in the beauty and strength of his natural life The character of this sort of Christs children by the first covenant is lively set down by the Prophet Ezekiel instancing in the children of Israel whom God took by the hand and led out of Aegypt under the ministry of the first covenant wherein he was a husband unto them as appears Jer. 31 32. and had made them beautiful and of great renown in the sight of the Heathens round about them from whom they were separated as made perfect through his comliness which he had put upon them Ezek. 16. 13 14. which sort of Gods children Paul ranks those Galatians amongst that still desired to be under the Law in the time of the Gospel Gal. 4. calling them children of that covenant given from Sinai gendring to bondage or of the Ierusalem that now is to wit the earthly Jerusalem in distinction from the children of the other covenant or of the Jerusalem that is above viz. the heavenly For we must not think that this generation of men passeth away through the coming in of the Gospel but is rather much more improved and compleated forasmuch as by the means of Christ death the Holy commandment is now spoken by the Son himself delivered more immediately by the dawning of the light of Christs first appearance in the heart which was in the time of the ministry of the Law the word only spoken by Angels as committed unto them to mannage through whose ministry or disposition Acts 7. 53. the circumcised seed of Abraham Isaac and Jacob received it who were as figures of this circumcision to be made immediately by Christ himself among the Gentiles without hands by the pouring forth of his spirit upon all flesh and building them up with him into one living body as the true Israel of God after the flesh all which amounts but to the compleating of Christs living body through this first-covenant-work of his set up in the heart and conscience called in Scripture the FIRST FAITH which may be departed from and prove a faith that fails as being held upon wavering and uncertain principles until it be fixed by the baptism of fire and have that brought forth in fellowship with it which accompanies salvation to wit the incorruptible and immortal seed of the perfection of the second Adam causing them to dwell on high and placing them upon the munitions of Rocks where bread is given to them and waters that do not fail The Rule that is given unto this fleshly seed or children of the first covenant is the pattern of Christs natural life and perfection as he appeareth in the fashion of a man and form of a servant like unto us in all
so ignorant of and such enemies to as most prophanely to call it a fiction and make little lesse of it then blasphemy We say that the flesh or natural man in the Saint whether considered in the workings of his morall nature or of his renewed enlightned nature under the first Covenant is crucified and rendred a copartner with Christ in his dead body whereby the powers and faculties of the mind in the natural man are neither annihilated nor deprived of their lawful use as lawful refers to the obedience of faith and the rule of the Gospel but only have death passe upon them or a disability and privation as to all unlawful use of them or possibility of acting in rebellion resistance or contradiction to the Law of the heavenly nature and mind set up by faith In this crucified posture of the flesh and broken-spiritednesse into which the powers and faculties of the natural mind are brought by faith the Prophet Isa 54. 1. calleth out to the Saint to sing as intimating that though the natural man be hereby disenabled to bear or bring forth fruit to its first husband Christ himself as made under the Law and head of natural perfection single yet it ought neverthelesse to break forth into singing in regard that by her being become dead to the Law she is married to another even to him that is raised from the dead to bring forth fruit in newnesse of spirit and life and that this its barrennesse is no just cause of reproach to it seeing it came to be lawfully disengaged from all obligation to its first Husband by the dead body of Christ through which her first Husband is become dead unto her so that she is no adulteresse though she be married to another man Rom. 7. 3 4. And therefore Cry aloud for joy saith the Prophet for more are the children of the desolate then of the married wife or she that keeps to her first Husband under the Law Fear not for thou shalt not be ashamed neither be thou confounded for thou shalt not be put to shame for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth and shalt not remember the reproach of thy Widowheod any more for thy Maker is thy Husband the Lord of Hosts is his Name and thy Redeemer the holy one of Israel the God of the whole earth shall he be called In these two particulars therefore conformity to the death of Christ is made to consist by the Prophet Isaiah in this Chapter First in Christs own refusal to be any longer a Husband unto the natural man in the Saint through his own voluntary departure and withdrawing of himself out of his own fleshly life to go to his Father and be and remaine for ever in the glory of the Father in order to returne againe to the Saint as he that is risen from the dead to marry and espouse the soul that he hath thus grieved by his withdrawing For saith he The Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken and grieved in spirit and a wife of youth when thou wast refused by thy God for a small moment have I forsaken thee but with everlasting mercies will I gather thee Secondly the Saints conformity unto the death of Christ consists in the desolate forsaken barren state wherein the flesh and natural man is left by Christ as in a dry and barren wildernesse exposed to all temptations and trials from God Angels and Men within and without ready to sink and faile in spirit every moment partly under the appearance of Gods displeasure whose withdrawing and forsaking the soul understands not any more then Job did who was privy and conscious to the faithfulnesse and integrity of his heart to his first Husband whilest he abode with him and partly from the cold dead disconsolate frame of spirit wherein it now finds it self as it measures it self by the life of sense and not by the life of faith under both which pressures the Word of Christs patience is set before the soul by faith to be kept and observed Who for the joy that was set before him endured the Crosse and despised the shame patiently suffering the bruising of his heele according as he had received commandment from the Father In this posture as a Widow indeed the poor broken-spirited Saint remains mourning and weeping left for a season as an Orphan by Christ brought into that condition which Christ foretold unto his Disciples whom at the present he acknowledged children of the Bridechamber whilest they had no higher knowledge of him then in his fleshly glory and perfection Of whom therefore he said As long as the Bridegroome was with them they could not fast but the dayes would come when the bridegroome should be taken away from them then they should fast intimating thereby the dayes of fasting and mourning and being clad in sackcloth which the true Saints witnesses of Christ were to be exercised with during the time of the trial of their faith upon the Bridegroomes being taken from them and changing that living fruitful frame of spirit which they were fed and nourished up in by him as they were his married wife under the Law into a fasting broken mournful desolate state of Widowhood which they are brought into as they are made one with Christ in his dead crucified body and are planted with him into the similitude of his death Christ then after he hath become a Bridegroome and married Husband unto true beleevers in and by his first appearance shining forth upon them in the life and glory of his natural and fleshly perfection wherein he hath nourished them up and made them fruitful children of that his Bride-chamber is pleased and hath power to take himself away from them and continue no longer with them as a Bridegroome under the first Covenant or in the ministery of his first appearance but wholly dissolve that marriage-band betweene them as refusing any longer to come forth in the exercise of life toward them upon the single root of his natural perfection in order upon the trial of their faith and their dutiful keeping the word of his patience during the time of this his separation from them to return again after a little moment and with everlasting mercies to embrace them and be married unto them in the light and life of his second appearance not only supplying to them again that wherein he was withdrawn from them but adding over and above a fuller and more abundant communication of life and glory which untill this death or withdrawing of his be perfected in them they are not capable subjects perfectly to receive and inherit but according to the steps and degrees of this death doth the approa hand increase of this higher life let it self in upon them and fill them This separation and withdrawing of Christ as a Bridegroome is the more bitter and grievous because this his absence carrieth in it the appearance of his wrath and sore displeasure to the eye of flesh
integrity of Jobs spirit herein the Devil hath leave granted from God to bruise Jobs heele or to be the executioner of Gods wrath upon Job in all manner of appearances and evidences thereof as could render it real and credible to flesh and blood either in Job himself or in the minds and apprehensions of his three friends having for this purpose a permissive Commssion from God to spolle and deprive Job of all gainfull things to him as to this world his life onely excepted Secondly this being obtained and also put into execution he doth his utmost to disquiet Jobs spirit outwardly from the sense of this hard usage and dealing thus received from the Lord to see if he could move him to an impatient murmuring mutining heart against God as a severe Master at best to a faithful servant or else as an unjust dealer according to Covenant who promiseth good dayes to them that do eschew evil and do good which Job having been most diligent and sincere in is neverthelesse thus rewarded as to be numbred amongst the vilest transgressors and malefactors in Gods outward dispensation towards him and yet put upon it to bear it patiently as becoming a broken contrite spirit before the Lord who as he gives freely the good things he bestowes so may also take them away againe without giving account why Thirdly when this takes not he incenses his nearest relations against him imputing the cause of all this wrath to his sincere walking and stedfast cleaving unto God in a singular way from all the rest of the world representing the sad and suffering state hereby brought upon himself and them which he might remedy by letting go his integrity and falling into a fawning compliance with the corrupt interest of the times helived in Fourthly as a backing and seconding of this he moves his three friends against him that probably were all the comfortable society he had in the middest of a heathenish and wicked world round about him and they being professors of the fear and worship of the true and living God and exceeding strict and exact in their walkings as appears by all their arguments and endeavours to perswade Job against the faithful witnesse of his own conscience within that all this is befallen him as a just reward from God of some secret hypocrisie of heart that is in him and unfaithfulnesse to God in his walkings which God hath now found out and punished and which they urge him to acknowledge and give glory to God by repenting and returning from it that so the rod may be removed hereby discovering their great ignorance of Gods designe in this manner of chastening and afflicting his Saints which is done by God for a farre other and higher end then they were aware of that is to say to traine them up unto the obedience of faith consisting in that which God accounts thankworthy in servants to their masters when a man for conscience towards God endures grief suffering wrongfully or without giving cause for it For what glory is it if when ye be buffeted for your faults ye take it patiently but if when ye do well and suffer for it ye take it patiently this is acceptable with God for even hereunto were ye called because Christ also thus suffered for us leaving us an example that we should follow his steps who did no sinne neither was guile found in his month who when he was reviled reviled not againe when he suffered he threatened not but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously This kind of obedience was God intending to teach Job who in and with all his former wel-doings is taught by God not only to want the reward of them for the present but to have the contrary reward executed upon him as the bruising of his heele for the triall of his patience under it and for the practising another kind of obedience and sort of good works then any worldly professour or bastard that is not the true son would ever bear or endure Heb. 12. and which all that are sons must be trained up in as the singular thing which is to be done by them in obeying Gods will in a way of patience which shall not be found in any that are enemies to the Crosse of Christ Fifthly and lastly Satan improves the result of all these appearances of wrath from God perswasions and mistakes of friends and relations together with the inward sense which by all this is ministred to the workings of unsubdued flesh and blood in him to make Job faile and despond in his minde towards God and to conclude himself amongst those that are free amongst the dead to whom the Lord hath forgotten to be gracious ready to cry out My God my God why hast thou for saken me This is the second maine particular of the fulfilling in us a conformity to Christ in his death by Satans bruising of the heele in this manner represented in the example of Job The third is in respect of the workings of unsubdued flesh and blood abiding and remaining in a Saint as the body of sin and death he carries about with him whether from the corrupt or pure old Adam set up in him both which are equally to feele the weight of the crosse of Christ unto which they are to be nailed to the causing of all enmity and sin to cease out of them and be for ever abolished and taken away For which purpose that is to be taken from them and offered up in sacrifice without spot unto God which the natural man in whatever capacity he is whether at his best or at his worst hath no minde to part with upon any termes and therefore doth resist and oppose as long as his ability serves or until a perfect disability and weaknesse be brought upon him rendering it impossible for him to hold out or keep any longer the selfish power to do his own will to speak his own words to think his own thoughts to finde his own desire or exercise his own lust either unto good or evil as living upon his natural root which exercise of free will is essential unto mans natural constitution or first make as hath been shewed in an arbitrary and independant course of motion and action conferred upon him by his participation of Gods first image or the Ministery to him of Gods first appearance single And which so long as that Ministery lasts as its husband or object of converse is kept up in man as a principle of acting by his own free choice and disposal of himself in the use of fit means allowed him by God to induce and perswade him to the good God requires of him This power in the natural man thus to act and live is his joy and delight the desire and lust of his soul and this is revived and strengthened by the Law or the Ministery of Christ in the perfection of the first Covenant which man makes use of to the emboldening and hardening of himself in a
way of natural good works and well-doing pretending to keep up his natural lust and desire in the life exercise and power thereof as Saul did the best of the goods of the Amalekites and their King for Sacrifice to God And therefore the natural man in the Saint in all the powers and faculties thereof stands it out long against the workings of faith in him and fights hard upon this principle of self-preservation deriding with the brothers of Joseph that dreamer which the New-Covenant-Faith in the life language and obedience thereof appears to be to the judgement of flesh and blood when it perswades us to become weak with Christ to suffer our selves to be disarmed and despoyled of this first power and the free exercise thereof upon its single natural root as keeping up a covetousnesse in us that is Idolatry and the root of all evill and does assure us that Gods strength shall be made perfect in us through this weaknesse so as we may rejoyce and glory in such infirmities through which the strength of Christ shall come to be ever resting on us whereby at last we shall be made to take pleasure in these infirmities reproaches necessities persecutions and distresses for Christs sake which at first are grievous but in conclusion we find by experience that when we in our selves are thus most weak then are we in the Spirit of Christ made most strong In this weaknesse then which is brought upon the naturall man of the Saint in which he is made to bear about in his body the marks of the dying of the Lord Jesus consisting in infirmities reproaches necessities persecutions and distresses inward and outward doth the death of Christ work in the flesh of every Saint untill it be fully crucified brought downe into the grave and formed into one dead body with Christs natural man for ever disenabled and weakened from acting this selfish power or exercising this natural lust or desire though in a way of natural or legal good workings singly considered but to have them brought to their lawful rest in the grave of Christ as a Sabbath-keeping there their reasonable service and sacrifice acceptable unto God by Jesus Christ Whence it comes to passe that we no longer live but Christ lives in us and in and through this weaknesse brought upon us by the Crosse quickens us to a more excellent way of working with God and for God then ever we were acquainted with before to the fulfilling and establishing the righteousnesse required by the Law to the highest so that against these weakened Saints and poor broken-spirited children of God there is no Law but the death of Christ that thus works in them doth condemne sinne in the flesh and never leave till it quite abolish it there and bring in the everlasting righteousnesse of God in the roome of that righteousnesse of man which was but as a morning dew Thus we come to bear about in our body the dying of the Lord Jesus that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal or crucified flesh which work of mortification is unto the old Adam most bitter and grievous it being that which bruises him and puts him to grief beyond all that can be imagined and which therefore he fights against and resists to the last drop of blood till he can no longer stand upon his feet but doth fall down amongst the slaine in the blood of Christ whose rest is blessed thus dying with or in the Lord and his works follow him This is the third particular wherein our conformity to Christs death doth consist The fourth and last does respect the workings of faith as they maintaine the good part of this fight in the Saints and gaine the victory over the world and the fleshly seed and principles in them In the managing of which faith doth at first whilest the spiritual senses are not come into use nor strength undergo many a sore brunt and is hard put to it by the workings of unsubdued flesh and blood in them as in the renewed principles thereof they abide in their vigour and flourishing of youth under the first Covenant having through the power of the Law and life of Christs fleshly perfection brought forth in them overcome the wicked one and by the knowledge of Jesus Christ after the flesh cleane escaped the pollutions of the world respecting the filth of the flesh in the confidence and strength whereof these young ones in the experiences of the Gospel think nothing too hard for them to break through and get the mastery of and therefore despise the workings of faith and seed of the promise as a barren desolate widowhood in comparison of their flourishing youth and would be putting in for the inheritance as obteined by the perfection of the Law and Christs first appearance esteeming that to be the Kingdome that is to abide and continue the holy City whose Tabernacle must never be taken down But against all these fierce encounters from pure flesh and blood in the Saint armed with conquests over the wicked one and many fruitful evidences of Christs presence and communion as a Bridegroome and Husband according to the flesh faith armes the soul putting on it the whole armour of light and evidencing to it things unseene the hidden Manna the new name the Jerusalem that is above that which neither eye hath seene nor eare heard nor hath entred into the natural mans heart and conception with which it puts forward and advances bringing in that which is enduring substance an inheritance undefiled and which fades not away in opposition to a failing decaying corruptible Crowne and Rest which flesh and blood glories in And in this more excellent way of worshipping and serving God it comes forth and gains ground in the heart to the stopping the high careere that flesh and blood was in before to the utter silencing it at last and casting down its lofty imaginations and every high thing that exalts it self against the knowledge of God bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ Through this powerful operation of faith the youth of flesh and blood in the Saint is weakened and grey heirs now begin to appear here and there upon him in this his captivity to the obedience of faith which state is very honourable and is the qualification that renders Saints the true Elders in the Church of God who being old men in Christian experiences ought to be in great esteeme for the use and advantage they are of and the great benefit they may bring to true Church-fellowship and Christian Societie how despicable soever this frame of spirit be in the eyes of the worldly Church and of the youthful visible Churches of Saints flourishing with their fair shewes in the flesh whereby they are puffed up and have life working in them whilest death works in Paul the aged and such Elders in spiritual growth that walk as he walked yea these are full and rich and would
be reigning as Kings in a fleshly visibility and worldly glory without the true crucified Saint that in the meane time is made a spectacle to men and Angels and judged as the filth of the world and as the off-scouring of all things unto whom neverthelesse Christ speaks after this manner Esay 26. 19. Thy dead men shall live with my dead body shall they arise awake and sing ye that dwell in dust This is the last particular of our conformity to Christs death And now by what hath beene said in these four particulars as the result rising out of them all our eye may receive enlightning if God please in this great and glorious mystery of Christs death and the effect it hath upon us when it conformes us unto its own likenesse and similitude For we see it doth not annihilate the first Adam or natural man in us but it spoils and disrobes him of the power in effect to sin against God which he upon specious pretences would faine keep for sacrifice in bodily exercise though of little value a power to do his own will and to be at his owne disposal in the strength of grace received bearing oile in his Lamp but not in his vessel In the exercise of which power man is perfectly weakened and disabled by the Crosse First through Christs withdrawing the food and nourishment of it in him Secondly through Satans bruising and breaking down his stout-heartednesse as an executioner of Gods wrath upon him in bereaving him of worldly comforts which God sanctifies to a laying low of mans spirit under this rod of God though applied by Satan and his instruments Thirdly through the victory and conquest of faith which never leaves till it captivate all the powers and faculties of the natural man and bring them into obedience and subjection unto Christ to live unto him that is risen from the dead and so to bring forth fruit unto God in newnesse of spirit and of life made at last to take faith in the principles and operations of it for its Lord and best friend and therein to observe the Law of God given on that behalf that the elder should serve the younger that the first Adam should serve the last Adam Esau should serve Jacob or the naturall powers and faculties of the Saints mind should serve the heavenly birth and spiritual senses thereof that the righteousnesse of the Law may be performed in the Spirit of faith by being made one spirit with Christ in the glory of his resurrection from the dead the life whereof doth not yet fully appear but shall do when he shall be seene in that admirable glory and bring his Saints with him in the same likenesse that they may see him as he is as his associates and coheirs of the same incorruptible inheritance having hereby the use of heavenly faculties and powers given unto them whereby Christ will be admired in all those that do beleeve and they are admitted to enter within the veile and are made capable to converse with God in his own similitude apparently face to face as friend converses with friend which no man as a natural man in his best capacity did ever see nor can see and so the true Saints are made such excellent seers and contemplators of God thus influenced and over-ruled in all the powers and faculties of their subdued natural man as fashions them to do the will of God in earth or their earthly natural man thus taught obedience as they see it done and as they are the doers of it in heaven or in their spiritual and heavenly part and have oile in their vessels as well as in their lamps In which heavenly frame of spirit they are beheld by the Prophet Isaiah in the 54 chapter before mentioned when he saith All thy children shall be taught of the Lord and great shall their peace be In righteousnesse shalt thou be established thou shalt be farre from oppression for thou shalt not fear and from terrour it shall not come near thee when thou art made thus to dwell on high and art seated upon this munition of rocks behold they that shall gather together against thee shall not do it by me but whoever shall gather together against thee shall fall for thy sake no weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper and every tongue that shall rise in judgement against thee thou shalt condemne this is the heritage of the servants of the Lord and their righteousnesse is of me saith the Lord. And let me say thus much upon this occasion in one word to the youthful visible and flourishing Saints of these our dayes who with great earnestnesse and zeale are trimming their Lamps with oile to go out to meet the Bridegroome in expectation of the fleshly glory of Christs Kingdome to the keeping up of Absalon against the true David in Spirit of my Lord Esau against the true Jacob or of Isaac in the flesh against Isaac crucified and offered up in sacrifice to God to be received againe in spirit in the life from the dead They are not yet under those promises before mentioned by reason whereof those that gather together against them may prevaile over them and the weapons formed against them may prosper till the power of the holy people be scattered and none shut up or left Whereas if the Lord take down and bruise the youthful spirit that is in them and cause them with David when they have tried the armour of man to put it off againe to go forth in this armour of God which makes the Saint strongest when he is weakest our Goliah shall be slaine that defies the Hosts of the living God and great salvation shall be wrought for Gods people when they shall be little more then standers by the Lord of the whole earth and lookers on By this time we come to see wherein our conformity to Christ in his death consists the place whereof is found under the third administration of the Kingdome of Christ which in the three branches thereof we have endeavoured to describe in the preceding chapters The first of which may be compared to the Moone that rules the night as the weaker and fainter light of Christs first appearance the representation whereof is given by the single Ministery of Angels as the supreme Lords and Rulers under Christ of the natural and first world by the first Covenant considered meerly as the Law of nature receiving its renewal in the blood of Christ The second is likened by the Scripture unto the Sunne which shadowes forth the vigorous light and glory of Christs first appearance as it is ministred singly in and by the first Covenant considered as the Law and perfection of his flesh in the principles and life whereof the sonnes and servants are not differenced one from another but both walk to the house of God as friends the sonnes of God as well as the sonnes of perdition those that are borne after the flesh as well
formes through counterfeit resemblances unto TRUTH to beguile and mislead unstable souls and is daily detected and discovered under all professions or visible formes of Saintship whether more or lesse refined whether earthly and sensual or heavenly and Angelical Hereof there are in these dayes of ours but too many living instances who as Lots wife are turned into Monuments of Gods righteous judgment declared upon them for the admonition of others And that we may not leave this subject without endeavouring to contribute some assistance towards the resolving of that great Question how the true Spirit may with certainty and infallibility be known and distinguished from the false I shall briefly recommend to consideration as conducible to the discovery hereof these following particulars The Spirit of TRUTH is evidently and infallibly distinguished from the spirit of lies and falshood three several wayes by which we may make a trial and judgement of the spirits whether they be of God or no. First by the evidence and witnesse which is given of it by the three that bear witnesse in heaven where the Spirit of TRUTH shines forth in its supreme original light and self-evidence as we have at large shewed in the first and second Chapters Secondly by the Record and witnesse that the Sonne or Christ the true Spirit gives of himself in his flesh or humane nature causing the truth to shine forth in the face of Jesus opening what he is and what he did by coming in the flesh suffering and rising againe according to the Scriptures which 1 John 5. 6. is rendred thus This is he that came by water and blood even Jesus Christ not by water only but by water and blood and it is the Spirit that heareth witnesse because the Spirit is truth even the witnesse shining forth in his Spirit and person who whether considered as being and subsisting in the WORD OF LIFE before his being made flesh or considered as after his coming in the flesh living dying and rising againe hath a witnesse born of him in heaven by the FATHER WORD and SPIRIT which Three are one and also in earth by the SPIRIT WATER BLOOD declaring themselves in and upon him as he was found in the fashion and habit of a man which agree in one Thus in the same person we have the greater witnesse which is the witnesse of God or of Christ as he is God and the lesser witnesse which is the witnesse of man or of Christ as he is the Son of man and in both these considered also as testified unto by the Scriptures we have the compleat witnesse which God hath testified of his Son By reason hereof 't is said 1 Joh. 2. 12. Who is a liar but he that denies Jesus is the Christ He is Antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son Whosoever denies the Son the same hath not the Father Whosoever sees not nor acknowledges the TRUTH as witnessed and shining forth in the face of Jesus the Son of man with those that are rightly admitted to serve in the first Sanctuary among the many that are called can much lesse behold it as witnessed and held forth in the brightnesse of Gods face or of the blessed Trinity with those who are culled out of the former and rightly admitted into the holiest of all among the few that are chosen By both these witnesses and records in harmony with the outward Word we do come to know him that is true as the right and whole object whereon through faith we are to fix our eye in the proper forme character and distinction which he gives of himself from all idols or counterfeit appearances of him whatsoever The third or last witnesse which is given us of the true Spirit is that which immediately and necessarily flows from his indwelling presence in our hearts growing up there more and more unto a perfect day by working out in the conscience and spirit of the beleever a confōrmity unto Christ in his death and resurrection causing a dying to sinne and a living unto righteousnesse in the full extent of both as we have opened For if any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his and if Christ be in you the body is dead because of sinne but the Spirit is life because of righteousnesse Examine therefore your selves whether ye be in the Faith know ye not your owne selves how that Jesus Christ is in you except ye be Reprobate And If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead awell in you he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortall bodies by his Spirit that dwellesh in you and so the Spirit it-selfe comes evidently and infallibly to witnesse with our spirits that we are the children of God as having this Spirit of Adoption poured into our hearts for if we be adopted children then we know we are heires heires of God and joynt heires with Christ if so be we suffer with him that we may also be glorified with him And though we are now Sonnes so as it doth not yet appeare what we shall be when we come to the stature of perfect men in Christ Jesus at the full manifestation of the sonnes of God yet now we know that we shall then be like him and that we shall then see him as he is yea by faith we now see him who is invisible Heb. 11. 27. and by this knowledge we have of him in the mean time we come to see and experience him that is true and that we are in him that is true even the true God and eternal life having the witnesse in our selves through that holy anointing which is TRUTH and no lie teaching us of all things and abiding in us as a seed to preserve us from the evil and snare of all false and seducing spirits Abide therefore in him that when he shall appear we may have confidence and not be ashamed before him at his coming These things I have written unto you concerning them that seduce you CHAP. XXI Shewing particularly the evil seed that is sowen in the natural conscience by Satan through which he works men off from their subjection to Christ in his first dispensation and fixes them in rebellion against him HAving already in general laid open the methods of Satan the weapons of his warfare together with the diligent and skilful prosecution of his designes upon mankind to seduce them work them off and forever deteine them from their duty and faithfulnesse unto Christ their true Husband and Lord we shall come now in a more particular manner to shew how closse an attendant he is upon the foregoing works of Christ in the hearts and consciences of men considered under the former dispensations walking about like a roaring Lion seeking whom he may devoure watching what he can find in such hearts that in the BEGINNING are Gods and Christs owne workmanship as hath beene shewed and trying whom he may corrupt from their first
these meere heathenish subjects even out of the world it self as restored in several measures and degrees to some purity and rectitude of natural principles by the coming of Christ in the flesh and by the preaching of the Gospel to every creature under heaven he therefore winds about and changes his course by transforming himself into an Angel of light and declaring himself a friend unto Christ considered in his first appearance and as he is the restorer and renewer unto man of his first purity natural perfection knowing that by this his dissimulation and feigned complyance with Christ as vile and false a spirit as he is he can come in by flatteries into those souls and consciences whence he hath beene cast out and kept out by force and can returne as unsuspected and take up his place and state in the very Temple of God shewing himself that he is God by all the signes wonders and evidences that flesh and blood can expect from him to approve himself by to the deceiving of the very elect themselves if it were possible and using all deceivablenesse of unrighteousnesse he knowes how to greaten and enlarge his Dominion and Rule by this second branch of it in the use he makes of enlightned restored men the children of the first Covenant that are under the Dominion of the Law married to Christ by that Covenant and who will admit no Rule nor Government over them but such as is consistent with the righteous and holy operations and actings that are required by the Law in those that work as debtors unto it whereof we have at large spoken in opening the mysterious workings of sinne and Satan that are taken by the occasion of the Commandment working death by that which is good so that the Devil makes a surer game for himself this way then the other for out of this grave there is no redemption but it must be let alone for ever There remaines no more sacrifice for sin nor place for repentance when after such enlightnings there is a drawing back and falling away through a root of bitternesse springing up against the dawning and approaching glory of Christ in his second and heavenly appearance Such backslidings and declinings of heart are fatal as having mingled in them that seed and nature of sinning for which God swears in his wrath whoever becomes wilfully guilty shall never enter into his rest but be delivered up to beleeve a lie that they all that are such might be damned and perish everlastingly because they received not the love of the truth that they might be saved but after they had received the knowledge of it became bitter haters and opposers thereof When once this Decree of Gods wrath comes in its execution upon any soul denying unto it the benefit of the sacrifice of Christs death let men have beene never so farre enlightned to the escaping of the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of Iesus Christ to the attaining of excellent spiritual gifts having all knowledge all faith that can be had without the love of the truth shining forth in the Crosse and Resurrection of Christ all this and all the righteousnesse they have done shall be no more remembred but in the iniquity they herein commit they shall surely die and their old sins from which they had beene washed and purged returne with vigor and power againe upon them making their latter end worse then their beginning So then the Devil is no loser at last by temporizing for a while and giving as it were leave unto his subjects these sonnes of perdition to conforme to the Lawes of his enemy and walk with the Saints as friends and fellow subjects in Christs Kingdome for when they break and part these drawing back to perdition whilst the true heirs go on to the saving of the soul the Devil finds his reckoning in the winding up and serves himself of this his deceitful compliance by himself and his instruments with Christ and the true spiritual seed to paythem home at last with inveterate rage and malice signified Rev. 12. by that flood of water which he poures out after them if it were possible to drowne and destroy them utterly as is most apparent also in the action and carriage of the He-goat in Daniel that pretended a long while to be for Christ the Prince of the heavenly Host and to engage on his and their behalf against the RAM till hereby he had strengthened the Kingdome to himself and then Christ and the true Saints have the slip given them and none more enraged against them at last then the HE-GOAT none that speaks greater words against them or more ready to piece up in association with the RAM which he before had beaten downe and got the perfect mastery over This will be found by experience a most certaine truth that Hypocrites and Apostates when once they come to wilfull sinning and with Saul to discerne that God hath left them and is departed from them as to what divine presence and fruits of it they had before beene made sensible of none will be more ready to joyne avowedly with the Devil and the worst of his instruments to accomplish their rage against the suffering Saints of Christ who by this meanes have all the power of the world not only withdrawn from being their protection but declaring it self in visible opposition to them and have little other defence left them then in faith and patience to possesse their souls as the poore destitute and needy ones of the flock of Christ Which dark dispensation and season is hastening apace being as it were the midnight-state wherein the Bridegroome shall come the second time without sinne unto salvation and unto which all things must work as the last times draw to their end when the falling away will be greater then ever and the rage of all the Churches enemies most enflamed and implacable and when all visible protection and defence shall be as good as taken away from the true spiritual seed and suffering Saints to the making of such a time of trouble as never was since there was a Nation Yet the Scriptures do declare that although the ordinary visible protection shall be taken away and withdrawn from the holy people and their power of the arme of flesh broken God will however be a little Sanctuary unto that residue and remnant which he shall preserve faithful unto himself under all the trials and shakings that shall be brought upon the world For Zach. 14. 3. It is said Then shall the Lord go forth against those Nations as when he fought in the day of battell which ver 13. interprets to be in the case of Gideon when a great tumult from the Lord was sent amongst his peoples enemies so as they did lay hold every one on the hand of his neighbour and rose up one against another until they all fell together like Abners and Ioabs men at the poole of Gibeon and became a prey