no grace What 's the reason Could he have none or would he have none To one I answer saith God he might have had grace and life and it would have pleased me to have enriched him with these To the other I will answer saith conscience This wretched soul would have no grace he loved iniquity and hated righteousnesse therefore is he here unrighteous he thought himself rich and vvell cloathed and therefore stands here novv poor and naked 'T is remedilesse wickednesse to deny free grace The miseries of man are many and yet there is but one remedy Free grace hath balm for every wound which rejected every wound is mortall The least sinne is death The wages of sinne that is of every sinne is death For bodily distresses there be many remedies if men will not pitty me when I hunger ravens may If Christians will not pitty when I am sore dogges may but in soul distresses there is but one remedy to wit what God will please to do if God will please to do nothing for me none else will or can No eye pittied thee to do any of these for thee Gods eye pitilesse and there is no eye pittifull nor can be to the soul 'T is storied of the balm that it groweth in the Holy-land and no where else which is the reason of that speech Is there no balm in Gilead Mercy for your souls is in the pleasure of God and no where else Sinners make no more of the favour of God then of the favour of man I live not upon one the heart layeth this conclusion and swelleth and lifteth up the heel Ah wretches you cannot say so of God you live upon one yea upon one thing in God upon the smiles of his countenance upon this that he is free in mercy that it pleaseth him to save souls This point hath been applyed to convince and humble and it may also be applyed in the next place to chear and revive There are burdened hearts I beleeve among you but let no distresse discourage you How great soever the wants of any be let them come to God it pleaseth him to lay out for you Are your wants more then Christ hath where withall to supply What ever Christ hath or can do and what is it that he cannot do it pleaseth God to the heart that he should imploy it for you Men under guilt fancy hard thoughts of God my sinnes are great and God will not pardon yes he will he is ready to forgive it pleaseth him to forgive he hath furnished Christ of purpose and laid out all upon this very designe which is reall demonstration of his pleasure this way If distresse lie any otherwise yet it should not distract because free grace speaketh supply to any distresse that you can mention t is a fountain a fountain open every one may draw and yet none draw drie Your straits are many and you cannot tell which way to get out remember the point in hand that it pleaseth God to contrive relief To undo knots is a troublesome thing especially such knots as unbelief knitteth in the soul and yet God is pleased with this work he is a God of peace made up of peace his whole pleasure as well as his whole imployment lieth this way The God of peace establish and strengthen you saith the Apostle The Apostles words are of great emphasis the Godhead bendeth strongly and delightfully this way to settle poore weak souls which can do nothing themselves Doubts cavills and complaints are many and God quieteth all because his pleasure and delight is in the peace and tranquillity of poore souls He is a God of peace his pleasure is to make peace and a Heaven where he cometh 'T is the pleasure of things to do things naturall to them 't is the pleasure of wicked spirits to torment and vexe and to make hell where ever they come and in this sense the devil may be called the God of warre so 't is the pleasure of God to do things naturall to him to comfort and cheere poore souls to strengthen and establish them to make a Heaven where ever he cometh as a God of and a God at this work Coloss 1.19 For it pleased the Father c. THe reason of what Christ is to man is rendered by the Spirit of God in this Text the cause of his greatnesse and fulnesse to maintain it is the will of God it pleased the Father that in him should all fulnesse dwell 'T is not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the word speak will and delight such a pursuit and such action as wherein there is transcendent souls rest Behold my servant which I have chosen my beloved which my soul hath willed Esay 42.1 In whom my soul is at rest saith the Evangelist 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is the same word here in my Text which noteth that the will and the delight of God are in the furnishing of Christ for us Scriptures compared the word you see soundeth double the will and the pleasure of God are wrapt up in it which we shall unfold one after another Doctr. God shapeth every thing to man according to his own will The will of God is absolute he moveth by a perfect rule his motion is without errour and yet guided in all by that which is no guide in us his own will We have many things from earth from Heaven and all shaped out to us according to the will of God Things below man Things below man are many and various and yet God turneth and windeth them all according to his will Can you tell how many good bodies come out of the earth to wait upon one bad Not one of them would do this but that God giveth them such bodies and shapeth them by his will to such qualities and properties and to such ends and purposes as to give their life to keep up dying man That which thou sowest thou sowest not that body that shall be but God giveth it a body as he willeth 1. Cor. 15.38 Things equall to man 'T is the like respecting things equall to us No creatures would serve one another man would not serve man member would not serve member the eye would not serve the hand nor the hand any other part were they not all shaped to this by the will of God God hath set the members in the body every one of them as he willeth 1. Corinthians 12.18 A foot with so many toes a hand with so many fingers a head with so many hairs bodies with such variety of members soules with such variety of gifts have all their shape according to divine will But all these worketh that one and the self same spirit dividing to every man severally as he will 1. Corinthians 12.11 One hath much wisedome another much knowledge another but a little of either onely enough for a toe to be carried and guided by a bigger and nobler member and yet as much
this to find out what soul-sensibilitie is in you Consider these things and as you find your selves indeed sensible of soul-misery shew it every one of you by seeking deliverance from it it should be all your work what else in this world have you to do 'T is an imployment for life for all to get our souls out of sinne and into Christ and yet some of you make it a work by starts and marre all sink your souls lower whilst you give but a half lift that is lift and let fall again the devill a little stirred and not cast out takes stronger hold Know your work and know your time know this time You are not like to die the common death of all men Gods sore judgements are abroad you may have your throats cut quickly in your beds and how sad will it be when bloud shall touch bloud a body in bloud touch a soul in bloud this will be a bloudy sight indeed Sinners me thinks you do not stirre as if justice were near you there is killing and slaying round about us and we in the midst of all are asleep is not your bloudy cloud gathering too There is a great crie of peace and I think God means no such thing yet sinners take heed justice doth not seize on your souls ere you know them or it You are making bulworks and forts to deliver your bodies but what do you do to deliver your souls You would not have your bodies kild and your souls are slain already and stink so that God cannot indure them do you think that your bulworks will be any defence for such bodies as have such souls in them Will not the justice of God beat down all to take her prey and seize upon malignants You have more malignants in the citie then you are aware of you have a great deal of malignancy in your souls and this will betray you all if you look not to it there are many of you desperate malignants to God which yet are not so to the Parliament What souls you have and what the condition of them is look to it and work out salvation for them with fear and trembling I will not give a rush else for all your forts to defend you justice will break through stone-walls and mud-walls and through all through your flesh and through your bones till it come into the very spring of sinne which is your souls there it will lie burning for ever as things when they are at their center there rest The soul is the center of sinne and wrath and wrath will to its center do what you can and make what fortifications you can if your souls be not delivered and saved from that wretched condition wherein naturally they are Colossians 1.13 Who hath 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 caught us out of the power of darknesse I Have been more generall in former attempts upon this verse I shall now be more particular and undertake each term as the holy Ghost hath here laid them in which undertaking I still beg your prayers you can tell when you misse Christ in my labours and I can tell when you misse me in your prayers Oyl our chariot wheels well or else we shall drive heavily the weight of Christs words and your souls is so great Salvation as accomplished the authour of it noted in these two tearms Who hath delivered c. I purpose not to stand on but the manner of Christs going forth to miserable man noted in the next word Who hath snatched us or catched us out of the power of darknesse Doctr. Christ snatcheth souls out of hell fire the metaphor is used highly to adorn the love of Christ in his motion towards miserable man and it doth it indeed gloriously as it may be I may set forth to you in severall particulars and all within the compasse of the metaphor 1. Christ moves strongly to save Snatching speaks an act of force Christ overturns all that stands in his way when he puts forth to deliver a soul omnipotence stretcheth forth his arm in this work devils tremble iniquitie is subdued captivitie carried captive the soul in the midst of violence violently rescued The Lion of the tribe of Judah moves to save as a lion strongly terribly none can resist his will sinners devils nor men Who hath resisted his will Which way the will of God moves power irresistable seconds he drives all before him and takes his prey to wit the poore soul that is preyd upon Two Lions contend about the soul of man the Lion of the tribe of Judah and that roaring Lion you reade of in Peter The Lion of the tribe of Judah is too strong for that Lion and snatcheth the prey out of the devils mouth Who hath snatched us out of the power of darknesse 2. Christ moves swiftly to save Snatching notes swift motion Power puts forth in order to miserie there is but a step between hell and that soul that is under the power of darknesse what therefore is done must be done speedily or the soul is lost Christ is a present help he moves as a Roe as a young Roe very swiftly to apply remedie to miserable man My beloved is like a Roe or a young hart behold he standeth behind our wall shewing himself through the lattice Canticles 2.9 When the devil hath the soul in his arms Christ is behind him as the spouse speaks he is behind our walls at hand when Sathan assaults and makes him let go his hold The devil doth not bite gently nor pull weakly remedy therefore must be swift in this case or else no remedie the soul quickly dyes with deep wounds Poison is of differing strength some kills suddenly and insencibly all the devils poison doth so if not overruled in working an antidote is answerably applyed and upon this ground the Church so prayes Make haste my beloved and be like to a Roe the companions hearken to thy voice make me to hear it Some creatures take their game gently Spannels take a duck and bite not deadly but the devil is not such a dog when he bites he bites deadly quickly and therefore doth Christ snatch out of his mouth before all be desperate and past remedie 3. Christ moves throughly to save Snatching out of the power of darknesse 't is an expression that speaks a full and totall assuming that which was fully and wholly anothers it notes a taking out of the devils arms into Christs arms a personall surprise Christ fights for his wife as Samson and David did he catches his spouse out of the devils arms and then she becomes intire his Christs spouse is no harlot she doth not lie embraced between two the soul lies not in the bosome of sinne which Christ hath catched Snatching from another varies not the proprietie with us but such a catching of a thing as is made in and by warre doth what I snatch or catch from my enemy in warre is wholly mine own Christ gets
of bloud upon thee is not thy nakednesse covered with scarlet of such price as puts a God in debt The redeemed adore the redeemer this is in the text Giving thanks to the Father who hath delivered us from the power of death c. a redeemed soul feeds two with every mercy himself and God he admires love this is feeding himself and then he praiseth God and this is feeding of God too Paul could not speak about soul-deliverance but he must make a breaking off and a breaking out Who shall deliver me I thank God Christ The soul is naturally active but as 't is freed by Christ 't is much more active and ascending it sends to God all that is done upon it The soul blesses necessarily as 't is blessed Soul-blessings make their qualitie in us suitable to themselves and to their own nature so much of God as they bring with them so much of God they leave in the soul and the soul necessarily carries as much of God to Heaven as it hath of God from Heaven in any mercy In the Devils arms there is singing drunkkards sing and worldlings sing In Christs armes there is singing too there is singing of halelujahs here the redeemed lift up the Redeemer every soul in Christs arms sings to him all Christs children can sing sweetly there are songs of Sion songs of deliverance Divine love makes gladnesse of heart a heart gladded gets into that bosome that made it so to dilate it self and that makes more gladnesse A redeemed soul is every day more admiring more praising him that redeemed him then other So many souls snatched out of hell so many sweet instruments of melody hath Christ in this world Christ glorifies to be glorified not a soul that Christ pulls out of the devils mouth but he is like Jonah when he came out of the belly of hell a humble relater of wonderfull things to God and man All that Christ takes out of the devils bosome and sets in his own stroke him and kisse him 3. The redeemed obey their redeemer Not a lambe taken out of the power of the wolf but follows the shepheard Your obedience is come abroad unto all saith the Apostle Whom Christ takes they become followers of him in the sight of all Redemption from the power of Sathan and the power of sinne are the same redeemed souls are out of both and obey neither they onely observe him that hath taken them I will run the waies of thy commandments when thou hast set my heart at liberty saith the Psalmist He speaks as a captive set at libertie that was glad of his legs and observe what wayes he takes to runne in I will runne the wayes of thy commandments The soul still is in behaviour as the power under which it is if under the power of sinne it walks sinnefully if under the power of Christ it walks holily in his commandments The soul is still according to the hand in which it is would you know in whose hand and power you are observe well then of what behaviour your souls are Sinners you wallow in your lusts and live according to the power of your corruption and yet many of you plead and glory in your redemption by Christ Your heart gives your tongue the lie and your life speaks you slaves to the devil and your lusts Is it a small thing to you to belie Christ and belie your souls to distract and make void divine redemption Are your souls redeemed and yet are they in slavery to sinne Acknowledge truth that discovers you and confesse your sad state this would better become you A bad state is remedilesse whilest 't is plead for as good the wicked may justifie themselves but God justifies none it will be double death to justifie that which God and conscience condemn Sinners you cut off your souls from grace by wicked confidence God does nothing for the man that thinks all is well but prepare double miserie for calling evill good As corruption is in strength let every soul complain O wretched man that I am c. Corruption makes wretchednesse according to its strength in every soul for as lust lives it misleads sinne will beare sway where 't is not thrust out the old man is not as some old men that sit still and do nothing but is very stirring corruption as it lives is imperious all must be her servants gifts parts yea the very heart Lust as it lives will bewitch your affection adulterate your judgement creep into your bosome and become your full delight then are you wretched souls indeed then are you galley-slaves Sinners consider this point corruption as it is in strength keeps its propertie in all the best of you all will find the devils heaven a hell Ah Lord what will his hell be then You will be weary of your lives as lust lives in you 't is such a bondage make what sweet out of it you can the more artificiall you become in acting and managing corruption the more power it hath in you and the sooner will it kill all your felicitie dead you will suddenly in the flame of lust cry out as that Martyr in a flame of fire in an other case Hell is come is come Sathan is come is come as he cried out Christ is come is come We may releive our selves from this point too respecting this land If power work irrisistablie to save the soul the salvation of the body is much more easie to it One devil is more strong then all the wicked men in England and yet the power which opposeth him about the soul which he most looks at and contends for is too hard for him Fearfull souls be strong you will see irresistable power snatch poore England as a brand out of the fire Power it self as irresistable should releive and as it hath such a propertie and so works snatching creatures when almost ready to be destroyed this should much more releive and raise the heart Were we much lower then we are yet irresistable power can put forth of a sudden and snatch us out of the mouth of lions and 't is its propertie so to do You are left now to fetch in your relief from God onely strike in to do it as you behold any propertie of any divine attribute to put forth it self Now you heare that this is the propertie of divine power to work irresistably Redemptio à nihilo que dam creatio est Means are still enough to that power which is absolute and to work so of a sudden to snatch out of miserie when all is ready to be swallowed up feed your weak souls with this and move at the throne of grace upon it and surely you will heare of God and England will be raised from the dust and have beauty for ashes Before your pots can feel the thorns he shall take them away as with a whirlwind both living and in his wrath And the righteous shall see this and joy
so doth Christ neither will he be deceived therefore deceive not your selves Death is at your doore do you not see him after him the next dispatch will be for eternity and it will bear but upon the resolution of this question whose image and superscrition is upon this soul If you would seek to delude at that day it will not do in the least for conscience then shall manage its office fully without any confront from an unsound heart it shall speak out then and unmask the face of the inward man to the judge of all Deluded souls I dread to think of you you have used a damnable art a great while to mask a naughty heart and a naughty life this trade must down now the sword of the Lords vengeance is come to rip you up you shall be known as you are judged as you are This man is as like the Devil in heart as he can look let children swimme home to their father in bloud I will make no better conveyance for them Let them have marshall law will the Lord of hosts say slay them in their beds slay them at their doors uggly souls I cannot endure any longer to look upon them But as for you that bear the image of Christ lift up your heads sing for joy of heart now though all the land be so sad Christs image is his mark upon you for mercy he will know you by this in the midst of the bloudiest battell in the midst of a fired citie You being like the Sonne of God you shall have one like the Sonne of God to embrace you in fiery flames as the three children had Coloss 1.15 Who is the image of the invisible God THis is said of Christ eminenter he is what none else are in heaven or in earth for likenesse to God They are exclusive words and make a proper rule for our right apprehension of God When we would conceive of God as he is we are to conceive of him as he holds forth himself in Christ and no where else for God hath no representation for divine adoration but Christ God hath no artificiall similitude nor no naturall similitude nothing grows like him nor nothing can be made like him Nature keeps her compasse and attempts nothing this way and yet art is venturous I admire it much for no man hath seen God at any time that is as he is onely he that lay in his bosome thus saw him Sight is the rule of art fancy cannot work upon nothing not our fancy Folly makes her self visible and not God when the man goes to make the likenesse of him he never saw Fancie is but bad at recollection when at a losse yet a little it can do sometimes this way call to mind such a countenance which at such a time it saw but that which it never saw it can do nothing about that but befool it self No man hath seen God at any time Fancie can draw to the life and it can work at second hand fancy can go after nature and fancie can go after art and make good work she can draw from a thing drawn from a thing it self or from the shape of that thing it can shape again to please it self and continue so contemplative but it hath neither wayes relief respecting God neither the naturall form of God nor any artificiall shape can be got Ye have neither heard his voice at any time nor seen his shape John 5.37 No man hath seen God to draw him to the life nor none hath seen his shape to copie him out ye have neither heard his voice nor seen his shape Christ as man is not the shape of God There was apparition frequently under the old covenant vision was an ordinance and although it were an ordinance yet God did make vision still under the shape of some other thing not of himself under the shape of men or of an eagle or a dove The form of man gives not a shape of the form of God Christ as man was not the image nor the shape of God but called so as he had a divine essence and action as the godhead and the fulnesse of the godhead dwelt in him and wrought by him Though fancy hath no full shape as a copie yet from a little from an eye or from a toe she can form the whole if she hath but the shadow of a shadow any rough draught any ground-work or any glimpse of such a similitude she can with some applause set her self on work but there is not this relief to make the image of God Take good heed for ye saw no manner of similitude when God talked with you in Horeb If there were any times to get some glimpse of God it was in Horeb but yet then there was no manner of similitude The result of all is this There is no image of God but Christ nor can be There is no representation for relief of apprehension in adoration but Christ Use Mens principles are strange which conceive otherwise and yet persons abusing their light make what apprehensions of God they please Look how the heart is engaged so it fancies God and represents him to it self A vain heart makes vain imaginations will guides affection affection guides fancie and fancie guides action when the soul is given up to sinne and death the heart chooseth its way and then fancy other powers set up a god in similitude to this way to go before the man to confirm the man in his way and to seal his destruction and yet thus men generally live and die Some mens principles are strange yet they will venture their souls upon the practise of them the pride of man and the wrath of God is in this what is the idole of any mans heart shall become the idol of his life to his death God will have what is in the heart under the mans hand to condemne him Professing themselves to be wise they became fools and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man and to birds and foure-footed beasts saith the Apostle First they became vain in imagination then in action the idol of the heart begins the idol of the hand and outward man necessarily if you would know any mans conception of God look upon his action if you would know what idol is in any mans heart be but patient a while and he will draw it out himself in his life How Romanists conceive of God they give it you under their hand by the many sensuall helps they use in their devotion their images and multitudes of carnall representations whereas God is a spirit and under the same notion and apprehension alone must be worshipped Carnality speaks corruptibility and that is admirable abominable to relieve apprehension by respecting an incorruptible God and yet this is the abomination of Rome and the persons which we stand to defend our selves against at this day Men which have corrupted their own
and gives off its office God hath not one adequate to render him visible to a mortall eye neither matter nor form neither longitude nor latitude neither white nor ruddy without any dimension and without any circumscription of time or place or any accident or shadow of them The summe of all is what I said in the beginning That God is wholly invisible invisible in person and action Vse Each of these are distinctly usefull that God is invisible in action tremble before him Sinners look not after their souls I tremble to see it because there lies the action of God principally a man is killed invisibly Sinne is best pleasing the man will have his way now God with-draws and this action is not seen but yet is the eternall death of a soul thousands are thus slain and no wounds seen felt nor complained of There be a great many bodies visibly slain and this makes you shake but there be a great many souls invisibly slain the sword of the spirit cuts off the spirits of men utterly from God apace therefore is hypocrisie at such a hellish height and so many great men become as devils and making damnation a court-complement There be a great many slain and fallen but weep not for these there be a great many more slain that are not yet fallen invisibly slain utterly cut off from God O weep for these for when these fall they will fall very low Fear not Christian they have their deaths wound that warre against you a deadly wound at heart from heaven which you see not stand still and you will see them fall fearfully hell pangs are upon them do you not hear them grone to be there by their horride imprecations Our warre hath slain more then we see how do men give up the holy Ghost daily and souls breathe out their last good breath What making of graves tolling and ringing out is there in the other world below if a man could see it Sinners tremble at these things for I tremble to think of some of you I see that in some of you which I fear is yet invisible to your souls invisible judiciary action upon your souls beg that your eyes may be opened that you may see Gods actions within you in some measure or you are lost men Gods action is invisible trust in him when Gods action carries not that in it visibly which we look for we think it hath nothing in it at all nor means nothing for our good and so let fall faith and fall a quarrelling with God and one another 't is our great disadvantage at this day and nothing more with which God is displeased which will be more and more disadvantage to us onely Why sayest thou O Jacob and speakest O Israel my way is hid from the Lord and my judgement is passed over from my God When we cannot see God going along with us in every thing we think he hath cast us off the godly despair and the wicked presume when things are thus carried both which are much alike good one looseth his comfort the other looseth his soul When we are in the dark and know not where we are God knows where he is variation of action doth not prove variation of intention one end may be intended in travell though every day the way turn In countreys full of mountains wayes are necessitated to turn and take compasse much there are great mountains in the Churches way these make many turnings and put us oft to a stand to see our way and him that goes before us Christians be not discouraged it is the manner of God to hide himself oft when he intends to shew his face gloriously I cannot let down my faith respecting Gods intentions of love to this bleeding land that that God now hides himself let it make matter of prayer as it did to David in like case and not matter of unbelief and impatience Hide not thy face from thy servant for I am in trouble heare me speedily deliver me out of the mire and let me not sink let me be delivered from them that hate me and out of the deep waters let not the water-flouds overflow me neither let the deep swallow me in let not the pit shut her mouth upon me c. Finally for as much as God according to person is invisible to a mortall eye long to be out of the body that mortality may put on immortality a mortall eye become an immortall eye that you may see him that dwells in that light to which no mortall eye can reach The body makes misery and not felicity to the soul here our mortall eye beholds nothing but mortality and so all our vision in the body makes misery and not felicity to the soul What is this world but a great body filled with the curse of God! and what are all the creatures of this world but each others deadly executioners and the dust of one a grave to turn another into the same and this is our dolefull vision throughout our dying life here our eye affects and afflicts our hearts and yet do not we long to go home to have better vision the vision of Saints and the vision of Angels and the vision of God in which is heaven Know your errour now you carnall wretches all is going away whither are your souls going to see God or the devil Know your errour Christians the glory of this world hath taken your eye and the shame of it will take your persons unlesse the Lord pitty What bloudy objects do I see in the countrey and what bloudy objects may I see in the citie But were I in that holy city above I know whom and what I should see and feel to all eternity Coloss 1.15 First-born of every creature FIrst-born notes two things precedence in affection and precedence in being in reference to all the creation Christ is before all chosen beloved and indued with grace and in this sence is called the first-born Whom he fore-knew he predestinated to be conformed to the image of his sonne that he might be the first-born among many brethren Christ and all the elect are here resembled by a family and Christ the first brought forth in the image of the Father of this family and all the rest conformed to this image Christ the first chosen and indued and then all others chosen and indued in him In this sence namely in regard of precedence in affection is Israel called Gods first-born that is in reference to all other people the first chosen and beloved And thou shalt say unto Pharaoh thus saith the Lord Israel is my sonne even my first-born Let my sonne my first-born go or else I will slay thy first-born Exodus 4.22 First-born notes precedencie in being there is a first coming into the kingdome of God and a first coming into this world First was the word begotten and then all other things begotten by him before any thing had being Christ had The Lord
the least superiority that can be discerned Of his own will he begat us with the word of truth As Christ doth otherwise receive so he doth otherwise impart light then any other teacher Christ was taught none like him and he teaches none like him Christ teacheth internally eternally instantly Our teaching is discursive we can do nothing within Christs words are of authority and make their impression upon the heart not a word that Christ speaks but goes to the heart though many words which we speak come not to the heart yet every word that Christ speaks goes to the hearts Did not our hearts burn within us whilest he talked with us Christ sets the soul on fire with his breath blows up internall powers and breaks open everlasting doors The prince of darknesse fortifieth within us and Christ can mount ordnances where the forts are shoot off terribly within and destroy the works of the devil that is sinne or the soul at every shot Christ doth with his cannon within as you do with yours without rend and tear wofully You take off bodies in the very midst so doth Christs cannon take off sinnes and souls in the very midst as Beza renders that word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which the Apostle useth I will destroy the wisdome of the wise 1. Cor. 1.19 tollam è medio I will cut it off in the midst Sinne is in the midst of the soul and Christ can mount such gunnes as to cut it off in the midst As Christs ministery is internall which none of the Prophets was so it is eternall Christs words are words are words of eternall life or eternall death and this simply as his words We speak words and they stick but a moment Christ speaks words and they stick for ever We make wounds and you lick them whole in an alehouse Christ makes wounds that no art can heal Thy arrows stick fast in me saith the Psalmist The arrows which Christ shoot they stick fast none can pull them out but that hand that shot them Christ can instruct and seal it That is make things so impressive as beyond obliteration O God thou hast taught me from my youth and hitherto I have declared thy wondrous works Psal 71.17 so Psal 119.102 I have not departed from thy judgements for thou hast taught me Christ can teach beyond all other teachers he can open the understanding that is open powers to take in and then close up these powers to keep in for ever Christ can teach internally eternally he can do all this instantly his ministery is an instantaneous ministery We are long hammering and beating to make persons understand and yet all will do nothing but when Christ takes the work in hand he makes the most ignorant creature that is wise to salvation presently Then opened he their understandings c. Luk. 24.45 Then at that instant he made them see throughly what they never saw Use You see what an able teacher Christ is what hath he taught you The wisdome of the world is foolishnesse with God I do not ask you how knowing you are in your particular calling as such and such trades-men but how knowing you are in your generall calling as Christians how knowing of Christ and your souls Light is come into the world a great light Do you see the way to heaven Confidence speaks not saving light but desperate blindnesse many ignorant men conceit they know much when they know nothing as they ought The fool is wise in his own conceit and the world is full of these fools yea the Christian world is full of these fools but Christ is emptying it Blindnesse and confidence makes us all bloudy at this day and the Lord grant it make us not bleed to death We have a Laodicean plague upon us and God seems to be spuing us out of his mouth and yet our Laodicean spirit lives in the midst of us We all of us think highly of our selves that we are rich in all spirituall excellencies and they that contradict our conceits are fools We are fools saith the Apostle but you are wise How strong and how generall this spirit is now you that are spirituall may see and what it presages Christ will explain fully if you can but hold fast a little Let every man look without and look within look abroad and look at home the plague of the multitude is it not your plague Are not you wiser in your conceits then your preacher is not spirituall preaching babbling When things touch your consciences then you rage and then the Minister is mad because you are mad Alas for us Lord thou makest us men of contention our life is a fighting with beasts that will not understand us nor thee If you had no other Prophets but us or did reject no other prophet but us some dispute might be made in the day of account but we will not judge you to the Father there is another prophet which you hear in us and yet will not heare and it is he that will judge you to the Father and to your own consciences If this will not beat off men from deluding themselves and from bearing off Christ I will go on Some spirits are wanton as there be light bodies so there be light souls such as go a whoring after lies Fansie sick longs after fresh speculation if this may be had it satisfies let it be in what it will in things as farre from Christ as earth is from heaven yea as hell is from heaven It is otherwise with the soul that is taught of God he hath a little light of Christ and now cares for no other vision all light is darknesse and all wisdome folly that relates not to make Christ more known I purpose to know nothing but Christ and him crucified Paul had many endowments but they were all sleighted Christ teacheth the heart as the heart is taught love burns nothing satisfies love but what stird it if such an object made love nothing but the fruition of that object will satisfie it You may know whether Christ hath opened any thing of himself to you by your love to him the purity of your light will speak out it self in the purity of your love and the purity of your affection in the purity of your action Should you say nothing yet a man that stands by you may tell what your light is and who hath taught your hearts Christ or the devil Some of you will swear and curse and lie some of you your love as fleshly as base as the earth it self Hath Christ taught such things as these No certainly the devil is the tutour of these and they will take their degree in hell I have a word to you all and conclude A loose life broadly speaks out an uninstructed heart what secretly swayes Christ sees and so shall all the world use what art you will to hide it wherein you are intractable to the teaching of Christ God will discover
But I am afraid he will be gone If Christ do go will he leave his dear ones behind him Doth not the eagle carrie her young so doth Christ I carried you upon eagles wings Coloss 1.18 The first born from the dead THere are two first-born mentioned in this chapter the first-born of every creature verse 15. and the first-born from the dead the one respects being the other respects well-being and Christ is first in both these first in being in reference to all the creation and first in well-being in reference to the new creation the first that came forth from under the power of sinne alive which is the first-born from the dead here meant which the Apostle calls the first-born amongst many brethren elsewhere that is the first in our nature in the state of divine favour Christ broke the ice as we speak in reference to that body of death under which the state of mankind lay and so the first that came forth alive from under the guilt of sinne and the killing justice of God This time is sad so is our text it leads us to behold a world of dead men From the dead c. The term is indefinite and speaks our condition universally We are all by sinne dead without power to please God and liable to wrath for ever and Christ the first that made way out of this condition the first that broke through that displeasure which spoild us all Bodily death is sad soul-death a thousand times more sad we must walk amongst the tombes for an houre we are to rip up the dead to set out the nature of soul-death Demonst 1. Breath is gone the spirit of God is not in a dead soul Union speaks life Sathan not Christ lies in a sinners heart he is alive to sinne affection strong action that is evil action free among the dead Such light hath such motion ghosts walk in the dark wayes of death dead souls walk in Spirituall death is a soul cast out from God a soul cast out from God casts out God the word of God the operations of God a dead soul fights against life quicknings are as stabbings sermons which stirre are conjurings his eyes stare his heart quakes let Paul be gone Felix will be in hell else before the time the words of life are death to a dead soul Felix soul is in departing whilest a world of life was imparted to him nothing will keep life in a dead soul but the departing of Christ and his quickning spirit The dead deny the resurrection they would not be raised out of their grave means that are used this way are to them as conjuring from the dead gastly Christs yoke is easie wisdomes wayes are pleasant so the devils yoke is easie and his wayes are pleasant the dead are at rest in sinne they feel no pain though in the way to hell till they come there Eyes closed this also belongs to the dead in sinne The dead see nothing godlinesse is a mystery and the word of life a parable to a dead soul Confusion covers the dead reason is rebellion doing is undoing and yet the soul thinks all is well Light is darknesse sweet is bitter life is death to a dead soul Jacob is Esau the blind miscall every person and every thing O that thou hadst known in this thy day The sunne brought out of heaven and set at the doore and yet not discerned the dead see nothing in the day time day is night to the dead sunshine darknesse Christ close by yet not apprehended by the dead Christ knocks at the doore the voice though just behind or just before yet not heard our Gospel is hid though this be light more sparkling more shining then all other light Pride buds as the Prophet speaks sinne spreads God frowns hell gapes yet the dead see nothing Spirituall death 't is spirituall understanding quite lost one not able to discern divine things however externally advantaged hold a torch to the eye of the dead yet he sees nothing and if ye could hold the sunne close to the eyes of a dead man yet could he apprehend nothing the wisdome of the world is foolishnesse in it self the wisdome of the Scriptures is even also the same to a dead soul he knows nothing as he ought not the things he gathers and looks upon in wisdomes house Carcase stinking The dead smell lothsome the dead in sins do so Malignity hath got victory the whole state is corrupted all the bloud black and filthy in the dead Temptations overcome what Sathan saith is law and Gospel imaginations evil and all so and onely so evil the whole bulk and carcase of Christianitie stinking to Christ Christians The dead are all dead all filthy from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot full of sores plague-sores and all run and bloud filth is wallowed in Spirituall death is the soul under the rule of sinne sinne ruling the heart sleights truth the heart sleighting truth life is evil and yet pleaded for as good this stinks abominably in the nostrils of God Havvoth pravitates wickednesses Spirituall death is the inward parts very wickednesse the heart given to a harlot a strumpet is base and stinking Affection false and your lungs are rotten the opening of your mouth to God is as the opening of a sepulchre Spirituall death 't is a man abominable to God person action in life in death the dead stink alwayes God hates a wicked soul forever Sinne is everlasting so is justice the soul that lies in it is an abomination from generation to generation The grave and hell do not purifie the dead Spirituall death is a soul eternally lothing and lothed Stretched out coffin'd and buried this is the last property of the dead Dead in sinne are stretched out with a witnesse conscience is racked Conviction is the proper divine operation in a dead soul men under the power of sinne are under the power of wrath here spirituall death is a heart under the mere sence and guilt of wrath Worms eat the dead conscience gnaweth souls that lie in their sinnes The dead are stretched out and buried the dead bury the dead There be black bearers below and they are fetched up when wicked souls depart and thousands of them stand ready to carry the dead to their place This night they shall take away thy soul A dead soul is stretched out carried forth and buried in the night saith the Text This night they shall take away thy soul Dead souls are all buried in the night in utter darknesse The summe of all is this Spirituall death is a soul seperated from God under pollution and conviction untill condemnation Vse 'T is a time of slaughter fields cities towns dipped and dyed in bloud Dead bodies are many but dead souls are more the dead are in every house yea almost in every bed and yet no Lord have mercy at the doore Husband dead wife dead child dead and
blessings A man out with God may have many things but no blessings Riches are no blessing honours no blessing knowledge no blessing to a man on whom God frownes The smiles of the Son comprehend all the vertues which do felicitate nature In the love of God is wrapt up our temporall and eternall felicity Peace and reconciliation speak the speciall love of God Definit Reconciliation 't is intire full and firm friendship between God and fallen mam by vertue of which his condition in all things is blessed Reconciliation speaks friendship God and man are enemies which falling out is sad but God can wash his hands because it began wholly on mans side he disliked Gods will and so threw it off and God disliked mans practice in this and so threw him off they are now far off one from another You that are far off c. Not far off according to presence but far off according to affection Man is a hater of the Lord and the Lord a hater of man Affection opposite and actions are opposite God and man fight they seek the life of one another fleshly lusts fight against the soule i. against God in the soul God considers mans venimous nature and pursues him that which riseth up against me shall die The soul that sins shall die Rebellion is death by divine Statute no man shall have his book in this case saith Justice Reconciliation is that act of Christ which takes off this deadly pursuite Let not this soul die I have died Reconciliation speaks compassion compensation yea advocation one pleads when the Sinner by reason of guilt is speechlesse If crime be crying and must have blood let my blood go for it saith Christ Reconciliation 't is Christ personating a sinner and pleading with a displeased God till he be overcome and think well of one whom he said he would ruine If we sin we have an advocate c. Reconsiliation hath advocation advocation closeth spirits and and things which differ and begets right understanding and so settles amity between such as were at enmity Christ hath slain enmity This friendship which Christ worketh between God and man is intire you have I known of all the people of the earth God knows some above all i. loves some above all other Reconciliation speaks peculiar love God carries a common respect to all he makes the Sun to shine upon the good and upon the bad as a creator he upholds the whole world which is great friendship this speaks not reconciliation Reconciliation speaks fatherly friendship Gods motion is wonderfull he comes very neer or goes very far off every one If he fall out he kills if he fall in he marries Reconciliation speaks conjugall love two united as Father and Son yea two united as Husband and Wife Christ personates a sinner i. stands under his notion in point of sin and wrath and works both off and then he priviledges a sinner he puts his own raiment upon him The King sets Moredeai upon his own horse and gives him royall apparel makes him stand in his own relation as a son We are children and heirs with Christ this speaks reconciliation intire union and friendship You fall out and can never get so far in as you were your hearts are naught you are reconciled yet remember something and for this keep your distance God doth not so Christ mediates and sin is put quite away so that God remembers iniquity no more the offender is laid where Christ is in the bosome of God Reconciliation it hath compensation advocation and remission There is no iniquity in Jacob nothing without nothing withing amisse in that person with whom God is at peace i. nothing amisse is imputed The expression sets forth that peculiar love which shines in Christ upon such as he mediates for they are the beautifullest in Gods eye of all the world Reconciliation speaks full friendship God at peace all is ours he could say so much to Job Acquaint thy self with God and be at peace thereby God shall come unto thee i. all good Job 22.21 Communion follows union if God become a Father Christ will get him to come along with him and feast with you a father goes oft to his children My Father and I will come and sup saith Christ Reconciliation speaks full communication feasting divine friendship is not as humane that works coldly and reaches out but a little lest it should over-do and undo divine friendship works freely because there is no feare of beggering the donor all his care is how to make the recipient receptive enough rich enough God at peace smiles the rayes of this Sun make a very rich Region I cannot tell you the prosperity that goes along with divine peace Secular peace wraps up all secular good in 't divine peace wraps up all good Secular and Celestiall My peace I leave with you Reconciliation is a legacy a legacie that hath all treasure in it In times of peace wealth comes tumbling in Reconciliation is a state of great income a soul sent to from heaven daily and presented with the choycest gifts that heaven will afford Reconciliation it is heaven gates set open and the soul given free egresse and regresse to ask receive and carry away any thing and this not for once but alwayes Reconciliation speaks firm friendship Love in God is not a passion as 't is in you you are off and on for trifles his kindness is everlasting kindnesse With everlasting kindnesse will I imbrace thee God lends his ear to be abused by none concerning any of his children Satan is an accuser of the brethren but God hearkens to nothing which he saith You cannot hearken to accusation but it takes impression and affection flattens which is your weaknesse You have many enemies one saith this of you another that and God hears all and yet lessens not love one whit but heightens it A reconciled person hath one friend sure let the world go which way 't will My love shall never depart c. Whom he loves he loves to the end c. There is no condition so tickle as secular favourites a man is an honour to day and cast out to morrow corruption is strong in all and therefore every little thing by asseth us about No state more sure then a divine favourite Principles within are pure foundation without firm to wit Christ Reconciliation speaks persons beloved for Christs sake love running thorow a sure channell and so becoming sure mercy to the soul God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself Not a man in the world which God loves but in Christ which is a firm foundation of love Christ waxeth not old his beauty fadeth not that the Fathers love should decline thereby He is the same yesterday to day and for ever All 〈◊〉 into this that I have said Reconciliation is an intire full and firm friendship between God and fallen man by vertue of which his condition is in all things blessed
death in sin to which the death of Christ is without profit this is when the soule will goe his own way Many walke by no rule all is fish that comes to net all is contentfull that sutes to a carnall affection conscience jogges these soules sometimes and then they talke of Christ that he hath dyed for their sinnes but poore soules they doe but talke If the faith of such persons forementioned were faith indeed and no fancie the soule would be crucified with crucified Christ I am crucified with Christ They which indeed appropriate the death of Christ die with him in affection first and then in action by little and little according as the death of Christ is more and more beheld The death of Christ is of double vertue it makes a death of guilt and a death of the very being of sin The bodie of sin as well as the soule of sin is dead The bodie is dead saith the Apostle speaking of corruption Corruption keepes in a bodie all that while 't is alive all powers combine to beate out their owne way as will best carry the world afore it and winke at if not scoffe at the way of Christ this soule crucifies Christ but is not crucified with him The sin of this age is bloudy wickednesse therefore doe we bleed Surely we bleed not so much for small sin our sin is crimson and scarlet coloured wee crucifie Christ his truth his people therefore doth he crucifie us Light rises so doth malice 't is nothing to the men of this generation to speak bitterly to murther bloudily their own convictions Christ shall die at the dore rather then they will open love to him to destroy the advantage of this time A man crucified to Christ is crucified to the world you that kill not the lusts of the world you kill Christ but not believe on him and his bloud shall be upon you not to take off guilt but to bind on guilt till you die till bloud goe for bloud 'T is a very bloudy time in which we live trials murther love to Christ to one another heartie affection to Christ can hardly be found men are so taken up with their own ends Povertie is marching towards us like an armed man all is falling flesh shakes at this and treads upon Christ and treads out his bowels to keepe up such wretches as these know not their wretched condition they have not tasted of the bloud of Christ nor know what Christ is now doing Christ is now avenging the bloud of his Covenant upon all that tread upon it men that doe not so take hold of his bloud and death as to bleed and die with him in name in state in person shall bleed and die by him this time is a discovery of unbeliefe and a recompence Unsensible persons are below discipline these therefore I must let goe Where conscience bleedes the bloud of the crosse may be of use and to these in the last place I will addresse my selfe Soules are loaded and troubled about many things but where the distresse is about eternall life whether shall I live or die Whether shall I live where Christ is or not 'T will be reliefe to such a burthened heart to thinke what Christ can doe for him in this case Thou hast a tender friend in Heaven and thy soule is precious to Christ he hath shed his bloud that thou mightest not die nor more despaire Things are very well between God and Christ he hath stood in the person of many and discharged well his undertaking the favour of God is at his dispose whom he intercedes for with his bloud escape the wrath of God 'T is sad to me to see how some soules sinke they thinke peace an impossible thing for them ever to attaine What is not peace Christs Is not Heaven Christs Is not kingdome power and glory Christs That all is Christs methinkes should quiet the cryings of conscience That God is at peace with Christ should generate faith in the most complaingest soule 'T is a facile thing for Christ to procure the favour of God but how should one get Christs favour And Christ is solicitous how to get thy favour Christs favour comes farre easier to us then Gods favour did to him he doth not expect your bloud to get his favour to accept him is to gaine him his favour is free all that he expects is that poore soules would but trust him and imploy him with their estates that they would imploy him and none else to procure the love of God and eternall blessednesse Could I trust Christ with my estate I know all would be well but I cannot believe Why know this that Christs bloud hath ingaged God to give faith and every grace else unto thee what thou wouldest doe and canst not let not that deject put out that grace you have When a man cannot goe into the poole 't is hopefull to lie neere it for one or other may take him up and carry him in thither whither he cannot goe himselfe Pained soules speake of nothing but the bloud of Christ prize nothing in comparison of this hence must come thy ease if ever out of these pantings spring faith unto joy Christ takes up these creeples of a sudden and carries them into the poole of his bloud You that have the Kings evill stand in the way of the King and though you cannot cure your selves yet you will lie as faire for cure as you can In a spirituall sense be thus prudent in the middest of all your soule-paines say If ever any thing give me ease it must be the bloud of Christ if ever any thing quiet my conscience it must be Christs bloud sprinkled upon it out of these honourable thoughts of proper remedie proceedes remedie to the soule Matter of faith and matter of love should spring from this point if one had time to goe this way The bloud of the crosse speakes love in strength love as strong as death what speakes it in Christ should make it in us No such Sermon of love in the Bible nor in the Creation as the bloud of the Crosse Enlarge this your selves in deeds COLOSSIANS 1.20 Whether they be things in earth or things in Heaven DIvine friendship according to its formalitie and causalitie I have handled according to its extent I am now to pursue it to wit how farre it reaches which is noted in these last words To things in earth and to things in Heaven This Scripture is difficult yet other Scriptures compared with it will helpe us to see something into it By things in earth is meant the Elect called and uncalled By things in Heaven is meant Saints and Angels By reconciling of all these to himselfe is meant the gathering of them all into one spirituall bodie under one head the Lord Jesus Christ by vertue of which the state of fallen man is restored the state of blessed Angels confirmed all to concenter in one common blessednesse for
counsell of Gods will is his guide Mercy goes forth and embraces this or that person and not from any respect else but Gods will he does all things according to the counsell of his will Prerogative carries all with him God is free and will be free to give what he will to whom he will he hath no respect nor obligement upon him nor will have I will have mercy upon whom I will men proffer to some persons this or that to induce them to do this or that for them and they say no what we do we will do freely God is such a noble Spirit The whole creation is spiritually turned into a Chaos darknesse is upon the face of the deep upon the deepest understanding every soule under heaven without form and void of God As all things were then materially as clay in the hands of the Potter free for God to shape how he would one to this another to that so are we now spiritually and as then he was led in the old creation by his will so is he now in the new creation and by nothing else the will of none interrupts or swayes a jot with God Of his own will be begat us by the Word of truth Jam. 1.18 Not any thing without God swayes him in what he does in the old creation or in the new and therefore all that comes forth from him is free and can be no otherwise I will give you an argument more of this nature and then the use of all not a creature upon the face of the earth that can present any thing of his own to God to draw love and to make friendship in the least kinde Distance and disparitie is so great between some persons that there is an utter incapacitie in one side to make and ingage the other What can a begger a vagabond present a Prince with to make his favour if he would be made with a gift The case is ours out of naught comes naught we are naught and nothing else and can present nothing else to him who is nothing but good There is no soundnesse in us Esa 1. 'T is a remarkable expression if we had any soundnesse and 't were but very light we might present that to attract and make friendship and love and so with something of our own help by art a bad condition but there is no soundnesse in us from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot What grace doth by degrees in a very long space of time that sin did presently Grace doth purge wholly but 't is long first The God of peace sanctifie you wholly c. Sin corrupts wholly presently as soone as ever Adam transgressed it did as some strong poyson run quite over him presently so that we are become as the Psalmist saith Altogether filthy Psal 14.3 Such as are altogether filthy cannot offer any thing of their own altogether cleane and yet so it must be to him who is altogether so or else it obtaines nothing with him and therefore 't is that the Scripture speakes of our righteousnesse as menstruous ragges Vse I have now shewed you that mercy cannot be merited but justice may The favour of God goes for nothing in man but the wrath of God goes forth alwayes for something in man a course of sin should be trembled at ah Lord what will this bring about My goodnesse extends not to God but my wickednesse doth My grace merits nothing but my sin merits much A man may doe enough to deserve hell quickly The troubles of the whole Land are many every Country dyed with bloud I know how folkes speake of all this yet not a drop of bloud more shed then merited If thy many wounds and much bleeding prove mortall O England thy death will be but just desert 'T were well if what now is upon us were all we have deserved we should then give a guesse when our troubles would end whereas now we can give none A person or Nation pursued according to merit perisheth unavoydably The wages of sin is death Our remedie is free mercy that God breake off from what he is yet but entred upon to wit judgement for if he goe on to doe but justice woe unto us all he will finde matter enough to keep justice alive till every person in the Land be dead See Esa 9. He shall snatch on the right hand and be hungry and he shall eate on the left hand and not be satisfied they shall eate every man the flesh of his own arme Manasseh Ephraim and Ephraim Manasseh c. And for all this his anger is not turned away but his hand is stretched out still vers 20 21. Justice will finde worke a great while if this be onely imployed about a people 't will eate out all and looke over the hatch for more For all this his anger is not put away c. When justice hath destroyed a whole Land yet not a jot satisfied nor pacified but stands ready to burne it againe and againe Mercy finisheth her worke that consummates the creature justice finisheth her worke too and this consumes the creature When justice doth finish her worke yet then 't is righteous 't is in righteousnesse He will finish his worke in righteousnesse If this be the determination of God upon us that justice shall finish her work in the middest of us we are in a consumption and can never recover He will finish his worke in righteousnesse c. That 's a fatall sentence If free grace intercept not till justice hath finished her worke 't will eate us out all Wee have deserved to die all beate at heaven to know whether the heart of God be hardened as yours is and whether he be onely judiciarily bent against us And whom he will he hardens c. Flint to flint strikes nothing but fire God hardened and we hardened nothing but blowes and fire will or can issue out of this Plead with God for grace and compassion for the Land or we cannot live More particularly I would make application of this point Grace is free in soule distresses let us all feed upon this doctrine God doth not choose us and imbrace us for our beautie as Ahasuerus did Esther and yet this is it that makes many poore soules to shake off what they should take hold on I am very filthy preyed upon with this lust or that should such a one as I kisse the King of glory Is there any reason to thinke that he will take me into his armes and make me his delight Wee may not measure the wayes of God by the wayes of man Grace workes above reason that which we can give no ground for God doth his love passeth knowledge in the breadth length height and depth of it in the spring of it Why is this man or that beloved can any man give a ground more then that which Paul doth It pleased God to reveale his Son in me Nothing can be rendered as
that might speake matter of hope to thee Despaire in strength is very peremptory in conclusions but never deliberate in examinations of grounds 'T is a soule so tossed and tumbled between Satan and conscience day and night that it hath no power to ponder any thing Pressus ab exemplo discat sperare secunda Thou shalt goe to hell O my soule when thou diest Why I have sinned So did all the Saints that are in Heaven when they were in earth as now thou art did not David sin much in life and yet what a brave hope had he in death Sin enough in life to make him a type of Satan for bloud and unmercifulnesse and yet hope enough in death to make him a type of Christ Thou wilt not leave my soule in grave Yea but some persons sins have a very sad consideration over others have This is a truth but no sin or misery must have any such consideration as to sinke the soule Hold this position all that God doth is to bring us nearer to him If he whip us and strike never so hard or never so strangely 't is to bring us nearer him not to drive us further from him If he strike the body or the soule if he let loose Satan to tempt and let loose the heart to fall 't is to bring the soule nearer to God God doth nothing to drive away thy soule from him nor would he have any thing else doe it and wilt thou doe it thy selfe by every thing thou seest hearest feelest c Despaire makes use of externall senses all together more then of the Bible and construes all things amisse it harpes much upon the intention of God God intends my death he holds me for his enemie fury guides him in all that he doth about me one may run and read his frownes in all his actions Thou frownest alwayes O tempted soule and thou thinkest God doth so Thy soule is precious to Christ he doth not desire its death 't is more precious to Christ then to thy selfe Christ would save it and thou wouldest destroy it he meanes nothing else in the blackest saddest things that are upon thee but love and mercy therefore be not prejudized concerning his intention the saddest things that are upon thee if thou couldest but turne them upside downe thou shouldest see in them the smiling face of God Hold one position more that Gods intentions toward us are accompanied with the readiest means to accomplish them in us Good is long a coming this principle swallowed is destructive to Hope the next step will be this 't will never come Christ long a coming the next crosse makes the soule conclude he will never come Wee may not construe Christ tedious in his motion and yet 't is hard to doe otherwise when much put to it when tryals are sharpest mercy and deliverance is nearest The Heathen rage The Lord of hosts is with us saith the next verse Hold fast I come quickly When 't is as much as ever one can hold tryall being so strong then Christ makes hast and salvation is neare This principle well laid into the soule would make one hope to the end hope to the last man in a battell to the last breath in a sicknesse Jacob comes hindermost of the company Christ comes after all means are done Isaac which signifies laughter is a childe of old age Christ comes out of a withered womb the man-childe that makes us laughter comes out of means given up as barren When Christ throwes a man downe and throwes him very low then is he about to raise him When Christ kills then is he readie to make alive If this were received who could despaire Who would not hope of life when every one gives him over Yea of eternall life Finally hold one position more that Satan and thine own unbelieving heart conspire against thy tranquilitie hope is the joy of a mans life Satan hath none and it addes to his sorrow when he seeth any else have joy it greatens his hell when he sees any else have but a little of Heaven Finall despaire shuts up that cursed spirit and all those that are with him the worme that gnawes me will never die the fire that burnes me is unquenchable the chaines that hold me are everlasting chaines the pit I am in is bottomelesse no possible passage from hence not a drop of mercy falls in here to cole any scorched creature in the space of eternitie this is the tone of Tophet these are the dismall complaints which those restlesse soules below throw out as they role to and fro in that fiery furnace Despairing sinner Satan is fallen in with thy conscience to conjure thy soule into this condition Thou art in hell upon earth as that other phrase is of her that is dead while shee lives Tell me How dost thou sleepe How dost thou eate How dost thou walke How dost thou talke How dost thou looke Is not thy moisture turned into the drought of summer Thy body turned into skin and bones Alas for thee poore soule God never made such a way as this to Heaven 't is Satan and thy owne despairing heart one evill spirit tormenting another just as they doe below and the designe is to seale the soule up for wrath despaire is the black seale of the bottomlesse pit Lay all this together now and doe but thinke how unkindly you deale with Christ for all his love and paines which hath done so much for the tranquilitie of your life to make you hope here and possesse hereafter Christ hath taken upon him your debts there is not a sin that ever you committed not a trespasse against any rule but he will be accountable for it and in your stead and all to make you hope Some friends will undertake for part of ones debt to make one chearfull and this is much love too much to be slighted but then there remaines something behind and that sads and sinkes the heart How shall I pay that Bleeding soule Christ leaves thee no debt to pay no sin to answer for 'T is lively set out in that Parable Luk. 18.32 O wicked servant I forgave thee all that debt because thou desirest it shouldest not thou also have compassion on thy fellow-servant What should make feare when all is discharged If I did know it were so Dost thou not desire it should be so Wouldest thou not have all right and sweet between God and thy soule rather then any thing Yes Why this may be a demonstration to thee that all is right and even between God and thee Did I not forgive thee all thy debt because thou desirest me God forgives debts to Christ upon exact satisfaction but Christ forgives debts to us upon complaining of them and groaning under them and desiring their discharge upon a heart panting to be clean the voice goes forth from Christ I will be thou cleane Panting languishing soule for mercy thou hast obtained mercy thou desirest to
against providence because it doth not jut and jumpe with my will now all is slaine and not till now Heaven and Earth on fire body and soule killed with a canon from Hell and all the powers of darknesse crying victory Doe Serpents sting murmure not remember where Christs church is of which thou art yet a member t is in the Wildernesse yet and but going to Canaan and such places are full of hurtfull beasts Be not overcome of evill then misery dissolves it selfe into sinne then God is stung and thou wilt have secret blowes for this indeed where men cannot pinch thee thou wilt have salt throwne where the spring of unsoundnesse lies and then thy Spirit will burne within thee for something We should not onely be submissive to but joyfull under the crosse of our Lord Jesus You cannot tell how much mercy t is to be any of that body of which Christ is the soule if it be but a foot a bare foot and still in the dirt still upon prickes briers and thornes to be any of that company that is travelling to Heaven though the meanest the hindmost the most misused c. But you will know when you come there The crosse keepes off some from being of the Church militant they cannot militare they had rather die then fight and kill what they love more then Christ Sinne effeminates the soule love any lust more then Christ and you will die ten thousand deaths rather then strike a stroke in good earnest against it or discharge one Piece with a Bullet against that fort where your heart lies Satan deales by stratagem sinners looke to your soules he can kill none that take up Armes against him and stand to it he either betrayes affection with trifles and makes the soule yeeld and so stab conscience and sweare a damnable peace or else he terrifies the soule with corporall dangers and makes men flee and all that flee in spirituall warfare die every one are cut off eternally by the pursuer When there are fightings without there are feares within When I came into Macedonia my flesh had no rest troubles on every side fightings without and feares within Men now love their flesh Paul in this had no rest no neither in his spirit he had stood to it upon pure principles Hee wants fellowes in this age of the world wonderfully The Church of the Lord Jesus travels groanes dies for want of them This generation will have more then the advantage of truth to encourage them to set forth to wit the advantage of time quiet time Deluded soules when will this be you so dote upon your skin that you have quite forgotten the state of Christs church upon earth t is militant You will live in Egypt that you may see no warre that you may save your skin your pompe your wealth this your wisdome is your folly Egypt shall not save you the Sword shall follow you into Egypt into your Egyptian huts and coverings Read Jeremy 42.13 14 15. But if ye say We will not dwell in this Land c. No but we will goe into the Land of Egypt where we shall see no warre nor heare the sound of the Trumpet nor have hunger of bread and there will we dwell c. Then it shall come to passe that the Sword which ye feared shall overtake you there in the Land of Egypt and the famine whereof ye were afraid shall follow close after you in Egypt and there ye shall die COLOS. 1.24 For his bodies sake which is the Church THe word notes a company called out of this world and the scope according to which it is used here carries it in its full bredth to comprize all the blessed company both which are in Heaven and in earth this generall society was shadowed by the generall Assembly at Ierusalem and is called by that name by the Apostle Heb. 12.23 Ye are come to the generall Assembly the Church of the first-borne This Catholique company is great and farre divided some in Heaven some in Earth some in this part of the Earth some in that and yet all have but one spirit and therefore essentially the same and what is done for the good of one part necessarily redounds to the good and glory of all He is of a publique spirit that layes out for the good of a City of a Kingdome and the like thousands will blesse him generations yet not borne will blesse God for such instruments but he is of a publique spirit indeed that layes out his state or blood for the good of the Church of Christ many thousands in this Kingdome in other Kingdomes all the Earth over all Heaven over will blesse him This generall assembly comes all out of one loine and divide themselves into two bands one turnes to the everlasting Hills 'tother to the Plaines and Valleys of this world There is a Lilly of the Valleys and a Lilly of the Hils there is a Church on Earth and a Church in Heaven The great King whom we subject to hath a Chappell of ease a Church in his house the condition of this is farre different from that here below the Lilly of the Hils is another gets Lilly then that of the Valleys the pursuit of each shall be distinct which will demonstrate the condition how it differs The Church which Christ hath in his house is a society of perfect spirits in perfect rest triumphing with Christ over all enemies The Congregation above is very big thousands and thousands of thousands from all parts quarters and countries yet all perfect not one dwarfe in grace in Heaven not one Zacheus a person of a little stature there are no spirits of little stature in grace above though it be all our case here every one is as tall as Christ to any ones beholding I cannot tell else how to interpret that expression of the Apostles Eph. 4 Till we all come into the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Sonne of God unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fulnesse of Christ They that are come to that unity and society above are all compleat their measure is the fulnesse of Christ their demensions his stature so tall so big limmed so faire and so accomplished to looke upon What a perfect man now is Christ in Heaven of what a brave stature in grace and in glory an Absolon without spot from the crowne of the head to the soule of the foot so are all that Noble society which are with him without spot or wrinkle and therefore called a glorious Church That he might present it to himselfe a glorious Church not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing c. Ephes 5.27 the word here translated spot is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies such spots as are in garments by dashing and dirting outside spots they have no spots within nor without above not in their skin not in their clothes nor any such thing that is
the last the noblest so doth spirituall nourishment Hope is the last concoction of the soule the last digestion of words and workes by which pure bloud spirits substance and strength is delated and defused all over the state The Scripture makes three concoctions as Nature doth corporall and Hope is the last Tribulation worketh Patience Patience Experience Experience Hope and now the spirit hath spirit hath it self strength setlednesse therefore it followes and hope confounds not Providence toumbles the soule and the soul toumbles providence and the first result of this is patience the second result experience what God is at present and in the breast of this sits hope what God will be and smiles till things worke to this last issue the soule is confounded as the Apostle speaks Hope sucks the sweet of the words and works of God to the bottome that which lyes in the bottome of all God saith and doth to a Christian is heaven what ever lyes utmost the end is eternall life still to a Saint what ever things are a this side Things looke variously sometimes to a neare sight and explicite repugnancy betwixt words and works between such an end and such meanes ordained to it and yet all in an ultimate interpretation carry an exact subordination to the soules highest good Hope is a great Peere privy to the depth of wisdome to the intentions and resolutions of God and to the harmony of all changes and turnings how when and where they will meet in such a blessed end and lies and bathes and sports her selfe in the consistances of all varieties with and towards her prime good 't is a grace to which felicity is alwayes in view a halcyon that findes out a quiet place upon the most moving and boysterous body to wit the sea Hope t is a soul free from a Consumption fat and merry eates not out it s owne spirits nor its owne marrow Some kinde of Spiders eate out the Dam which sits upon them as soone as hatcht so do the thoughts and apprehensions of some souls kill the minde and spirit that brings them forth they are such poysonous and eating things they are so venemous so fiery so dark so gnawing so voyd of heaven of any glimpse of it and so full of hell I reckon upon my afflictions from morning to night saith Hezekiah and I have cut off mine own life his soule hatched such thoughts in time of distresse as did gnaw out the bowells and. life of it selfe that affliction became as death and death as hell which is the property of despaire and unbeliefe to render persons as destroyed and damn'd already as that expression is As there be soules damn'd already and in hell already so there be souls saved already and in heaven already in heaven whilst looking for it apprehension of it in Christ so strong so clear what ever accidentals turmoile the outward man the while Accounting that the long-suffering of the Lord is salvation 2 Pet. 3.15 t is a soule that hath so clear an apprehension of the issue of all sufferings for Chirst that the issue of them is in him already what he expects is to him already in a degree in judgement and account judging that the long-suffering of God is salvation yea not onely in judgement not onely in strong evidence and conviction but in sweet contemplation delectation and fruition for 't is a grace that speaks the love of God shed abroad in the soule and experience hope and hope makes not ashamed why because the soule now hath a good part what it hopes for Because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the holy Ghost which is given to us Rom. 5.5 Vse Our felicity lies in noble principles 't were well if we had an impregnable estate in these times Every thing is unsetled and almost hopelesse how is your spirituall condition Every thing without hath made its will and bequeathed it selfe to Death Devills Ruine have your soules made their will and bequeathed themselves to Death and Devills too Ah my soule what a sad state is this Sinne reignes though every thing runne to ruine this doth not The Sword of the Spirit can kill no sinnes therefore it doth soules O how consciences bleed how ghastly are many soules now more to seek for eternall safety then temporall I know not what these wretches will doe God and man are upon you and against you whither will you flee what will you doe for relief Nothing destroyes hope like an evill conscience Now sinners tell me what is sinne now to you Where is that sweet that did ere while so extraordinarily take you what is that in your sinne that did hold you so fast and so long from Christ Shew me now the kirnell of your course You have been cracking shells a great while and what now is the in-side of all nothing but Death and Hell and in stead of your wonted joy an afrighted soule and a fearefull looking for of judgement and fiery indignation Now that which you chose should stand you in most stead doth it thus cheat you then write upon thy sinne Vanity upon thy heart Thou hast deluded me I know not what will be the issue of these evill times death is gathering to the heart apace to the heart of Kingdomes Estates and the like if it be there already in order to your soules truly Justice is quicke with you and you had neede looke about you In swoning fits cordials be necessary something to be taken inwardly that is Christ he fetches life and hope Christ in you the hope of glory Sinfull fearefull wretches there is nothing in you but nature and the old man therefore are you so weake and wicked in your course so dreadfull in apprehension about the end Men would do much sometimes in their owne strength when a lively word takes hold on them but this cannot be never considering how desolate all within is Your eyes are not in your head as the wise man speaks that is they are not in your heart you see nothing within as you should When conscience is fired by the word you thinke to do this and that presently and then all will be well and then fayle in the action and so increase the flame Conscience when a fire must have something dropt in to it things done without are nothing to wit the bloud of Christ Not a sparkle of hell is alayed without bloud without the bloud of Christ or the bloud of the soule Application of remedy must be as the distresse lies your hell is within you and Christ must descend into hell to do a sinner good to set his soule in rest and hope he must goe into the World to save it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. 10.5 Christ must come into this World and then into the heart of man that is in it into the great World and then into the little World which he is willing to doe and so expresseth himselfe Heb. 10.5 When
every thing in Christ we shall stand and see God above face to face that which we cannot doe here and live no nor there out of Christ in his light we shall be able to master that great object in his light we shall be able to see that great light that dazles all the creation to behold and then hath the soule all that ever it is to have all that ever it desires to have With respect to this wide scope I am upon and affirming concerning Christ is Christ cald the heire of all things Heb. 1.2 Earth Heaven grace and glory The Apostle is yet more expressely particular in this thing and saith that we are glorified in him That the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ might he glorified in you and ye in him according to the grace of our God 2 Thes 1.12 In him we are heires and in him we are actuall inheritors Perfection is hotly pursued by all to wit a compleate state though what it is and in whom be mistaken almost by all The soule of man is the greatest traveller that you have read off if its travells could be written out or if any volumne would containe them you would say so as full of motion as there be objects in the world and minutes in the day and in the night to finde out one fully to blesse it selfe in and rest but cannot because Christ is overlookt and therefore dies in travell Prudence will speak much of this in many experienced persons yet Christ never the more regarded nor sought after this is sad Every cisterne is broken every vessell full of leakes saith the sinner and yet he is found still stopping up these leakes and going out againe to Sea venturing Life Soule Heaven all that ever is in these broken bottomes I tremble at no state but this Conviction abused conversion is farther off the man then from him that is a simple sinner that tasts no bitter in any dish at the Divils table Folly found out and yet made further triall of the man will not he cannot escape punishment if the foole go on hee will be punished First-folly is pittied and discovered that is simple simplicity simple sinning as one would say when a man doth thus and thus for want of knowledge but when the foole is found out and yet will on he will now die in his folly Conviction is sanctified when experienced emptinesse of the creature makes the soule looke out where indeed fulnesse is when the Canticles follow next after Ecclesiastes when the soule with Solomon having found and confest the vanity of the creature falls a breathing and a panting after Christ Balaam was convinced stopt with a drawne sword from Heaven and yet would on the Asse could not go and yet Balaam would God Iames and slayes things under us that we ride with our affections like mad men and yet we have no mind to alight and come off them things we dote upon God by some stroak or other upon them makes them speake in our conscience like that Asse to Balaam why wilt thou on O my soule any further this way death is before thee the sword of Gods displeasure is drawne and at thy breast because of this wicked motion stop sinner now stop now cast thy eye an other way towards Christ and see what is in him taste how good and gracious he is no I will not I will have the tother bout I will spurr a little farther and see to the utmost if I can curse Jsrael and get that great pay proferd There is a perfection of misery as well as of felicity and this forementioned is it when a sinner will pursue his sinne to the utmost go to the end of long suffering then wrath comes inevitably upon him and to the utmost when the man say's that his sinne shall out-live every object ere it shall cease and rides every horse to death to fetch and find out pleasures to keepe his lust alive then God say's that this lust shall out-live the man too and then it out-lives all indeed when the soule is rid to death As there is a never pardoning of sinne till the soule die so there is a never subduing of sinne for these are necessarily subordinate till the soule die never a taking off the love of sinne from the soule till the soule grow sicke and die in love All perfection being in Christ t is well onward toward all that neede it such as are in distresse for grace or glory should so account and be incouraged Sinne is a very burdensome thing when God opens the eyes the aggravations and multiplications of this by conscience over-beare the soule much When Christ puts not in how shall I withstand so many enemies get off so much pollution what shall I do for this what shall I do for that saith the soule Why think on this all perfection is in Christ and because in him it lies ready for thee Every good and perfect gift as the Apostle James speakes thou needest dispensations which have a perfection of goodnesse in them Christ hath every good and perfect thing in him and because he hath them they are all ready to be bestowed on thee to be bestowed for nothing every perfect good he hath is a perfect gift and comes downe saith the Text when the soule doth not fetch it Thou hast many imperfections and Christ hath many perfections and thou canst do nothing to get these not one of these if thou couldest doe any thing they would not come this way for they are al gifts perfect gifts and come downe upon us and are not puld downe as the next verse doth there interpret of his owne will hee begat us As Christ doth begin so he doth finish all of his owne-will Christ is given which is summum or perfectum cardinale and then every good and perfect thing in him must needs be so too gifts and given freely with him as the Apostle speakes Having given us Christ hee will with him freely give us all things Rom. 6.32 't is not an easy thing to bring the soule to belive every perfect good to be a perfect gift to be as perfectly a gift as 't is perfectly good There is an order in grace but no merit first this thing is done then that but all freely through this medium and through that as a Pipe through Preaching and through Praying and through Hearing but not for any of these And therefore when a soule objects this and objects that he cannot doe this nor he cannot do that I will answer as many objections of this kind as any one can possibly make in one word what ever you need is a perfect gift I cannot believe nor do no thing to make saith yet there is no cause of dejection faith is a perfect gift more perfectly a gift then in the formality of the thing perfect so may it be said of all other things that the soule complaines on grace hath no merit but order which
is this when Christ would perfect a soule in himselfe he turnes a man off and out of himselfe out of creatures of Gods making and out of creatures of the mans owne making out of his prayers and all his duties and this he doth sometime by letting the man fall into sin when proud of any parts or workes and sometimes in a more mild sweet way where nature is more meek and sweet and then when the soule is turn'd off and turnd out of all he that is indeed all presents himselfe to him and woes and wins the soule I will be a husband to thee saith Christ friends riches honours whatsoever can be desired to make one blessed the great world is han'gd upon nothing so is the little world to wit a Christian brought first to be nothing in understanding but a brute nothing in action but worse then a brute a devill very poore very poore in spirit and then blest with a Kingdom and now the soule that was nothing nor could do nothing for Christ or against sin can do all having regnum he hath proprium regni having a Kingdome he hath the proprium of that Kingdome which is dominion over all hee that is made a King and hath a Kingdom doth not rule in this Town only or that Town but over all parts in the Kingdom and this order Christ will move in towards you that desire it for this Kingdom and all belonging to it is a perfect gift COLOS. 1.29 Whereunto I also labour TO take soules from off themselves and to set them downe in Christ beares much by divine Ordinance upon our calling and makes our worke very hard which is noted in this terme labour 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the word signifies such actions and industrie as faints wastes and weares out all such a labour as Solomon speaks of Eccles 10.15 The labour of the foolish wearieth every one of them because he knoweth not how to goe to the City This Emphasis of the word is held forth to the Thessalonians to worke them to a reverend esteem of their teachers We beseech you brethren to know them which labour among you and are over you in the Lord 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which spend and waste themselves amongst you to take you off from sinne and selfe and to set you downe in Christ in whom onely soules are fully and perfectly blessed We are as Jonathans armour-bearer whither so ever our Master goes we are to goe after him though we creep upon all foure Your life is our death your fatning is our leaning your Raven-black haires are our milke white We are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 Tim. 3.2 Such as wax white with painfulnesse and watchfulnesse reading praing sighing mourning and groaning for your good Coaction with Christ is no idle imployment he doth not attempt small things neither is he of small strength to keep pace with such weak agents as we are 't is hard work to draw in yoke with one that is double and treble in strength above me We are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 workers together with Christ he attempts the greatest things that are and the most desperate the taking of holds strong holds Canaanites Hittites c. which dwell in Towns which are walled up to heaven and founded downe to hell he attempts the bloud and death of all the conquest of this whole world the generall making such desperate attempts and taking onely Rams-hornes a sling and a stone such a fraile party as we are you may easily think our work to be desperate full of paine and perill Had man been set to fight with man one man with one man that had been painfull worke but man is drawn out to fight with beasts the fiercest beasts with Lions Beares Wolves Serpents Scorpions yea with devills there was never such a fight in the grand Circue at Rome We wrestle with such creatures as have no hold-fast to be taken of them which have no armes no legs no flesh nor bones we wrestle not against flesh and bloud but against principalities against powers against the rulers of the darknesse of this world against spirituall wickednesses in high places Ephes 6.12 We are drawne out to fight upon all the disadvantage in the world against creatures that are upon higher ground that have pitched field in high places that have no flesh to be wounded nor bloud to lose that can make ambushments at pleasure being the rulers of the darknesse of this world this is the Rhetorick of the Apostle We are Stewards of mysteries sentence is past upon us to dye according to the Law which we have broken onely we have the benefit of our book but this book is written as books of such nature usually are very mysteriously with an old strange Character our worke is to stand by and prompt soules concerning their neck verse which is very painfull and trembling worke the book in which sinners are to read for their life is written with bloud which is very inward and ominous inke The Characters and Syllables sutable when put together into words these words are spirit The words I speake saith Christ are spirit What is a more inward and hidden thing then this and yet this are we to interpret our worke is to be an interpreter betweene two of very remote parts that live as farre asunder as heaven and earth as heaven and hell I might say between Spirits the spirit of God and the spirit of man one whereof 't is more proper to say is in hell whilst out of heaven then in any middle place between Transactions between God and the soule are the deepest the weightiest the intricat'st things in the world A sinner is convicted sentenced carried to the place of execution his winding sheet wrapt about his shoulders his handkerchiffe tyed before his eyes his halter about his neck his sentence written upon his forehead in this shalt thou hang till thou bee dead and yet possibly no internall intention concurring or meaning the bloud of the soule Divining in this case at the foot of the Ladder what will become of him that is on the top on 't sitting trembling whether he will be turned off or fetcht downe with a pardon is extraordinary hard work to determine and yet beares not upon any extraordinary office no Angel is dispatcht from heaven to be an oracle in this difficult case but it lyes upon our shoulders by ordinance The Priests lips are to preserve knowledge If there be any divining in this extraordinary worke t is not by extraordinary but ordinary office there is not one from the dead to tell who shall dye next no one sent from hell to tell who is to come next thither Things belonging both to the death and life of the soule are made manifest by our ministration by our labour wee are the Heralds of Heaven the Trumpet of God in which he sounds Retreat and March fight and victory funerall and triumph we are to sound sad and dolefull sweet
forgivenesse of sin is p. 57 Christ is admirable in action and in person p. 59 The excellency of Christs person makes the excellency of his action p. 60 How Noble action proceeds from the Noble forme of things p. 61 What Christ is in compleatnesse he is for believers p. 62 63 Christ as the Image of God to man explained p. 63 64 65 How to conforme to Christ as the Image of God p. 66 No representation for Divine adoration but Christ how nature attempts nothing this way and how fancie if it would is disadvantaged p. 67 68 God invisible in action and person p. 70 That God is invisible in action tremble before him p. 73 Gods action is invisible trust in him ibid. That God is in person invisible long to be out of the body p. 74 What first-borne notes Birth-right an honourable thing p. 74 75 They which have but a meere naturall birth-right spoken to and they which have both a naturall and a spirituall p. 76 77 Bâ—avenesse of spirit to maintaine priviledge wanting p. 78 Every thing a this side Christ a creature things therefore should be feared loved trusted in as they are p. 79 80 81 Men are apt to conceive too low and too meane of Christ p. 82 We set up things as we see them and as we love them p. 82 83 84 Demonstrations of setting Christ above all p. 84 85 A holy soule cannot tire it selfe in the contemplation of Christ p. 87 There is variety congruity transcendency of excellency in Christ p. 87 88 Three things that destroy divine contemplation p 88 89 T is our duty and our consolation to contemplate whole Christ p 90 91 God doth create and new create in Christ ibid. All divine action going forth in Christ is consolation to the godly they may argue for the choysest mercy upon this ground p. 93 Earth the room we live in here which is low common darke filthy p. 95 96 97 As our dwelling is so should we expect to find things p. 97 98 But one good neighbour in Earth ibid. The workes of God afford man a full soule imployment p. 99 The soule is noble in its acts and Christ would lose none for want of imployment p. 100 The soule is remisse in its acts Christ leaveth this without excuse p. 100 Whence soule-idlenesse about divine things springs p. 100 101 Thrones Dominions are explained p. 102 Christ hath an unexpressable power by him at command to over-rule this world p. 102 Angelicall properties p. 103 104 The pride and folly of men that war against God p. 105 Christians exhorted to trust in Christ because of his command of Angels p. 106 107 All things must be for Christ p. 108 Many will dye by this law that all is to be for Christ p. 110 Nothing will be for Christ as it should be when the heart is not p. 110 What speakes the heart for God in action p. 111 Affection naturally is no whit divine p. 112 What eternity is p. 113 There is principium ordinis temporis essentiae p. 113 Obedience must be suited to Christs being and moving p. 114 Christ as an eternall agent worketh in the soule p. 115 Christ being eternall eternall things may be had p. 116 In Christ all things consist and what this expression imports p. 117 118 What providence is common and speciall p. 119 120 Consolation to necessitous creatures that in Christ all consists p. 121 122 What to be observed to make Christ give out himselfe for sweet subsistance p. 123 There is store in Christ for all spirituall necessity p. 125 Grounds why not supplied with much from Christ our head p. 127 Many spirituall eonsiderations to quiet soules that are complaining for want of much of Christ ibid. Christ as head what his rule is and where p. 130 131 Men cannot beare the rule of Christ p. 131 Two things demonstrate the heart ruled by Christ p. 132 133 Severall considerations to draw the heart under the rule of Christ p. 134 135 The principality of Christs Priesthood demonstrated p. 136 137 Christs Priestly Office to be made used of p. 138 Hard to convince men that they trust in their woâ—kes two things discover it p. 136 Consolation in a double respect issues from the Priestly Office of Christ to believers p. 140 141 The superiority of Christs Propheticall Office set forth p. 142 143 Christ teacheth internally eternally instantly p. 15 146 Whether taught of â—hrist and what demonstrates it p. 146 147 Christ hath a generall glory a garment without seame p. 148 Gold proffered to sinners that hath no drosse p. 149 Persons that would love Christ are excepted ibid. God fits one thing to another p. 150 Gods way in this world is a tracing of man ibid. The Deity speaks out it selfe in apt action ibid. Divine action is to make conviction p. 150 151 God will be even with men that oppose him p. 152 England to justifie Christ in all her misery p. 153 The folly of some in looking for great things what fitteth for great things p. 154 155 A gracious heart is taken with Christ as chiefe ibid. Judgement is cleare and love sincere in a Saint p. 155 156 Persons exhorted to consider who is chiefe in their soules three things speake the undervaluing of Christ p. 156 157 158 I cannot believe this objection answered to p. 159 Saints prize Christ as chiefe and so doth he them the benefit of this ibid. We are all by sin dead the properties of spiritually death p. 160 161 Now trading is dead to thinke of dead hearts p. 163 Two things tend to spirituall life p. 163 164 Christ hath in all things the preheminence what universall dominion meanes p. 165 166 The power of Christ to be laid to heart proud sinners to trouble at it p. 167 As God hath set Christ over all so should we p 168 Love sets Christ as high as God hath set him over all ibid. The blessednesse of their condition that gives Christ preheminence in all things p. 169 How freely God contrives reliefe for man p. 170 Free motion the purest the noblest the surest the sweetest p. 170 171 That Gods motion to sinners is free should comfort them p. 172 T is pleasing to God to give grace but not so to sinners to receive it ibid. Deniall of free grace hath foure aggravations p. 173 174 Every thing is shaped to man according to Gods own will p. 178 Things below man equall to man above man are all shaped by Gods will p. 179 Though God yet no man may pursue his own will ibid. A man fast to his will was first very loose from God p. 180 A man pinned to his will hath three grand plagues upon him p. 181 182 Very comfortable in all conditions that things come to us according to Gods will p. 183 God restlesse till fallen man relieved p. 161 T is naturall to God to shew mercy he eyes the beauty of action the necessity of action p.
first abus'd his soul and then his body he swel'd within pride puffed up his spirit the man would be God pride is spirituall wickednesse which had suitable justice man is made naked within as well as without body and soul stript of God and he that would be a God is no man but a beast Man that was in honour became as the beast that perisheth that is perishing all over for you know so is the state of a beast soul and body perishing Justice works like justice she makes suitable revenge to cut off a finger when the man deserves to have his neck cut off humane justice doth not go forth so unsuitably neither doth divine Man abus'd his glory his soul and therefore God turned this glory into shame man defiled this with sinne and therefore this is subjected to wrath and made to need deliverance most and therefore is this deliverance here from sinne noted as the grand deliverance Who hath delivered us from the power of darknesse c. Man is in soul-misery universally Wrath death soul-death Universally is passed over all men The whole world is a great field of slain souls not a man in the world but lies under a deadly soul-wound Unbelief hath shut up all and that 's a soul-plague and yet the plague of all saith the Apostle Jews and Gentiles The whole world is shut up in sinne and misery and needs a deliverance what a great goal is one sinne become a gangrene keeps not at one part it runs over all There were many lepers in Israel saith the prophet and he also saith there were many widows but I cannot say of this world that there are many lepers and many widows but all are lepers and widows unmarried creatures to Christ not one good Who can say his heart is clean Prov. 20.9 There is a plague of the body but that is not every ones plague but there is a plague of the heart and that is every ones plague there are mortall diseases upon the immortall souls of all and the expression in the Text here speaks it plain Who hath delivered us from the power of darknesse who hath taken us out of the common deluge Use The truth is plain before you man is in soul-misery he needs a soul-deliverance Apply this point to your selves are you sensible of the truth of it do you set your selves to work answerably Bodily misery begins to creep towards you and you are very sensible of this bloud and wounds are like to be common to catch hold of every one and every ones flesh shakes O what misery are we in saith one and what misery are we in saith another yea but what misery is thy soul in art thou sensible of that dost thou feel that plague of plagues that misery within which hath made all so miserable without Bodily misery is but to make sensible of soul-misery 't is Gods pulling the rope without to make the bell speak within and 't is many thousand mens unhappinesse that they consider not this and it comes as the last means to do this The sunne shines a great while as the onely kind means to open mens eyes and to bring them to see their state but when this will not do the sunne sets and darknesse comes in the place thereof that is misery and calamity to beat open these doors which love could not unlock Look about thee England thy last remedie is upon thee to make thee good to make thee know thy lukewarmnesse thy settlednesse upon thy lees thy soul-misery Thou beginnest to grow very poore in temporalls dost thou yet begin to see that thou art poore in spiritualls Thou beginnest to be made naked in body dost thou yet begin to see thy soul-nakednesse what a poore blind wretched and naked Church thou art what a pitifull soul thou hast Bishops may be and Common Prayer book may be and this and that unwarranted thing may be in Gods worship such language as this speaks how soul-miserable thou art still But I will not be so generall in the application of this point I will speak particularly to you In the night owls eyes are open and they see 'T is night now in England and very dark ye blind creatures are your eyes open do you yet see any thing that belongs to your souls doth sinne revive now things without are kill'd your iniquity hath found ye out have you found out it Can you lay your hand on your heart and say Here 's that iniquity that hath made a kingdome bleed my family desolate undone me and mine Paul when the Law was preached to him sinne revived and he died in the consideration of his wretched condition God preaches Law now all the kingdome over because Gospel will do no good doth sinne revive now and can you see the wretched state of your souls When the sonnes of Jacob were cast into bodily misery then their soul-misery came to sight what they had done to their brother Joseph and they could lay their hand distinctly upon that within which brought so much misery without upon them When ponds are stirred and water let out then frogs and toads appear and we see what uggly things they are Thus hath God dealt with many of you Londoners you had great estates like great deep ponds and now God hath let out all almost that you may see what mud toads and frogs are at the bottome of it in your souls with what hearts ye got and kept your wealth do you see any uggly creatures yet stirre in your souls ye are almost I think some of you in Josephs brethrens case ready to starve for want of bread Can you now like them tell that within which hath made such clean work without which hath clean'd your teeth and your states Sensibility of soul-misery is the thing that is driven at in all this The man that complains not of soul-misery amongst all other miseries he undergoes I am afraid is not sensible of the main evil upon him Where there is a new man and an old in one heart there is a perpetuall warre and this very sensible I find a law in my members rebelling against the law of my mind That which will be death to the soul is death to it and the soul groans under it as in the pangs of death Who shall deliver me from the body of this death Corruption according to its qualitie and according to its quantity a soul sensible of its state is sensible of both what corrupt bloud is in him and how much and how it runs up and down in every vein and pricks as it goes and no Physician like him that can do good to this diseased body Who shall deliver me from this body of death What a burthen corruption is to you in the body of it and in the branches of it and what a death it makes to your life what a blessing desired is Christ and what pantings daily about these things you know there is no way like
your affections burn and your hearts beat to be redeemed That 's well then there is but one step more believe and you are redeemed out of bondage and this will be wrought it will spring and grow insensibly out of those pantings and breathings which are upon you I have seen the bondage of my people and I have heard their cry saith God When bondage makes crying out O what shall I do and who shall deliver me Enemies are got into a body and are deadly strong a body of death besets my soul and in the midst of this body shall not I loose my soul Now the sinner is turned from iniquity and now the redeemer comes to Sion Let the redeemed admire and adore the redeemer this one thing I will touch and give up the point and I am the rather induced unto it because 't is the use made in my text In whom we have redemption through his bloud Which words are spoken in way of admiration and thanksgiving and are but the continuation of that thanksgiving which is begun in the verse fore-going The redemption of the soul is precious silver would not reach it gold would not reach it onely the precious bloud of Christ would do it precious bloud must stirre and precious spirits leap from this consideration as high as heaven and spurtle up in Gods face Freedome binds man all must be sent to heaven that is saved from hell Let the redeemed say this and say that saith the Psalmist Redemption is obligation who ever hangs by his harp a redeemed person must not because he hath his advantage with him above all others his lesson set and laid before him yea his instrument tuned and put into his hand his lips are opened as the Psalmist speaks 't is but stirre thy tongue and matter cannot be wanting nor affections be able to lie still He that died for us must be perfumed and carried home honourably and buried in his own countrey as Jacob was he that died for you on earth must be perfumed by praises and carried to his own countrey and buried in heaven You must not bury Christ in his works but take him up out of his works and words and carry him to heaven and bury him there Nature abhorres burying things in their own bloud you must not bury Christ in his own bloud but take him up out of his bloud and bath him and perfume him and lay him to sleep in the arms of his father The redemption we speak of here and would have you thankfull for respects your souls and your bodies what mercy comes to either is a blessing from Christ as a Redeemer Not a deliverance in these bloudy times but from the bloud of Christ from that great redeemer that sits in heaven Bodily redemption is but the outside of soul-redemption I hope the blindest sight will be able to see the out-sides of mercy Blind wretches look upon temporall redemptions which now Christ makes and see if you can blesse him for these you had not had the lives of your bodies nor the livelihood of your estates at this houre had not your redeemer pleaded for you had not he pleaded for you w th his bloud you had been all ere this tumbling in your own bloud you had had your bloud trod under foot by those which have long trod under foot the bloud of Christ One redeemer works all redemptions for soul and body one redeemer pleads in soul-cases and in bodily cases See a full plain place Prov. 23.18 Enter not into the fields of the fatherlesse for their redeemer is mightie he shall plead their cause with thee It is but one redeemer that pleads for us in spirituall things and in corporall and therefore in all mercies both spirituall and corporall let Christ be honoured and praised Coloss 1.14 In whom we have redemption through his bloud THe way of grace is here considerable life comes through death God comes in Christ and Christ comes in bloud to save The choisest mercies come through the greatest miseries prime favours come swimming in bloud to us Through a red sea Israel came to Canaan Many a man lost his life and much bloud shed the very land flowing with milk and honey made to flow with bloud ere Israel could inherit the promise seven nations were destroyed ere the land of Canaan was divided to the Israelites Acts 13 19. Israel came to Canaan through bloud and kept in Canaan through bloud Samson was strangled in his own bloud like Christ to keep bloud and life in that blessed people The harlot had her life by a scarlet thread and so had the rest of her faith As the promised land so the promised crown came swimming to David in bloud how many men died and how near was David death many times ere that promise of his honour did live Josephs garment was dipt in bloud and he dead alive for so many years and this was the way to his greatnesse and to the saving of the life of all the holy seed Sinne makes mercie so deadly hard in bringing forth to cristen every precious child every Benjamin Benoni every sonne of Gods right hand a sonne of sorrow and death to her that brings him forth Adam's sweets had no bitter till he transgressed Gods will one mercie did not die to bring forth another till he died One creature was a felicitie for another and none a death to or for another mercy generated mercy and man fed upon the cream and top of all and yet the bottom as sweet as the top mans felicitie was no creatures misery under him they were happy in him and he in them and all in the presence of God to each I will rain bread from heaven saith God to Moses and this was an extraordinary thing then and yet ordinary to Adam before his fall spiritually understood he had all his provision without cost or toil his felicity descended from heaven upon him as dew heaven and earth opened and not any ones sides or veins and so mercy streamed upon him he had his felicity with no more hardship then Angels Man would have his pleasure and God would have his too divine pleasure hath turned the course of love The sea hath runne so many thousand years in such a channell yet God can when he will turn it into another though so broad and big an element The sea is bottomlesse but not boundlesse 't is ordered by the pleasure of God and so is mercy the will of God bounds it orders it keeps it in and lets it forth through what channells it will life through death heaven through hell The first covenant was sealed with life the tree of life was the seal of Adams first grace and favour the second covenant is ratified with death the tree of life must die or else none could live by eating of it 't is not life out of life now as out of the first covenant but life out of death and this necessarily because
according to the will of God Verily unlesse a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die it abides alive but if it die it bringeth forth fruit John 12.24 God hath taken counsell of his will and turned the sea of love into a new channell the first covenant gave out all favours without bloud but the second through bloud through Christs bloud and our own Christs cup is called Gods will and our cup is called Christs will the will of God orders both these and therefore is Christs cup when full of bloud said to be Gods will not my will but thine c. And our bloudy cup also called Gods will if any suffer according to his will c. Great favours to come through great hardships is the will of God Means carry proportion to their end death to make death the death of Christ to make the death of the serpent bruising to bruise it was so proportioned by God It shall bruise thine head and thou shalt bruise his heel Nature hides her choise things closest and bids art use pains sutable to prise to obtain them and so doth grace she hides life in death our life is hid saith the Apostle where In bleeding dying Christ Wisdome orders great things to be obtained with great pains grace and glory in bloud in Christs bloud and our own Christ gets heaven by suffering and all that will live godly with him shall suffer too Means are generally proportioned to their end so by God to Christ and so by Christ to us This world is thrown upon men which is providence disposing sutable to things disposed this world is worth nothing and comes for nothing but the world to come is invaluable and the way to it proportionable the bloud of Jesus Christ and the bloud of his people the one per modum meriti the other per modum congrui Things are prised rather as they come then as they are farre fetched and dear bought makes all the prise and gives all the worth with us weak creatures upon this ground the Scripture when it speaks of our great fortune tells the great prise it cost as eying our weaknesse who look more at what things cost then at what things are and as knowing if any thing will work and take with us this will To him that loved us and washed us from our sinnes in his own bloud Rev. 1.5 Man is a legall creature and looks much at what is given for a thing and prises this more then that which comes for little he values things more under a notion of prise then under a notion of freenesse What did this cost why it cost Christs own bloud Fancie works foolishly in weak brains colour is more then the cloth and scarlet colour a generall taking colour and therefore is Christs garment dipt in bloud and he admired in this habit Who is this that comes from Edom with garments died red from Bozra Use Let no man be offended if mercy come any way to sinners though through never so much bloud and misery Sinne had totally and finally closed up every wombe of grace and it could not enter into the imagination of any creature that ever any dramme of mercy should find any way to them that the earth opens after much sweating and labouring and that heaven opens after much sweating and bleeding to send forth favours to sinners is beyond the expectation of men and Angels Mercy lay buried under impossibility of resurrection impossibilities reduced to difficulties and grace become fesable though with much cost is admirable Deadly sentence was with redoubled strength passed and not with a syllable of revocation for any lost creature to make the least guesse at any restauration By dying thou shalt die c. Here is the grave of a whole world of felicity and a stone rolled upon it daring all powers in heaven and in earth to open it if they can and that grace notwithstanding so buried should rise and become atainable is admirable I wonder that all the world is not bleeding and howling in hell and every one catching his bloud as it falls and writing out his fall in capitall letters to the glory of justice to all eternitie 't is wonderfull to me that it is not the whole imployment of all the creatures in this world to drown one another in bloud to stab tear and rend one another in pieces without any ceasing as that world below doth that there are not two hells a higher and a lower an upmost and a nethermost and that this is not as bad as that that all of this side heaven is not hell out-right Murmuring spirits be patient you think much to see so much spoil and bloudshed in the land 't is the way of God to bring great things to man through the bloud of prime brave persons are brave things brought forth Is there a braver person then Christ in the land or in any land and yet through his sides and through his bloud must great and gallant favours come You eye your pain and not Gods pleasure his way is in the deep the Leviathan tumbles there in the sea in the red sea in bloud and death to life and glory do ye think to justle God out of his wayes as ye justle a man Murmuring is spirit justling against spirit a bad against a good and the worst will have the worst for God treads such to death as will not give him his way You know that God fell out with his own people deadly when they disliked the way of hardship which he had cast them into to humble them and to do them good under heathen princes Let a wise man propose such an end and such a way to it let it be what it will red or white fair or foul you honour him in all and with joy look for good in this way give God this honour Wisdomes way to great things is in bloud in the bloud of some prime persons to the life and welfare of many One or two things may make us give God the honour of his way to such an end let his way be never so sad in our eye God alwayes makes his way most just to what end soever he bends mercy comes clothed but like your sinne when it comes clothed in scarlet your sinnes are crimson scarlet sinnes you die mercies red and bloudy 't is not God Justice treads upon sinne properly upon man accidentally as he lies under it if no body did ly under sinne justice would tread no body to death to bring life into the world nor shed a drop of any ones bloud to bring the greatest blessings to us God goes after man because man will not go after God justice follows sinners because sinners will not follow righteousnesse God doth not step a step in a way of punishment but as you lead him and to trace you in your wayes of sinne all wayes of bloud and death you chalk out to him you lead love out of his way and
much of his worth which spake him a child of perdition there be more of these children in the world You Londoners have heard much and seen much of Christ more I think then any city under heaven and yet to many of you your bags and your wealth I fear are dearer then the Lord Jesus Some things are afflicting others ruining undervaluing of Christ is damnable the spots of this I will shew you Three things speak the undervaluing of Christ truth neglected sinne approv'd Christ unbelieved Light is to walk by men sleight this and sear their consciences truth is neglected when not made a rule of life Able discoursing speaks not prising of truth but practising Truth is made subordinate to self ends the plague is in the heart love is not sincere Christ is not prised above the world Many will not fully follow God because it will fully undo them to follow truth as the world approves is to prize Christ onely as the world doth Fear your own hearts snares are many within and without Christ is indeed prized when his will is obeyed Action speaks out affection If you love me keep my commandments if the heart be drawn the foot will run the crown wheel moving though but slowly the little wheels run apace the hand and the foot are but little wheels in order to the heart if this be drawn and moved though but a little the other run Draw me and I will runne after thee Draw me that is my heart and then feet and all other parts shall come Affection puts on to action O how willing to obey is that soul that sincerely loves He would go he would run he would ride post to please God no precept harsh where the heart is right Christ made chief and so is his will above an Isaac By faith Abraham when he was tried offered up Isaac God tried Abraham what was chief in his heart himself or Isaac and Abraham gives open testimony of his affection in his action Sinne approved speaks Christ undervalued Will is strong lusts overcoming and pleasing to the most and alas for such souls Christ is not prised as chief Approbatio mali est reprobatio animi Some sinne from mis-understanding God pities these some sinne from mis-affection more then from mis-apprehension they love darknesse better then light which is reprobation of mind a soul disapproving the truth which he knows What I would I understand not or I know not saith Paul when he wrought evil and he argues from hence that God and the Gospel would pity him What I do I allow not so you reade it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Nosco to know I think is from this Greek word I know not Weak hearts you do many things amisse of ignorance and Christ will pity you and therefore wound not your selves But wilfull wretches you put bitter for sweet you call evil good you love vanities and follow after lies the evil courses you follow you love and approve To prise Christ and to prise sinne are inconsistent you cannot love God and Mammon You are positive in your evil way you put darknesse for light you justifie your course which is drawing of Christs bloud out of his sides and then trampling upon it and despising of it when ye haue done which is the highest undervaluing of Christ Christ unbelieved is Christ undervalued it is frowning upon one that smiles boundlesse grace limited The great things of my Law are made small things saith the Lord. Lessening speaks undervaluing it doth so respecting precepts and respecting promises Unbelief makes great precepts no precepts and it maketh great promises no promises It is the highest commendation of any dish at Christs table that you eat heartily of it Christ accounts it so it is the highest valuation of Christ that you rest upon him that you take life at his hands which he proffers Sinners would you prise Christ be invited then unto unto him by what he proffers he will pardon you he will purge you he will justifie sanctifie glorifie you if you believe on him Faith is laying Christ in your bosome and that is proper prising of a thing faith is an heart act a soul going out of every thing to God wearied with every thing as defective and fiting down in Christ as complete Then do I prise Christ indeed when I behold him as all and so appropriate him to my self when I make him my wealth my honour my righteousnesse when I have none in heaven nor none in earth but him when I have none to present to God to conscience nor to the world but him Weak hearts if guilt deterre you from Christ you will die in your sinne as undervaluers of remedy salvation is brought near to you God will not your death repent and believe the Gospel to day do this and to day shall salvation come to your house Ob. Sol. I know that believing speaks reall prising of Christ but I cannot believe To this I answer The obiection lies not merely here that you cannot believe you will not believe Humour is strong in many weak hearts grace in it self and in its means rejected and then they say they cannot believe you cannot because you will not Blame your will and bleed over the perversnesse of a proud heart beg God to bring salvation yet nearer to you nearer to your understanding nearer to your will 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 faith 't is suadere 't is that act of Christ by which he doth perswade a froward will Beg Christ to conquer thy will and then thou wilt have power enough to believe presently he will perswade Japhet I cannot stand to speak of particulars I have but one thing to speak in generall and then I have done and that is to all Gods people You prise Christ as chief and so doth Christ you Christ is your jewel and you are Christs jewels you make him your husband and you are to him as a wife They are blessed indeed which have Christs prime love upon them prime love gives out prime favours you will be fed with the finest of the wheat the fatted calf will be killed for you the best robe will be brought for you Benjamins double dish and double dainties will be set before you Prime love works out into tender mercy and tender mercy is mercy shaped to all your necessities to keep you happy against all unhappinesse Some are but commonly loved yet they live well upon it and are merry you are dearly beloved of Christ and yet you cannot live well upon this No I shall want my bread Shall ravens be fed and not dear children will not a Father a heavenly Father provide Ob. Sol. If the famine do not kill me the sword will Is not Christ a strong tower to the righteous to his dear ones is not the munitions of works your defence your castles and rocky places will hold out but a while Christ is a rock of ages he saves with an everlasting salvation Ob. Sol.
he will be at peace with you and you should plead it and build upon it COLOSSIANS 1.20 And having made peace by the bloud of his Crosse c. CHrist had dispensation made to him in order to use God meant to doe much by him and therefore gave much to him Christ had full reception and full imployment of the one you have heard and of the other you are now to heare Christ had all fulnesse all in Heaven and all in earth to reconcile all that are in heaven and that are in earth as full as Christ was God emptied out all he drew out grace he drew out nature to the last drop of bloud that was in him And having made peace by the bloud of his Crosse c. Doct. Observe the condition of this world here God gives and God takes Every condition in this world hath mutation A man weares a Jewel in his breast twentie thirtie yeares fortie fiftie yeares and then 't is snatched away againe The spirit returnes to God that gave it Yea Christ and all that Christ hath return to God that gave him Christ lives and then dies dies and then rises Where is Christ now and all the fulnesse that he hath but in that bosome from whence he came forth Hath not Christ bled out all into the hand of the first Doner 't is a brave condition which they have above there is all giving and no taking away every ones life is everlasting and as the silver coard is so are the Jewels that are hung upon it Above all things are everlasting but here nothing is so no not Christ whilst in this world Yet a little while and the world seeth me no more This world hath and then loseth the biggest blessings seeth me no more This world is a little while rich and hath all and then a great while poore and stript of all Seeth me no more Thou shalt see an enemy in my habitation said God to Eli 1 Sam. 2.32 Christ is Gods habitation his speciall habitation yet is an enemy there Sin of man whilst Christ is here The noblest life dies Sin hath brought death over all over Christ Felicitie at first was fixed no mercy Adam had died transgression hath made mutation this is the worme that lies at the roote and gnawes and killes the greenest and pleasantest Goard that growes over us here The sin of the first Adam hath sucked the bloud of the second and not onely his bloud but the bloud of all things else That which followes in the place forecited is here applicable Thou shalt see an enemy in my habitation and in all the wealth which God shall give Israel c. Much was made in a little time and marred in lesse Sin hath subjected the whole creation to vanitie the fall of the body of Christ which was so firmly knit is the liveliest demonstration of it in the world Saul slew his thousands and David his ten thousands but sin hath slaine its millions hath wounded every thing to the heart Christ not excepted he together with all the creation groanes bleeds dies Some things are venemous and deadly within such a limited compasse the destructive propertie of sin is universall it poysons and killes all the world over it changes times seasons Kingdomes worlds hath swept one world away and 't will sweepe another world away Sin makes the Heavens waxe old and passe away yea that which is more firme then the Heavens Christs glorious and heavenly bodie which was not as the Apostle saith of this creation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sin hath its influence into the mutation of things so hath the will of God Mutation speakes affliction Will of God affliction springs not out of the dust but from the will of God God sets one thing against another and makes fighting between creature and creature between man and man unto death I set all men every one against his neighbour Zach. 8.9 10. I set all men c. That there were men against Christ and took away his life that there were such men against Christ neighbours one in his owne familie c. God set them against him Christ was delivered by the determinate counsell of God Things are set their course divine determination byasseth every state to such an end conditions can be no otherwise then they are Knowne to the Lord are all his workes from the beginning The age of a man is set the age of the world is set it shall be an hundred and twentie yeares saith God Sin provokes justice decrees this makes condition vary necessarily every thing shall die rather then divine justice this overturnes all to keepe up it selfe Angels men the world he which is greater and better then the world Christ The will of God the wisdome of God Wisdome of God hath its influence into the mutation of things here below The being of all things is such that no man may be secure Mutation moulds up time into opportunitie and duty presses hard upon a mans spirit under such a notion it did upon Christ I have but a day to worke in saith Christ things will change quickly night will come and then there will be no opportunitie to worke If Christ made use of motive from the changeablenesse of his condition fallen man may much more God is wise condition is squared to quicken dutie God would have any thing die rather then your grace Were nothing dying holy action would not be lively Man is confident if not powred out from vessel to vessel he settles upon his lees Because they have no changes therefore they feare not God saith the Psalmist Fallen man is pursued in his own way to wit with the falling of things now one thing crackes and anon another thing crackes and these all eccho to one another and speake joyntly and lowdly to the soule that all will crack anon and fall Wherefore looke about thee sinner not a thing not a person comes into thy bosome but breakes there to breake the heart You mourne at the funerall of things groanes beget groanes The bloud and death of things when that cryes and preaches to us if there be any grace if there be any nature the heart cannot but stirre Wisdome hath ordered every thing to preach it selfe to death to you plants brutes men the choicest man that ever was that ever came into the world went out of it againe in his bloud to move and so to save the world Having made peace by the bloud of his Crosse All runs into this All conditions here below have mutation Vse This point preaches submission It hath been a long time of giving and receiving now 't is a time of taking away and peoples hearts rise at it God is dishonoured much by discontentednesse Had we said nothing to prove the point that all things here below are mutable the times in which wee live are a sad demonstration of it View how like himselfe God still moves this shall be our use
shall all the nations of the earth be blessed The Sun that shines upon us shines upon thousands more it casteth over the world and shines upon a world so doth the Son of righteousnesse God was in Christ reconciling a world to himself the expression notes quantity in some sense as well as quality a world of worldly men Vse Bounty should be admired 't is so respecting men why should it not be so much more respecting God He whose hand is open to all all mens mouths are open to speak of his goodnesse Christ is a generall good lame blind halt have favour he keeps a table of kindnesse for all commers he reconciles all things Love is destroyed when the heart is not taken with great goodnesse love destroyed there can be no marrying between Christ and the soul 'T was a great judgement when their maids were not given to marry There is no inclination to embrace Christ when his beauty is no whit admired Vanities destroy affection some souls are sots talk of any thing that is spirituall and their hearts grow not amorous by it but die within them like Nabals the curse of God is in strength here these have made themselves Eunuches for the kingdome of darknesse Christ hath no engine to raise love like this to wit his bounty and sweetnesse that he will give every one to drink that is dry that Moses a fair man will marry a Blackmoore that Abraham will lodge a Lazarus in his bosome If goodnesse will not make good if love will not draw love let the soul marry whom he will Christ will have none of him Christ is noble he will gain the heart fully or he will marry no person in the world Persons shall be sick of love or they shall be unmarried to Christ You care not whether persons love you so you can but get their wealth Christ is righteous he seeks us not ours persons not dowry I seek not yours but you He was a friend to the Bride which spake that and spake his heart I know not what hearts you have nor how to wooe for my Masters Son I can say nothing but this he is all love he reconcileth all high low rich poore heavenly things earthly things he takes dust into his bosome and delights in it for ever The contemplation of Christs sweetnesse makes the marriage knot and the solace of the marriage when made When is the soul in heaven but when taken with that love which hath loved him when considering love in its latitude He hath loved me and given himself for me he reconciles all things indeed that would not leave out me Milk and honey is Canaan As the soul feeds upon the riches of love 't is in heaven Man is doubly miserable he is at a losse of satisfying solace and of the right way to acquire it he is taken with creatures and when he comes to lie down in their bosome to solace they vanish and vex a man lies down smiling riseth up howling because that 's nothing which he made so much and this may be the Motto of all earthly beauties That creature is nothing which man makes all Taken with the love of Christ and the longer so the stronger so the more blessed the soul cannot want depth here and tumble it self ashore as it doth when it tumbles in other waters sweetnesse in this way is found bottomlesse O the depth of the riches of the goodnesse of God! c. 'T is a brave thing to dive the depths of kindnesse if there be heaven any where 't is in the bottome of divine love Things have their full solace in their proper element this in reference to the soul of man is the love of God in the extent thereof What did take up Adams soul into Paradise whilest he moved well but the beauty of God the extent of his kindnesse that it reached all that Adam could look upon and all that while had he Paradise in his spirit but when he began to admire the beauty of forbidden things the beauty of Diabolicall fancies then he dyed in his nest presently What takes up those blessed spirits above but the contemplation of the love of God Here lies their full and perpetuall blessednesse that they cannot nor will not look beside love 'T is a very desolate time in which we live many have little left in the world to think upon and yet set not themselves to think of that which might make all to them Such are without solace indeed which have none without nor within how such poor creatures bear up I know not how to keep them up if they sink I know not there is no cordiall in any distresse but the contemplation of the love of Christ and under this notion how large it is This bleeding time makes my heart bleed to think what refreshments to give forth to mourning persons in every corner State is gone friends gone all left me gone this the complaint of thousands Yet he that is all is ready to receive you all and to impart all to you God hath set you free of this world to think of another which is better Make use of the rich proffers of grace and all will do well yet What doth Christ reconcile all things in earth to himself and leave out me Blesse me even me also O my Father so pray Some are froward and will not stir after grace though never so plentifull though Christ will be friends with them yet they will not with him How oft would I have gathered thee and thou wouldst not Take heed of stubbornnesse in sin though Christ shew mercy to thousands yet he will be the death of such a soul I am affraid of some of you lest Satan should harden your hearts against the Lord Jesus Christ Know the disposition of grace Christ treads upon none that stoop Know the season of grace doth Christ knock O then is the time when he would reconcile thee to himself Never let that word of Christ which takes thee be forgotten that 's a kisse of Christs lips to gain thee kisse the Son again Blesse God that he would make any word of his a sword to wound thy hard heart Blesse Christ that hee would come so neer where thou dwellest that he would not once knock but put in his finger by the hole of the dore to make thy bowels yearn after him when he knocks again intreat him to knock all down that hinders his coming in Longing souls after Christ are the blessedst souls in the world who ever die unreconciled to God they will not This point will leave all men without excuse I will touch this and conclude God would have all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth and Christ acts according to this latitude he reconciles all things to himself he desires not the death of one sinner Sinners if you die in your sins blame your selves not God you will die as those that exclude your selves as those that
judge your selves unworthy of the Kingdome of God Spirits deeply ingaged to their lusts have desperate reasonings against free grace when they can say nothing to stop the mouth of men and their conscience to keep on in their course they alledge the decree of God and if I be decreed to life I shall do better one day if not all you say or that I shall do will do me no good Ah that so much of hell should flame out of any mans mouth upon earth What hath any soul to do with the Decree of God Gods secret will doth not contradict his revealed What latitude of love doth his revealed will hold forth consider that and know that God is reall Doth he reconcile all things then thou art bound to believe it and to put in for a share in that grace which is so large which no soul ever did and missed COLOSSIANS 1.21 And you that were sometimes alienated and enemies in your mindes by wicked workes yet now hath he reconciled c. A Double condition is here mentioned what these Colossians are and what they once were They were alienated in their mindes naught at heart soules sinfull and this they expressed in life by wicked workes very doingly evill and yet these though thus bad made very good hell-fire in the soule quenched two spirits burning one against another reconciled by an act of love and man and God made one in the bodie of Christs flesh to be presented blamelesse in the exactest eye And you that were sometimes alienated c. yet now hath he reconciled in the bodie of his flesh c. How ever condition change yet it 's a good thing to consider what once wee were And you which were sometimes so and so The heart is naught it forgets its own worst and Gods best acts You were so sinfull you are now otherwise you need be hinted and minded of both as if the Apostle had said Sin slips out of our minds transgression makes lasting impression upon Gods Spirit though little upon ours I remember what once you were though yee have forgotten Doctr. Wee are apt sinfully to forget sin Some glory in their shame that 's a sinfull remembring of sin so some die in their shame this also is a sinfull remembring of sin Evill past thought of with joy or thought of with despaire are both displeasing to Christ My sin is ever before me they are a load too heavie this was not commended by God though loved by a wounded spirit There are two extreames and both naught broken hearts ever thinke of their sins and hard hearts never a stone as oft sighes as they The text and point I am upon points at a third thing though distinct from either of these i sin remembred with godly sorrow this godly hearts are backward to 't is intimated in the text Yee were enemies in your minds by wicked workes doe yee remember it Some acts awaken conscience he speakes the saddest of any facultie a carnall creature willingly neglects sad worke To call to minde what I was at such a place and at such a time is to throw sparkles of fire upon a sleepie dog which will make him start up flie out and barke and bite fiercely Man loves his flesh yea he loves his spirit he doth not love to be bit in either if he can tell how to shift it The best are bad though not starke naught good spirits are apt to play the slugge in those duties that are dolorous and painfull I remembred God and was troubled and complained and my spirit was overwhelmed To remember what God is and how unsutable wee have been to him will trouble yea overwhelme the stoutest spirit we doe not care to meddle with troublesome works When sin revives we die remembring what we were reviveth sin 't is terrible to the flesh to wound and kill it selfe 't is so spiritually we had rather any should wake and sit up then conscience we had rather goe quietly to hell then conscience should torment us before the time Man is a lazie creature examination of ones former state is hard worke flesh and bloud shunnes this quite yea grace neglects this oft till losse be great I call to remembrance my song in the night I commune with mine own heart and my spirit made diligent search But 't was long first so long till he stood in feare of being cast off for ever as you may see in the next verse Psalm 77.6 7. A string slackened or broken in play and 't is laborious to be winding up the pin still to keepe tune to the song one sings to take notice how many notes too flat or too loud in play requires a diligent eare the labour of it makes one willing to passe by and forget many false stroakes If the examination of small things be so laborious much more to examine things of weight our spirituall state when all is naught Man doth not love hard worke nor terrible worke Transgression multiplies and young children make one forget old ones Present transgressions harden or wound much the heart hardened becomes uncapable to consider any sin the sin of last yeare or of this yeare or of this houre A stone melts under no consideration a stone thinkes of nothing neither of things past present or to come Multiplication of sin makes stonie hearts Their hearts are as hard as an adamant You cannot beat things into a stone no words nor blowes will make hard hearts thinke of their wayes Though a man eate of the evill of his way weekes moneths yeares yet will not this make him bethinke himselfe what steps he trod in all that while to call his way evill and his person wicked Present sin if it harden not much it wounds much and wounded persons thinke altogether of their present paine Dolour distracts crazie braines are weake at any thing but worst at recollection specially if things of weight When wounds are deep much bleeding inwardly makes much faintnesse Languishing dying soules thinke of nothing but going to hell 'T is with sins as 't is with mercies when a man goes about to number them one can finde no end of them and this makes a bleeding heart leave looking backward and look forward to fix his eyes upon that blacke place whither all sin lookes he leaves multiplying number rises so innumerably and turnes himselfe to consider where all will end the sum of all will come to this saith he the death of my soule for ever because the sinner can make a kinde use of no sin he gives up the consideration of all and lays down his soule at the foot of Justice for lost I am sure all sin centers whither my soule is going saith the sinner and closeth his eyes though I cannot tell their number yet I know their nature All runs into this Wee are all apt sinfully to forget sin Vse God certainly hath espied this and he is rousing up our memory Wrath doth much when love can do but little
God will have every one consider what he was and what he is before he hath done England unhappy England thou dost neither therefore dost thou bleed and die daily thou dost not lay to heart what thou wast nor what thou art For twenty yeers together forty fifty yeers and more hast thou been a bitter persecuting kingdome of truth and godlinesse What art thou now France is noted for pride Germany for drunkennesse but England for persecuting the power of godlinesse the last of these is the worst and by so much the more the worst by how much more we lesse think what we have been and are How many Saints suffered under Queen Mary How many under Bishops a Prelaticall spirit is still alive truth and the power of godlinesse persecuted at this day and what suffering is yet behinde for Christ Christ knowes Englands genius and dexterity seems to lie this way alwayes to vex the Saints of the most High Thou hast made many a conscience bleed O England therefore doth thy carkasse bleed Dost thou call to mind thy bitternesse and basenesse against Christ and godlinesse Our ruines are great this lies heavie upon us Many think of what they had and weep but not of what they did when they had such things and weep We are more apt to lay to heart misery then sin though this be the greatest misery in the world 't was Jerusalems case 't is Englands He hath turned aside my wayes and pulled me in pieces he hath made me desolate he hath made his arrows to enter into my reines he hath filled me with bitternesse he hath made me drunk with wormwood and so goes on exactly repeating miserie Lament 3. But observe what she saith vers 19 20. Remember my affliction and my misery the wormwood and the gall my soul hath them still in remembrance and is humbled in me c. The gall and the wormwood that God gave Jerusalem this she had still in her remembrance but the gall and vineger which she gave Christ and his servants this not so called to minde 'T is so with us our losses and overthrowes in the West in the North the gall and wormwood which God in divers fights hath given us this is called to mind and dayes of mourning because of it but the gall and wormwood which we have for many yeers and under severall Princes raignes given to Christ and his members we call not this to minde I will give you a sad demonstration that England doth sinfully forget her sin that she does not call to minde what she was in Bishops time The demonstration is this to wit an aptnesse to run into the same sin Sin kindly called to minde melts the heart the heart melted abhors its former course Yea what indignation yea what revenge Where is this to be found now against that barbarous and bloody sin of burthening the conscience with unwarranted things which was the sin of Bishops and for which the Land now mourns Are we not very apt to run into the same courses What is that which wee humbly seek for now in matters of Church-government but divine warrant and where this is not that customes and courses of our own may not be imposed and yet this accounted harsh and refractorinesse by many and persons conscienciously carried but at this height construed and trampled on at mens pleasure because they can stoop to nothing but the will of Christ Consciences are of severall constitutions such as are peevish must be pitied not knocked in head such as are ingenuously tender honoured where neither of these can be found that spirit is Prelaticall and Lording over the conscience let it live in what breast it will Now what pity or what honour tender consciences find at this present in England of all Lands I leave to you to judge Satan rages at us in many God is good to us in a few to bind him up or we should be buried alive again thrown in prisons and dungeons again as bad as ever mens tongues talk freely this way which speaks the heart and what the hand should be if other things did concurre How do mens fingers itch to be tearing our estates and fortunes and whatsoever is dear as formerly Antichrist is set forth in the Scripture under various shapes alteration of times necessitates him to change habite to save his life and livelihood but he never went so like a Lamb as now and yet a Lion still poor hearts can tell you so which feel how bard he pinches name state conscience c. If this be repenting for former ill deeds then England doth not sinfully forget her former sins If inclination to former sins make demonstration of a sinfull forgetting of sin resolution to former courses may much more I beg that this may never gather about thy heart O England for death is in it my heart bleeds for thee when I consider with what violence thou goest in thine own way but in this I spare thee yet and speak more of this to God upon my knees Application hitherto hath been nationall let every one turn it now and make it personall I was a blasphemer a persecutor alienated from God by wicked works but now I have obtained mercy I doubt you cannot all say thus Do you lay your condition past and present to heart and no smiting of breast nor no change it cannot be What you were you are and would be Alas for such souls their condition is more miserable then any they have no mercy nor care for none The first step to conversion is to consider what we have been and are I considered my wayes turned my feet unto thy testimonies The prodigall came to himself and then returned to his father To himself i. to consider what course he had led what state he was in whither that way he was in did lead Would sinners would tread one step in the way to life What is the course I have led What a man or a woman have I been hitherto A sinners hand to the Devils Plough he may look back and do well but Satan is against it so is a mans own heart yet something must be done in this way against both or the soul is unavoidably lost Satan cannot endure that a man should commune with his own heart his wayes have no glosse at a view he hath twenty wayes to prevent the danger of losing a soul What 's past cannot be helped what shouldest thou trouble thy self to think upon 't God forgets thy sin and wilt not thou Sinner Satan is rocking thy soul now if thou look not to it thou will die in a slumber God forgets our sins when we do remember them and lay them upon Christ not otherwise when we examine our selves and judge our selves and go out of our selves to Christ If we confesse our sin God is mercifull to forgive Many that had been thus and thus saith the Text came and confest their deeds and then found mercy from Christ Christ
to bring God and the soule together yet Christ undertakes it for them that groane after it I create the fruit of the lips peace to them that are far off Sin wounds and then Satan makes it mortall this must be looked to 't is the worke of Christ to seeke out poore soules which are stray'd away from God and to carry them home to him in his arme We that enjoy the presence of God should joy and blesse him so I conclude this point Alienation is a sad condition it hints lively what the contrary is to wit a fruition of all priviledge a soule in the bosome of God one ever with the Lord which is Heaven In thy presence is the fulnesse of joy 't is so here God present in an Ordinance God present in a Saint God present in a dungeon and there is fulnesse of joy to the soul what ever be to the body Much company spoiles some so doth much solitude others a man is too much alone when without God Society is never too few nor too many when God is one Delight not too little nor too much when God is present If I had never so many enemies I would care but for the company of one to encounter them 'T is enemies we fear now it should not be Fear not I am with thee So 't was spoken to Gideon The Lord is with thee God takes it for granted that he hath spoken enough to setle any heart against any feare when he hath said we shall have his presence Read Isaiah 64.1 2. O that thou wouldest rend the heavens that thou wouldest come down that the mountains might flow down at thy presence as when the melting fire burneth The fire causeth the waters to boil to make thy name known to thine adversaries that the nations may tremble at thy presence Let 's prise much that condition which cannot be undone having Christ with us we have him whose presence can make mountains melt turn any thing to nothing that nihilates our felicity COLOS. 1.21 Being enemies in your mind c. SUch a tree such fruit what a sad state alienation from God is appears by the effects which are here to the life expressed it makes a man all over naught inside outside heart hand it casts all into a resolute posture of defiance against God Enemies in your mind by wicked works or enemies with your mind in wicked works not nillingly but willingly wicked not so in affection only but in action not in one action only but in many actions enemies in their mind in wicked works The words of God are of weight every one hath much in it 't will appear so being distinctly considered which hath been and shall be our method and manner of following of him who is so far above us and will not let one tittle of his will fall to the ground Alienation is here anatomised we must reade lectures distinctly upon distinct parts They are enemies c. We must open this They are enemies with their mindes or in their mindes c. We must reade upon this also They are thus not only in affection but in action in their works We must consider this too and by that time you will see much of a bad condition and it may be something of your own The Land is overrun with enemies against Christ therefore it bleeds and dies 't will be very seasonable therefore to lay open to you what an enemy to Christ is which is our first work here in the Text to follow the words as they lie And ye which were sometimes alienated enemies c. Sin was Gods first enemy a steady pursuit of this renders men and Angels the next The worst man alive as a creature simply as a creature is not accounted Gods enemy but as these noble creatures above all others prostituted themselves to something besides Gods will God had no enemies till sin came into the world as long as all obeyed Gods will there was love and friendship all the world over Sin hath a legall and a Gospel consideration considered according to the former the least transgression of rule the eating of any fruit forbidden enough to render man an enemy and to be pursued so with all the plagues written in Gods Book Sin hath a Gospel consideration and so the naked acting of sin doth not presently denote an enemy but the going on in it as a constant intended and approved course God shall smite the head of his enemies and the hairy scalp of such as go on still in their trespasses saith the Psalmist Sin is an unwearied course to some what ever rubs they meet with from the hand of God by blows or otherwise yet they step over them all and go on still That 's an enemy the spirit of an enemy is in him Enemies fear no colours blows blood death will not divert their design against one another The expression in the originall speaks not only resolution but delight in sin and there are not two fuller properties more infallibly to expresse an enemy ambulandis dilictis such as walk in sins a mans walk is his pleasure 't is made and contrived of purpose with much art to suit fancy and to give a complacency As the outward man so the inward man has his walks something that with much industry he makes shapes to suit and delight it self and this is preferr'd before all other wayes now if this be any thing dissonant to Gods will this speaks the man an enemy Some words of Christ set out an enemy more generally others more particularly I shall touch both Christ is set as King over the sons of men his Lawes are written and divulged and such as obey him not according to these he calls his enemies Bring those mine enemies which would not that I should raign over them i. such as will not obey my will Some disobey one part of Gods will and some another Christ hath many sorts of enemies but all so called from one ground to wit disobeying of his Lawes The Lawes of Christ are said to be disobeyed when carelesly neglected ignorantly opposed or maliciously rejected Truth is truth with some men and that 's all as one would say it bears little or no price in affection how plain and convincing soever to judgement they see and do not see i. see and do not regard O that thou hadst known in this thy day c. Did not Israel know the will of God yes there was light but no love to it which was as no light in the account of Christ and this went to his heart Such as stab Christ to the heart are surely his enemies 'T is as if Christ had said O that thou hadst regarded and so it notes an ignorance of opportunity a defect in affection and not simply an ignorance of the thing it self Love naught and the heart is so too hatred in the seeds of it lie in such a soul which will spring up with a little more rain A
Christ then 't is maturated and shall meet us as so many royall Diadems to adorn us for ever You see now the way to work well thus work and your work will be work and wages 'T is a very sweet life to do all in Christ Things are very lively and contentfull in their own element Set a Lark to flie in the open aire 't is his element 't is his heaven he will flie upward upward which is very hard work and yet he will do this and sing too The breast of Christ is the proper element of a Christian and when here a man works nimbly he works and sings too goes upward towards that place above which is very hard work and yet sings as he goes because he has such silver wings from Christ If ye abide in me saith Christ ye will do bravely you will bring forth good works as a Garden as a Vine doth fruits smilingly Let 's work as Christ did and we shall finde our work as he did 't was meat and drink to him to do his Fathers will his works were all works wrought in God as the Apostle speaks Let a Christian set himself in Christ when he goes about any action and he shall finde his work will be very sweet work and wages his meat and drink No motion so free and delightfull as Christian motion where 't is purely Christian We set upon work out of Christ and then the Chariot wheels move heavily and we look sadly and are tired presently Christs sayings are so hard to be done by this a stumbling block is cast before men of the world the works and wayes of God evill spoken of To work divine works is the joyfullest the sweetest life in the world if a man take the advantage of his work that is Christ with him in every thing a Christian and Christ will do any thing with ease remove mountains sins harder to be removed then mountains and stand and smile to behold the plagues of death O death I will be thy plagues to be the plagues of the king of plagues is brave action indeed A man might speak more consolatory from this point Every workman in Christs Vineyard hath a peny here and Christs peny is more then any ones pound but I cannot stand to sum up this now COLOS. 1.21 Yet now hath he reconciled THe love of God is wholly dispensed as love 't is in giving out as in taking in all along free birth bears it not to this rather then to that Not many noble c. friends work it not there is but one Mediator but one favourite in all the world that appears in the presence of God about any such thing and he is no respecter of persons The vilest as soon as those that are more beholding to nature obtain grace And ye that were sometimes alienated and enemies in your minde by wicked works yet now hath he reconciled Reconciliation in the formality of it I have already handled this therefore I shall not meddle with again neither is it that which the Holy Ghost doth principally point at here but as you see by reading the whole verse one inviting property of reconciliation is most aim'd at to wit that the favour of God goes forth to all sorts that there is nothing in one sort of persons more then another to invite or discourage God to dispence his eternall grace all sorts and all at one price may obtain the favour of God i. Doctr. The Grace of God unto life is in all respects free and this is that sweet property of reconciliation which according to the scope of this place and the necessity of many poor souls at this time I would demonstrate to you The love of God is compared to a Feast in feasting men are free if men be not God is and you will say so if some circumstances in his feasting be observed Vniversally God doth invite universally You make feasts but yet every one may not come God sets no such bound nor makes no such distinction of persons Ho every one as many as you shall find bid to the marriage Matth. 22.9 The heavens are generall in their influence not one grasse on the ground but dewed The Ark had of all sorts brought into it from the East West North and South come and sit downe in the Kingdome of God As persons are in estate so they invite and so they feast Christ is a great King over all the earth and so he invites over all the earth he hath one house that will hold all he hath one table that will hold all yea he hath one dish that will serve all and answerably he invites Ho every one that thirsts If there be any thing looked at in those which Christ invites 't is something within not any thing without If the man be lame blinde halt if he be bodily soare yet it s nothing if he would sit at Gods table and if he would have crums or flagons this is all that is looked at God doth universally invite and he doth affectionatly invite Affectionatly which loudly speaks his love free The world is deaf 't would discourage any one to make a feast for a company of deaf folks stocks and blocks that one must strain ones lungs to make them heare and yet it doth not discourage God certainly his love is very affectionate God doth lay his mouth to the eare of the deaf and cries aloud Ho every one that thirsts John was a crier in the Wildernesse he did Christs work so are we at this day and the injunction is to cry aloud like a trumpet spirits lungs nothing to be spared in expression of Gods affection to mans eternall good Souls are precious to God distresse is laid to heart as 't is bowels sound lungs sound Ho every one c. vocations interjections c. speaks very affectionate motion towards the distressed Why will you die O Jerusalem Matters of weight move not us we make expression from no impression God smites his heart again and again and then speaks and proffers love O Ephraim what shall I do unto thee O Judah how shall I give thee up God calls and knocks and waites he calls and beseeches calls and weeps what he utters is from his heart that it may go to our heart Things are so molded and shaped as to make their own way Every word of God hath so much Majesty and sweetnesse conviction and consolation which plainly speaks him very free and willing to be reconciled to man Who puts on such apparell when he wooes a Spouse as Christ does Who speaks such effectuall words or presents such precious jewels when he wooes as Christ doth I will give you something else to demonstrate this thing to you God pursues prerogative altogether in his gracious dispensations Grace must needs be in all respects free because no obligement is upon God to give to this rather then to that I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy The
sinful mirth into mourning God will turne it into howling God loves not revenge yet what he is exemplarily eminent in he cannot endure that men should altogether slight God layes to heart all that we undergo for him in all our afflictions he is afflicted so should we lay to heart all that he and his undergoe for us 'T is the grand medium of conversion this that I touch What will melt the heart if that love which bleeds to death for us be forgotten Sinners Christ hath suffered the wrath of God for you he left more wealth then this world is worth and became poore he left a mansion in glory and took a body of flesh a house of clay and in this house dyed and left you all that you might live for ever in the fruition of all Is all this nothing Will you regard your sinnes more then this Christ Shall your lust live though Christ have dyed The death and bloud of the Lord Jesus will be upon you Can you looke upon pierced Christ and not mourne He will shew you your owne hardnesse of heart in a like carriage he will looke upon the wounds and torments of your consciences in the houre when you make your will and not be affected When mercy cannot bring forth justice becomes the mid-wife and this cryes save the womb save the womb let what will become of the childe if this childe die and bee puld to pieces between the legges yet another may live if the womb be preserved God much eyes the meanes he uses to doe us good he will preserve the honour of these though thousands die which trample upon them What Christ hath suffered for us shall gain and save thousands though it destroy you though you lay not Christs love to heart yet Christ will have a great many to do it When I am lifted up I will draw all men unto me Christ makes means and then blesseth them to their end men eye not this and so die without the benefit of them What Christ hath suffered for us he hath promised so to order as to make it drawing and winning of us that his lifting up upon the crosse and from thence to heaven shall lift up our souls from sins and from thence to him and to the place where he is These words should be believingly urged and then the work of our welfare would go on an end As mercy stoops lowest it takes up us for God to make means and blesse them is mercy stooping very low to take up them that are quite down Doct. There is one point more I would willingly touch ere I part from these words and that is The mortality of all earthly and fleshly things Death passeth over all now The body of beasts flesh the body of our flesh the body of Christs flesh dies In the body of his flesh through death Some worms are small to look upon and yet will penitrate and consume an Oak Sin is such a thing small in the account of men and yet gnawes asunder the strongest sinews the body of Christ transcendently compacted not of this creation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heb. 9.11 as the Author to the Hebrews speaks and yet sin dissolves moulders this stately fabrick From the greater to the lesse we may argue safely If the body of Christ cannot live in respect of sin surely no body else can The body of Christ would have born more then all the world and not have cracked Vanity of vanity all is vanity the body of Christ dies the body of all other things die which stand further off from sin then the body of Christ and the body of man do The body of Christ and the body of man stand in a more immediate relation to sin and the fruit thereof then other things of the creation do and yet sin eats out every body of the creation those that stand furthest off from it the whole world waxeth old waxeth languishing ' thath made its will 't will die in a moment the glory of this world passeth away the forehead of this world to wit the heavens will become wrinckled and wax old Wisdome will have no heaven here Death shall gnaw the greenest goard the strongest mans body and every body that bears respect to it We and our best friends die your fathers where are they My father my father the chariots and horsemen of Israel c. and yet this would not hold him his dearest friend in the world must be gone It shadowed out Christ he is our Father our Father twice as good and as dear as all other friends that is he is the dearest friend man hath in all the earth and yet a fiery chariot fetches up this Father from his children here Christ goes away I go away and yee shall see me no more So said Paul to his spirituall children and it did cut to the quick Justice doth retaliate We killed God in all and so doth he us we did run away from God and left him solitary and he makes every thing run from us husband wife children one dearer then all Christ and leaves us alone The spirit of the Angels which fell was in us when we fell pride and malice would have puld down God we shew'd our will but could not accomplish it upon God but he hath upon us not we nor any thing in our similitude can live if God see but our shadow and Image he strikes at it as we did at his Christ fared the worse for us he dyes for having to do with us Vse What God means in all this should be inquired into What every carnall thing dying and yet carnall affection alive There is demonstration enough without of the mortality of all things but no demonstration of this within us our inward thoughts are that our habitation shall indure for ever England all over is a demonstration of this point that all things are bleeding and dying Christ had rather that a thousand thousands of bodies should die then one soul one thing is aimed at that all things die to wit the death of your lust the life of faith and this is your lesson from this Doctrine Can you receive it Every thing shall live for ever when you can love all in Christ and admire all in Christ and make an advantage of love by all to Christ All the ruines you behold in this kingdom or in the whole creation all the seas of blood wherin the world is at this day are but to wash our hearts that 's very foul which must have all without even Christ himself turn'd into blood to cleanse it 'T is long ere carnall affections be slain every thing must die and its blood be thrown in the face of conscience ere the man will spit out what offends God The stability of all about you bears much upon the rectitude of your affection Take heed how you love husband wife children you may hug them to death with a sinfull love You complain of Cavalleers for
like his glorious body according to the working whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself Phil. 3.21 no condition desperate to Christ he can give sight to one that is born blinde he 〈◊〉 change the spots of the Leopard plague spots all things touching the fallen condition of man are possible to him 't was spoken you know by himself upon a sad fight which none of Christs Disciples could do good to to wit one rended and torn by Satan which Christ cured with ease There be many thousand impossibilia to us yea in us not a sin in a mans soul the least but is impossible to us to subdue because in our nature Can a Leopard change his spots any one of his spots He may lick at them but can he remove them 'T is as if Christ had said Can a sinner take out any stain in his soul he may lick at them by prayer and the like but he cannot remove them because as a nature to him yet I can do it as if Christ had said I can take out any spot out of any cloth out of any part soul or body He is able to save all that come to God by him Christ hath this vast power and he cannot suspend it If he refuse to do what he can for any distressed creature that comes unto him and be the most miserable in the world he will displease his Father which we know he would not do he would undergo hell first The power that Christ hath for the good of sinners is necessarily acted The Sun shines upon all the world and it cannot do otherwise Christ in the 6th of John when he had discoursed largely according to what latitude and compasse he wrought for the salvation of souls he puts it to this conclusion I can do no lesse saith he for this is the will of my Father that every one that seeth the Son and believeth on him might have everlasting life if it be the tatterdst the forlornst creature in the city that looks pitifully upon me I must look pitifully upon him if he hang about me for soul favour I must in no wayes cast him off but take him out of the jaws of death and carry him in my arms to eternall life What is the will of the Father is the will of Christ the will of Christ naturally not artificially in a way of self-deniall and contest as the will of God is said to be a Saints will so that what the Father would have Christ own Christ cannot but own for the same Spirit is in him and in the same measure and therefore you have him setting himself forth by the Prophet just as I do as one bound by that Spirit which anointed him The Spirit of the Lord is upon me and he hath anointed me to preach unto these and these and to comfort all that mourn a Christ doth not say the will of the Lord is nakedly revealed to me how far I shall shew mercy and how far not but the same Spirit that speaks to me saith he is upon me i. in the same measure that it speaks to me 't is in me and so necessitates me to obey or captivates me as my own nature and as my own affection God is captivated with love toward all captives so am I saith Christ he would have all to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth Jewes and Gentiles so would I too saith Christ the same bottomlesse sea of love that fluctuates in his breast is in mine the Father and I are one and often Christ uses this expression when he speaks about love to the creature Vse Sinners if ever you would be saved consider this point well how wide the arms of Christ are how big the bosome of mercy is it hath many thousands between her breasts already and yet there is roome for you The love of Christ is not coy 't is not humerous ' thath not naturall antipathy against any but persons that sleight it Sinners sinners I beseech you consider it at what height you love your sins Do you love your sins above your bodies above your estates and names yet there may be hope Do ye love your sins above your souls this is sad yet there may be hope But do ye not love your sins above that love which stands with her arms open to you yet for all this What hope can there be in this case How can you escape the damnation of hell as Christ spake to this generation There is no art to make the soul set open the everlasting dores like telling him of the King of glory which would come in I conclude so because 't is the art the holy Ghost useth Mercy held out in the extent of it is the King in visible glory drunkards swearers adulterers set open your everlasting dores the King of glory would come into you he would forgive your sins against the light of Scripture your sins against the light of nature your beastly sins I those wherein you have been worse then beasts your sins against your own bodies as well as against your own souls Love would get her self a name upon you by cleansing and kissing of Swine by laying a Toad in her bosome by bringing a devill out of hel to heaven Can you spit in the face of this Love now in the sight of all this congregation and turn to your lusts again Mercy comes to all your dores she falls down at all your feet will you tread upon her Mercy shews you what she would have you do Christ humbles himself to the dust laies himself at all your feet if you would but do the like to him not a soul of you should perish We hold out to you now the riches of grace if it work kindly you shall know it by this the soul longs to be partaker of it this grace must be nourished if longing die ere it obtain the soul is guilty of stifling the Spirit What buds in the soul will blossome do but keep it in the Sun all that are weary and heavie laden have ease all that are opprest with the devill are healed 't is the thing we are upon If this grace work not kindly the soul hardens it self in its sin If love be so large I may go on in my sin yet a while longer and do well enough at last God rejects none not young sinners not old sinners I will make as much as I can of my sin and lie as long as I may in the lap of Delilah if I must part with it I will part with it at last when I must part with all Death is seised violently upon this soul he vomits his excrements Would a Judas speak worse then this man I will keep my covetousnesse and treachery as long as I can if I must leave it it shall be at last when I leave this world my master and my hope for ever You cannot imagine the depth of guile that is in our hearts naturally
not any thing like it the same measures of grace within the same without the same Robes of State that Christ weares they doe the mantle of Elijah is put upon Elisha Our perfection now is per proximum by a proxey as another weares such a compleat habit within and without for us And thy renowne went out among the Heathen for thy beauty for it was perfect through my comelinesse which I have put upon thee Ezek. 16.14 Whereas beauty and perfection is here imputative t is there inhesive every one in his owne person and in his owne state inside outside renowned and perfect for beauty in their owne comlinesse they are joynt with Christ we are joynt heires with Christ here we are joynt partakers with Christ there we have joynt crownes joynt thrones joynt perfections Christ doth not weare a crowne above for this Saint and for that Saint he doth not personate any Saints condition in glory but every Starre there hath its owne glory every Saint weares his owne Crowne himselfe no ones condition there for blessednesse and happinesse is onely personated in Christ as all our conditions are here in order to that State above but all joynt partakers with him and every seed it s owne body which is a glorious State indeed and makes a glorious Church as the Apostle speakes Ephes 5.27 T is a perfect society and in in perfect rest That glorious Church above keepes a perpetuall Sabbath you know the Law of the Sabbath both in precept and president enjoyned a totall complacentiall and perfect rest i. a cessation from all labour and application with all delight to sublime and supreame things Whilst this law was in president onely and yet unwritten it held out this compleat rest God did not nakedly cease from his worke but refreshed himselfe in the things which he had wrought On the seventh day he rested and was refreshed Exod. 31.17 Now what this refreshing was see Exod. 20.11 The Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it This was his refreshing after his worke he had a totall and complacentiall rest According to this president did the precept afterwards strictly runne as you may read Exodus the 20. The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord in it thou shalt not doe any worke How farre this extended you know they were not to doe any ordinary worke of their calling no not necessary workes for life they were not to gather Manna on the Lords day though Manna was all the food they then had and had it but from day to day The godly which lived under this Law and knew the strictnesse of it would not performe funerall rites for our Lord Jesus on this day as you may see Luke 23. last They viewed the body of Jesus upon the day of preparation and prepared Spices and Ointment but rested upon the Sabbath day according to the Commandement This totall and strict cessation from all labour was upon paine of death Ye shall keepe the Sabbath for t is holy to you every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death whosoever doth any worke therein shall surely be cut off from amongst his people Evod. 31.14 This was for aversion and turning away from things forbidden on the other hand application to Divine things and to holy imployment was as strict every thought was to be consecrated to God and this with divine intention with delight the strings were to be set very high and to hold it and to make delightfull Musicke If thou turne thy foot from thine owne pleasure and call the Sabbath a delight Esay 58.13 All these things doe but shadow the condition of that glorious Church above they rest from their labours and this rest is a perfect rest they doe not any worke as the expression before is they doe not so much as dresse their owne meat no nor gather in any thing for meat all is drest to their hand and set before them Manna is potted up and stands alwaies before every one not any sinew not any thought painfully stirres about livelihood all are intensly but very delightfully applied to the vision of God to the contemplation of the Lord of this Sabbath the grace of redemption that brought them from hence thither to so transcendent a state Their rest above t is as totall as complacentiall as Gods was looke how he rested from his worke so doth these from theirs For if Jesus had given them rest i. Joshua then would he not have spoken of another day there remaines therefore a rest to the people of God for he that is entered into his rest he also hath ceased frrom his owne worke as God did from his Hebrews 4.8 9 10. Now God totally rested and then was totally filled and refreshed with the contemplation and sanctification of what he had done he rested and was refreshed so doe they above they doe rest and are refreshed cease from all labours from all that speakes the least paine and then they refresh themselves with the contemplation of God and what they finde laid up in him for them and so are these times called by the Scripture times of resting they do rest from their own workes and are refreshed with with Gods i with the vision and contemplation of him therefore is it added there when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord i from the beholding and contemplating him and his person in whose presence they stand who is the Lord of that great rest Triumphing together with Christ That glorious society above of which we now speake is a Church triumphant all displaying their banners all Heaven over as they that have fully conquered all enemies Sinne is quite dead death and him that hath the power of death dead O death where is thy sting O Hell where is thy victory this is the triumphant language in every ones mouth above Here we are in continuall combate in perpetuall war detesting legue truce but not able to conquer but there all are conquerers and weare their Crown Lawrells and make a shew of their conquest openly as Christ David hath slaine his thousand c. Many such triumphant expressions are above for every little one there is as David and sing his songs There is a petty transient triumph here in the Church militant but 't is only as it now and then reaches their state above in any degree of conquering enemies And I saw as it were a Sea of glasse mingled with fire and them that had gotten victory over the Beast and over his Image stand on the Sea of Glasse and having the Harpes of God and they sang the song of Moses the servant of God and the song of the Lambe saying Great and mighty are thy workes Lord God Almighty just and true are thy wayes thou King of Saints Revel 15.3 this hints to us the manner of their triumph above for Saints do the will of God on earth as they do in Heaven The Lambe sings too they
kinde must be without delay or else all is eternally lost the Basilisk blastes and burnes every greene thing it comes upon and makes death to every creature in a moment his poyson is so fiery strong Satan is such a Serpent not a Dart hee throwes but it is so fiery that it 's mortall presently In the day that thou eatest thou shalt die eatest what any of the Serpents poyson Thou shalt die the long-livest creature in the World In the day thou eatest i in the hower in the present moment although the long-livest creature the Serpents poyson will dispatch thee Our patients who are spirituall Physitians are all poisoned strongly poisoned their intrailes are afire our worke is the giving of Antidotes they must be speedy death is marching so speedily and so directly to the heart All this World is afire it lies so neere that below it every house in a blaze there are such lightnings and blastings from that region of darknesse that not a soule upon earth but is black burnt and in danger to be consumed they had neede bestir them that worke about quenching internall flames which take hold here this is our worke to quench Hell fire Two things are incomparably swift in bringing forth corrupt affection and Divine wrath The time is so little betweene conception and birth in order to sinne that it 's not mentioned Lust when it hath conceived brings forth sinne The Apostle doth not say that it brings forth in so many Moneths or in so many yeares two yeares or the like as Historians say the Elephant goes but when 'tas conceived it fals in travaile presently and the soule cannot sleepe till it bee delivered The wrath of God is just such another wombe conceives and brings forth presently internally or externally upon soule or body or both a sparke of fire no sooner takes but it burns presently within the house though you do not see all the out-parts of the house in a blaze presently a house is a fire a great while before all the Towne cry Fire fire Wrath kindled but a little as the Psalmist speakes in Gods breast against any man it burnes presently against him though not visible presently it sulters and takes more and more hold secretly and breakes forth all in a blaze in a shorter or longer space as tempests and windes arise and as wisdome will Spirituall Offices are shaped and injoyn'd in order to these nimble bearing wombes Goe quickly make an atonement wrath is begun said Moses to Aaron If wrath be begun as if he had said I know the nature of it 't will quickly make a dispatch of all therefore bestir thee be a Diaconos a diligent speedy Officer take a Censer and fire from off the Altar and put out one fire with another The nature of our Office hintes the nature of your condition 't is very dangerous of a sudden sinners you are undone it should be laid to heart Sinners are damnable venturous not knowing the wayes of God they make nothing of sinne and yet the wages of it is death and paid presently The soule froward and wilfull of a suddaine dispatched Say unto the children of Israel Yee are a stif-neeked people J will come up into the midst of thee in a moment and consume thee c. Exod. 33.5 Christ is our Breath and Life when resisted our Breath and Life departs and leaves the dead corps to be stretched out coffined and buried when justice will Christ and the soule parted this is death other things as laying the man in his Grave and such like these are but businesses about the Funerall Sinner Christ woes thee dost thou regard him He tels thee of the Harlot thou hast in thy bosome doth thy soule rise against him Why turn thy face to the wall draw up thy Legges in thy bed thou wilt have a death-pull presently conscience will sting thee ere thou art aware and now Christ is setting foot in stirrup to be gone he is now throwing off the dust of his feete as a preparative to departure Christ hath put the Knife now to thy throate yea more he hath stabbed thee to the heart and thou bleedest inwardly what wilt thou do to stop and heale this wound Didst thou dreame of a dart in thy heart ere thou hadst done thy sport to be shot from Heaven in the act of sinne in the bosome of Delilah But 't is not so with mee though I eate forbidden fruit now and then yet it agrees well enough with me it doth not make tumblings and ruptures in my bowels Death seiseth not upon all alike some goe away in a swone Insensibility is the deadliest condition of all Christ disregarded the soule is disregarded in the hower that one is the other is whether it now roare or bee still all is one Christ is departed there is no divine Life in the man you see but a corps not a Christian which will be buried out of Gods sight quickly The winde blowes where it lists how it lists of a night of an instant it turnes and blowes against one that was with one and drives the Vessell upon Rockes and splits all A sinner is nobly and sweetly intreated for a season this despised the old one leaves the nest hee cannot hatch what hee sits upon and therefore that stranger which hath blowne upon the egges and chilled them with handling let him suck them too now or teare them or do what hee will with them I beseech you sinners know your day your hower if the Sunne would kisse you kisse him He wooes hartily yet not in ordinately as some Lovers doe that will never give over that die when they cannot obtaine Christ kils others that will not love him but never kills himselfe with love he can of a wooer become a slayer of you and all in one day yea in one hower Wherefore receive that holy word Luke 12.36 Let your Loyns be girded about saith hee and your lights burning and yee your selves like unto men that waite for their Lord when he will returne from the wedding and when he commeth and knocketh they may open to him immediatly If you thinke out of pride and stoutnesse to make Christ waite your leasure till you have taken your fill of forbidden things and gone on as far as ever Nature and Life could let you goe you will be deceived Christ will in this case leave knocking and only marke the doore and be gone Some are hard to vomit there is such a concinnity betweene the stomack and what filth is burnt to the coates of it t will goe hard with such Some cast up presently as soone as nature is offended So do you saith Christ open immediately what I knock for to be delivered up deliver it up imediately I will not waite Christ makes short quick worke in the Earth when he hath to do with meer earth that will be no more COLOS. 1.25 According to the dispensation of God DIspensation the word meanes domesticke distribution
God to save and so is the word translated 2 Thess 2. Where t is used in order to the wicked having 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pleasure in unrighteousnesse c. You may imagine how much the Word doth import being used to set out a sinners love and strongest affection to sinne What a pleasure is a wicked mans sinne to him Can you expresse it why so says God t is to mee now to looke towards poore lost man and to sit downe in his soule The Word is used by the Apostle elsewhere 't is my hearts desire that Israel might be saved c. Just as if the Apostle should have said it would be my Heaven that Jsrael might come to Heaven t is my Heaven to thinke that ever they shall have Heaven and O that they might be called and he speakes there but in the straine and spirit of the Gospell the riches of the glory of this mystery that I am opening the heart of God and the heart of Christ now to man Vse You see now what is the riches of the glory of this mystery t is the proffer of mercy to man with much strength of affection a proffer of Heaven in Heaven i as one in Heaven a proffer of Life in Life or with Life and so are all the dispensations of the Gospell typified Revel 4. A throne was set in Heaven to set out the things of Heaven Let poore sinners know what is the riches of the glory of this mystery and inrich themselves by it Blessed are they that know the joyfull sound which words point at Aarons bells his going into the holiest of all made a joyfull sound to them that could understand it it pointed at Christ offering up his life for us and yet doing it as it were with Musick cheerfully and delightfully You have had this mystery explained all along my discourse do you understand it sinners then inrich your selves with it The Sunne is the riches and glory of all the World such a Sunne is the Gospell of Christ desire that this Sunne may shine into the little World if the Sun did not shine in this great World it could not inrich it nor glorifie it The Apostle speakes of this very thing to wit the Gospell and under this Metaphor of the Sun and he uses such tearmes as signifie in apparition and illustration But after that the kindnesse and gentlenesse of God appeared 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the word is used to expresse the second comming of Christ and that will be bright and glorious indeed 2 Thess 2.8 i in apparition for otherwise it had beene of no force to those effects which he there mentions a like place 2 Tim. 1.10 But is now made manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ who hath abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospell It is plaine by these following words that the apparition here spoken of meanes in apparition death could not be otherwise destroyed nor immortality be brought to light And the learned agree that the word notes a mighty shining light that searches every corner of the heart is the light that you have of such illustration hath it brought life and immortality to light i a holy life that never end There is a great deale of light now in the World but when wee looke how it illustrates it selfe we are sad because it comes to no more ordinarily then the light of a comet that falles and the matter that bore it resolving it selfe into a filthy stinck to the great disgrace of the Gospel to the death of brave persons and Kingdomes What is it that makes such bloudy worke in the Christian World now but this that the riches of the glory of this mystery doth nothing in men this hath made a long night to our brethren the Iewes and is like to doe the like to the Gentiles The Gospell being riches prize Christ and his Ministers let them be glorious in your eye which bring glorious things Know which way the riches of glory comes to you it comes but by one gate Which puts me in mind of a story In the County of Saba which signifies a mystery when Frankinsence was brought into the chiefe City thereof it was ordered by the Priests that it should come in but at one Gate upon paine of death to wit that which they had consecrated for that purpose T is of lively use the riches of glory come in but one way by Christ and by the Ministry of his Word and therefore keepe open this Cate if all the money in your purses will do it if all the bloud in your veines will do it let all goe rather then this and the Gospel when this departeth the glory departeth the riches of glory departeth There is but one thing that is eminently accessary to the destruction of the riches of glory and that is hardnesse of heart The Balme-Trees when they had wounded them to get the vertue of them to drop forth they laid Wooll upon which the drops might fall that so they might be sure to save it so to gaine the riches of the glory of the Gospel to save the drops that fall from Christs mouth you must lay soft hearts tender and fleshy hearts otherwise you will die poore and miserable notwithstanding all the riches of glory that are amongst you COLOS. 1.27 Among the Gentiles or in the Gentiles 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Ethnick This is the word in the originall by which we are called it may be from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 two words which signify a minde accustomed to some thing a heart evill and onely evill that is stout enough and such neither can nor will be made otherwise it speakes a nature of sinne a body of death one in the flesh and led by the flesh I will discribe a Gentile to you generally and particularly t is one uncircumcised in flesh and spirit that hath not the externall ordinances of Christ nor the internall efficacy this is to speake properly and fully a Gentile though where the latter is wanting under the fruition of the former such are called Gentiles For that he hath brought into my sanctuary strangers uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in flesh to be in my sanctuary to polluate it Ese 44.7 they which are called here strangers were Gentiles and their condition is described they were uncircumcised in heart and flesh and this to speake properly and fully is a Gentile one that is beside all culture that that is without the visible Church and without the invisible grace of such estate There is a Gentile in the flesh and a Gentile in the spirit and a Gentile in both The Apostle makes this destinction and in these termes Wherefore remember that yee being in times past Gentiles in the flesh were called the uncircumcision by that which is called the circumcision in the flesh which is made with hands Eph. 2.11 They were Gentiles in the flesh as well as in the
such heigths and depths of grace we account it a great mercy to finde our soules in such a frame here and yet this would be misery above there is no panting nor thirsting after any thing because no distance of any thing that is blessed there is no darkenesse no twilight no cloud of a hand breadth all that Heaven over to hide any thing from any soule to sad him all there have all plaine and open to them abundance of Revelations a Hyperbole of Revelations it is the expression of him that was there a little while 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Least J should he exalted above measure through the abundance of the Revelations 2 Cor. 12.7 t is abundance of Revelations indeed for t is a personall beholding of God and that is a Hyperbole of Revelations you will all grant and yet t is very true and me thinkes very plainly set out Exod. 33.17 18 19 20. at the eighteene verse this is Moses request J beseech thee shew me thy glory observe how God answers to this at the 20 vers thou canst not see my face by which is interpreted what is meant by Gods glory to wit his face what Moses before called Gods glory that God himselfe when he comes to English it to us calls his face but what then is meant by Gods face why this also in the next words God himselfe interprets There shall no man see mee and live expressing his person so that the glory of God according to Gods owne interpretation is a personall beholding of God and this is a hyperbole of revelations indeed and that which makes a hyperbole of joyes indeed thou shalt make mee full of joy with thy countenance Acts 2.28 which is a place paralell with the former and poynts at the personall vision of God which and which only makes full joy to the soule of man COLOS. 1.28 Whom wee preach warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdome that wee may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus 29. Whereunto I also labour striving according to his working which worketh in mee mightily THe call of God by whom to whom and to what are the generalls exprest and amplified in these two verses The call of God now is by men whom wee preach and whereunto J also labour Sinne is punished weakenesse condescended to immediate commerce was our life it is now our death we cannot see God nor heare God and live take both in a parallel speach but wee shall doe both 'T was shadowed by the mediation of Moses who talked with God upon the Mount and in the Tabernacle which shadowed Heaven as our spirituall Tabernacles now do Face to face as a man talkes with his friend Exod. 33.11 there was very immediate vision and commerce though not personall yet as neare it as it was possible for our frayle condition to beare to be strongly preaching and confirming what Christ our Mediator will one day bring us to againe in that holy of holies that glorious Tabernacle where now he himselfe officiates The call of God is by men to men by some selected to all in generall whom wee preach warning every man and teaching every man Earth to earth Potsherds strive with Potsherds of the Earth wee must beseech and intreat every one and with every degree of patience wee must be beggers at every ones dore for Christ for earth to go to Heaven and if it will not be earth must shake off earth against earth we must shake off the dust of our feete against Adams sons Earth is used to save or to destroy earth Goliah is kil'd with a stone a little heape strikes downe a great Goliah some thinke may signify a great heape which if so name and person did agree and David who was but a little man and with a little stone strikes downe this great person Earth kils earth and earth buries earth earth rings the Funerall of earth by us though poore earthen Vessels Christ sounds and sets forth who are dead eternally You know the call of God by whom it is and to whom it is to what it is is the next generall particularly to bee spoken to Wee are cal'd to a perfect person and in him to a perfect condition That wee may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus Divine vocation is in opposition to diabolicall avocation we were called from God by Satan and God cal'd us to him againe simply and circumstantially i not onely to him but as fully to him as ever to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 toti dilecti wholly beloved Having thus divided the verses wee will begin with the first clause thereof whom we preaeh The originall word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whom we exactly shew or fully declare 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in this composition notes a superlative and is to intend the expression like as it doth Luke 12.58 where our Saviour sayes of conscience that it should not onely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That is throughly draw or perfectly draw The word thus opened that which I would stand on is this That Gospell administration makes exact illumination the Gospell hath a peculiar Idiom nothing speakes so plaine and so full of every thing concerning man as this doth 'T is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Apostle speakes 1 Cor. 14.9 a word very significative i very plaine and very full every administration humane conducing to illumination speakes darkely and by halves no language yeelds vox bene significans therefore are they which leane upon these helps children of darknesse notwithstanding all their light their hearts and lives full of lyes a lie is in their right hand i. In that wherein they are confident they are intelligent they understand nothing Gospel adminstration makes that which the old Testament calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 * Col. 3.24 Noting certaine knowledge and the new Jadang * Isa 6.9 Perception a looking through things i. it makes every thing transparent manifest quite through out-side and inside Yee see indeed but perceive not 't is as if the Prophet had said yee doe not Gospelly apprehend your reception makes not perception not vision quite through as doth the Gospell therefore is the light of the Church of Christ compared to a stone most precious as Jasper Chrystall He carried me away in the spirit saith John and shewed me the great City holy Jerusalem descending out of heaven having the glory of God and her light was like to a stone most precious even like to a Jasper stone Revel 21.11 Like to this is Cant. 6.10 Who is she that looketh forth as the morning faire as the Moon cleare as the Sun By all which Metaphors is made manifest that what light the gospell gives is very cleare Vse Gospel-Administration makes exact Illumination what hath it done in you what is your light under all the meanes of light you enjoy paines is considered t is so with you t is so with God you observe
the Lord Jesus as you would blesse God highly for your sinne makes many miserable but your selves most though yet you feele it not surely Justice hath espyed us all carnall for Paul Apollo for Cephas for this thing for that for nothing cordially but our lust Sinners can you consider your selves can you consider this time you of this place your advantages are great do you know them it will not be long ere our glasse be out ere we meete before Christ the Sword of Justice is at all our breasts all that you have heard will be repeated all that you have rejected will be chronicled with the bloud of your soules to beare witnesse against you as long as Christ and your soules are Opportunity is more then eternity 'tas not so much time in it but 'tas more advantage you shall answer for all advantages which are the waightiest things in the world facility to Christ is now doubly needfull soule hardning blowes are strucke apace the Ax is to the root hypocrites are not so borne with now as formerly but ript up and carried forth from the sincere like Judas and Ananias and Saphira our misery is mercy in this sinkes are loathsome yet t is well that Christ so workes that basenesse cannot hide it selfe Drunken soules and drunken bodies pride covetousnesse malice blasphemy all sorts of sinnes that lay hid a great while now shew themselves in their colours speedy action and through action is now expected upon paine of speedy and through detection and rejection COLOS. 1.28 That we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus THis terme perfection is not found in some Greeke copies but read onely thus That we may present every man in Christ T is a reading very honourable compared with other copies for it intimates that to be presented at the great day in Christ is all You may call such a soule what you will that is Noble holy unblameable unreproveable in Gods sight as this terme perfect is interpreted at the 22 verse of this Chapter or if there be any tearme amongst us more significative you may use it and apply it to him that is set downe before God in Christ you may call him eximium adultum a man come to full age a man singular chosen out from among thousands by royall favour such a one in whom the eye of God can see nothing amisse no defect no excesse no presence of sinne no absence of grace a man come to his journeys end all this the originall word will beare As soone as one comes into Christ then a mans journey as a Christian begins the soule that is thus come into the Arke when the Arke leaves floating and tossing the soule and lands it selfe and its fraught upon the mountaine in that place above where God Angels and just men made perfect are then t is come to its journeys end then is man a perfect man All our perfection is in Christ Perfection is of things above or below both are in Christ There is a creation here which gives all parts of a perfect creature and therefore cald perfect new all new Old things are past away and all things are become new but this is not till the soule be in Christ He that is in Christ is a new creature A man whilst in himselfe whatever parts he hath or advantage of externall tuition he is an old creature that is adhering to and led by that which God of old condemned in the Angels and in Adam private will selfe will and worth which is the originall of all evill within and without A man in Christ that is a man in the grace and strength of Christ renounceth this to wit himselfe his owne will which is the seat and spring of all carnall lusts and in no other strength whatsoever can he doe it My grace is sufficient The old man is bed-ridden never goes out of his chamber never out of himselfe what ever brave things you discerne him doe or say nor can Perfection here is the through death of selfe I am crucified Crucifixion speakes many deaths head hands feet sides brest all wounded nailed it notes much paine but through worke all powers and parts of selfe tortured crying out eloy much anguish and great earth-quakes but selfe at last quite giving up the ghost I am crucified the heart blood of all that may speake me in any thing that is good is out and this through death of selfe is wrought with no other engine but Christ that with which selfe is crucified is with Christ I am crucified with Christ This is the stone that slaies Goliah that sinkes into the braine of the Gyant Our being in Christ is the death of sinne and the life of grace as Jonas being in the Whale was the death of his pride this makes personall action truly pure that is of such rise and of such reach as fully suits the Gospell and without which none can be or act The Apostle gives this bound to sanctity if any be sanctified here t is in Christ to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus 1 Cor. 1.2 Sanctification and glorification is in Christ There is a fulnesse here and a fulnesse hereafter a perfection of quantity and a perfection of quality a perfection of quantity is that which Divines call a perfection of parts as a child hath every finger and every toe every limbe of a man though these not growne to a mans maturity Then there is also perfection of quality which Divines call a perfection of degrees when all parts and gifts are throughly come to maturity the eye so strong and so cleare as able to behold all things that are in God to blesse the soule and so the eare hearing all things the tongue tasting all things the hand feeling all things that are in and from that blessed being to make the being of the soule like it all this perfection is in Christ and this by the pleasure of God It pleased the Father that in him should all fulnesse dwell grace glory Whatsoever God gives forth here whatsoever he gives forth above Christ is the continent in which t is laid With thee is the fountaine of life and in thy light shall we see light Psal 36.9 There are streames and broad rivers which runne to soules here the fountaine of these is with him that is the whole that God is to man in this world or will be to man in the world to come which is explained in that which followes with thee is the fountaine of life meaning Christ in thy light we shall see light In Christ wee have all the blessednesse that God gives in this world and in him we shall see that is actually possesse all that God gives above Therefore t is that David saith All my springs are in thee those that runne above and therefore also are the rivers of pleasure there said to be at Gods right hand the place where Christ sits In Christ wee stand and see God here in
the bloud of his Crosse Hanging was used under the old Covenant onel◠for some notorious crimes as blasphemie sacrificing to Devils c. and was used as a second death first life was taken away by some other punishment as stoning or the like and then the body hanged up to render the person as well as the fact abominable to all to God and man which is the meaning of that expression He that is hanged is accursed of God Deut. 21.23 his person as well as his fact is execrable greatly abhorred Thus David commanded Rechab and Barzillah to be punished with a double death for that foule fact of murthering Ishbosheth he slew them and then he hanged them up 2 Sam. 4.12 Such a one was Christ judged to be a notorious malefactor a blasphemer one that had a devill c. and therefore hanged on a tree not slaine first but tortured to death upon the Crosse which was a Romish variation from the rule as in matter so in forme and served in this case onely to vend the height of malice against innocency making not two deaths but a thousand deaths in one The bloud of the crosse speakes three things Divine wrath fully suffered Infinite Justice was offended answerable displeasure brake forth a sea of wrath in the world and Christ in the bottome of it alive and all the waves passing over him I went downe to the bottome of the mountaines saith Jonah All the waves passed over me yet hast thou brought my life the pit These expressions speake Christ he lay under mountaines seas of displeasure he bore the full weight of divine wrath he paid the utmost farthing God is not extreame to marke what 's done amisse in reference to us but he was so in reference to Christ not a sin not a circumstance of sin overlooked of all those millions of sinners and sins undertaken for but wrath weigh'd out exact in proportion to all and laid on Christ and he bore all He bore the iniquitie of us all Justice mingles her selfe with mercy when shee breakes forth upon us in the middest of Justice God remembers mercie but it did not so in reference to Christ Justice went forth in its full strength against him without a dram of mercy mixed with it He was made a curse for us Which words speake no mercy The strength of sin is the Law and the strength of the Law is the curse all the curses written in Gods book without any mercy mixed and all this did Christ beare upon the crosse The crosse was a grand curse a superlative punishment which wrapt up all the misery in it that ever justice made or any creature felt Christs cup had mixture in it but not one sweet ingredient all corroding and speaking full and pure wrath gall and vineger was given him in the pangs of death The bloud of the crosse speakes justice fully satisfied 't is called for this cause a Lutron a ransome Wee were sold under sin and the bloud of the crosse bought us paid the full demands of that power under which we were The Son of man came not to be ministred unto but to minister and give his life a ransome for many The bloud of the crosse is a ransome that which gives full satisfaction to an offended God under whose wrath wee lay Wee are bought with a price this price is not gold nor silver but the precious bloud of Christ The bloud of Christ is bloud of price that this is shed is as much as if the bloud of all the creatures in the world had been shed yea more life is our choicest jewel yet all creatures lives put together and put into one bundle of life and presented to God he would not have taken it to ransome one soule no he would not have taken it as satisfactory for one sin Justice offended is infinite the price given for satisfaction must be proportionable or else no satisfaction the bloud of all the world is finite and not proportionable to infinite and therefore God shed his bloud the bloud of the crosse is the bloud of him that was God-man this made the bloud of the humane nature precious bloud as Peter speakes that is infinitely precious of worth to satisfie for all the sins that are or shall be committed in the world because all will rise but to a finite bulke let it swell as big as 't will 't is of price to satisfie for all the sinnes in the world and if there were so many more then there are therefore is that expression 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 much more repeated twice in the fifth of the Romans Not as the offence so is the free gift the price is another gets thing then that in proportion to which it is given for if through the offence of one many be dead much more the grace of God and the gift by grace which is by one man Jesus Christ hath abounded unto many The bloud of the crosse speakes guilt fully expiated actually in reference to Christ as an undertaker and so also in reference to us who are actually in him by faith He bore our sinnes in his bodie upon the crosse saith the Apostle Peter The Leviticall bloud was purging it purified the flesh as the Scripture speakes and pointed at Christs bloud which purifies flesh and spirit i takes away the wrath of God liable to both Without bloud there is no remission but with bloud there is remission full remission the bloud of the crosse takes out all spots The bloud of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin 1 Joh. 1.7 There is not a spot in Christ consider him as our undertaker as married to our nature he is all faire Thou art all faire my love c. Joshua had filthy garments but he hath washed them white in his owne bloud so have they which are in him by faith their garments are white with the bloud of the Lambe by garments is not meant the outside onely but outside and inside the whole person They that are washed are cleane every whit Christ speakes of the Spouse as the Spouse speakes of him Thou art all faire c. Vse Sinners doe you consider how usefull Christ is and make use of him The chastisement of our peace is upon him that which belongs to any mans eternall welfare is contrived upon the crosse by Christ he hath bought all into his hand with his bloud which tends to any ones good he has the eare of God the hand of God the heart of God he has Earth Heaven he hath eternall life and can give it to whom he will he hath the keyes of David the keyes of those everlasting dores he is the dore to the bosome of the Father he hath by his bloud entered within the vaile bought all under his custodie Christ is furnished to doe us good and we make no use of him Sinners tumble in their sinnes and fall asleepe and wrath cuts them off ere they dreame of a Saviour There is a