bodies in the last sickness you had And what then had become oâ— you What could have been expected to succeed your impenitent state in this World but howlings in another But he repriev'd you upon your petitions or the sollicitations of your friends and have you not broke your word with him Have your hearts been stedfast hath he not yet waited expecting when you would put your vows and resolutions into Execution What need had he to cry out to any so loud and so long Oh you fools how long will you love foolishness Prov. 1.22 when he might have ceased his crying to you and have by your death prevented your many neglects of him Did he do all this that any of us might add new sins to our old or rather that we should bless him for his forbearance comply with the end of it in reforming our lives and having recourse to his mercy 3. Exhortation therefore presume not upon his patience The exercise of it is not Eternal you are at present under his Patience yet while you are unconverted you are also under his anger Psal 7.11 God is angry with the wicked every day You know not how soon his Anger may turn his Patience aside and step before it It may be his Sword is drawn out of his Scabbard his Arrowes may be settled in his Bow and perhaps there is but a little time before you may feel the edge of the one or the point of the other and then there will be no more time for Patience in God to us or petition from us to him If we repent here he will pardon us If we deferre Repentance and dye without it he will have no longer mercy to pardon nor Patience to bear What is there in our power but the present the future time we cannot command the past time we cannot recal squander not then the present away The time will come when time shall be no more and then long-suffering shall be no more Will you neglect the time wherein patience acts and vainly hope for a time beyond the resolves of patience Will you spend that in vain which Goodness hath allotted you for other purposes What an estimate will you make of a little forbearance to respite death when you are gasping under the stroke of its Arrows How much would you value some few days of those many years you now trifle away Can any think God will be alwayes at an expence with them in vain that he will have such riches trampled under their feet and so many editions of his patience be made wast Paper Do you know how few sands are yet to run in your glass Are you sure that he that waits to day will wait as well to morrow How can you tell but that God that is slow to anger to day may be swift to it the next Jerusalem had but a day of peace and the most carelâ—â—â— sinner hath no more When their day was don they were destroyed by 〈◊〉 Pestilence or Sword or led into a doleful Captivity Did God make our lives so uncertain and the duration of his forbearance unknown to us that we should live in a lazy neglect of his Glory and our own happiness If you should have more patience in regard of your lives do you know whither you shall have the effectual offers of Grace As your lives depend upon his will so your conversion depends solely upon his Grace There have been many examples of those miserable wretches that have been left to a reprobate sence after they have a long time abus'd Divine forbearance Thoug◠〈…〉 he binds up sin Hos 13.12 The sin of Ephraim is bâ—â—â—d up as bonds are bound up by a Creditor till a fit opportunity when God comes to put the bond in suit it will be too late to wish for that patience we have so scornfully despised Consider therefore the end of Patience The Patience of God considered in it self without that which it tends to affords very little Comfort 't is but a step to pardoning Mercy and it may be without it and often is Many have been repreived that were never forgiven Hell is full of those that had Patience as well as we but not one that accepted pardoning grace went within the gates of it Patience leaves men when their sins have ripen'd them for Hell but pardoning Grace never leaves men till it hath conducted them to Heaven His Patience speaks him placable but doth not assure us that he is actually appeas'd Men may hope that long-suffering tends to a pardon but cannot be assured of a pardon but by something else above meer long-suffering Rest not then upon bare Patience but consider the end of it 't is not that any should sin more freely but repent more meltingly 't is not to spirit rebellion but give a merciful stop to it Why should any be so ambitious of their ruine as to constrain God to ruine them against the inclinations of his sweet disposition 4. The fourth Exhortation is let us imitate Gods patience in our own to others He is unlike God that is hurryed with an unruly impetus to punish others for wronging him The consideration of Divine Patience should make us square our selves according to that pattern God hath exercised a long-suffering from the fall of Adam to this minute on innumerable subjects and shall we be transported with desire of revenge upon a single injury If God were not slow to wrath a sinful World had been long ago torn up from the foundation And if Revenge should be exercised by all men against their Enemies what man should have been alive since there is not a man without an Enemy If every man were like Saul breathing out threatnings the World would not only be an Aceldama but a Desert How distant are they from the nature of God who are in a flame upon every slight provocation from a sence of some feeble and imaginary honour that must bloody their Sword for a trifle and write their revenge in wounds and death When God hath his Glory every day bespattered yet he keeps his Sword in his sheath what a wo would it be to the World if he drew it upon every affront This is to be like Brutes Dogs or Tygers that snarle bite and devour upon every slight occasion But to be Patient is to be divine and to shew our selves acquainted with the disposition of God Be you therefore perfect as your heavenly father is perfect Matth. 5.48 i. e. Be you perfect and good for he had been exhorting them to bless them that curs'd them and to do good to them that hated them and that from the example God had set them in causing his Sun to rise upon the evil as well as the good Be you therefore perfect To Conclude as Patience is Gods perfection so it is the accomplishment of the Soul And as his slowness to anger argues the greatness of his power over himself so an unwillingness to revenge is a sign of
Himself By giving his Son he hath given himself and in both Gifts he hath given all things to us The Creator of all things is eminently all things He hath given all things into the hands of his Son * Joh. 3.35 and by consequence given all things into the hands of his Redeem'd Creatures by giving them him to whom he gave all things Whatsoever we were invested in by Creation whatsoever we were depriv'd of by Corruption and more he hath deposited in safe hands for our enjoyment And what can Divine Goodness do more for us What further can it give unto us than what it hath given and in that Gift design'd for us 3. This Goodness is enhanc'd by considering the State of Man in the first Transgression and since 1. Mans first Transgression If we should rip up every Vein of that first Sin should we find any want of Wickedness to excite a just Indignation What was there but ingratitude to Divine Bounty and Rebellion against Divine Soveraignty The Royalty of God was attempted the Supremacy of Divine knowledge above Mans own knowledge envied the Riches of Goodness whereby he lived and breathed slighted There is a discontent with God upon an unreasonable Sentiment that God had denied a knowledge to him which was his right and due when there should have been an humble acknowledgment of that unmerited Goodness which had not only given him a Being above other Creatures but placed him the Governor and Lord of those that were inferior to him What alienation of his understanding was there from knowing God and of his will from loving him A Debauch of all his Faculties A Spiritual Adultery in preferring not only one of Gods Creatures but one of his desperate Enemies before him thinking him a wiser Counsellor than Infinite Wisdom and imagining him possessed with kinder affections to him than that God who had newly Created him Thus he joyns in League with Hell against Heaven with a Fallen Spirit against his Bountiful Benefactor and enters into Society with Rebels that just before commenc'd a War against his and their common Soveraign He did not only falter in but cast off the Obedience due to his Creator endeavoured to purloin his Glory and actually murder'd all those that were vertually in his Loyns * Rom. 5.12 Sin enter'd into the World by him and Death by Sin and passed upon all Men taking them off from their Subjection to God to be Slaves to the damn'd Spirits and Heirs of their Misery And after all this he adds a foul imputation on God taxing him as the Author of his Sin and thereby stains the Beauty of his Holiness But notwithstanding all this God stops not up the Floodgates of his Goodness nor doth he entertain Fiery Resolutions against Man but brings forth a healing Promise and sends not an Angel upon Commission to Reveal it to him but Preaches it himself to this Forlorn and Rebellious Creature †Gen. 3.15 2. Could there be any thing in this Fallen Creature to allure God to the Expression of his Goodness Was there any good action in all his Carriage that could plead for a readmission of him to his former State Was there one good quality left that could be an Orator to perswade Divine Goodness to such a gracious Procedure Was there any Moral Goodness in Man after this Debauch that might be an Object of Divine Love What was there in him that was not rather a provocation than an allurement Could you expect that any Perfection in God should find a Motive in this ungrateful Apostate to open a Mouth for him and be an Advocate to support him and bring him off from a just Tribunal Or after Divine Goodness had begun to pity and plead for Man is it not wonderful that it should not discontinue the Plea after it found Mans Excuse to be as black as his Crime * Gen. 3.12 and his Carriage upon his Examination to be as disobliging as his first Revolt It might well be expected that all the Perfections in the Divine Nature would have entered into an association eternally to treat this Rebel according to his deserts What attractives were there in a silly Worm much less in such compleat Wickedness inexcusable Enmity infamous Rebellion to design a Redeemer for him and such a Person as the Son of God to a Fleshy Body an Eclipse of Glory and an ignominious Cross The meaness of Man was further from alluring God to it than the dignity of Angels 3. Was there not a World of demerit in Man to animate Grace as well as Wrath against him We were so far from deserving the opening any Streams of Goodness that we had merited Floods of devouring Wrath. What were all Men but Enemies to God in a high manner Every offence was infinite as being committed against a Being of Infinite Dignity it was a stroke at the very Being of God A resistance of all his Attributes it would degrade him from the height and Perfection of his Nature it would not by its good will suffer God to be God If he that hates his Brother is a Murderer of his Brother he that hates his Creator is a Murderer of the Deity * Joh. 1.3.15 and every Carnal mind is Enmity to God †Rom. 8.7 Every Sin envies him his Authority by breaking his Precept and envies him his Goodness by defacing the Marks of it Every Sin comprehends in it more than Men or Angels can conceive That God who only hath the clear apprehensions of his own Dignity hath the sole clear apprehensions of Sins Malignity All Men were thus by Nature those that Sinned before the coming of the Redeemer had been in a State of Sin those that were to come after him would be in a State of Sin by their Birth and be Criminals as soon as ever they were Creatures All Men as well the Glorifi'd as those in the Flesh at the coming of the Redeemer and those that were to be born after were consider'd in a State of Sin by God when he bruis'd the Redeemer for them All were filthy and unworthy of the Eye of God All had employ'd the Faculties of their Souls and the Members of their Bodies which they enjoyed by his Goodness against the interest of his Glory Every Rational Creature had made himself a Slave to those Creatures over whom he had been appointed a Lord subjected himself as a Servant to his Inferior and strutted as a Superior against his Liberal Soveraign and by every Sin rendred himself more a Child of Satan and Enemy of God and more worthy of the Curses of the Law and the Torments of Hell Was it not now a mighty Goodness that would surmount those high Mountains of Demerit and elevate such Creatures by the Depression of his Son Had we been possessed of the highest Holiness a Reward had been the natural effect of Goodness It was not possible that God should be unkind to a Righteous and Innocent Creature
had a body t is impossible to mould an Image of it in the true glory of that body Can the Statue of an excellent Monarch represent the Majesty and air of his Countenance tho made by the skilfullest workman in the world If God had a body in some measure suted to his excellency were it possible for Man to make an exact Image of him who cannot picture the light heat motion magnitude and dazling property of the Sun The excellency of any Corporeal nature of the least Creature the temper instinct artifice are beyond the power of a Carving tool much more is God 2. To make any Corporeal representations of God is unworthy of God 'T is a disgrace to his nature Whosoever thinks a Carnal corruptible Image to be fit for a representation of God renders God no better than a Carnal and Corporeal being 'T is a kind of debasing an Angel who is a Spiritual nature to represent him in a bodily shape who is as far removed from any fleshliness as Heaven from Earth much more to degrade the glory of the Divine nature to the lineaments of a man The whole stock of Images is but a lie of God Jer. 10 8 14. A Doctrin of vanities and falsehood It represents him in a false garb to the world and sinks his glory into that of a corruptible Creature * Rom. 1.25 It impairs the reverence of God in the minds of men and by degrees may debase mens apprehensions of God * Rom. 1.22 and be a means to make them believe he is such a one as themselves and that not being free from the figure he is not also free from the imperfections of their bodies Corporeal Images of God were the fruits of base imaginations of him and as they sprung from them so they contribute to a greater corruption of the notions of the Divine nature The Heathens begun their first representations of him by the Image of a corruptible Man then of birds till they descended not only to four footed beasts but creeping things even Serpents as the Apostle seems to intimate in his enumeration Rom. 1.23 It had been more honourable to have continued in human representations of him than have sunk so low as beasts and Serpents the baser Images tho the first had been infinitely unworthy of him he being more above a man though the noblest Creature than Man is above a Worm a Toad or the most despicable creeping thing upon the Earth To think we can make an Image of God of a piece of Marble or an Ingot of Gold is a greater debasing of him than it would be of a great Prince if you should represent him in the statue of a Frog When the Israelites represented God by a Calf 't is said they sinned a great sin Exod. 32.31 And the sin of Jeroboam who intended only a representation of God by the Calves at Dan and Bethel is called more emphatically * Hosea 10.15 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the wickedness of your wickedness the very skum and dreggs of wickedness As men debased God by this so God debased men for this he degraded the Israelites into Captivity under the worst of their Enemies and punished the Heathens with spiritual Judgments as uncleaness through the lusts of their own hearts Rom. 1.24 which is repeated again in other expressions v. 26 27. as a meet recompence for their disgracing the spiritual nature of God Had God been like to Man they had not offended in it But I mention this to shew a probable reason of those base lusts which are in the midst of us that have scarce been exceeded by any Nation viz. the unworthy and unspiritual conceits of God which are as much a debasing of him as material Images were when they were more rife in the world and may be as well the cause of those spiritual Judgments upon men as the worshipping molten and carved Images were the cause of the same upon the Heathen 3. Yet this is natural to Man Wherein we may see the contrariety of Man to God Though God be a Spirit yet there is nothing Man is more prone to than to represent him under a corporeal form The most famous Guides of the Heathen world have fashioned him not only according to the more honourable Images of men but beastialized him in the form of a Brute The Egyptians whose Country was the School of Learning to Greece were notoriously guilty of this brutishness in worshiping an Ox for an Image of their God and the Philistines their Dagon in a figure composed of the Image of a Woman and a Fish * Daille super Cor. 1.10 Ser. 3. Such representations were ancient in the Oriental parts The Gods of Laban that he accuseth Jacob of stealing from him are supposed to be little figures of men * Gen. 31.30.34 Such was the Israelites Golden-Calf their worship was not terminated on the Image but they worshipped the true God under that representation They could not be so brutish as to call a Calf their Deliverer and give so him great a Title these be thy Gods oh Israel which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt Exod. 32.4 or that which they knew belonged to the true God the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob. * Gen. 3.16 17. They knew the Calf to be formed of their Ear-rings but they had consecrated it to God as a representation of him Though they chose the form of the Egyptian Idol yet they knew that Apis Osiris and Isis the Gods the Egyptians adored in that figure had not wrought their Redemption from Bondage but would have used their force had they been possessed of any to have kept them under the Yoke rather than have freed them from it The Feast also which they celebrated before that Image is called by Aaron the Feast of the Lord Exod. 32.5 a Feast to Jehovah the incommunicable name of the Creator of the world 'T is therefore evident that both the Priest and the People pretended to serve the true God not any false Divinity of Egypt That God who had rescued them from Egypt with a mighty hand divided the Red-Sea before them destroyed their Enemies conducted them fed them by miracle spoken to them from Mount Sinai and amazed them by his Thundrings and Lightnings when he instructed them by his Law a God they could not so soon forget And with this representing God by that Image they are charged by the Psalmist Psal 106.19 20. they made a Calf in Horeb and changed their glory into the similitude of an Ox that eateth Grass They changed their glory that is God the glory of Israel so that they took this figure for the Image of the true God of Israel their own God not the God of any other Nation in the world Jeroboam intended no other by his Calves but Symbols of the presence of the true God instead of the Ark and the Propitiatory which remained among the Jews We see the inclination
good evil is present with me * Rom. 7.21 Never more present than when we have a mind to do good and never more present than when we have a mind to do the best and greatest good How hard is it to make our thoughts and affections keep their stand place them upon a good Object and they will be frisking from it as a Bird from one bough one fruit to another We vary postures according to the various objects we meet with The course of the World is a very airy thing suted to the uncertain motions of that Prince of the power of the Air which works in it * Eph. 2.2 This ought to be bewail'd by us Tho we may stand fast in the truth tho we may spin our resolutions into a firm web tho the Spirit may triumph over the flesh in our practice yet we ought to bewail it because inconstancy is our nature and what fixedness we have in good is from grace What we find practised by most men is natural to all * Lawrence of Faith p. 262. As face answers to face in a glass so doth heart to heart * Pro. 27.19 a face in the glass is not more like a natural face whose image it is than one mans heart is naturally like another 1. 'T is natural to those out of the Church Nebuchadnezzar is so affected with Daniels prophetick Spirit that he would have none accounted the true God but the God of Daniel * Dan. 2.47 How soon doth this notion slip from him and an image must be set up for all to worship upon pain of almost cruel painful death Daniels God is quite forgotten The miraculous deliverance of the three Children for not worshipping his Image makes him settle a Decree to secure the Honour of God from the reproach of his Subjects * Dan. 3.29 yet a little while after you have him strutting in his Palace as if there were no God but himself 2. 'T is natural to those in the Church The Israelites were the only Church God had in the World and a notable Example of inconstancy After the Miracles of Aegypt they murmured against God when they saw Pharaoh marching with an Army at their Heels They desired food and soon nauseated the Manna they were before fond of when they came into Canaan They sometimes worshipped God and sometimes Idols not only the Idols of one Nation but of all their Neighbours In which regard God calls this his Heritage a Speckled Bird * Jer. 12.9 a Peacock saith Hierom inconstant made up of varieties of Idolatrous colours and Ceremonies This levity of Spirit is the root of all mischeif it scatters our thoughts in the Service of God it is the cause of all revolts and Apostacies from him it makes us unfit to receive the communications of God whatsoever we hear is like words writ in sand ruffled out by the next gale whatsoever is put into us is like precious liquor in a palsie hand soon spilt It breeds distrust of God when we have an uncertain judgment of him we are not like to confide in him an uncertain judgment will be followed with a distrustful heart In fine where it is prevalent it is a certain sign of ungodliness to be driven with the wind like chaffe and to be ungodly is all one in the judgment of the Holy Ghost Psal 1.4 the ungodly are like the chaff which the wind drives away which signifies not their destruction but their disposition for their destruction is inferred from it ver 5. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in judgment How contrary is this to the unchangeable God who is alwayes the same and would have us the same in our religious Promises and Resolutions for good 4. If God be immutable 't is sad news to those that are resolved in wickedness or careless of returning to that duty he requires Sinners must not expect that God will alter his will make a breach upon his nature and violate his own Word to gratifie their lusts No 't is not reasonable God should dishonour himself to secure them and cease to be God that they may continue to be wicked by changing his own nature that they may be unchanged in their vanity God is the same goodness is as amiable in his sight and Sin as abominable in his eyes now as it was at the beginning of the world Being the same God he is the same Enemy to the Wicked as the same Friend to the Righteous He is the same in Knowledge and cannot forget sinful acts He is the same in Will and cannot approve of unrighteous Practices Goodness cannot but be alway the Object of his Love and Wickedness cannot but be alway the Object of his Hatred And as his aversion to Sin is alway the same so as he hath been in his Judgments upon Sinners the same he will be still for the same perfection of Immutability belongs to his Justice for the punishment of Sin as to his Holiness for his disaffection to Sin Though the Covenant of Works was changeable by the crime of man violating it yet it was unchangeable in regard of Gods justice vindicating it which is inflexible in the punishment of the breaches of his Law The Law had a preceptive part and a minatory part When man changed the observation of the Precept the righteous nature of God could not null the execution of the threatning He could not upon the account of this perfection neglect his just word and countenance the unrighteous transgression Tho there were no more rational Creatures in being but Adam and Eve yet God subjected them to that death he had assured them of and from this immutability of his Will ariseth the necessity of the suffering of the Son of God for the relief of the apostate Creature His Will in the second Covenant is as uncâ—aâ—â—eable as that in the first only repentance is settled as the condition of the second which was not indulged in the first and without repentance the sinner must iâ—â—voâ—â—bly pâ—rish or God must change his nature There must be a change in man there can be nâ—â—â—e in God his bow is bent his arrows are ready if the wicked do not turn * Psal 7.11 There is not an Atheist an hypocrite a prophane person that ever was upon the Earth but Gods Soul abhorred him as such and the like he will abhor for ever While any therefore continue so they may sooner expect the Heavens should roul as they please the Sun stand still at their order the Stars change their course at their beck than that God should change his nature which is opposite to prophaness and vanity Who hath hardned himself against him and hath prospered * Job 9.4 Use 2. Of comfort The immutability of a good God is a strong ground of consolation Subjects wish a good Prince to live for ever as being loath to change him but care not how soon they are rid of an Oppressor
pierce into the lower World as if his Presence and Cares were confin'd to Coelestial things and the Earth were too low a Sphere for his Essence to reach at least with any Credit 'T is forgotten by good men when they fear too much the designs of their Enemies Fear not for I am with thee Isa 43.5 If the Presence of God be enough to strengthen against fear then the prevailing of fear issues from our forgetfulness of it 2. This Attribute of Gods Omnipresence is for the most part contemn'd When men will commit that in the presence of God which they would be afraid or ashamed to do before the eye of man Men do not practice that Modesty before God as before men He that would restrain his tongue out of fear of mens eye will not restrain either tongue or hands out of fear of Gods What is the language of this but that God is not present with us or his presence ought to be of less regard with us and influence upon us than that of a creature Drexel Niceâ— lib. 2. cap. 10. Ask the Thief why he dares to steal Will he not answer No eye sees him Ask the Adulterer why he strips himself of his Chastity and invades the Rights of another Will he not answer Job 24.15 No eye sees me He disguiseth himself to be unseen by man but slights the all-seeing eye of God If only a man know them they are in terror of the shadow of death they are Planet-struck but stand unshaken at the presence of God Job 24.17 Is not this to account God as limited as man as ignorant as absenting as if God were something less than those things which restrains us 'T is a debasing God below a creature If we can forbear sin from an awe of the presence of man to whom we are equal in regard of Nature or from the presence of a very mean man to whom we are superior in regard of condition and not forbear it because we are within the ken of God We respect him not only as our inferior but inferior to the meanest man or child of his Creation in whose sight we would not commit the like action 'T is to represent him as a sleepy negligent or careless God as tho any thing might be concealed from him before whom the least fibres of the heart are anatomiz'd and open who sees as plainly midnight as noon-day sins Heb 4.13 Now this is a high aggravation of sin To break a Kings Laws in his sight is more bold than to violate them behind his back as it was Haman's offence when he lay upon Esthers bed to force the Queen before the Kings face The least iniquity receives a high tincture from this And no sin can be little that is an affront in the face of God and casting the filth of the creature before the eyes of his holiness As if a Wife should commit Adultery before her Husbands face or a Slave dishonour his Master and disobey his commands in his presence And hath it not often been thus with us Have we not been disloyal to God in his sight before his eyes those pure eyes that cannot behold iniquity without anger and grief Isa 65.12 Ye did evil before my eyes Nathan chargeth this home upon David 2 Sam. 12. â— Thou hast despised the commandment of the Lord to do evil in his sight And David in his repentance reflects upon himself for it Psal 51.4 Against thee thee only have I sinned and done this evil in thy sight I observed not thy presence I neglected thee while thy eye was upon me And this consideration should sting our hearts in all our confessions of our Crimes Men will be afraid of the presence of others whatsoever they think in their heart How unworthily do we deal with God in not giving him so much as an eye-service which we do man 8. How terrible should the thoughts of this Attribute be to sinners How foolish is it to imagine any hiding-place from the Incomprehensible God Quo fugis Encelade quas cunque accesseris oras sub Jove semper eris who fills and contains all things and is present in every point of the World When men have shut the door and made all darkness within to meditate or commit a Crime they cannot in the most intricate recesses be sheltred from the presence of God If they could separate themselves from their own shadows they could not avoid his company or be obscured from his sight Psal 139.12 The darkness and light are both alike to him Hypocrites cannot disguise their sentiments from him he is in the most secret nook of their hearts No thought is hid no lust is secret but the eye of God beholds this and that and the other He is present with our heart when we imagine with our hands when we act We may exclude the Sun from peeping into our solitudes but not the eyes of God from beholding our actions The eyes of the Lord are in every place beholding the evil and good Prov. 15.3 He lies in the depths of our souls and sees afar off our designs before we have conceived them He is in the greatest darkness as well as the clearest light in the closest thought of the mind as well as the openest expressions Nothing can be hid from him no not in the darkest Cells or thickest Walls He compasseth our path wherever we are Psal 139.3 and is acquainted with all our ways He is as much present with wicked men to observe their sins as he is to detest them Where he is present in his Essence he is present in his Attributes His Holiness to hate and his Justice to punish if he please to speak the word 'T is strange men should not be mindful of this when their very sins themselves might put them in mind of his presence Whence haâ—â— thou the power to act who preserves thy being whereby thou art capable of committing that evil Is it not his Essential presence that sustains us and his Arm that supports us And where can any man flye from his presence Not the vast Regions of Heaven could shelter a sinning Angel from his eye How was Adam ferreted out of his hiding-places in Paradice Nor can we find the depths of the Sea a sufficient covering to us If we were with Jonah closeted up in the belly of a Whale if we had the wings of the morning as quick a motion as the light at the dawning of the day that doth in an instant surprise and overpower the regions of darkness and could pass to the utmost parts of the earth or hell there we should find him there his eye would be upon us there would his hand lay hold of us and lead us as a Conqueror triumphing over a captive Psal 139.8 9 10. Nay if we could leap out of the compass of heaven and earth we should find as little reserves from him He is
Stock for the Redeemer yet God gave a Son from that Unlawful Bed whereof Christ came according to the flesh Gen. 38.29 compared with Mat. 1.3 Jonahs Sin was probably the first and remote occasion of the Ninivites giving credit to his Prophesy His Sin was the cause of his Punishment and his being slung into the Sea might facilitate the reception of his Message and excite the Ninivites Repentance whereby a Cloud of severe Judgment was blown away from them 'T is thought by some That when Jonah passed through the Streets of Niniveh with his Proclamation of Destruction he might be known by some of the Mariners of that Ship from whence he was cast Over-board into the Sea and might after their Voyage be occasionally in that City the Metropolis of the Nation and the place of some of their Births and might acquaint the People that this was the same Person they had cast into the Sea by his own consent for his acknowledg'd running from the Presence of the Lord for that he had told them Jonah 1.10 and the Marriners Prayer Verse 14. evidenceth it whereupon they might conclude his Message worthy of Belief since they knew from such Evidences that he had sunk into the Bowels of the Waters and now saw him safe in their Streets by a Deliverance unknown to them and that therefore that Power that delivered him could easily verifie his Word in the threatned Judgment Had Jonah gone at first without committing that Sin and receiving that Punishment his Message had not been judged a Divine Prediction but a fruit of some Enthusiastick madness His Sin upon this account was the first occasion of averting a Judgment from so great a City 3. The good of the Sinner himself is sometimes promoted by Divine Wisdom ordering the Sin As God had not permitted Sin to enter upon the World unless to bring Glory to himself by it so he would not let Sin remain in the little World of a Believers Heart if he did not intend to order it for his good What is done by Man to his damage and disparagement is directed by Divine Wisdom to his advantage not that it is the intent of the Sin or the Sinner but it is the event of the Sin by the Ordination of Divine Wisdom and Grace As without the Wisdom of God permitting Sin to enter into the World some Attributes of God had not been Experimentally known so some Graces could not have been exercis'd For where had there been an Object for that Noble Zeal in vindicating the Glory of God had it not been invaded by an Enemy The intenseness of Love to him could not have been so strong had we not an Enemy to hate for his sake Where had there been any place for that Noble part of Charity in holy Admonitions and Compassion to the Souls of our Neighbours and Endeavours to reduce them out of a destructive to a happy Path Humility would not have had so many grounds for its growth and exercise and holy Sorrow had had no fewel And as without the appearance of Sin there had been no exercise of the Patience of God so without Afflictions the Fruits of Sin there had been no ground for the exercise of the Patience of a Christian one of the Noblest parts of Valour Now Sin being Evil and such as cannot but be Evil hath no respect in it self to any good and cannot work a gracious End or any thing profitable to the Creature nay it is a hindrance to any good and therefore what good comes from it is Accidental occasioned indeed by Sin but efficiently caused by the over-ruling Wisdom of God taking occasion thereby to display it self and the Divine Goodness The Sins and Corruptions remaining in the Heart of a Man God orders for good and there are good effects by the direction of his Wisdom and Grace I. As the Soul respects God 1. God often brings forth a sensibleness of the necessity of Dependance on him The Nurse often lets the Child slip that it may the better know who supports it and may not be too venturous and confident of its own strength Peter would trust in Habitual Grace and God suffers him to Fall that he might trust more in Assisting Grace Mat. 26.35 Though I should die with thee yet I will not deny thee God leaves sometimes the brightest Souls in an Eclipse to manifest that their Holiness and the preservation of it depend upon the darting out his Beams upon them As the Falls of Men are the effects of their coldness and remisness in Acts of Faith and Repentance so the fruit of these Falls is often a running to him for Refuge and a deeper sensibleness where their Security lies It makes us Lower our swelling Sails and come under the Lee and Protection of Divine Grace When the Pleasures of Sin answer the expectations of a Revolted Creature he reflects upon his former state and sticks more close to God when before God had little of hâ—s Company Hos 2.7 I will return to my first husband for then it was better with me than now As God makes the Sins of Men sometimes an occasion of their Conversion so he sometimes makes them an occasion of a further Conversion Onesimus run from Philemon and was met with by Paul who proved an Instrument of his Conversion Philem. 10. My Son Onesimus whom I have begotten in my Bonds His slight from his Master was the occasion of his Regeneration by Paul a Prisoner The Falls of Believers God orders to their further stability He that is fallen for want of using his Staff will Lean more upon it to preserve himself from the like Disaster God by permitting the Lapses of Men doth often make them despair of their own strength to subdue their Enemies and rely upon the strength of Christ wherein God hath laid up Power for us and so becomes stronger in that strength which God hath ordained for them We are very apt to trust in our selves and have confidence in our own worth and strength and God lets loose Corruptions to abate this swelling humor This was the reason of the Apostle Pauls Thorn in the flesh 2 Cor. 12.9 whether it were a Temptation or Corruption or Sickness that he might be sensible of his own inability and where the sufficiency of Grace for him was placed He that is in danger of Drowning and hath the Waves come over his head will with all the might he hath lay hold upon any thing near him which is capable to Save him God lets his People sometâ—mes sink into such a condition that they may lay the faster hold on him who is near to all that call upon him 2. God hereby raiseth higher Estimations of the value and virtue of the Blood of Christ As the great Reason why God permitted Sin to enter into the World was to honour himself in the Redeemer so the Continuance of Sin and the Conquests it sometimes makes in Renewed Men are to honour the Infinite
by Violent Persecutions till she was establish'd in the Faith He would not expose her to so great Combats while she was weak and feeble but gave her time to fortifie her self to be render'd more capable of bearing up under them He stifled all the motions of Passion the Idolaters might have for their Superstition till Religion was in such a condition as rather to be increased and purified than extinguish'd by Opposition Paul was sâ—cured from Neroes Chains and the Nets of his Enemies till he had broke off the Chain of the Devil from many Cities of the Gentiles and catched them by the Net of the Gospel out of the Sea of the World Thus the Wisdom of God is seen in the Seasons of Judgments and Afflictions 3. It is apparent in the gracious issue of Afflictions and Penal Evils It is a part of Wisdom to bring Good out of Evil of Punishment as well as to bring Good out of Sin The Church never was so like to Heaven as when it was most Persecuted by Hell The Storms often cleans'd it and the Lance often made it more healthful Jobs Integrity had not been so clear nor his Patience so illustrious had not the Devil been permitted to afflict him God by his Wisdom out-wits Satan when he by his Temptations intends to pollute us and buffet us God orders it to purifie us he often brings the clearest light out of the thickest darkness makes Poysons to become Medicines †Turretin Serm. p. 53. Death it self the greatest Punishment in this Life and the entrance into Hell in its own Nature he hath by his Wise contrivance made to his People the Gate of Heaven and the passage into Immortality Penal Evils in a Nation often end in in a publick Advantage Troubles and Wars among a People are many times not destroying but Medicinal and cure them of that Degeneracy Luxury and Effeminateness they contracted by a long Peace 4. This Wisdom is evident in the various Ends which God brings about by Afflictions The attainment of various Ends by one and the same Means is the fruit of the Agents Prudence By the same Affliction the Wise God corrects sometimes for some base Affection excites some sleepy Grace drives out some lurking Corruption refines the Soul and ruines the Lust discovers the greatness of a Crime the Vanity of the Creature and the Sufficiency in himself The Jews bind Paul and by the Judge he is sent to Rome whiâ— his Mouth is stopt in Judea 't is open'd in one of the greatest Cities of the World and his Enemies unwittingly contribute to the increase of the knowledge of Christ by those Chains in that City ‖ Acts 28.31 that triumphed over the Earth And his afflictive Bonds added Courage and Resolution to others Phil. 1.14 Many waxing confident by my Bonds which could not in their own Nature produce such an effect but by the order and contrivance of Divine Wisdom In their own nature they would rather make them disgust the Doctrine he suffered for and cool their Zeal in the propagating of it for fear of the same disgrace and hardship they saw him suffer * Daille sur Philip. Part 1. pag. 116 117. But the Wisdom of God changed the nature of these Fetters and conducted them to the glory of his Name the encouragement of others the increase of the Gospel and the comfort of the Apostle himself Phil. 1.12 13 18. The Sufferings of Paul at Rome confirm'd the Philippians a People at a distance from thence in the Doctrine they had already received at his hands Thus God makes Sufferings sometimes which appear like Judgments to be like the Viper on Pauls hand Acts 28.6 a means to clear up Innocence and procure favour to the Doctrine among those Barbarians How often hath he multiplied the Church by Death and Massacres and increased it by those means used to annihilate it 5. The Divine Wisdom is apparent in the Deliverances he affords to other parts of the World as well as to his Church There are delicate composures curious threds in his Webs and he works them like an Artificer A goodness wrought for them curiously wrought Psal 31.19 1. In making the Creatures subservient in their Natural order to his gracious Ends and Purposes He orders things in such a manner as not to be necessitated to put forth an extraordinary Power in things which some part of the Creation might accomplish Miraculous productions would speak his Power but the ordering the Natural course of things to occasion such effects they were never intended for is one part of the glory of his Wisdom And that his Wisdom may be seen in the course of Nature he conducts the Motions of Creatures and acts them in their own strength and doth that by various windings and turnings of them which he might do in an instant by his Power in a Supernatural way Indeed sometimes he hath made Invasions on Nature and suspended the Order of their Natural Laws for a season to shew himself the Absolute Lord and Governour of Nature Yet if frequent Alterations of this nature were made they would impede the knowledge of the Nature of things and be some bar to the discovery and glory of his Wisdom which is best seen by moving the wheels of Inferiour Creatures in an exact regularity to his own Ends. He might when his little Church in Jacobs Family was like to starve in Canaan have for their preservation turn'd the Stones of the Country into Bread but he sends them down to Egypt to procure Corn that a way might be opened for their removal into that Country the Truth of his Prediction in their Captivity accomplish'd and a way made after the declaration of his great Name Jehovah both in the fidelity of his Word and the greatness of his Power in their Deliverance from that Furnace of Affliction He might have struck Goliah the Captain of the Philistines Army with a Thunderbolt from Heaven when he Blasphemed his Name and scar'd his People but he useth the Natural strength of a Stone and the Artificial motion of a Sling by the Arm of David to confront the Giant and thereby to free Judea from the ravage of a potent Enemey He might have delivered the Jews from Babylon by as strange Miracles as he used in their Deliverance from Egypt He might have plagu'd their Enemies gather'd his People into a Body and protected them by the bulwark of a Cloud and a Pillar of Fire against the Assaults of their Enemies But he uses the differences between the Persians and those of Babylon to accomplish his Ends. How sometimes hath the veering about of the Wind on a sudden been the loss of a Navy when it hath been upon the point of Victory and driven back the Destruction upon those which intended it for others And the accidental stumbling or the Natural fierceness of a Horse flung down a General in the midst of a Battle where he hath lost his life
the wisdom of God Christ is the wisdom of God principally and the Gospel instrumentally as it is the power of God instrumentally to subdue the heart to himself This is wrapped up in the appointing Christ as Redeemer and open'd to us in the revelation of it by the Gospel 1. It is a hidden wisdom In this regard God is said in the Text to be only wise and it is said to be a hidden wisdom 1 Tim. 1.17 and wisdom in a mystery 1 Cor. 2.7 incomprehensible to the ordinary Capacity of an Angel more than the abstruse qualities of the Creatures are to the understanding of man No wisdom of Men or Angels is able to search all the Veins of this Mine to tell all the threds of this Web or to understand the lustre of it they are as far from an ability fully to comprehend it as they were at first to contrive it That wisdom that invented it can only comprehend it In the uncreated Understanding only there is a clearness of light without any shadow of darkness We come as short of full apprehensions of it as a Child doth of the Counsel of the wisest Prince It is so hidden from us that without Revelation we could not have the least imagination of it and though it be revealed to us yet without the help of an Infiniteness of Understanding we cannot fully fathom it 'T is such a tractate of Divine wisdom that the Angels never before had seen the Edition of it till it was publish'd to the World Eph. 3.10 To the intent that now unto Principalities and Powers in heavenly places might be known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God Now made known to them not before and now made known to them in the heavenly places They had not the knowledge of all heavenly Mysteries though they had the possession of heavenly Glory They knew the Prophecies of it in the Word but attained not a clear Interpretation of those Prophecies till the things that were prophecied of came upon the Stage 2. Manifold wisdom So 't is called As manifold as mysterious Variety in the Mystery and Mystery in every part of the Variety It was not one single act but a variety of Counsels met in it a conjunction of excellent ends and excellent means The glory of God the salvation of Man the defeat of the Apostate Angels the discovery of the blessed Trinity in their Nature Operations their combin'd and distinct Acts and Expressions of Goodness The means are the conjunction of two Natures infinitely distant from one another the union of Eternity and Time of Mortality and Immortality Death is made the way to Life and Shame the path to Glory The weakness of the Cross is the reparation of man and the Creature is made wise by the foolishness of preaching fallen man grows rich by the poverty of the Redeemer and man is filled by the emptiness of God The Heir of Hell made a Son of God by God's taking upon him the form of a Servant the Son of Man advanc'd to the highest degree of Honour by the Son of God becoming of no reputation 'T is called Eph. 1.8 abundance of wisdom and prudence Wisdom in the Eternal Counsel contriving a way Prudence in the Temporary Revelation ordering all Affairs and Occurrences in the World for the attaining the end of his Counsel Wisdom refers to the Mystery Prudence to the manifestation of it in fit ways and convenient seasons Wisdom to the contrivance and order Prudence to the execution and accomplishment In all things God acted as became him as a wise and just Governour of the World Heb. 2.10 Whether the wisdom of God might not have found out some other way or whether he were in regard of the necessity and naturalness of his Justice limited to this is not the question But that it is the best and wisest way for the manifestation of his glory is out of question This wisdom will appear in the different Interests reconciled by it In the Subject the second Person in the Trinity wherein they were reconciled In the two Natures wherein he accomplish'd it whereby God is made known to man in his Glory Sin eternally condemned and the repenting and believing sinner eternally rescued The honour and righteousness of the Law vindicated both in the Precept and Penalty The Devil's Empire overthrown by the same Nature he had overturned and the Subtilty of Hell defeated by that Nature he had spoiled The Creature engaged in the very act to the highest Obedience and Humility that as God appears as a God upon his Throne the Creature might appear in the lowest posture of a Creature in the depths of resignation and dependance the publication of this made in the Gospel by ways congruous to the wisdom which appeared in the execution of his Counsel and the Conditions of enjoying the fruit of it most wise and resonable 1. The greatest different Interests are reconcil'd Justice in punishing and Mercy in pardoning For man had broken the Law and plung'd himself into a Gulf of Misery The Sword of Vengeance was unsheathed by Justice for the punishment of the Criminal The Bowels of Compassion were stirred by Mercy for the rescue of the Miserable Justice severely beholds the Sin and Mercy compassionately reflects upon the Misery Two different claims are entred by those concerned Attributes Justice votes for Destruction and Mercy votes for Salvation Justice would draw the Sword and drench it in the blood of the Offender Mercy would stop the Sword and turn it from the breast of the Sinner Justice would edge it and Mercy would blunt it The Arguments are strong on both sides 1. Justice pleads I Arraign before thy Tribunal a Rebel who was the glorious Work of thy Hands the Center of thy rich Goodness and a Counterpart of thy own Image he is indeed miserable whereby to excite thy Compassion but he is not miserable without being Criminal Thou didst create him in a state and with ability to be otherwise The riches of thy Bounty aggravate the blackness of his Crime He is a Rebel not by necessity but will What constraint was there upon him to listen to the Counsels of the Enemy of God What force could there be upon him since it is without the compass of any Creature to work upon or constrain the Will Nothing of Ignorance can excuse him the Law was not ambiguously express'd but in plain words both as to Precept and Penalty it was writ in his Nature in legible Characters Had he received any disgust from thee after his Creation it would not excuse his Apostacy since as a Soveraign thou wert not obliged to thy Creature Thou hadst provided all things richly for him he was crowned with glory and honour Thy infinite power had bestowed upon him an Habitation richly furnished and varieties of Servants to attend him Whatever he viewed without and whatever he viewed within himself were several Marks of thy Divine Bounty to engage him to Obedience Had
what God hath hid as to be careless of what God hath manifested Too great an inquisitiveness beyond our line is as much a provoking arrogance as a blockish negligence of what is revealed is a slighting ingratitude 2. Submit to God in his Precepts and Methods Since they are the results of Infinite Wisdom disputes against them are not tolerable What orders are given out by Infallible Wisdom are to be entertained with respect and reverence though the reason of them be not visible to our purblind minds Shall God have less respect from us than Earthly Princes whose Laws we observe without being able to pierce into the exact reason of them all Since we know he hath not a Will without an Understanding our observance of him must be without Repining we must not think to mend our Creators Laws and presume to judg and condemn his Righteous Statutes If the flesh rise up in opposition we must cross its motions and Silence its Murmurings his Will should be an acceptable Will to us because it is a wise Will in itself God hath no need to impose upon us and deceive us He hath just and righteous waies to attain his glory and his Creatures good To deceive us would be to dishonour himself and contradict his own nature He cannot impose false injurious Precepts or unavailable to his subjects happiness not false because of his Truth not injurious because of his Goodness not vain because of his Wisdom Submit therefore to him in his Precepts and in his Methods too The honour of his Wisdom and the interest of our Happiness calls for it Had Noah disputed with God about building an Ark and listned to the scoffs of the sensless World he had perished under the same fate and lost the honour of a Preacher and worker of righteousness Had not the Israelites been their own enemies if they had been permitted to be their own guides and returned to the Egyptian bondage and furnaces instead of a liberty and earthly felicity in Canaan Had our Saviour gratified the Jews by descending from the Cross and freeing himself from the power of his Adversaries he might have had that Faith from them which they promised him but It had been a faith to no purpose because without ground they might have believed him to be the Son of God but he could not have been the Saviour of the World His death the great ground and object of Faith had been unaccomplished they had believed a God pardoning without a content to his Iustice and such a Faith could not have rescued them from falling into eternal Misery The Precepts and Methods of Divine Wisdom must be submitted to 3. Submit to God in all Crosses and Revolutions Infinite Wisdom cannot err in any of his paths or step the least hairs bredth from the way of Righteousness There is the Understanding of God in every motion an Eye in every Wheel the Wheel that goes over us and crusheth us We are led by Fancy more than Reason We know no more what we ask or what is fit for us than the Mother of Zebedees children did when she Petitioned Christ for her sons advancement when he came into his Temporal Kingdom * Mat. 20.22 The things we desire might pleasure our Fancy or Appetite but impair our health One man complains for want of Children but knows not whither they may prove Comforts or Crosses Another for want of Health but knows not whither the health of his Body may not prove the disease of his Soul We migh◠lose in Heavenly things if we possess in Earthly things what we long for God in regard of his infinite Wisdom is fitter to carve out a condition than we our selves our Shallow reason and self-love would wish for those things that are injurious to God to our selves to the World but God alwaies chooses what is best for his Glory and what is best for his Creatures either in regard of themselves or as they stand in relation to him or to others as parts of the World We are in danger from our self-love in no danger in complying with Gods Wisdom When Rachel would dye if she had no Children she had Children but Death with one of them †Gen. 30.1 Good men may conclude that whatsoever is done by God in them or with them is best and fittest for them because by the Covenant which makes over God to them as their God the conduct of his Wisdom is assured to them as well as any other Attribute And therefore as God in every transaction appears as their God so he appears as their wise Director and by this Wisdom he extracts good out of evill makes the affliction which destroys our outward Comforts consume our inward Defilements And the waves which threatned to swallow up the vessel to cast it upon the shore And when he hath occasion to manifest his Anger against his People his Wisdom directs his Wrath. In Judgment he hath a work to do upon Zion and when that work is done he punishes the fruit of the stout heart of the King of Assyria ‖ Isa 10 1◠As in the answers of Prayer he doth give oftentimes above what we ask or think Eph. 3.20 so in outward concerns he doth above what we can expect or by our short-sightedness conclude will be done Let us therefore in all things frame our minds to the Divine Wisdom and say with the Psalmist Psal 47.4 The Lord shall chuse our inheritance and condition for us 6. Exhortation Censure not God in any of his waies Can we Understand the full scope of Divine Wisdom in Creation which is perfected before our Eyes Can we by a rational knowledge walk over the whole Surface of the Earth and wade through the Sea Can we Understand the Nature of the Heavens Are all or most or the thousandth part of the particles of Divine Skil known by us yea or any of them throughly known How can we then Understand his deeper methods in things that are but of yesterday that we have not had a time to View We should not be too quick or too rash in our Judgments of him The best that we attain to is but feeble conjectures at the designs of God As there is something hid in whatsoever is revealed in his Word so there is some thing inaccessible to us in his Works as well as in his Nature and Majesty In our Saviours act in washing his Disciples feet he checkt Peters contradiction John 13.7 What I do thou knowest not now but thou shalt know hereafter God were not infinitely wise if the reason of all his acts were obvious to our Shallowness He is no profound States-man whose inward intention can be sounded by vulgar Heads at the first act he starts in his designed method The wise God is in this like wisemen that have not breasts like glasses of Christal to discover all that they intend There are secrets of Wisdom above our reach * Iob 11.6 nay when
upon them by the Wonders wrought by the Apostles Acts 2.43 And fear came upon every Soul and many wonders and signs were done by the Apostles Was there not the same reason in the nature of the Works our Saviour wrought to point them to the Finger of God and calm their rage Yet did not the Power of God work upon their Passions in those Miracles nor stop the impetuousness of the Corruption resident in their hearts Yet now those who had the boldness to attack the Son of God and nail him to the Cross are frighted at the Appearance of Twelve unarmed Apostles as the Sea seems to be afraid when it approacheth the bounds of the feeble Sand. How did God bend the Hearts of the Egyptians to the Israelites and turn them to that point as to lend their most costly Vessels their precious Jewels and rich Garments to supply those whom they had just before tyrannically loaded with their Chains * Exod. 3.21 22. 1 Chro. 18.31 When a great part of an Army came upon Jehosaphat to dispatch him into another World how doth God in a trice touch their hearts and move them by a secret instinct at once to depart from him As if you should see a numerous sight of Birds in a moment turn wing another way by a sudden and joynt consent When he gave Saul a Kingdom he gave him a Spirit fit for Government and gave him another heart 1 Sam. 1â—â— and brought the People to submit to his yoke who a little before wandred about the Land upon no nobler employment than the seeking of Asses 'T is no small remark of the Power of God to make a number of strong and discontented Persons and desirous enough of liberty to bend their Necks under the yoke of Government and submit to the Authority of One and that of their own Nature often weaker and unwiser than the most of them and many times an Oppressor and Invader of their Rights Upon this account David calls God his Fortress Tower Shield Psal 144 2. all terms of Strength in subduing the People under him 'T is the Mighty hand of God that links Princes and People together in the bands of Government The same hand that asswageth the Waves of the Sea suppresseth the Tumults of the People III. It appears in his Gracious and Judicial Government 1. In his Gracious Government In the Deliverance of his Church He is the strength of Israel and hath protected his Little Flock in the midst of Wolves 1 Sam. 15.29 and maintained their standing when the strongest Kingdoms have sunk and the best joynted States have been broken in pieces When Judgments have ravaged Countries and torn up the Mighty as a tempestuous Wind hath often done the tallest Trees which seem'd to threaten Heaven with their Tops and dare the Storm with the depth of their Roots when yet the Vine and Rose-bushes have stood firm and been seen in their beauty next morning The state of the Church hath outlived the most flourishing Monarchies when there hath been a mighty knot of Adversaries against her when the Bulls of Bashan have pusht her and the whole Tribe of the Dragon have sharpen'd their weapons and edg'd their Malice when the voice was strong and the hopes high to raze her foundation even with the ground when Hell hath roar'd when the wit of the World hath contriv'd and the strength of the World hath attempted her ruine when Decrees have been past against her and the Powers of the World arm'd for the execution of them when her Friends have droop'd and skulk'd in Corners when there was no Eye to pity and no Hand to assist help hath come from Heaven her Enemies have been defeated Kings have brought gifts to her and rear'd her Tears have been wip'd off her Cheeks and her very Enemies by an unseen Power have been forc'd to court her whom before they would have devour'd quick The Devil and his Armies have sneakt into their Den and the Church hath triumphed when she hath been upon the brink of the Grave Thus did God send a mighty Angel to be the Executioner of Senacheribs Army and the Protector of Jerusalem who run his Sword into the hearts of Eighty Thousand 2 King 19.35 when they were ready to swallow up his beloved City When the Knife was at the Throats of the Jews in Shushan Esther 8. by a powerful hand it was turned into the hearts of their Enemies With what an Out-stretched Arm were the Israelites freed from the Egyptian yoke Deut. 4.34 When Pharoah had muster'd a great Army to pursue them assisted with Six hundred Chariots of War the Red Sea obstructed their passage before and an enraged Enemy trod on their rear when the fearful Israelites despair'd of Deliverance and the insolent Egyptian assured himself of his Revenge God stretches out his irresistible Arm to defeat the Enemy and assist his People he strikes down the Wolves and preserves the Flock God restrain'd the Egyptian Enmity against the Israelites till they were at the brink of the Red Sea and then lets them follow their humor and pursue the Fugitives that his Power might more gloriously shine forth in the Deliverance of the one and the Destruction of the other God might have brought Israel out of Egypt in the â—ime of those Kings that had remembred the good Service â—f Joseph to their Country but he leaves them till the Reign of a cruel Tyrant suffers them to be Slaves that they might by his sole Power be Conquerors which had had no appearance had there been a willing dismission of them at the first summons Exod. 9.16 In very deed for this cause have I raised thee up for to shew my Power and that my Name might be declared throughout all the Earth I have permitted thee to rise up against my People and keep them in Captivity that thou might'st be an occasion for the manifestation of my Power in their rescue and whilst thou art obstinate to enslave them I will stretch out my Arm to deliver them and make my Name famous among the Gentiles in the wrack of thee and thy Host in the Red Sea The Deliverance of the Church hath not been in one Age or in one Part of the World but God hath signaliz'd his Power in all Kingdoms where she hath had a footing As he hath guided her in all places by one Rule animated her by one Spirit so he hath protected her by the same Arm of Power When the Roman Emperors bandied all their Force against Her for about Three hundred years they were further from effecting her ruine at the end than when they first attempted it The Church grew under their Sword and was hatcht under the Wings of the Roman Eagle which were spread to destroy her The Ark was elevated by the Deluge and the Waters the Devil poured out to drown Her did but slime the Earth for a new increase of her She hath sometime been
crucified at Jerusalem Honours and Wealth were to be despis'd Flesh to be tam'd the Cross to be borne Enemies to be loved Revenge to be satisfied Blood to be spilt and Torments to be endured for the Honour of One they never saw nor ever before heard of who was preached with the Circumstances of a shameful Death enough to affright them from the Entertainment And the Report of a Resurrection and glorious Ascension were things never heard of by them before and unknown in the World that would not easily enter into the belief of men The Cross Disgrace Self-denial were only discours'd of in order to the attainment of an invisible World and an unseen reward which none of their Predecessors ever returned to acquaint them with a Patient death contrary to the pride of Nature was publisht as the way to Happiness and a blessed Immortality The dearest Lusts were to be pierced to death for the honour of this new Lord. Other Religions brought Wealth and Honour this struck them off from such Expectations and presented them with no Promise of any thing in this Life but a prospect of Misery Except those inward Consolations to which before they had been utter Strangers and had never experimented It made them to depend not upon themselves but upon the sole Grace of God It decried all natural all moral Idolatry things as dear to men as the Apple of their Eyes It despoyl'd them of whatsoever the Mind Will and Affections of men naturally lay claim to and glory in It pulled Self up by the Roots unman'd carnal Man and debas'd the Principle of Honour and Self-satisfaction which the World counted at that time noble and brave In a word it took them off from themselves to act like Creatures of God's framing to know no more than he would admit them and do no more than he did command them How difficult must it needs be to reduce men that plac'd all their happiness in the Pleasures of this Life from their pompous Idolatry and brutish Affections to this mortifying Religion What might the World say Here is a Doctrine will render us a company of puling Animals Farewel Generosity Bravery Sense of Honour Courage in enlarging the Bounds of our Country for an ardent Charity to the bitterest of our Enemies Here 's a Religion will rust our Swords Canker our Arms dispirit what we have hitherto called Vertue and annihilate what hath been esteem'd worthy and comely among Mankind Must we change Conquest for Suffering the increase of our Reputation for Self-denial the natural Sentiment of Self-preservation for affecting a dreadful Death How impossible was it that a Crucified Lord and a Crucifying Doctrine should be received in the World without the mighty Operation of a Divine Power upon the Hearts of Men And in this also the Almighty Power of God did notably shine forth II. Divine Power appear'd in the Instruments employ'd for the publishing and propagating the Gospel Who were 1. Mean and worthless in themselves Not noble and dignified with an earthly Grandeur but of a low Condition meanly bred So far from any splendid Estates that they possessed nothing but their Nets without any Credit and Reputation in the World without Comliness and Strength as unfit to subdue the World by Preaching as an Army of Hares were to conquer it by War Not learned Doctors bred up at the feet of the Famous Rabbins at Jerusalem whom Paul calls the Princes of the World * 1 Cor. 2.8 nor nurs'd up in the School of Athens under the Philosophers and Orators of the time Not the Wise-men of Greece but the Fishermen of Galilee naturally skill'd in no Language but their own and no more exact in that than those of the same Condition in any other Nation Ignorant of every thing but the Language of their Lakes and their fishing Trade except Paul call'd sometime after the rest to that Imployment And after the descent of the Spirit they were ignorant and unlearned in every thing but the Doctrine they were commanded to publish for the Council before whom they were summon'd prov'd them to be so which increased their wonder at them Acts 4.13 Had it been publish't by a Voice from Heaven That Twelve poor men taken out of Boats and Creeks without any help of Learning should conquer the World to the Cross it might have been thought an Illusion against all the Reason of Men yet we know it was undertaken and accomplish't by them They publish't this Doctrine in Jerusalem and quickly spread it over the greatest part of the World Folly outwitted Wisdom and Weakness over-powred Strength The Conquest of the East by Alexander was not so admirable as the Enterprise of these poor men He attempted his Conquest with the hands of a Warlike Nation though indeed but a small number of Thirty thousand against Multitudes many Hundred thousands of the Enemies yet an Effeminate Enemy a People inur'd to Slaughter and Victory attack'd great Numbers but enfeebled by Luxury and Voluptuousness Besides he was bred up to such Enterprizes had a learned Education under the best Philosopher and a Military Education under the best Commander and a natural Courage to animate him These Instruments had no such advantage from Nature the Heavenly Treasure was placed in those Earthen Vessels as Gideons Lamps in empty Pitchers Judges 7.16 that the excellency or Hyperbole of the Power might be of God 2 Cor. 4.7 and the strength of his Arm be display'd in the infirmity of the Instruments They were destitute of earthly Wisdom and therefore despis'd by the Jews and derided by the Gentiles the Publishers were accounted Mad men and the embracers Fools Had they been Men of known natural Endowments the Power of God had been vail'd under the Gifts of the Creature 2. Therefore a Divine Power suddenly spirited them and fitted them for so great a Work Instead of Ignorance they had the knowledge of the Tongues and they that were scarce well skill'd in their own Dialect were instructed on the sudden to speak the most flourishing Languages of the World and Discourse to the People of several Nations the great things of God †Acts 2.11 Though they were not enricht with any Worldly wealth and possessed nothing yet they were so sustained that they wanted nothing in any place where they came a Table was spread for them in the midst of their bitterest Enemies Their Fearfulness was chang'd into Courage and they that a few days before skulk'd in Corners for fear of the Jews ‖ John 20.19 speak boldly in the Name of that Jesus whom they had seen put to death by the Power of the Rulers and the Fury of the People They reproach them with the Murder of their Master and out-brave that great People in the midst of their Temple with the glory of that Person they had so lately Crucified * Acts 2.23 Acts 3.13 Peter that was not long before qualm'd at the presence of a Maid was not daunted
God is able to make him to stand Rom. 14.4 5. From this Attribute of the Infinite Power of God we have a ground of comfort in the lowest estate of the Church Let the state of the Church be never so deplorable the condition never so desperate that Power that created the World and shall raise the Bodies of men can create a happy state for the Church and raise her from an overwhelming Grave Though the Enemies trample upon her they cannot upon the Arm that holds her which by the least motion of it can lift her up above the heads of her Adversaries and make them feel the thunder of that Power that none can understand By the blast of God they perish and by the breath of his nostrils they are consumed Job 4.9 they shall be scattered as Chaff before the wind If once he draw his hand out of his bosom all must fly before him or sink under him * Psal 74.11 And when there is none to help his own Arm sustains him and brings salvation †Isa 63.5 and his fury doth uphold him What if the Church totter under the underminings of Hell What if it hath a sad heart and wet eyes In what a little moment can he make the night turn into day and make the Jews that were preparing for death in Shushan triumph over the necks of their Enemies and march in one hour with Swords in their hands that expected the last hour ropes about their necks Esth 9.1.5 If Israel be pursued by Pharoah the Sea shall open its arms to protect them If they be thirsty a Rock shall spout out Water to refresh them If they be hungry Heaven shall be their Granary for Manna If Jerusalem be besieg'd and hath not Force enough to encounter Senacherib an Angel shall turn the Camp into an Aceldema a Field of Blood His People shall not want deliverances till God want a power of working Miracles for their security He is more jealous of his Power than the Church can be of her Safety And if we should want other Arguments to press him we may implore him by virtue of his Power For when there is nothing in the Church as a Motive to him to save it there is enough in his own Name and the illustration of his Power Psal 106.8 Who can grapple with the Omnipotency of that God who is jealous of and zealous for the honour of it And therefore God for the most part takes such opportunities to deliver wherein his Almightiness may be most conspicuous and his Counsels most admirable He awakened not himself to deliver Israel till they were upon the brink of the Red Sea nor to rescue the three Children till they were in the fiery Furnace nor Daniel till he was in the Lions Den. 'T is in the weakness of his Creature that his strength is perfected not in a way of addition of perfectness to it but in a way of manifestation of the perfection of it As it is the perfection of the Sun to shine and enlighten the World not that the Sun receives an increase of light by the darting of his Beams but discovers his Glory to the admiration of Men and pleasure of the World If it were not for such occasions the World would not regard the Mightiness of God nor know what Power were in him It traverses the Stage in its fulness and liveliness upon such occasions when the Enemies are strong and their strength edg'd with an intense hatred and but little time between the contrivance and execution 'T is a great comfort that the lowest Distresses of the Church are a fit Scene for the discovery of this Attribute and that the Glory of God's Omnipotence and the Churches Security are so straitly link't together 'T is a promise that will never be forgotten by God and ought never to be forgotten by us that in this Mountain the hand of the Lord shall rest ‖ Isa 25.10 that is the Power of the Lord shall abide and Moab shall be trodden under him even as Straw is trodden down for the Dunghill And the Plagues of Babylon shall come in one day death and mourning and famine for strong is the Lord who judges her Rev. 18.8 Use III The Third Vse is for Exhortation 1. Meditate on this Power of God and press it often upon your Minds We conclude many things of God that we do not practically suck the comfort of for want of deep thoughts of it and frequent inspection into it We believe God to be true yet distrust him we acknowledge him powerful yet fear the motion of every straw Many Truths though assented to in our Understandings are kept under hatches by corrupt Affections and have not their due influence because they are not brought forth into the open air of our Souls by meditation If we will but search our hearts we shall find it is the Power of God we often doubt of When the heart of Ahaz and his Subjects trembled at the Combination of the Syrian and Israelitish Kings against him for want of a confidence in the Power of God God sends his Prophet with Commission to work a miraculous sign at his own choice to rear up his fainting heart and when he refus'd to ask a sign out of diffidence of that Almighty Power the Prophet complains of it as an affront to his Master * Isa 7.12 13. Moses so great a Friend of God was overtaken with this kind of unbelief after all the Experiments of God's miraculous Acts in Egypt the Answer God gives him manifests this to be at the Core Is the Lord's hand waxed short Numb 11.23 For want of actuated thoughts of this we are many times turned from our known duty by the blast of a Creature as though man had more power to dismay us than God hath to support us in his commanded way The belief of God's Power is one of the first steps to all Religion without settled thoughts of it we cannot pray lively and believingly for the obtaining the Mercies we want or the averting the Evils we fear we should not love him unless we are persuaded he hath a Power to bless us nor fear him unless we were perswaded of his Power to punish us The frequent thoughts of this would render our Faith more stable and our Hopes more stedfast it would make us more feeble to sin and more careful to obey When the Virgin stagger'd at the Message of the Angel that she should bear a Son he in his Answer turns her to the Creative power of God Luke 1.35 The Power of the highest shall over-shadow thee Which seems to be in allusion to the Spirits moving upon the face of the Deep and bringing a comely World out of a confus'd Mass Is it harder for God to make a Virgin conceive a Son by the power of his Spirit than to make a World Why doth he reveal himself so often under the title of Almighty and press it upon us but
Organ whereby he blew in his Temptation is put into a worse condition than it was before Thus God hated the Spunge whereby the Devil deform'd his beautiful Image Thus God to manifest his detestation of Sin ordered the Beast whereby any Man was slain to be slain as well as the Malefactor Levit. 20.15 The Gold and Silver that had been abused to Idolatry and were the Ornaments of Images though good in themselves and uncapable of a Criminal Nature were not to be brought into their Houses but detested and abhorred by them because they were cursed and an abomination to the Lord. See with what loathing Expressions this Law is enjoyn'd to them Deut. 7.25 26. So contrary is the holy Nature of God to every Sin that it curseth every thing that is Instrumental in it 3. How detestable is every thing to him that is in the Sinners possession The very Earth which God had made Adam the Proprietor of was Cursed for his sake Gen. 3.17 18. It lost its Beauty and lies languishing to this day and notwithstanding the Redemption by Christ hath not recovered its health nor is it like to do till the compleating the Fruits of it upon the Children of God Rom. 8.20 21 22. The whole Lower Creation was made subject to Vanity and put into Pangs upon the Sin of Man by the Righteousness of God detesting his Offence How often hath his implacable Aversion from Sin been shewn not only in his Judgments upon the Offenders Person but by wrapping up in the same Judgment those which stood in a near relation to them Achan with his Children and Cattle are overwhelmed with Stones and burned together Josh 7.24 25. In the destruction of Sodom not only the grown Malefactors but the young Spawn the Infants at present uncapable of the same Wickedness and their Cattle were burned up by the same Fire from Heaven and the Place where their Habitations stood is at this day partly a heap of Ashes and partly an Infectious Lake that choaks any Fish that swim into it from Jordan and stifles as is related by its Vapor any Bird that attempts to fly over it Oh how detestable is Sin to God that causes him to turn a pleasant Land as the Garden of the Lord as it is styled Gen. 13.10 into a Lake of Sulphur to make it both in his Word and Works as a lasting Monument of his abhorrence of Evil 4. What design hath God in all these Acts of Severity and Vindictive Justice but to set off the lustre of his Holiness He testifies himself concerned for those Laws which he hath set as Hedges and Limits to the Lusts of Men and therefore when he breaths forth his fiery Indignation against a People he is said to get himself Honour As when he intended the Red Sea should swallow up the Egyptian Army Exod. 14.17 18. which Moses in his Triumphant Song Ecchoes back again Exod. 15.1 Thou hast triumphed gloriously gloriously in his Holiness which is the glory of his Nature as Moses himself interprets it in the Text. When Men will not own the Holiness of God in a way of Duty God will vindicate it in a way of Justice and Punishment In the destruction of Aarons Sons that were Will-worshippers and would take Strange Fire Sanctified and Glorified are coupled Lev. 10.3 He glorified himself in that Act in vindicating his Holiness before all the People declaring that he will not endure Sin and Disobedience He doth therefore in this Life more severely punish the Sins of his People when they presume upon any act of Disobedience for a Testimony that the nearness and dearness of any Person to him shall not make him unconcern'd in his Holiness or be a plea for Impurity The End of all his Judgments is to witness to the World his Abominating of Sin To Punish and Witness against Men are one and the same thing Micah 1.2 The Lord shall witness against you and it is the Witness of Gods Holiness Hos 5.5 And the Pride of Israel doth testifie to his face One renders it the Excellency of Israel and understands it of God the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is here in our Translation Pride is rendred Excellency Amos 8.7 The Lord God hath sworn by his Excellency which is Interpreted Holiness Amos 4.2 The Lord God hath sworn by his Holiness What is the issue or end of this Swearing by Holiness and of his Excellency testifying against them In all those Places you will find them to be sweeping Judgments In one Israel and Ephraim shall fall in their Iniquity in another He will take them away with Hooks and their Posterity with Fish-hooks and in another He would never forget any of their works He that punisheth Wickedness in those he before used with the greatest Tenderness furnisheth the World with an undeniable Evidence of the Detestableness of it to him Were not Judgments sometimes poured out upon the World it would be believed that God were rather an Approver than an Enemy to Sin To Conclude Since God hath made a stricter Law to guide Men annex'd Promises above the merit of Obedience to allure them and Threatnings dreadful enough to affright Men from Disobedience He cannot be the Cause of Sin nor a lover of it How can he be the Author of that which he so severely forbids or love that which he delights to punish or be fondly Indulgent to any Evil when he hates the Ignorant Instruments in the Offences of his Reasonable Creatures III. The Holiness of God appears in Our Restoration 'T is in the Glass of the Gospel we behold the Glory of the Lord * 2 Cor. 3.18 that is the Glory of the Lord into whose Image we are changed but we are changed into nothing as the Image of God but into Holiness We bore not upon us by Creation nor by Regeneration the Image of any other Perfection We cannot be changed into his Omnipotence Omniscience c. but into the Image of his Righteousness This is the pleasing and glorious sight the Gospel Mirror darts in our eyes The whole Scene of Redemption is nothing else but a discovery of Judgment and Righteousness Isai 1.27 Zion shall be redeemed with Judgment and her Converts with Righteousness 1. This Holiness of God appears in the manner of our Restoration viz. by the Death of Christ. Not all the Vials of Judgments that have or shall be poured out upon the wicked World nor the flaming Furnace of a Sinners Conscience nor the Irreversible Sentence pronounc'd against the Rebellious Devils nor the Groans of the Damned Creatures give such a demonstration of Gods Hatred of Sin as the Wrath of God let loose upon his Son Never did Divine Holiness appear more beautiful and lovely than at the time our Saviours Countenance was most marr'd in the midst of his Dying Groans This himself acknowledges in that Prophetical Psalm Psal 22.1 2. when God had turned his Smiling Face from him and thrust his sharp Knife
into his heart which forced that Terrible cry from him My God my God why hast thou forsaken me he adores this Perfection of Holiness v. 3. But thou art holy Thy Holiness is the Spring of all this sharp Agony and for this thou Inhabitest and shalt for ever inhabit the Praises of all thy Israel Holiness drew the Vail between Gods Countenance and our Saviours Soul Justice indeed gave the stroke but Holiness order'd it In this his Purity did sparkle and his Irreversible Justice manifested that all those that commit Sin are worthy of death this was the perfect Index of his Righteousness †Rom 3 2◠that is of his Holiness and Truth then it was that God that is Holy was sanctified in Righteousness Isai 5.16 It appears the more if you consider 1. The Dignity of the Redeemers Person One that had been from Eternity had laid the Foundations of the World had been the Object of the Divine Delight He that was God blessed for ever becomes a Curse He who was blessed by Angels and by whom God blessed the World must be seiz'd with Horrour The Son of Eternity must bleed to death Where did ever Sin appear so irreconcileable to God Where did God ever break out so furiously in his detestation of Iniquity The Father would have the most Excellent Person one next in order to himself and Equal to him in all the glorious Perfections of his Nature * Phil 2.6 Die on a Disgraceful Cross and be exposed to the flames of Divine Wrath rather than Sin should live and his Holiness remain for ever disparaged by the Violations of his Law 2. The near Relation he stood in to the Father He was his own Son that he delivered up Rom. 8.32 His Essential Image as dearly beloved by him as himself yet he would abate nothing of his Hatred of those Sins imputed to one so dear to him and who never had done any thing contrary to his Will The strong Cries utter'd by him could not cause him to cut off the least Fringe of this Royal Garment nor part with a Thred the Robe of his Holiness was woven with The Torrent of Wrath is open'd upon him and the Fathers Heart beats not in the least notice of Tenderness to Sin in the midst of his Sons Agonies †Lingend Tom. 3. p. 699 700. God seems to lay aside the Bowels of a Father and put on the garb of an Irreconcileable Enemy Upon which account probably our Saviour in the midst of his Passion gives him the Title of God not of Father the Title he usually before Addrest to him with Math. 27.46 My God my God not My Father my Father why hast thou forsaken me He seems to hang upon the Cross like a disinherited Son while he appear'd in the garb and rank of a Sinner Then was his Head loaded with Curses when he stood under that Sentence of Cursed is every one that hangs upon a Tree Gal. 3.13 and look'd as one forlorn and rejected by the Divine Purity and Tenderness God dealt not with him as if he had been one in so near a Relation to him He left him not to the Will only of the Instruments of his Death he would have the chiefest blow himself of bruising of him Isai 53.10 It pleased the Lord to bruise him the Lord because the power of Creatures could not strike a blow strong enough to satisfie and secure the Rights of Infinite Holiness It was therefore a Cup temper'd and put into his hands by his Father a Cup given him to drink In other Judgments he lets out his Wrath against his Creatures in this he lets out his Wrath as it were against Himself against his Son One as dear to him as himself As in his making Creatures his Power over Nothing to bring it into Being appear'd but in pardoning Sin he hath power over himself so in punishing Creatures his Holiness appears in his Wrath against Creatures against Sinners by inherency But by punishing Sin in his Son his Holiness sharpens his Wrath against him who was his Equal and only a reputed Sinner As if his Affection to his own Holiness surmounted his Affection to his Son For he chose to suspend the breakings out of his Affections to his Son and see him plunged in a sharp and Ignominious Misery without giving him any visible Token of his Love rather than see his Holiness lie groaning under the Injuries of a Transgressing World 3. The Value he puts upon his Holiness appears further in the Advancement of this Redeeming Person after his Death Our Saviour was Advanc'd not barely for his Dying but for the respect he had in his Death to this Attribute of God Heb. 1.9 Thou hast loved Righteousness and hated Iniquity therefore God even thy God hath Anointed thee with the Oil of Gladness c. By Righteousness is meant this Perfection because of the opposition of it to Iniquity Some think Therefore to be the final Cause as if this were the sense Thou art anointed with the Oil of Gladness that thou mightest love Righteousness and hate Iniquity But the Holy Ghost seeming to speak in this Chapter not only of the Godhead of Christ but of his Exaltation the Doctrine whereof he had begun in Verse 3. and prosecutes in the following Verses I would rather understand Therefore For this cause or reason hath God anointed thee not to this end Christ indeed had an Unction of Grace whereby he was fitted for his Mediatory Work He had also an Unction of Glory whereby he was rewarded for it In the first regard it was a qualifying him for his Office in the second regard it was a solemn Inaugurating him in his Royal Authority And the Reason of his being setled upon a Throne for ever and ever is because he loved Righteousness He suffered himself to be pierced to Death that Sin the Enemy of Gods Purity might be destroy'd and the Honour of the Law the Image of Gods Holiness might be repair'd and fulfilled in the Fallen Creature He restored the Credit of Divine Holiness in the World in manifesting by his Death God an irreconcileable Enemy to all Sin in abolishing the Empire of Sin so hateful to God and restoring the rectitude of Nature and new framing the Image of God in his chosen Ones And God so valued this Vindication of his Holiness that he confers upon him in his Humane Nature an Eternal Royalty and Empire over Angels and Men. Holiness was the great Attribute respected by Christ in his dying and manifested in his Death and for his Love to this God would bestow an Honour upon his Person in that Nature wherein he did vindicate the Honour of so dear a Perfection In the Death of Christ he shewed his Resolution to preserve its Rights In the Exaltation of Christ he evidenced his mighty pleasure for the Vindication of it In both the Infinite value he had for it as dear to him as his Life and Glory 4. It
Judgments upon some to form a new Generation for himself He destroy'd an old World to raise a new one more Righteous As a Man pulls down his old Buildings to erect a sounder and more stately Fabrick To sum up what hath been said in this particular How could God be a Friend to Goodness if he were not an Enemy to Evil How could he shew his enmity to Evil without revenging the abuse and contempt of his Goodness God would rather have the Repentance of a Sinner than his Punishment but the Sinner would rather expose himself to the severest frowns of God than pursue those Methods wherein he hath setled the conveyances of his kindness You will not come to me that you might have Life saith Christ How is Eternity of Punishment inconsistent with the Goodness of God Nay how can God be good without it If Wickedness always remain in the Nature of Man Is it not fit the Rod should always remain on the Back of Man Is it a want of goodness that keeps an incorrigible Offender in Chains in a Bridewell While Sin remains it 's fit it should be Punished Would not God else be an Enemy to his own Goodness and shew favour to that which doth abuse it and is contrary to it He hath threatned Eternal Flames to Sinners that he might the more strongly excite them to a Reformation of their Ways and a Practice of his Precepts In those Threatnings he hath manifested his Goodness And can it be bad in him to defend what his Goodness hath Commanded and Execute what his Goodness hath Threatned His Truth is also a part of his Goodness for it is nothing but his Goodness performing that which it oblig'd him to do That is the first thing Severe Judgments in the World are no Impeachments of his Goodness 2. The Afflictions God inflicts upon his Servants are no violations of his Goodness Sometimes God aflicts Men for their Temporal and Eternal good for the good of their Grace in order to the good of their Glory which is a more excellent Good than Afflictions can be an Evil. The Heathens reflected upon Vlysses his hardship as a Mark of Jupiters goodness and love to him that his Virtue might be more conspicuous By strong Persecutions brought upon the Church her Lethargy is Cur'd her Chaff Purg'd the glorious Fruit of the Gospel brought forth in the lives of her Children The number of her Proselytes multiply and the strength of her weak ones is increased by the Testimonies of Courage and Constancy which the stronger present to them in their Sufferings Do those good Effects speak a want of goodness in God who brings them into this condition By those he cures his People of their Corruptions and promotes their Glory by giving them the honour of suffering for the Truth and raiseth their Spirits to a Divine pitch The Epistles of Paul to the Ephes Philip. and Colos wrote by him while he was in Nero's Chains seem to have a higher strain than some of those he wrote when was at liberty As for Afflictions they are Marks of a greater measure of Fatherly Goodness than he discovers to those that live in an uninterrupted Prosperity who are not dignifi'd with that glorious Title of Sons as those are that he chasteneth * Heb. 12.6 7. Can any question the goodness of the Father that Corrects his Child to prevent his Vice and Ruine and breed him up to Vertue and Honour It would be a Cruelty in a Father leaving his Child without Chastisement to leave him to that Misery an ill Education would reduce him to God judges us that we might not be condemned with the World †1 Cor. 11.32 Is it not a greater Goodness to separate us from the World to Happiness by his Scourge than to leave us to the condemnation of the World for our Sins Is it not a greater Goodness to make us smart here than to see us scorcht hereafter As he is our Shepherd it is no part of his Enmity or ill will to us to make us feel sometimes the weight of his Shepherds Crook to reduce us from our Stragling The visiting our Transgressions with Rods and our Iniquities with Stripes is one of the Articles of the Covenant of Grace wherein the greatest lustre of his Goodness appears * Psal 89.33 The advantage and gain of our Afflictions is a greater Testimony of his Goodness to us than the pain can be of his Unkindness The Smart is well recompenced by the accession of clearer Graces It is rather a high Mark of his Goodness than an Argument for the want of it that he treats us as his Children and will not suffer us to run into that Destruction we are more ambitious of than the Happiness he hath prepared for us and by Afflictons he fits us for the partaking of by imparting his Holiness together with the inflicting his Rod †Heb. 12.10 That is the third thing God is Good The Fourth thing is The manifestation of this Goodness in Creation Redemption and Providence 1. In Creation This is apparent from what hath been said before That no other Attribute could be the Motive of his Creating but his Goodness His Goodness was the Cause that he made any thing and his Wisdom was the Cause that he made every thing in Order and Harmony He pronounced every thing good i. e. such as became his Goodness to bring forth into Being and rested in them more as they were Stamps of his Goodness than as they were Marks of his Power or Beams of his Wisdom And if all Creatures were able to answer to this Question What that was which Created them The Answer would be Almighty Power but employed by the Motion of Infinite Goodness * Cusan p. 228. All the varieties of Creatures are so many Apparitions of this Goodness Though God be one yet he cannot appear as a God but in variety As the greatness of Power is not manifest but in variety of Works and an Acute Understanding not discover'd but in variety of Reasonings so an Infinite Goodness is not so apparent as in variety of Communications 1. The Creation proceeds from Goodness 'T is the Goodness of God to extract such multitude of things from the depths of nothing Because God is Good things have a Being If he had not been Good nothing could have been Good Nothing could have imparted that which it possessed not Nothing but Goodness could have communicated to things an Excellency which before they wanted Being is much more Excellent than nothing By this Goodness therefore the whole Creation was brought out of the dark Womb of Nothing This formed their Natures this beautified them with their several Ornaments and Perfections whereby every thing was enabled to act for the good of the Common World God did not Create things because he was a Living Being but because he was a Good Being No Creature brought forth any thing in the World meerly because it is
He never sent his Son to shed a drop of Blood for their Recovery they can expect nothing but the torment of their Persons and the destruction of their Works But we abuse that Goodness that would Rescue us since we are Miserable as well as that Righteousness which Created us Innocent How base is it to use him so ill that is not once or twice but a daily hourly Benefactor to us whose Rain drops upon the Earth for our Food and whose Sun shines upon the Earth for our pleasure as well as profit such a Benefactor as is the true Proprietor of what we have and thinks nothing too good for them that think every thing too much for his Service How unworthy is it to be guilty of such base Carriage towards him whose benefits we cannot want nor live without How disingenuous both to God and our selves to despise the riches of his Goodness that are design'd to lead us to Repentance * Rom. 2.4 and by that to Happiness And more hainous are the Sins of Renew'd Men upon this account because they are against his Goodness not only offer'd to them but tasted by them not only against the Notion of Goodness but the Experience of Goodness and the relisht sweetness of choicest Bounty 3. God takes this Contempt of his Goodness hainously He never upbraids Men with any thing in the Scripture but with the abuse of the good things he hath vouchsaft them and the unmindfulness of the Obligations arising from them This he bears with the greatest regret and indignation Thus he upbraids Eli with the preference of him to the Priesthood above other Families * 1 Sam. 2.28 And David with his Exaltation to the Crown of Israel †2 Sam. 12.7 8 9. when they abused those Honours to carelesness and licentiousness All Sins offend God but Sins against his Goodness do more disparage him and therefore his fury is the greater by how much the more liberally his benefits have been dispens'd It was for abuse of Divine Goodness as soon as it was tasted that some Angels were hurl'd from their Blessed Habitation and more happy Nature It was for this Adam lost his present Enjoyments and future Happiness for the abuse of Gods Goodness in Creation For the abuse of Gods Goodness the old World fell under the fury of the Flood and for the Contempt of the Divine Goodness in Redemption Jerusalem once the darling City of the infinite Monarch of the World was made an Aceldema a Field of Blood For this Cause it is that Candlesticks have been removed great Lights put out Nations overturn'd and Ignorance hath triumph'd in places bright before with the Beams of Heaven God would have little care of his own Goodness if he always prostituted the Fruits of it to our Contempt Why should we expect he should always continue that to us which he sees we will never use to his Service When the Israelites would Dedicate the Gifts of God to the service of Baal then he would return and take away his Corn and his Wine and make them know by the less that those things were his in Dominion which they abus'd as if they had been Soveraign Lords of them * Hos 2.8 9. Benefits are Entail'd up us no longer than we obey †Josh 24.20 If you forsake the Lord he will do you hurt after he hath done you good While we obey his Bounty shall shower upon us and when we revolt his Justice shall consume us Present Mercies abus'd are no Bulwarks against impendent Judgments God hath Curses as well as Blessings and they shall light more heavy when his Blessings have been more weighty Justice is never so severe as when it comes to right Goodness and revenge its quarrel for the injuries received A convenient Enquiry may be here How Gods Goodness is contemn'd or abus'd 1. By a forgetfulness of his Benefits We enjoy the Mercies and forget the Donor we take what he gives and pay not the Tribute he deserves The Israelites forgot God their Saviour which had done great things in Egypt * Psal 100 2â— We send Gods Mercies where we would have God send our Sins into the Land of forgetfulness and write his Benefits where himself will write the Names of the Wicked in the Dust which every Wind defaceth The remembrance soon wears out of our Minds and we are so far from remembring what we had before that we scarce think of that Hand that gives the very instant wherein his Benefits drop upon us Adam basely forgot his Benefactor presently after he had been made capable to remember him and reflect upon him the first remark we hear of him is of his forgetfulness not a syllable of his thankfulness We fâ—rget those Souls he hath lodg'd in us to acknowledge his favours to our Bodies we forget that Image wherewith he beautified us and that Christ he expos'd as a Criminal to Death for our Rescue which is such an act of Goodness as cannot be exprest by the Eloquence of the Tongue or conceiv'd by the acuteness of the Mind Those things which are so common that they cannot be invisible to our Eyes are unregarded by our Minds our Sense prompts our Understanding and our Understanding is deaf to the plain dictates of our Sense We forget his Goodness in the Sun while it warms us and his Showers while they enrich us in the Corn while it nourisheth us and the Wine while it refresheth us * Hos 2.8 She did not know that I gave her Corn and Wine and Oyl She that might have read my Hand in every bit of Bread and every drop of Drink did not consider this 'T is an injustice to forget the benefits we receive from Man 't is a Crime of a higher Nature to forget those dispens'd to us by the hand of God who gives us those things that all the World cannot furnish us with without him The Inhabitants of Troas will condemn us who worshipped Mice in a grateful remembrace of the Victory they had made easie for them by gnawing their Enemies Bow-strings They were mindful of the Courtesie of Animals though unintended by those Creatures and we are regardless of the fore-meditated Bounty of God 'T is in Gods Judgment a brutishness beyond that of a stupid Ox or a duller Ass * Isai 1.3 The Ox knows his Owner and the Ass his Masters Crib but Israel doth not know my People do not consider The Ox knows his Owner that Pastures him and the Ass his Master that feeds him but Man is not so good as to be like to them but so bad as to be inferior to them He forgets him that sustains him and spurns at him instead of valuing him for the benefits conferr'd by him How horrible is it that God should loose more by his Bounty than he would do by his Patrimony If we had Blessings more sparingly we should remember him more gratefully If he had sent us a bit of
Corruptions will certainly be subdued in his voluntary subjects The Covenant I will be your God implyes protection government and relief which are all grounded upon Soveraignty That therefore which is our greatest burden will be remov'd by his Soveraign power Micah 7.19 He will subdue our iniquities If the outward enemies of the Church shall not bear up against his Dominion and perpetuate their rebellions unpunisht those within his people shall as little bear up against his Throne without being destroy'd by him The billows of our own hearts and the raging waves within us are as much at his beck as those without us And his Soveraignty is more eminent in quelling the corruptions of the heart than the commotions of the World in reigning over mens Spirits by changing them or curbing them more than over mens bodies by pinching and punishing them The remainders of Satans Empire will moulder away before him since he that is in us is a greater Soveraign than he that is in the World 1 Joh. 4.4 His enemies will be laid at his feet and so neveâ— shall prevail against him when his Kingdom shall come He could not be Lord of any man as a happy creature if he did not by his power make them happy and he could not make them happy unless by his Grace he made them holy He could not be praised as a Lord of Glory if he did not make some creatures glorious to praise him And an Earthly Creature could not praise him perfectly unless he had every grain of enmity to his Glory taken out of his heart Since God is the only Soveraign he only can still the commotions in our spirits and pull down all the Ensigns of the Devil's royalty he can wast him by the powerful word of his lips 4. Hence is a strong encouragement for Prayer My King was the strong compellation David us'd in Prayer as an argument of comfort and confidence as well as that of My God Psal 5 2. Hearken to the voice of my cry my King and my God To be a King is to have an Office of Government and Protection He gives us liberty to approach to him as the Judge of all Heb. 12.23 i. e. As the Governour of the World we pray to one that hath the whole Globe of Heaven and Earth in his hand and can do whatsoever he will Though he be higher than the Cherubims and transcendently above all in Majesty yet we may soar up to him with the wings of our Soul Faith and Love and lay open our cause and find him as gracious as if he were the meanest subject on Earth rather than the most soveraign God in Heaven He hath as much of tenderness as he hath of Authority and is pleased with Prayer which is an acknowledgment of his Dominion an honouring of that which he delights to honour For Prayer in the notion of it imports thus much that God is the Rector of the World that he takes notice of humane affairs that he is a careful just wise Governour a store-house of blessing a fountain of goodness to the indigent and a releif to the oppressed What have we reason to fear when the soveraign of the World gives us liberty to approach to him and lay open our case That God who is King of the whole Earth not only of a few Villages or Cities in the Earth but the whole Earth and not only King of this dreggy place of our dross but of Heaven having prepar'd or established his Throne in the most glorious place of the Creation 5. Here is comfort in afflictions As a soveraign he is the Author of Afflictions as a soveraign he can be the remover of them he can command the waters of affliction to go so far and no farther If he speaks the Word a disease shall depart as soon as a servant shall from your presence with a Nod. If we are banisht from one place he can command a shelter for us in another If he orders Moab a Nation that had no great kindness for his people to let his outcasts dwell with them they shall entertain them and afford them sanctuary Isaiah 16.4 Again God chastneth as a soveraign but teacheth as a Father Psal 99.12 The exercise of his Authority is not without an exercise of his goodness He doth not correct for his own pleasure or the Creature 's torment but for the Creature 's instruction though the rod be in the hand of a soveraign yet it is tinctur'd with the kindness of divine bowels He can order them as a soveraign to mortifie our flesh and try our Faith In the severest tempest the Lord that rais'd the Wind against us which shatter'd the ship and tore its rigging can change that contrary wind for a more happy one to drive us into the Port. 6. 'T is a comfort against the projects of the Churches adversaries in times of publick commotions The consideration of the Divine soveraignty may arm us against the threatnings of mighty ones and the menaces of persecutors God hath Authority above the Crowns of men and a Wisdom superior to the cabals of men None can move a step without him he hath a negative voice upon their Counsels a negative hand upon their motions their politick resolves must stop at the point he hath prescrib'd them Their formidable strength cannot exceed the limits he hath set them their overreaching wisdom expires at the breath of God There is no Wisdom nor Vnderstanding nor Counsel against the Lord. Prov. 21.30 Not a bullet can be discharg'd nor a Sword drawn a wall battered nor a person dispatcht out of the world without the leave of God by the mightiest in the World The instruments of Satan are no more free from his soveraign restraint than their inspirer they cannot pull the hook out of their nostrils nor cast the bridle out of their mouths This soveraign can shake the Earth rend the Heavens overthrow Mountains the most Mountainous opposers of his interest Though the Nations rush in against his people like the rushing of many waters God shall rebuke them they shall be chased as the chaff of the Mountains before the Wind and like a rolling thing before the Whirlwind Isaiah 17.13 So doth he often burst in pieces the most mischievous designs and conducts the oppressed to a happy port He often turns the severest tempests into a calm as well as the most peaceful calm into a horrible storm How often hath a well-rigg'd ship that seemed to spâ—rn the Sea under her feet and beat the waves before her to a foam been swallowed up into the bowels of that Element over whose back she rode a little before God never comes to deliver his Church as a Governour but in a wrathful posture Ezek. 20.23 Surely saith the Lord with a mighty hand and with an out stretched arm and with fury pour'd out will I rule over you not with fury poured out upon the Church but fury pour'd out upon her Enemies as the words
and from every Creature to the great Landlord since all are Tenants and hold by him at his Will Every Creature in Heaven and Earth under the Earth and in the Sea were heard by John to ascribe blessing honour glory and power to him that sits on the Throne Rev. 5.13 We are as much bound to the soveraignty of God for his preâ—â—rvation of us as for his Creation of us We are no less oblig'd to him that preservs our beings when exposed to dangers than we are for bestowing a being upon us when we were not capable of danger Thankfulness is due to this Soveraign for publick concerns Hath he not preserved the Ship of his Church in the midst of whistling winds and roaring waves in the midst of the combats of men and Devils and rescued it often when it hath been near ship-wrackt 3. How should we be induc'd from hence to promote the honour of this Soveraign We should advance him as supream and all our actions should concur in his honour We should return to his Glory what we have receiv'd from his Soveraignty and enjoy by his mercy He that is the superior of all ought to be the end of all This is the harmony of the Creation that which is of an inferiour nature is order'd to the service of that which is of a more excellent nature thus water and earth that have a lower being are employ'd for the honour and beauty of the plants of the earth who are more excellent in having a principle of a growing life These plants are again subservient to the beasts and birds which exceed them in a principle of sense which the others want Those beasts and birds are order'd for the good of man who is superior to them in a Principle of reason and is invested with a Dominion over them Man having God for his superior ought as much to serve the glory of God as other things are design'd to be useful to man Other Governments are intended for the good of the Community the chief end is not the good of the Governours themselves But God being every way Soveraign the Soveraign being giving being to all things the Soveraign Ruler giving order and preservation to all things is also the end of all things to whose glory and honour all things all creatures are to be subservient Rom. 11.36 For of him and through him and to him are all things to whom be glory for ever Of him as the efficient cause through him as the preserving cause to him as the final cause All our actions and thoughts ought to be addrest to his glory our whole beings ought to be consecrated to his honour though we should have no reward but the honour of having been subservient to the end of our Creation So much doth the excellency and Majesty of God infinitely elevated above us challenge of us Subjects use to value the safety honour and satisfaction of a good Prince above their own David is accounted worth 10000 of the people and some of his Courtiers thought themselves oblig'd to venture their lives for his satisfaction in so mean a thing as a little water from the Well of Bethlehem Doth not so great so good a Soveraign as God deserve the same affection from us Do we swear saith a Heathen * Arrian in Epicter to prefer none before Caesar and have we not greater reason to prefer none before God 'T is a Justice due from us to God to maintain his Glory as it is a Justice to preserve the right and property of another As God would lay aside his Deity if he did deny himself so a creature acts irregularly and out of the rank of a creature if it doth not deny it self for God He that makes himself his own end makes himself his own Soveraign To napkin up a gift he hath bestow'd upon us or to employ what we possess solely to our own Glory to use any thing barely for our selves without respect to God is to apply it to a wrong use and to injure God in his propriety and the end of his donation What we have ought to be us'd for the honour of God He retains the Dominion and Lordship though he grants us the use We are but Stewards not Proprietors in regard of God who expects an account from us how we have employ'd his goods to his honour The Kingdom of God is to be advanced by us we are to pray that his Kingdom may come we are to endeavour that his Kingdom may come that is that God may be known to be the chief Soveraign that his Dominion which was obscur'd by Adam's fall may be more manifested that his Subjects which are supprest in the World may be supported his Laws which are violated by the rebellions of men may be more obeyed and his enemies be fully subdued by his final judgment the last evidence of his Dominion in this State of the World that the Empire of sin and the Devil may be abolish'd and the Kingdom of God be perfected that none may rule but the great and rightful Soveraign Thus while we endeavour to advance the honour of his Throne we shall not want an honour to our selves He is too gracious a Soveraign to neglect them that are mindful of his Glory those that honour him he will honour 1 Sam. 2.30 4. Fear and reverence of God in himself and in his actions is a duty incumbent on us from this Doctrine Jer. 10.7 Who would not fear thee O King of Nations The ingratitude of the World is taxt in not reverencing God as a great King who had given so many marks of his Royal Government among them The Prophet wonders there was no fear of so great a King in the World Since among all the wise men of the Nations and among all their Kings there is none like unto this No more reverence of him since none ruled so wisely nor any ruled so graciously The dominion of God is one of the first sparks that gives fire to Religion and Worship consider'd with the goodness of this Soveraign Psal 22.27.28 All the Nations shall worship before thee for the Kingdom is the Lord's and he is Governour among the Nations Epicurus who thought God careless of humane affairs leaving thâ—â— at hap-hazard to the conduct of mens wisdom and mutability of fortune yet acknowledged that God ought to be worshipped by man for the excellency of his nature and greatness of his Majesty How should we reverence that God that hath a Throne encompast with such Glorious Creatures as Angels whose faces we are not able to behold though shadow'd in assum'd bodies How should we fear the Lord of Hosts that hath so many Armies at his command in the Heavens above and in the Earth below whom he can dispose to the exact obedience of his will how should men be afraid to censure any of his actions to sit judge of their Judge and call him to an account to their Bar How should such
yet he hath also power to verifie his word and accomplish his will assure your selves he will not at all acquit the wicked He will not acquit the wicked He will not always account the criminal an innocent as he seems to do by a present sparing of them and dealing with them as if they were destitute of any provoking carriage towards him and he void of any resentment of it He will not acquit the wicked how is this who then can be saved Is there no place for remission He will not acquit the wicked i. e. He will not acquit obstinate sinners As he hath Patience for the wicked so he hath Mercy for the penitent The wicked are the subjects of his long suffering but not of his acquitting grace He doth not presently punish their sins because he is slow to anger But without their Repentance he will not blot out their sins because he is righteous in judgment If God should acquit them without Repentance for their crimes he must himself repent of his own Law and Righteous Sanction of it He will not acquit i. e. he will not go back from the thing he hath spoken and forbear at long run the punishment he hath threatned The Lord hath his way in the Whirl-wind The way of God signifies sometimes the Law of God sometimes the providential operations of God Ezek. 18.25 Is not my way equal It seems there to take in both And in the Storm and the Clouds are the dust of his feet * Tirinus in loc The Prophet describes here the fight of God with the Assyrians as if he rusht upon them with a mighty noise of an Army raising the dust with the feet of their horses and motion of their Chariots Symbolically it signifies the multitude of the Chaldean and Median forces invading besieging and storming the City It signifies 1. The rule of Providence The way of God is in every motion of the creature He rules all things Whirl-wind Storms Clouds his way is in all their walks in the whirlings and blustrings of the one in the raising and dissolving the other He blows up the Winds and compacts the Clouds to make them serviceable to his designs 2. The management of wars by God His way is in the storm As he was the Captain of the Assyrians against Samaria so he will be the Captain of the Medes against Niniveh As Israel was not so much wasted by the Assyrians as by the Lord who levied and arm'd their Forces So Niniveh shall be subverted rather by God than by the Arms of the Medes Their force is describ'd not to be so much from Humane power as Divine God is President in all the commotions of the World his way is in every Whirl-wind 3. The easiness of executing the judgment He is of so great power that he can excite Tempests in the Air and overthrow them with the Clouds which are the dust of his feet He can blind his enemies and avenge himself on them he is Lord of Clouds and can fill their womb with Hail Lightnings and Thunders to burst out upon those he kindles his anger against He is of so great force that he needs not use the strength of his Arm but the dust of his Feet to effect his destroying purpose 4. The suddenness of the judgment Whirl-winds come suddenly without any harbingers to give notice of their approach Clouds are swift in their motion Isa 60.8 Who are those that flie as a Cloud i. e. with a mighty nimbleness What God doth he shall do on the sudden come upon them before they are aware be too quick for them in his motion to over-run and over-reach them The winds are describ'd with wings in regard of the quickness of their motion 5. The terror of judgments The Lord hath his way in the Whirl-wind i. e. in great displeasure The anger of the Lord is often compar'd to a storm He shall bring Clouds of judgments upon them many and thick as terrible as when a day is turn'd into night by the mustering of the darkest clouds that interpose between the Sun and the Earth Clouds and darkness are round about him and a fire goes before him when he burns up his enemies Psal 97.2 3. The judgments shall have terror without mercy as clouds obscure the light and are dark masks before the face and glory of the Sun and cut off its refreshing Beams from the Earth Clouds note multitude and obscurity God could crush them without a Whirlwind beat them to powder with one touch but he will bring his judgments in the most surprizing and amazing manner to flesh and blood so that all their Glory shall be chang'd into nothing but terror by the noise of the bellowing winds and the clouds like ink blacking the Heavens 6. The confusion of the Offenders upon God's proceeding A Whirlwind is not only a boysterous wind that hurls and rouls every thing out of its place but by its circular motion by its winding to all points of the compass it confounds things and jumbles them together It keeps not one point but by a circumgyration toucheth upon all Clouds like dust shall be blown in their face and gumm up their eyes They shall be in a posture of confusion not know what counsels to take what motions to resolve upon Let them look to every point of Heaven and Earth they shall meet with a Whirlwind to confound them and cloudy dust to blind them 7. The irresistibleness of the judgment Winds have more than a Gyant like force a torrent of compacted Air that with an invincible wilfulness bears all before it displaceth the firmest Trees and levels the tallest Towers and pulls up bodies from their natural place Clouds also are over our heads and above our reach When God places them upon his people for defence they are an invincible security Isa 4.5 And when he moves them as his Chariot against a people they end in an irresistible destruction Thus the ruine of the wicked is describ'd Prov. 10.25 As the Whirlwind passes so is the wicked no more It blows them down sweeps them away they irrecoverably fall before the force of it What heart can endure and what hands can be strong in the days wherein God doth deal with them Ezek. 22.14 Thus is the judgment against Niniveh describ'd God hath his way in the Whirlwind to thunder down their strongest Walls which were so thick that Chariots could march a-breast upon them and batter down their mighty Towers which that City had in multitudes upon their Walls They are the first words I intend to insist upon to treat of the Patience of God describ'd in those words The Lord is slow to anger Doct. Slowness to anger or admirable Patience is the property of the divine nature As Patience signifies suffering so it is not in God The divine nature is impassible uncapable of any impair it cannot be touched by the violences of men nor the essential Glory of it be diminisht by
his blow the smarter it will be The heavier the Canons are the more difficulty are they drawn to the besieged Town but when arriv'd they recompence the slowness of their march by the fierceness of their battery Because I have purged thee i. e. used means for thy reformation and waited for it and thou wast not purg'd thou shalt not be purg'd from thy filthiness any more till I have caused my fury to rest upon thee I will not go back neither will I spare according to thy ways and according to thy doings shall they Judge thee Ezek. 24.13.14 God will spare as little then as he spar'd much before His wrath shall be as raging upon them as the Sea of their wickedness was within them When there is a bank to forbid the irruption of the streams the waters swell but when the bank is broke or the lock taken away they rush with the greater violence and ravage more than they would have done had not they met with a stop The longer a stone is in falling the more it bruiseth and grinds to powder There is a greater treasure of Wrath laid up by the abuses of patience Every sin must have a just recompence of reward and therefore every sin in regard of its aggravations must be more punished then a sin in the singleness and simplicity of its own nature As treasures of mercy are kept by God for us he keeps mercy for thousands so are treasures of wrath kept by him to be expended and a time of expence there must be Patience will account to Justice all the good offices it hath done the sinner and demand to be righted by Justice Justice will take the account from the hands of Patience and exact a recompence for every disingenuous injury offered to it When Justice comes to arrest men for their debts Patience Mercy and Goodness will step in as Creditors and clap their actions upon them which will make the condition so much more deplorable 4. When he puts an end to his abus'd patience his wrath will make quick and sure work He that is slow to Anger will be swift in the execution of it The departure of God from Jerusalem is described with wings and wheels Ezek. 11.23 One stroke of his hand is irresistible he that hath spent so much time in waiting needs but one minute to ruine though it be long ere he draws his Sword out of his scabbard yet when once he doth it he dispatcheth men at a blow Ephraim or the Ten Tribes had a long time of patience and prosperity but now shall a month devour him with his portion Hosea 5.7 One fatal month puts a period to the many years peace and security of a sinful Nation His Arrows wound suddenly Psal 64.7 And while men are about to fill their Bellies he casts the fruits of his wrath upon them Job 20.23 Like thunder out of a Cloud or a Bullet out of a Cannon that strikes dead before it is heard God deals with sinners as Enemies do with a Town batter it not by planted Guns but secretly undermines and blows up the Walls whereby they involve the Garrison in a suddain ruine and carry the Town God spar'd the Amalekites along time after the injury committed against the Israelites in their passage out of Egypt to Canaan but when he came to reckon with them he would wast them in a trice and make an utter consumption of them 1 Sam. 15.2 3. He describes himself by a travelling Woman Isaiah 42.14 That hath born long in her Womb and at last sends forth her Birth with strong cries Though he hath held his peace been still and refrained himself yet at last he will destroy and devour at once The Ninivites spar'd in the time of Jonah for their Repentance are in Nature threatned with a certain and total ruine when God should come to bring them to an account for his length and patience so much abus'd by them Though God endur'd the murmuring Israelites so long in the Wilderness yet he paid them off at last and took away the Rebels in his Wrath. He uttered their sentence with an irreversible Oath that none of them should enter into his rest and he did as surely execute it as he had solemnly sworn it 5. Though he doth deferre his visible wrath yet that very delay may be more dreadful than a quick punishment He may forbear striking and give the Reins to the hardness and corruption of mens hearts He may suffer them to walk in their own Counsels without any more striving with them whereby they make them selves fitter fuel for his vengeance This was the fate of Israel when they would not hearken to his voice he gave them up to their own hearts lusts and they walked in their own Counsels Psal 81.12 Though his sparing them had the outward aspect of patience it was a wrathful one and attended with spiritual judgments thus many abusers of patience may still have their line lengthned and the Candle of prosperity to shine upon their heads that they may encrease their sins and be the fitter mark at last for his arrows They swim down the stream of their own sensuality with a deplorable security till they fall into an unavoidable gulf where at last it will be a great part of their Hell to reflect on the length of divine patience on Earth and their inexcusable abuse of it 2. It informs us of the reason why he lets the Enemies of his Church oppress it and deferrs his promise of the deliverance of it If he did punish them presently his holiness and Justice would be glorifyed but his power over himself in his patience would be obscured Well may the Church be content to have a perfection of God glorified that is not like to receive any honor in another World by any exercise of it self If it were not for this patience he were uncapable to be the Governour of a sinful World he might without it be the Governour of an innocent World but not of a criminal one he would be the destroyer of the World but not the orderer and disposer of the extravagancies and sinfulness of the World The interest of his Wisdom in drawing good out of evil would not be served if he were not clothed with this perfection as well as with others If he did presently destroy the Enemies of his Church upon the first oppression his wisdom in contriving and his power in accomplishing deliverance against the united powers of Hell and Earth would not be visible no nor that power in preserving his people unconsumed in the furnace of Affliction He had not got so great a name in the rescue of his Israel from Pharaoh had he thundered the Tyrant into destruction upon his first Edicts against the innocent If he were not patient to the most violent of men he might seem to be cruel But when he offers peace to them under their rebellions waits that they may be members of his Church rather
than Enemies to it he frees himself from any such imputation even in the judgment of those that shall feel most of his wrath 't is this renders the equity of his Justice unquestionable and the deliverance of his people righteous in the Judgment of those from whose fetters they are delivered Christ Reigns in the midst of his Enemies to shew his power over himself as well as over the heads of his Enemies to shew his power over his Rebels And though he retards his promise and suffers a great interval of time between the publication and performance sometimes years sometimes ages to pass away and little appearance of any preparation to shew himself a God of Truth 'T is not that he hath forgotten his Word or repents that ever he passed it or sleeps in a supine neglect of it but that men might not perish but bethink themselves and come as friends into his bosome rather than be crush'd as enemies under his feet 2 Pet. 3.9 The Lord is not slack concerning his promise but is long-suffering to usward not willing that any should perish but that all should come to Repentance Hereby he shews that he would be rather pleased with the conversion than the destruction of men 3. We see the reason why sin is suffered to remain in the Regenerate To shew his Patience towards his own for since this attribute hath no other place of appearance but in this World God takes opportunity to manifest it because at the close of the World it will remain closed up in the Deity without any further operation As God suffers a multitude of sins in the World to evidence his Patience to the wicked so he suffers great remainders of sin in his people to shew his Patience to the Godly His sparing mercy is admirable before their conversion but more admirable in bearing with them after so high an Obligation as the conferring upon them special converting Grace 2. The second Vse is of comfort 'T is a vast comfort to any when God is pacified towards them but it is some comfort to all that God is yet Patient towards them though but very little to a refractory sinner His continued Patience to all speaks a possibility of the cure of all would they not stand against the way of their recovery 'T is a terror that God hath anger but it is a mitigation of that terror that God is slow to it While his Sword is in his sheath there is some hopes to prevent the drawing of it Alas if he were all fire and sword upon sin what would become of us We should find nothing else but over-flowing deluges or sweeping Pestilences or perpetual flashes of Sodom's Fire and Brimstone from Heaven He doomes us not presently to execution but gives us a long breathing time after the crime that by retiring from our iniquities and having recourse to his mercy he may be with-held for ever from signing a Warrant against us and change his Legal Sentence into an Evangelical pardon 'T is a special comfort to his people that he is a Sanctuary to them Ezek. 11.16 A place of refuge a place of Spiritual Communications But it is some refreshment to all in this life that he is a defence to them for so is his Patience call'd Numb 14.9 Their defence is departed from them Speaking to the Israelites that they should not be afraid of the Canaanites for their defence is departed from them God is no longer Patient to them since their sins be full and ripe Patience as long as it lasts is a temporary defence to those that are under the wing of it but to the believer it is a singular comfort And God is called the God of Patience and consolation in one breath Rom. 15.5 The God of Patience and Consolation grant you to be like-minded All interpreters understand it effectively The God that inspires you with comfort and cheares you with comfort grant this to you Why may it not be understood formally of the Patience belonging to the nature of God and though it be exprest in the way of Petition yet it might also be proposed as a pattern for imitation and so suits very well to the Exhortation laid down ver 1. which was to bear with the infirmities of the weak which he presseth them to ver 3. by the example of Christ And ver 5. by the Patience of God to them and so they are very well linkt together God of Patience and Consolation may well be joyned since Patience is the first step of comfort to the poor creature If it did not administer some comfortable hopes to Adam in the interval between his fall and God's coming to examine him I am sure it was the first discovery of any comfort to the creature after the sweeping the destroying deluge out of the World Gen. 9.21 After the savour of Noah's Sacrifice representing the great Sacrifice which was to be in the World had ascended up to God the return from him is a publication of his forbearing to punish any more in such a manner And though he found man no better than he was before and the imaginations of mens hearts as evil as before the deluge that he would not again smite every living thing as he had done This was the first expression of comfort to Noah after his exit from the Ark And declares nothing else but the continuance of Patience to the New World above what he had shewn to the Old 1. 'T is a comfort in that 't is an argument of his Grace to his people If he hath so rich a Patience to exercise towards his enemies he hath a greater treasure to bestow upon his friends Patience is the first attribute which steps in for our Salvation and therefore called Salvation 2 Pet. 3.15 Something else is therefore built upon it and intended by it to those that believe Those two letters of his name a God keeping Mercy for Thousands and forgiving iniquity transgressions and sin follows the other Letter of his long suffering in the Proclamation Exod. 34.6 7. He is slow to anger that he may be merciful that men may seek and recieve their pardon If he be long suffering in order to be a pardoning God he will not be wanting in pardoning those who answer the design of his forbearance of them You would not have had sparing mercy to improve if God would have deny'd you saving mercy upon the improvement of his sparing goodness If he hath so much respect to his enemies that provoke him as to endure them with much long suffering he will surely be very kind to those that obey him and conform to his will If he hath much long suffering to those that are fitted for destruction Rom. 9.22 he will have a muchness of mercy for those that are prepared for Glory by Faith and Repentance 'T is but a natural conclusion a gracious Soul may make if God had not a mind to be appeased towards me he would not have had
360 618 619 Not Instruments in the Creation of Man Pag. 443 Evil not redeemed Pag. 619 620 Angels not Governors of the world Pag. 673 674 Subject to God Pag. 717 718 Men Apostatize from God when his will crosses theirs Pag. 80 In times of Persecution Pag. 90 By reason of practical Atheism Pag. 102 103 Apostles the first Preachers of the Gospel mean and worthless men Pag. 463 464 Spirited by Divine Power for spreading of it Pag. 464 465 The Wisdom of God seen in using such Instruments Pag. 393 394 Applauding our selves v. Pride Atheism opens a Door to all manner of wickedness Pag. 2. Some spice of it in all men Pag. 2 4 The greatest folly 3 ad Pag. 39 Common in our days Pag. 3 41 Strikes at the Foundation of all Religion Pag. 3 We should establish our selves against it ibid. 'T is against the light of Natural Reason Pag. 4 Against the universal consent of all Nations Pag. 6 But few if any profest it in former Ages Pag. 8 41 Would root up the Foundations of all Government Pag. 39 Introduce all evil into the world Pag. 39 40 Pernicious to the Atheist himself Pag. 40 41 The cause of Publick Judgments Pag. 41 Mens Lusts the cause of it Pag. 43 Promoted by the Devil most since the destruction of Idolatry Pag. 44 Uncomfortable Pag. 44 45 Directions against it Pag. 45 46 All sin founded in a secret Atheism Pag. 50 Practical Atheism natural to Man Pag. 47 Natural since the Fall Pag. 48 To all men ibid. Proved by Arguments 54 ad Pag. 99 We ought to be humbled for it both in our selves and others Pag. 103 104 How great a sin it is 104 ad Pag. 106 Misery will attend it Pag. 106 We should watch against it ibid. Directions against it Pag. 106 107 Atheist can never prove there is no God Pag. 41 42 All the Creatures fight against him Pag. 42 In Afflictions suspects and fears there is one Pag. 42 43 How much pains he takes to blot out the notion of a God Pag. 43 Suppose it were an even lay that there were no God yet he is very imprudent ibid. Uses not means to enform himself ibid. Atoms the World not made by a casual concourse of them Pag. 20 Attributes of God bear a comfortable respect to believers Pag. 342 Authority how distinguisht from Power Pag. 704 B. THe Best we have ought to be given to God Pag. 155 156 Blessings Spiritual God only the Author of Pag. 698 Temporal God uses a Soveraignty in bestowing them 740 Vide Riches Body of Man how curiously wrought Pag. 30 31 350 Every Human one hath different Features Pag. 31 32 God hath none v. Spirit We must worship God with our Bodies Pag. 139 140 141 Yet not with our Bodies only Vide Soul and Worship We must not conceive of God under a Bodily shape Pag. 124 125 Bodily Members ascribed to him Vide Members Brain how curious a workmanship Pag. 30 C. THe Israelites worshipped the true God under the golden Calf Pag. 122 God fits and enclines men to several Callings Pag. 356 357 650 Appoints every mans Calling Pag. 747 There is a first Cause of all things Pag. 20 21 Which doth necessarily exist and is infinitely perfect Pag. 21 We must not Censure God in his Counsels Actions or Revelations Pag. 192 193 403 404 Or in his ways Pag. 415 416 Censuring the hearts of others is an injury to God's Omniscience Pag. 324 325 Men is a contempt of God's Soveraignty Pag. 763 Ceremonial Law abolisht to promote Spiritual Worship Pag. 135 Called Flesh ibid. Not a fit means to bring the heart into a spiritual frame Pag. 135 136 Rather hindred than further'd Spiritual Worship Pag. 136 137 God never testified himself well-pleased with it nor intended it should always last Pag. 137 138 The abrogating of it doth not argue any change in God Pag. 228 229 The Holiness of God appears in it Pag. 510 511 Men are prone to bring Ceremonies of their own into God's Worship 79 Vide Worship and Additions c. Chance the World not made nor governed by it Pag. 26 Charity men have bad ends in it Pag. 93 We should exercise it Pag. 691 692 The consideration of God's Soveraignty would promote it Pag. 774 We should be Chearful in God's worship Pag. 150 Christ his Godhead proved from his Eternity Pag. 191 192 From his Omnipresence Pag. 261 262 From his Immutability Pag. 229 230 From his Knowledge of God all Creatures the hearts of men and his prescience of their Inclinations Pag. 315 316 317 From his Omnipotence manifest in Creation Preservation and Resurrection Pag. 472 ad 476 From his Holiness Pag. 551 From his Wisdom Pag. 395 Is God-man Pag. 458 Spiritual Worship offered to God through him Pag. 154 155 The imperfectness of our Services should make us prize his Mediation Pag. 168 The only fit Person in the Trinity to assume our Nature Pag. 378 379 Fitted to be our Mediator and Saviour by his two Natures Pag. 381 382 383 Should be imitated in his Holiness and often viewed by us to that end Pag. 559 563 The greatest Gift Pag. 622 ad 625 Appointed by the Father to be our Redeemer Pag. 749 750 751 The Christian Religion its Excellency Pag. 103 Of Divine Extraction Pag. 551 Most opposed in the World Pag. 63 Vide Gospel Church God's Eternity a comfort to her in all her Distresses and Threatnings of her Enemies Pag. 193 194 Under God's special Providence Pag. 272 273 His Infinite Knowledge a comfort in all subtil contrivances of men against her Pag. 328 329 Troublers of her Peace by corrupt Doctrines no better than Devils 341 †God 's Wisdom a comfort to her in her greatest dangers Pag. 406 Hath shewn his Power in her deliverance in all Ages Pag. 180 453 454 And in the destruction of her Enemies Pag. 454 455 456 Ought to take comfort in his Power in her lowest Estate Pag. 487 488 Should not fear her Enemies v. Fear His Goodness a comfort in dangers Pag. 684 How great is God's love to her Pag. 769 820 His Soveraignty a comfort to her Pag. 771 772 He will comfort her in her â—ears and destroy her Enemies Pag. 787 788 God exercises Patience towards her Pag. 812 For her sake to the wicked also Pag. 812 813 Why her Enemies are not immediately destroyed Pag. 819 Commands of God v. Laws The Holiness of God to be relied on for Comfort Pag. 551 God gives great Comforts in or after Temptations Pag. 659 Creatures cannot Comfort us if God be angry Pag. 768 Communion with God man naturally hath no desire of Pag. 98 The advantage of Communion with him Pag. 106 107 Can only be in our Spirits Pag. 127 We should desire it Pag. 201 202 Cannot be between God and sinners Pag. 548 549 Holiness only fits us for it Pag. 562 Conceptions we cannot have adequate ones of God Pag. 123 We ought to labour after as high ones as