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
Reprobate Sense and unfit for any good work and judges against all their vain glorious braggs that they had not a Reverence of God in their Hearts there was more of the Denial of God in their Works than there was Acknowledgement of God in their Words Those that have neither God in their Thoughts nor in their Tongues nor in their Works cannot properly be said to acknwledge him Where the Honour of God is not practically owned in the lives of men the Being of God is not sensibly acknowledged in the hearts of men The Principle must be of the same kind with the Actions if the Actions be Atheistical the Principal of them can be no better Prop. 2. All Sin is founded in a secret Atheism Atheism is the Spirit of every Sin all the Flouds of Impieties in the World break in at the Gate of a secret Atheism And though several sins may disagree with one another yet like Herod and Pilate against Christ they joyn hand in hand against the interest of God Though lusts and pleasures be divers yet they are all united in Disobedience to him * Tit. 3.3 All the wicked inclinations in the heart and strugling motions secret repinings self applauding confidences in our own wisdom strength c. envy ambition revenge are sparks from this latent fire the language of every one of these is I would be a Lord to my self and would not have a God Superior to me The variety of sins against the first and second Table the neglects of God and violences against Man are derived from this in the Text first the Fool hath said in his heart and then follows a legion of Devils As all vertuous actions spring from an acknowledgment of God so all vitious actions rise from a lurking Denial of him All licentiousness goes glib down where there is no sense of God Abraham judged himself not secure from Murder nor his Wife from Defilement in Gerar if there were no Fear of God there * Gen. 20.11 He that makes no Conscience of Sin has no regard to the Honour and consequently none to the Being of God By the Fear of God men depart from Evil Pro. 16.6 By the non-regarding of God men rush into Evil. Pharaoh opprest Israel because he knew not the Lord. If he did not deny the Being of a Deity yet he had such an unworthy Notion of God as was inconsistent with the Nature of a Deity he a poor Creature thought himself a Mate for the Creator In sins of Ommission we own not God in neglecting to perform what he enjoyns In sins of Commission we set up some lust in the place of God and pay to that the Homage which is due to our Maker In both we disown him in the one by not doing what he commands in the other by doing what he forbids We deny his Soveraignty when we violate his Laws we disgrace his Holiness when we cast our filth before his Face we disparage his Wisdom when we set up another Rule as the Guide of our Actions than that Law he hath fixed we slight his Sufficiency when we prefer a satisfaction in sin before a happiness in Him alone and his Goodness when we judge it not strong enough to attract us to him Every sin invades the Rights of God and strips him of one or other of his Perfections 'T is such a vilifying of God as if he were not God as if he were not the supream Creator and Benefactor of the World as if we had not our Being from Him as if the Air we breathed in the Food we lived by were our own by right of Supreamacy not of Donation For a Subject to slight his Soveraign is to slight his Royalty or a Servant his Master is to deny his Superiority Prop. 3. Sin implies that God is unworthy of a Being Every Sin is a kind of cursing God in the Heart * Job 1.5 an aim at the destruction of the Being of God not actually but vertually not in the intention of every Sinner but in the nature of every Sin That Affection which excites a man to break his Law would excite him to annihilate his Being if it were in his power A Man in every sin aims to set up his own will as his rule and his own glory as the end of his actions against the will and glory of God and could a Sinner attain his end God would be destroyed God cannot out live his will and his glory God cannot have another rule but his own will nor another end but his own honour Sin is called a turning the back upon God * Jer. 32.33 Deut. 32.15 a kicking against him * Jer. 32.33 Deut. 32.15 as if he were a slighter person than the meanest beggar What greater contempt can be shew'd to the meanest vilest person than to turn the back lift up the heel and thrust away with indignation All which actions though they signifie that such a one hath a Being yet they testifie also that he is unworthy of a Being that he is an unuseful Being in the world and that it were well the world were rid of him All Sin against Knowledge is called a Reproach of God * Numb 15.30 Ezek. 20.27 Reproach is a vilifying a man as unworthy to be admitted into Company We naturally Judge God unfit to be conversed with God is the term turned from by a sinner Sin is the term turned to which implies a greater excellency in the nature of sin than in the nature of God And as we naturally Judge it more worthy to have a being in our affections so consequently more worthy to have a being in the world than that infinite nature from whom we derive our beings and our all and upon whom with a kind of disdain we turn our backs Whosoever thinks the Notion of a Deity unfit to be cherished in his mind by warm Meditation implies that he cares not whether he hath a being in the world or no. Now tho the light of a Deity shines so clearly in Man and the stings of Conscience are so smart that he cannot absolutely deny the being of a God yet most Men endeavour to smother this knowledge and make the Notion of a God a sapless and useless thing Rom. 1.28 They like not to retain God in their knowledge It is said Cain went out from the presence of the Lord Gen. 4.16 That is from the Worship of God Our refusing or abhorring the presence of a man implies a carelessness whether he continue in the World or no T is a using him as if he had no being or as if we were not concerned in it Hence all men in Adam under the Emblem of the prodigal are said to go into a far Country Not in respect of place because of Gods Omnipresence but in respect of acknowledgment and affection they mind and love any thing but God And the descriptions of the Nations of the world lying in the Ruines of Adams fall
with hatred The beneficence and patience of God and his readiness to pardon men is the reason of the honour they return to him And this is so evident a motive that generally the Idolatrous world rankt those Creatures in the number of their Gods which they perceived useful and neficial to man-kind as the Sun and Mooâ— the Aegyptians the Ox c. And the more beneficial any thing appeared to mankind the higher station men gave it in the rank of their deities and bestowed a more peculiar and solemn worship upon it Men worshipped God to procure or continue his favour which would not have been acted by them had they not conceived it a pleasing thing to him to be merciful and gracious Sometimes his Justice is proposed to us as a motive of worship Heb. 12.28 29. Serve God with Reverence and Godly fear for our God is a consuming fire which includes his holiness whereby he doth hate sin as well as his wrath whereby he doth punish it Who but a mad and totally brutish person or one that was resolved to make war against heaven could behold the effects of Gods anger in the world consider him in his Justice as a consuming fire and despise him and rather be drawn out by that consideration to blasphemy and despair than to seek all ways to appease him Now tho the infinite power of God his unspeakable wisdom his incomprehensible goodness the holiness of his nature the vigilance of his Providence the bounty of his hand signifie to man that he should love and honour him and are the motives of worship yet the Spirituality of his nature is the rule of worship and directs us to render our duty to him with all the powers of our Soul As his goodness beams out upon us worship is due in Justice to him and as he is the most excellent nature veneration is due to him in the highest manner with the choicest affections So that indeed the Spirituality of God comes chiefly into consideration in matter of worship All his perfections are grounded upon this He could not be infinite immutable omniscient if he were a Corporeal being * Amirald dissert 6. disp 1. pa. 11. We cannot give him a worship unless we Judge him worthy excellent and deserving a worship at our hands And we cannot Judge him worthy of a worship unless we have some apprehensions and admirations of his infinite vertues And we cannot apprehend and admire those perfections but as we see them as causes shining in their effects When we see therefore the frame of the world to be the work of his power the order of the world to be the fruit of his wisdom and the usefulness of the world to be the product of his goodness We find the motives and reasons of worship and weighing that this power wisdom goodness infinitely transcend any corporeal nature we find a rule of worship that it ought to be offered by us in a manner sutable to such a nature as is infinitely above any bodily Being His being a Spirit declares what he is his other perfections declare what kind of Spirit he is All Gods perfections suppose him a Spirit all center in this His wisdom doth not suppose him merciful or his mercy suppose him omniscient There may be distinct notions of those but all suppose him to be of a spiritual nature How cold and frozen will our devotions be if we consider not his omniscience whereby he discerns our hearts How carnal will our services be if we consider him not as a pure Spirit * Amyraut de Relig. In our offers to and transactions with men we deal not with them as meer Animals but as rational Creatures and we debase their natures if we treat them otherwise And if we have not raised apprehensions of Gods spiritual nature in our treating with him but allow him only such frames as we think fit enough for men we debase his spirituality to the littleness of our own Being We must therefore possess our Souls with this we shall else render him no better than a fleshly service We do not much concern our selves in those things of which we are either utterly ignorant or have but slight apprehensions of That is the first Proposition The right exercise of worship is grounded upon the spirituality of God Propos 2. This spiritual worship of God is manifest by the light of Nature to be due to him In reference to this consider 1. The outward means or matter of that worship which would be acceptable to God was not known by the light of Nature The Law for a Worship and for a spiritual worship by the faculties of our Souls was natural and part of the Law of Creation though the determination of the particular acts whereby God would have this homage testified was of positive institution and depended not upon the Law of Creation Though Adam in Innocence knew God was to be worshipped yet by Nature he did not know by what outward acts he was to pay this respect or at what time he was more solemnly to be exercised in it than at another This depended upon the directions God as the soveraign Governour and Law-giver should prescribe You therefore find the positive institutions of the Tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil and the determination of the time of worship Gen. 2.3.17 Had there been any such notion in Adam naturally as strong as that other that a worship was due to God there would have been found some reliques of these modes universally consented to by Mankind as well as of the other But though all Nations have by an universal consent concurred in the acknowledgment of the Being of God and his right to adoration and the obligation of the Creature to it and that there ought to be some publick rule and polity in matters of Religion for no Nation hath been in the world without a worship and without external acts and certain ceremonies to signifie that worship yet their modes and rites have been as various as their climates unless in that common notion of sacrifices not descending to them by nature but tradition from Adam and the various ways of worship have been more provoking than pleasing Every Nation suted the kind of worship to their particular ends and polities they designed to rule by How God was to be worshipped is more difficult to be discerned by Nature with its eyes out than with its eyes clear * King on Jonah P. 63. The pillars upon which the worship of God stands cannot be discerned without revelation no more than blind Sampson could tell where the pillars of the Philistians Theatre stood without one to conduct him What Adam could not see with his sound eyes we cannot with our dim eyes He must be told from Heaven what worship was fit for the God of Heaven 'T is not by Nature that we can have such a full prospect of God as may content and quiet us This is the noble
Hills are said to leap and the Mountains to rejoyce The Creature is said to groan as the Heavens are said to declare the glory of God passively naturally not rationally 'T is not likely Angels are here meant though they cannot but desire it since they are affected with the dishonour and reproach God hath in the world they cannot but long for the restoration of his honour in the restoration of the Creature to its true end And indeed the Angels are employed to serve man in this sinful state and cannot but in holiness wish the Creature freed from his corruption Nor is it meant of the new Creatures which have the first fruits of the Spirit those he brings in afterwards groaning and waiting for the Adoption * Verse 23. where he distinguisheth the rational Creature from the Creature he had spoken of before If he had meant the believing Creature by that Creature that desired the liberty of the Sons of God what need had there been of that additional distinction and not only they but we also who have the first fruits of the Spirit groan within our selves Whereby it seems he means some Creatures below rational Creatures since neither Angels nor blessed Souls can be said to travail in pain with that distress as a Woman in travail hath as the word signifies who perform the work joyfully which God sets them upon * Mestraezat fur Heb. 1. If the Creatures be subject to vanity by the sin of man they shall also partake of a happiness by the restoration of man The Eâ—â—â—h hath born Thorns and Thistles and venemous Beasts The Air hath had its Tempests and infectious Qualities The Water hath caused its Flouds and Deluges The Creature hath been abused to luxury and intemperance and been tyranniz'd over by Man contrary to the end of its creation 'T is convenient that some time should be allotted for the Creature 's attaining its true end and that it may partake of the peace of Man as it hath done of the fruits of his sin otherwise it would seem that sin had prevailed more than grace and would have had more power to deface than grace to restore and things into their due order 5. Again upon what account should the Psalmist exhort the Heavens to rejoyce and the Earth to be glad when God comes to judge the world with Righteousness * Psal 96.11 12 13. if they should be annihilated and sunk for ever into nothing It would seem saith Daille to be an impertinent figure if the Judge of the world brought to them a total destruction an entire ruin could not be matter of triumph to Creatures who naturally have that instinct or inclination put into them by their Creator to preserve themselves and to affect their own preservation 6. Again The Lord is to rejoyce in his works Psal 104.31 The Glory of the Lord shall endure for ever the Lord shall rejoyce in his works not hath but shall rejoyce in his works In the works of Creation which the Psalmist had enumerated and which is the whole scope of the Psalm And he intimates that it is part of the glory of the Lord which endures for ever that is his manifestative glory to rejoyce in his works The Glory of the Lord must be understood with reference to the Creation he had spoken of before How short was that joy God had in his works after he had sent them beautified out of his hand How soon did he repent not only that he had made Man but was grieved at the heart also that he made the other Creatures which Man's sin had disordered What joy can God have in them * Gen. 6.7 since the Curse upon the entrance of sin into the world remains upon them If they are to be annihilated upon the full restoration of his Holiness what time will God have to rejoyce in the other works of Creation 'T is the joy of God to see all his works in their due order every one pointing to their true end marching together in their excellency according to his first intendment in their Creation Did God create the World to perform its end only for one day scarce so much if Adam fell the very first day of his Creation What would have been their end if Adam had been confirm'd in a state of happiness as the Angels were 'T is likely will be answered and performed upon the compleat restoration of Man to that happy state from whence he fell What Artificer compiles a work by his skill but to rejoyce in it And shall God have no joy from the works of his hands Since God can only rejoyce in goodness the Creatures must have that goodness restored to them which God pronounced them to have at the first Creation and which he ordained them for before he can again rejoyce in his works The goodness of the Creatures is the glory and joy of God Inference 1. We may infer from hence what a base and vile thing Sin is which lays the foundation of the worlds change Sin brings it to a decrepit age Sin overturned the whole work of God * Gen. 3.17 so that to render it useful to its proper end there is a necessity of a kind of a new creating it This causes God to fire the Earth for a purification of it from that infection and contagion brought upon it by the apostacy and corruption of Man It hath served sinful man and therefore must undergo a purging Flame to be fit to serve the holy and righteous Creator As Sin is so riveted in the body of man that there is need of a change by death to rase it out so hath the Curse for sin got so deep into the bowels of the world that there is need of a change by fire to refine it for its Masters use Let us look upon Sin with no other notion than as the Object of Gods hatred the cause of his grief in the Creatures and the Spring of the pain and ruin of the World 2. How foolish a thing is it to set our hearts upon that which shall perish and be no more what it is now The Heavens and Earth the solidest and firmest parts of the Creation shall not continue in the posture they are they must perish and undergo a refining change How feeble and weak are the other parts of the Creation the little Creatures walking upon and fluttering about the world that are perishing and dying every day and we scarce see them clothed with life and beauty this day but they wither and are despoyl'd of all the next and are such frail things fit Objects for our everlasting Spirits and Affections Though the daily employment of the Heavens is the declaration of the glory of God * Psal 19.1 yet neither this nor their harmony order beauty amazing greatness and glory of them shall preserve them from a dissolution and melting at the presence of the Lord Though they have remained in the same posture from
Wisdom that God many times makes a Sin which Meritoriously fits us for Hell a Providential occasion to fit us for Heaven when it is an occasion of a more humble Faith and believing Humility and an occasion of a through Sanctification and growth in Grace which prepares us for a state of Glory 1. He makes use of one Sin 's breaking out to discover more and so brings us to a Self-abhorrency and Indignation against Sin the first step towards Heaven Perhaps David before his gross Fall thought he had no Hypocrisie in him We often find him appealing to God for his Integrity and desiring God to try him if any guile could be found in his Heart as if he could find none himself But his Lapse into that great Wickedness makes him discern much Falseness in his Soul when he desires God to renew a right Spirit within him and speaks of Truth in the inward parts Psal 51.6 10. The stirring of one Corruption makes all the Mud at the bottom appear which before a Soul did not suspect No Man would think there were so great a Cloud of Smoke contain'd in a little Stick of Wood were it not for the powerful operation of the Fire that both discovers and separates it Job that Cursed the Day of his Birth and uttered many Impatient expressions against God upon the account of his own Integrity upon his Recovery from his Affliction and Gods close application of himself was wrought to a greater Abhorrency of himself than ever we read he was exercis'd in before ‖ Job 42.6 The Hostile acts of Sin increase the Souls hatred of it and the deeper our Humiliations are for it the stronger impressions of Abhorrency are made upon us 2. He often orders it to make Conscience more tender and the Soul more watchful He that finds by his Calamity his Enemy to have more strength against him than he suspected will double his Guards and quicken his Diligence against him A being overtaken by some Sin is by the Wisdom of God dispos'd to make us more fearful of cherishing any occasion to enflame it and watchful against every motion and start of it By a Fall the Soul hath more experience of the Deceitfulness of the Heart and by observing its methods is render'd better able to watch against them 'T is our Ignorance of the Devices of Satan and our own hearts that makes us obnoxious to their Surprizes A fall into one Sin is often a prevention of more which lay in wait for us As the fall of a small Body into an Ambush prevents the design of the Enemy upon a greater As God suffers Heresies in the Church to try our Faith so he suffers Sins to remain and sometimes to break out to try our Watchfulness This advantage he brings from them to steel our Resolutions against the same Sins and quicken our Circumspection for the future against new Surprizes by a Temptation Davids Sin was ever before him Psal 51.3 and made his Conscience cry Blood Blood upon every occasion He refused the Water of the Well of Bethlehem 2 Sam 23.16 17. because it was gained with the hazard of Lives He could endure nothing that had the taste of Blood in it Our fear of a thing depends much upon a Trial of it A Child will not fear too near approaches to the Fire till he feels the smart of it Mortification doth not wholly suppress the Motions of Sin though it doth the Resolutions to commit it but that there will be a proneness in the Reliques of it to entice a Man into those Faults which upon sight of their blemishes cost him so many Tears As great Sicknesses after the Cure are more watch'd and the Body humour'd that a Man might not fall from the Craziness they have left in him which he is apt to do if Relapses are not carefully provided against A Man becomes more careful of any thing that may contribute to the resurrection of an expir'd Disease 3. God makes it an occasion of the Mortification of that Sin which was the matter of the Fall The livelyness of one Sin in a Renewed Man many times is the occasion of the death of it A wild Beast while kept close in a Den is secure in its life but when it breaks out to Rapine it makes the Master resolve to prevent any further mischief by the death of it The impetuous stirring of a humor in a Disease is sometime Critical and a Prognostick of the strength of Nature against it whereby the Disease loseth its strength by its struggling and makes room for health to take place by degrees One Sin is used by God for the destruction both of it self and others As the Flesh of a Scorpion cures the biting of it It sometimes by wounding us loseth its Sting and like the Bee renders it self uncapable of a second Revenge Peter after his gross Denial never denied his Master afterwards The Sin that lay undiscovered is by a Fall become visible and so more obvious to a mortifying stroke The Soul lays the faster hold on Christ and the Promise and goes out against that Enemy in the Name of that Lord of Hosts of which he was too negligent of before and therefore as he proves more strong so more successful He hath more strength because he hath less confidence in himself and more in God the prime strength of his Soul As it was with Christ so it is with us while the Devil was bruising his Heel he was bruising his Head and while the Devil is bruising our Heel the God of Peace and Wisdom is sometimes bruising his Head both in us and for us so that the strugglings of Sin are often as the faint groans or bitings of a Beast that is ready to expire 'T is just with a Man sometimes as with a Running Fountain that hath Mud at the bottom when it is stirred the Mud tinctures and defiles it all over yet some of that Mud hath a vent with the Streams which run from it so that when it is re-settled at the bottom 't is not so much in quantity as it was before God by his Wisdom weakens the Sin by permitting it to stir and defile 4. Sometimes Divine Wisdom makes it an occasion to promote a Sanctification in all parts of the Soul As the working of one Ill-humor in the Body is an occasion of cashiering not only that but the rest by a sound Purge As a Man that is a little Cold doth not think of the Fire but if he slips with one Foot into an Icy-puddle he hastens to the Fire whereby not only that part but all the rest receive a warmth and strength upon that occasion Or as if a Person fall into the Mire his Cloaths are washed and by that means cleansed not only from the filth at present contracted but from the former Spots that were before unregarded God by his Wisdom brings secret Sins to a discovery and thereby cleanseth the Soul of them Davids Fall
of God and aspired to be a sharer with him in his Infinite Knowledge Would not let him be the only wise God but cherished an ambition to be his Partner Just as if a Beam were able to imagine it might be as bright as the Sun or a Spark fancy it could be as full fraught with Heat as the whole Element of Fire Man would not submit to the Infinite Wisdom of God in the prohibition of one single Fruit in the Garden when by the right of his Soveraign Authority he might have granted him only the use of one All Presumptuous sins are of thâ—s nature they are therefore called Reproaches of God Numb 15.30 the Soul that doth ought presumptuously reproacheth the Lord. All Reproaches are either for Natural Moral or Intellectual defects All Reproaches of God must imply either a Weakness or Unrighteousness in God If Unrighteousness his Holiness is denied if Weakness his Wisdom is blemished In General All Sin strikes at this Perfection two ways 1. As it defaceth the wise workmanship of God Every Sin is a deforming and blemishing our own Souls which as they are the prime Creatures in the lower World so they have greater Characters of Divine Wisdom in the Fabrick of them But this Image of God is ruin'd and broken by Sin Though the spoiling of it be a scorn of his Holiness 't is also an affront to his Wisdom for though his Power was the cause of the production of so fair a Piece yet his Wisdom was the guide of his Power and his Holiness the Pattern whereby he wrought it His Power effected it and his Holiness was exemplified in it but his Wisdom contrived it If a Man had a curious Clock or Watch which had cost him many years pains and the strength of his Skill to frame it for another after he had seen and considered it to trample upon it and crush it in pieces would argue a contempt of the Artificers Skill God hath shewn infinite Art in the Creation of Man but Sin unbeautifies Man and ravisheth his Excellency It cuts and slasheth the Image of God stampt by Divine Wisdom as though it were an Object only of Scorn and Contempt The Sinner in every Sin acts as if he intended to put himself in a better posture and in a fairer dress than the Wisdom of God hath put him in by Creation 2. In the slighting his Laws The Laws of God are highly Rational they are drawn from the depths of the Divine Understanding wherein there is no unclearness and no defect As his Understanding apprehends all things in their true Reason so his Will enjoyns all things for worthy and wise Ends His Laws are contrived by his Wisdom for the happiness of Man whose Happiness and the Mâ—thods to it he understands better than Men or Angels can do His Laws being the Orders of the Wisest Understanding every breach of his Law is a flying in the Face of his Wisdom All Human Laws though they are enforced by Soveraign Authority yet they are or ought to be in the composing of them founded upon Reason and should be particular applications of the Law of Nature to this or that particular emergency The Laws of God then who is summa ratio are the birth of the truest Reason though the Reason of every one of them may not be so clear to us Every Law though it consists in an act of the Will yet doth presuppose an act of the Understanding The act of the Divine Vnderstanding in framing the Law must be supposed to precede the act of his Will in commanding the Observance of that Law So every Sin against the Law is not only against the Will of God commanding but the Reason of God contriving and a cleaving to our own Reason rather than the Understanding or Mind of God As if God had mistaken in making his Law and we had more understanding to frame a better and more conducing to our happiness As if God were not Wise enough to govern us and prescribe what we should do and what we should avoid as if he designed not our welfare but our misfortune Whereas the Precepts of God are not tyrannical Edicts or Acts of meer Will but the fruits of Counsel and therefore every breach of them is a real declamation against his Discretion and Judgment and preferring our own Imaginations or the Suggestions of the Devil as our Rule before the Results of Divine Counsel While we acknowledge him Wise in our Opinion we speak him Foolish by our Practise when instead of being guided by him we will guide our selves No Man will question but it is a controuling Divine Wisdom to make Alterations in his Precepts dogmatically either to add some of their own or expunge any of his And is it not a Crime of the like reflection to alter them Practically When we will observe one part of the Law and not another part but pick and choose where we please our selves as our Humors and Carnal Interest prompts us It is to charge that part of the Law with Folly which we refuse to conform unto The more cunning any Man is in Sin the more his sin is against Divine Wisdom as if he thought to out-wit God He that receives the Promises of God and the Testimony of Christ sets to his Seal that God is true John 3.33 By the like strength of Argument it will undeniably follow That he that refuseth Obedience to his Precept sets to his Seal that God is foolish Were they not Rational God would not enjoyn them and if they are Rational we are Enemies to Infinite Wisdom by not complying with them If Infinite Prudence hath made the Law why is not every part of it observed if it were not made with the best Wisdom why is any part of it observed If the defacing his Image be any Sin as being a defaming his Wisdom in Creation the breaking his Law is no less a Sin as being a disgracing his Wisdom in his Administration 'T is upon this account likely that the Scripture so often counts Sinners Fools since it is certainly inexcusable Folly to contradict undeniable and infallible Wisdom yet this is done in the least Sin And as he that breaks one title of the Law is deservedly accounted guilty of the breach of the whole James 2.10 so he that despiseth the least stamp of Wisdom in the minutest part of the Law is deservedly counted as a Contemner of it in the frame of the whole Statute-Book But in Particular the Wisdom of God is affronted and Invaded 1. By introducing new Rules and Modes of Worship different from Divine Institutions Is not this a manifest reflection on this Perfection of God as though he had not been Wise enough to provide for his own Honour and model his own Sâ—rvice but stood in need of our directions and the caprichio's of our Brains Some have observed that it is a greater Sin in Worship to do what we should not than to omit what we should
Terms of this Union were infinitely distant What greater distance can there be than between the Deity and Humanity between the Creator and a Creature Can you imagine the distance between Eternity and Time Infinite Power and Miserable Infirmity an Immortal Spirit and Dying Flesh the Highest Being and Nothing yet these are espous'd A God of unmixt Blessedness is linkt personally with a Man of perpetual Sorrows Life uncapable to Die joyn'd to a Body in that Oeconomy uncapable to live without dying first Infinite Purity and a reputed Sinner Eternal Blessedness with a Cursed Nature Almightiness and Weakness Omniscience and Ignorance Immutability and Changableness Incomprehensibleness and comprehensibility that which cannot be comprehended and that which can be comprehended that which is intirely Independent and that which is totally Dependant the Creator forming all things and the Creature made met together to a Personal Union the Word made flesh †John 1.14 the Eternal Son the Seed of Abraham ‖ Heb. 2.16 What more Miraculous than for God to become Man and Man to become God That a Person possessed of all the Perâ—ections of the Godhead should inherit all the Imperfections of the Manhood in one Person Sin only excepted A Holiness uncapable of sinning to be made Sin God blessed for ever taking the properties of Humane Nature and Humane Nature admitted to a Union with the Properties of the Creator The Fulness of the Deity and the Emptiness of Man united together * Colos 2.9 not by a shining of the Deity upon the Humanity as the light of the Sun upon the Earth but by an inhabitation or indwelling of the Deity in the Humanity Was there not need of an Infinite Power to bring together Terms so far asunder to elevate the Humanity to be capable of and disposed for a conjunction with the Deity If a clod of Earth should be advanced to and united with the Body of the Sun such an advance would evidence it self to be a work of Almighty Power The Clod hath nothing in its own nature to render it so glorious no power to climb up to so high a dignity How little would such a Union be to that we are speaking of Nothing less than an incomprehensible Power could effect what an Incomprehensible Wisdom did project in this affair 3. Especially since the Vnion is so strait 'T is not such a Vnion as is between a Man and his House he dwells in whence he goes out and to which he returns without any alteration of himself or his House nor such a Vnion as is betwen a Man and his Garment which both communicate and receive warmth from one another nor such as is between an Artificer and his Instrument wherewith he works nor such a Vnion as one Friend hath with another All these are distant things not one in Nature but have distinct subsistences Two Friends though united by love are distinct Persons a Man and his Cloaths an Artificer and his Instruments have distinct subsistences But the Humanity of Christ hath no subsistence but in the Person of Christ †Lessius de Perf. divin lib. 12. cap. 4. p. 104. The straitness of this Vnion is exprest and may be somewhat conceiv'd by the union of Fire with Iron Fire pierceth through all the parts of Iron it unites it self with every particle bestows a light heat purity upon all of it you cannot distinguish the Iron from the Fire or the Fire from the Iron yet they are distinct Natures So the Deity is united to to the whole Humanity seasons it and bestows an excellency upon it yet the Natures still remain distinct And as during that union of Fire with Iron the Iron is uncapable of rust or blackness so is the Humanity uncapable of Sin And as the operation of Fire is attributed to the red-hot Iron as the Iron may be said to heat burn and the Fire may be said to cut and pierce yet the imperfections of the Iron do not affect the Fire so in this Mystery those things which belong to the Divinity are ascribed to the Humanity and those things which belong to the Humanity are ascribed to the Divinity in regard of the Person in whom those Natures are united yet the Imperfections of the Humanity do not hurt the Divinity The Divinity of Christ is as really united with the Humanity as the Soul with the Body The Person was one though the Natures were two so united that the Sufferings of the Humane Nature were the Sufferings of that Person and the dignity of the Divine was imputed to the Humane by reason of that Unity of both in one Person Hence the Blood of the Humane Nature is said to be the Blood of God ‖ Acts 20.28 * Lessius p. 103 104. All things ascrib'd to the Son of God may be ascrib'd to this Man and the things ascrib'd to this Man may be ascrib'd to the Son of God as this Man is the Son of God Eternal Almighty And it may be said God suffered was Crucified c. for the Person of Christ is but one most simple the Person suffered that was God and Man united making One Person 4. And though the Union be so strait yet without confusion of the Natures or change of them into one another †Lessius ut antea p. 103 104. Amyrald Irenic p. 284. The two Natures of Christ are not mixed as Liquors that incorporate with one another when they are poured into a Vessel the Divine Nature is not turned into the Humane nor the Humane into the Divine one Nature doth not swallow up another and make a third Nature distinct from each of them The Deity is not turned into the Humanity as Air which is next to a Spirit may be thickned and turned into Water and Water may be rarifi'd into Air by the power of Heat boyling it The Deity cannot be chang'd because the Nature of it is to be unchangeable It would not be Deity if it were Mortal and capable of Suffering The Humanity is not chang'd into the Deity for then Christ could not have been a Sufferer If the Humanity had been swallowed up into the Deity it had lost its own distinct Nature and put on the Nature of the Deity and consequently been uncapable of Suffering Finite can never by any mixture be chang'd into Infinite nor Infinite into Finite This Union in this regard may be resembled to the Union of Light and Air which are strictly joyn'd for the Light passes through all parts of the Air but they are not confounded but remain in their distinct essences as before the union without the least confusion with one another * Amyrald Irenic p. 282. The Divine Nature remains as it was before the Union intire in it self only the Divine Person assumes another Nature to himself The Humane Nature remains as it would have done had it existed separately from the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 except that then it would have had a
many Leagues behind any resemblance to God he stript off that which was the glory of his Nature and was the only means of glorifying God as his Creator The word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Apostle uses is very significant Postpon'd by Sin an infinite distance from any imitation of Gods Holiness or any appearance before him in a garb of Nature pleasing to him Let us lament our Fall and distance from God 3. Information All Vnholiness is vile and opposite to the Nature of God 'T is such a loathsom thing that the Purity of Gods eye is averse from beholding Hab. 1.3 'T is not said there that he will not but he cannot look on Evil there cannot be any amicableness between God and Sin the Natures of both are so directly and unchangeably contrary to one another Holiness is the Life of God it endures as long as his Life He must be Eternally averse from Sin he can live no longer than he lives in the hatred and loathing of it If he should for one instant cease to hate it he would cease to live To be a Holy God is as Essential to him as to be a Living God and he would not be a living but a dead God if he were in the least point of Time an Unholy God He cannot look on Sin without loathing it he cannot look on Sin but his Heart riseth against it It must needs be most odious to him as that which is against the glory of his Nature and directly opposite to that which is the lustre and varnish of all his other Perfections 'T is the Abominable thing which his Soul hates Jer. 44.4 the vilest terms imaginable are used to signifie it Do you understand the loathsomness of a miry Swine or the nauseousness of the vomit of a Dog These are Emblems of Sin †2 Pet. 2.22 Can you endure the steams of putrified Carkasses from an open Sepulchre * Rom. 3.23 Is the smell of the stinking sweat or Excrements of a Body delightful the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in James 1.21 signifies as much Or is the sight of a Body overgrown with Scabs and Leprosie grateful to you So vile so odious is Sin in the sight of God 'T is no light thing then to fly in the Face of God to break his Eternal Law to dash both the Tables in pieces to trample the Transcript of Gods own Nature under our feet to cherish that which is inconsistent with his Honour to lift up our heels against the glory of his Nature to joyn Issue with the Devil in stabbing his Heart and depriving him of his life Sin in every part of it is an opposition to the Holiness of God and consequently an envying him a Being and Life as well as a Glory If Sin be such a thing ye that love the Lord hate Evil. 4. Information Sin cannot escape a due Punishment A hatred of Unrighteousness and consequently a will to punish it is as Essential to God as a love of Righteousness Since he is not as an Heathen Idol but hath Eyes to see and Purity to hate every Iniquity he will have an Infinite Justice to punish whatsoever is against Infinite Holiness As he loves every thing that is amiable so he loaths every thing that is filthy and that constantly without any change his whole Nature is set against it he abhors nothing but this 'T is not the Devils knowledge or activity that his Hatred is terminated in but the Malice and Unholiness of his Nature 't is this only is the Object of his Severity 'T is in the recompence of this only that there can be a manifestation of his Justice Sin must be punish'd for 1. This Detestation of Sin must be manifested How should we certainly know his loathing of it if he did not manifest by some act how ungrateful it is to him As his love to Righteousness would not appear without rewarding it so his hatred of Iniquity would be as little evidenc'd without punishing it His Justice is the great Witness to his Purity The Punishment therefore inflicted on the Wicked shall be in some respect as great as the Rewards bestow'd upon the Righteous Since the hatred of Sin is natural to God 't is as natural to him to shew one time or other his hatred of it And since Men have a conceit that God is like them in Impurity there is a necessity of some manifestation of himself to be Infinâ—tely distant from those Conceits they have of him Psal 50.21 I will reprove thee and set them in order before thine eyes He would else encourage the Injuries done to his Holiness favour the Extravagances of the Creature and condemn or at least slight the Righteousness both of his own Nature and his Soveraign Law What way is there for God to manifest this Hatred but by Threatning the Sinner and what would this be but a vain Affrightment and ridiculous to the Sinner if it were never to be put in execution There is an indissoluble connexion between his Hatred of Sin and Punishment of the Offender Psal 11.5 6. The wicked his Soul hates Vpon the wicked he shall rain snares fire and brimstone c. He cannot approve of it without denying himself and a total Impunity would be a degree of Approbation The Displeasure of God is Eternal and Irreconcileable against Sin for Sin being absolutely contrary to his holy Nature He is Eternally contrary to it If there be not therefore a way to separate the Sin from the Sinner the Sinner must lie under the Displeasure of God no displeasure can be manifested without some marks of it upon the Person that lies under that Displeasure The Holiness of God will right it self of the wrongs done to it and scatter the Prophaners of it at the greatest distance from him which is the greatest Punishment that can be inflicted to be removed far from the Fountain of Life is the worst of Deaths God can as soon lay aside his Purity as always forbear his Displeasure against an Impure Person 't is all one not to hate it and not to manifest his Hatred of it 2. As his Holiness is natural and necessary so is the punishment of Vnholiness necessary to him 'T is necessary that he should abominate Sin and therefore necessary he should discountenance it The Severities of God against Sin are not vain Scare-crows they have their foundation in the Righteousness of his Nature 't is because he is a Righteous and Holy God that he will not forgive our Transgressions and Sins Josh 24.19 that is that he will punish them The Throne of his Holiness is a fiery flame Dan. 7.9 there is both a pure light and a scorching heat Whatsoever is contrary to the Nature of God will fall under the Justice of God he would else violate his own Nature deny his own Perfection seem to be out of love with his own Glory and Life He doth not hate it out of choice but from the
the ground of our love to God Not because he is gracious to us but holy in himself As God honours it in loving himself for it we should honour it by pitching our Affections upon him chiefly for it What renders God amiable to himself should render him lovely to all his Creatures Isa 42.21 The Lord is well pleased for his righteousness sakâ— If the hatred of evil be the immediate result of a love to God then the peculiar object or term of our love to God must be that Perfection which stands in direct opposition to the hatred of evil Psal 97.10 Ye that love the Lord hate evil When we honour his holiness in every stamp and impression of it his Law not principally because of its usefulness to us its accommodateness to the order of the World but for its innate Purity and his People not for our interest in them so much as for bearing upon them this glittering mark of the Deity we honour then the Purity of the Law-giver and the Excellency of the Sanctifier 2. We honour it when we regard chiefly the illustrious appearance of this in his Judgments in the World In a case of Temporal Judgment Moses celebrates it in the Text In a case of Spiritual Judgments the Angels applaud it in Isaiah All his Severe proceedings are nothing but the strong breathings of this Attribute Purity is the flash of his revenging sword If he did not hate evil his Vengeance would not reach the Committers of it He is a Refiners fire in the day of his Anger * Mal. 3 â— By his separating Judgments he takes away the wicked of the earth like Dross Psal 119.119 How is his holiness honoured when we take notice of his sweeping out the rubbish of the World How he sutes punishment to sin and discovers his hatred of the matter and circumstances of the Evil in the matter and circumstances of the Judgment This Perfection is legible in every stroke of his Sword we honour it when we read the syllables of it and not by standing amaz'd only at the greatness and severity of the Blow when we read how holy he is in his most terrible Dispensations For as in them God magnifies the greatness of his Power so he sanctifies himself that is declares the Purity of his Nature as a Revenger of all Impiety Ezek. 38.22 23. And I will plead against him with Pestilence and with Blood and I will rain upon him and upon his bands and upon the people that are with him an overflowing Rain and great Hail-stones Fire and Brimstone Thus will I magnifie my self and sanctifie my self 3. We honour this Attribute when we take notice of it in every accomplishment of his Promise and every grant of a Mercy His Truth is but a branch of his Righteousness a slip from this Root He is glorious in Holiness in the account of Moses because he led forth his People whom he had redeemed Exod. 15.13 His People by a Covenant with their Fathers being the God of Moses the God of Israel and the God of their Fathers Verse 2. My God and my Fathers God I will exalt thee For what for his faithfulness to his Promise The holiness of God which Mary Luke 1.49 magnifies is summ'd up in this the help he afforded his Servant Israel in the remembrance of his mercy as he spake to our Fathers to Abraham and his Seed for ever Verse 54 55. The certainty of his Coâ—enant Mercy depends upon an unchangeableness of his holiness What are * Isa 55.3 sure mercies are holy mercies in the Septuagint and in Acts 13.34 which makes that Tr nslation Canonical His nearness to answer us when we call upon him for sucâ— Mercies is a fruit of the holiness of his Name and Nature Psal 145.17 The Lord is holy in all his works the Lord is nigh to all them that call upon him Hannah after a return of Prayer sets a particular mark upon this in her Song 1 Sam. 2.2 There is none holy as the Lord separated from all Dross firm to his Covenant and righteous in it to his Suppliants that confide in him and plead his Word When we observe the workings of this in every return of Prayer we honour it 't is a sign the Mercy is really a return of Prayer and not a Mercy of course bearing upon it only the Characters of a common Providence This was the Perfection David would bless for the Catalogue of Mercies in Psal 103.1 c Bless his holy Name Certainly one reason why sincere Prayer is so delightful to him is because it puts him upon the exercise of this his beloved Perfection which he so much delights to honour Since God acts in all those as the Governour of the World we honour him not unless we take notice of that Righteousness which sits him for a Governour and is the inward Spring of all his Motions Gen. 18.25 Shall not the Judge of all the Earth do right It was his design in his pity to Israel as well as the Calamities he intended against the Heathens to be sanctified in them that is declared holy in his Merciful as well as his Judicial procedure †Ez. 36.21 â—3 Hereby God credits his Righteousness which seemed to be forgotten by the one and contemned by the other ‖ Sanct. in loc he removes by this all suspicion of any unfaithfulness in him 4. We honour this Attribute when we trust his Covenant and Promise against outward Appearances Thus our Saviour in the Prophecy of him * Psal 22 2 3.4 when God seemed to bar up the Gates of his Palace against the entry of any more Petitions This Attribute proves the support of the Redeemers Soul But thou art holy Oh thou that inhabitest the Praises of Israel As it refers to what goes before it has been twice explain'd as it refers to what follows it is a ground of trust Thou inhabitest the Praises of Israel Thou hast had the Praises of Israel for many Ages for thy holiness How Our Fathers trusted in thee and thou didst deliver them They honoured thy holiness by their trust and thou didst honour their Faith by a deliverance thou alwaies hadst a Purity that would not shame nor confound them I will trust in thee as thou art holy and expect the breaking out of this Attribute for my good as well as my Predecessors Our Fathers trusted in thee c. 5. We honour this Attribute when we shew a greater Affection to the marks of his holiness in times of the greatest Contempt of it As the Psalmist Psal 119.126 127. They have made void thy Law therefore I love thy Commandments above Gold While they spurn at the Purity of thy Law I will value it above the Gold they possess I 'le esteem it as Gold because others count it as Dross By their scorn of it my love to it shall be the warmer and my hatred of iniquity shall be the sharper The disdain of others
sends not Judgments without giving warnings His Justice is so far from extinguishing his Goodness that his Goodness rather shines out in the preparations of his Justice He gives Men time and sends them Messengers to perswade them to another temper of mind that he may change his Hand and exercise his Liberality where he threatned his Severity When the Heathen had Presages of some Evil upon their Persons or Countreys they took them for invitations to Repentance excited themselves to many acts of Devotion implored his Favour and often Experimented it The Ninivites upon the Proclamation of the destruction of their City by Jonah fell to Petitioning him whereby they signified That they thought him good though he were just and more prone to Pity than Severity and their humble Carriage caused the Arrows he had ready against them to drop out of his hands * Jonah 3.9 10. When he brandisheth his Sword he wishes for some to stand in that Gap to mollifie his anger that he might not strike the fatal blow †Ezek 22.30 I sought for a Man among them that should make up the Hedge and stand in the Gap before me in the Land that I should not destroy it He was desirous that his Creatures might be in a capacity to receive the Marks of his Bounty * Cressel Antholog Decad. 2. p. 162. This he signified not obscurely to Moses Exod. 32.10 when he spoke to him to let him alone that his anger might wax hot against the People after they had made a Golden Calf and Worshipped it Let me alone said God Not that Moses restrained him saith Chrysostom who spake nothing to him but stood silent before him and knew nothing of the Peoples Idolatry But God would give him an occasion of praying for them that he might exercise his Mercy towards them yet in such a manner that the People being struck with a sense of their Crime and the horrour of Divine Justice they might be amended for the future when they should understand that their Death was not averted by their own Merit or Intercession but by Moses his Patronage of them and pleading for them As we see sometimes Masters and Fathers angry with their Servants and Children and preparing themselves to punish them but secretly wish some Friend to intercede for them and take them out of their hands There is a Goodness shining in the preparations of his Judgments 2. A Goodness in the Execution of them They are good as they shew God disaffected to Evil and conduce to the glory of his Holiness and deter others from presumptuous Sins †Deut. 10.3 I will be glorified in all that draw near unto me in his Judgment upon Nadab and Abihu the Sons of Aaron for Offering strange Fire By them God preserves the excellent Footsteps of his own Goodness in his Creation and his Law and curbs the Licentiousness of Men and contains them within the bounds of their Duty The Judgments are good saith the Psalmist * Psal 119. Psal 39. i. e. Thy Judicial proceedings upon the Wicked For he desires God there to turn away by some signal act the reproach the Wicked cast upon him Can there be any thing more Miserable than to live in a World full of Wickedness and void of the Marks of Divine Goodness and Justice to repress it Were there not Judgments in the World Men would forget God be insensible of his Government of the World neglect the Exercises of Natural and Christian Duties Religion would be at its last gasp and expire among them and Men would pretend to break Gods Precepts by Gods Authority Are they not good then as they restrain the Creature from further Evils Affright others from the same Crimes which they were inclinable to commit He strikes some to reform others that are Spectators As Apollonius tam'd Pigeons by beating Dogs before them Punishments are Gods gracious warnings to others not to venture upon those Crimes which they see attended with such Judgments The Censers of Corah Dathan and Abiram were to be wrought into Plates for a covering of the Altar to abide there as a Memento to others not to approach to the Exercise of the Priestly Office without an authoritative call from God * Num. 16.38 40. And those Judgments exercised in the former Ages of the World were intended by Divine Goodness for warnings even in Evangelical times Lots Wife was turned into a Pillar of Salt to prevent Men from Apostacy That use Christ himself makes of it in the exhortation against turning back †Luke 17.32 33. And * Psal 58.10 The Righteous shall wash his Feet in the Blood of the Wicked When God shall drench his Sword in the Blood of the Wicked the Righteous shall take occasion from thence to purifie themselves and reform their Ways and look to the Paths of their Feet Would not Impunity be hurtful to the World and Men receive incouragement to Sin if severities sometimes did not bridle them from the practice of their Inclinations Sometimes the Sinner himself is reform'd and sometimes removed from being an example to others Though Thunder be an affrightning noise and Lightning a scaring flash yet they have a liberal goodness in them in shattering and consuming those contagious Vapours which burden and infect the Air and thereby render it more clear and healthful Again There are few acts of Divine Justice upon a People but are in the very Execution of them attended with demonstrations of his Goodness to others He is a Protector of his own while he is a Revenger on his Enemies When he rides upon his Horses in anger against some his Chariots are Chariots of Salvation to others * Hab. 3.8 Terrour makes way for Salvation The overthrow of Pharaoh and the strength of his Nation compleated the deliverance of the Israelites Had not the Aegyptians met with their Destruction the Israelites had unavoidably met with their Ruine against all the Promises God had made to them and to the defamation of his former Justice in the former Plagues upon their Oppressors The death of Herod was the security of Peter and the rest of the Malic'd Christians The gracious deliverance of good Men is often occasion'd by some severe stroak upon some eminent Persecutor The destruction of the Oppressor is the rescue of the Innocent Again Where is there a Judgment but leaves more Criminals behind than it sweeps away that deserved to be involved in the same fate with the rest More Aegyptians were left behind to possess and enjoy the goodness of their fruitful Land than they were that were hurried into another World by the overflowing Waves Is not this a Mark of goodness as well as severity Again Is it not a goodness in him not to pour out Judgments according to the greatness of his Power To go gradually to work with those whom he might in a moment blow to destruction with one breath of his Mouth Again He sometimes exerciseth
Goodness to have given one of the lofty Seraphims A greater Goodness to have given the whole Corporation of those glorious Spirits for us those Children of the most high But he gave that Son whom he commands all the Angels to Worship * Heb. 1.6 and all Men to adore and pay the lowest Homage to †Psal 2.12 that Son that is to be honoured by us as we honour the Father * Joh. 5.23 that Son which was his delight his delights in the Hebrew †Prov. 8.30 wherein all the delights of the Father were gathered in one as well as of the whole Creation and not simply a Son but an only begotten Son upon which Christ lays the stress with an Emphasis †Joh. 3.16 He had but one Son in Heaven or Earth one Son from an unviewable Eternity and that one Son he gave for a degenerate World this Son he Consecrated for evermore a Priest * Heb. 7 28. The word of the Oath makes the Son The peculiarity of his Sonship heightens the Goodness of the Donor It was no meaner a Person that he gave to empty himself of his glory to fulfil an obedience for us that we might be rendred happy partakers of the Divine Nature Those that know the natural affection of a Father to a Son must judge the affection of God the Father to the Son infinitely greater than the affection of an Earthly Father to the Son of his Bowels It must be an unparallell'd Goodness to give up a Son that he loved with so ardent an Affection for the Redemption of Rebels Abandon a glorious Son to a dishonourable Death for the security of those that had violated the Laws of Righteousness and endeavoured to pull the Soveraign Crown from his head Besides being an only Son all those Affections center'd in him which in Parents would have been divided among a multitude of Children So then as it was a Testimony of the highest Faith and Obedience in Abraham to offer up his only begotten Son to God * Heb. 11.17 So it was the Triumph of Divine Goodness to give so great so dear a Person for so little a thing as Man and for such a piece of nothing and vanity as a Sinful World 3. And this Son given to Rescue us by his Death It was a gift to us For our sakes he descended from his Throne and dwelt on Earth For our sakes he was made Flesh and infirm Flesh For our sakes he was made a Curse and scorcht in the Furnace of his Fathers Wrath For our sakes he went naked arm'd only with his own Strength into the Lists of that Combat with the Devils that led us Captive Had he given him to be a Leader for the conquest of some Earthly Enemies it had been a great Goodness to display his Banners and bring us under his Conduct but he sent him to lay down his Life in the bitterest and most inglorious manner and exposed him to a cursed Death for our Redemption from that dreadful Curse which would have broken us to pieces and irreparably have crusht us He gave him to us to suffer for us as a Man and Redeem us as a God to be a Sacrifice to expiate our Sin by translating the Punishment upon himself which was merited by us Thus was he made low to exalt us and debased to advance us made poor to enrich us * ◠Co◠8.9 and Eclipsed to brighten our sullied Natures and Wounded that he might be a Physician for our languishments He was ordered to taste the bitter Cup of Death that we might drink of the Rivers of Immortal Life and pleasures To submit to the frailties of the Humane Nature that we might possess the Glories of the Divine He was order'd to be a Sufferer that we might be no longer Captives and to pass through the Fire of Divine Wrath that he might purge our Nature from the dross it had contracted Thus was the Righteous given for Sin the Innocent for Criminals the Glory of Heaven for the Dregs of Earth and the Immense Riches of a Deity expended to re-stock Man 4. And a Son that was exalted for what he had done for us by the order of Divine Goodness The Exaltation of Christ was no less a signal Mark of his miraculous Goodness to us than of his Affection to him since he was obedient by Divine Goodness to die for us his advancement was for his obedience to those Orders †2 Phil. 8 9. The Name given to him above every Name was a repeated Triumph of this Perfection Since his Passion was not for himself he was wholly Innocent but for us who were Criminal His advancement was not only for himself as Redeemer but for us as Redeem'd Divine Goodness center'd in him both in his Cross and in his Crown for it was for the purging our Sins he sat down on the Right hand of the Majesty on high * Heb. 1.3 And the whole blessed Society of Principalities and Powers in Heaven admire this Goodness of God and ascribe to him Honour Glory and Power for advancing the Lamb slain †Revel 5.11 12 13. Divine Goodness did not only give him to us but gave him Power Riches Strength and Honour for manifesting this Goodness to us and opening the passages for its fuller conveyances to the Sons of Men. Had not God had thoughts of a perpetual Goodness he would not have setled him so near him to manage our Cause and testified so much Affection to him on our behalf This Goodness gave him to be debas'd for us and order'd him to be Enthron'd for us As it gave him to us Bleeding so it would give him to us Triumphing that as we have a share by Grace in the Merits of his Humiliation we might partake also of the glories of his Coronation that from first to last we may behold nothing but the Triumphs of Divine Goodness to fallen Man 5. In bestowing this Gift on us Divine Goodness gives whole God to us Whatsoever is great and excellent in the Godhead the Father gives us by giving us his Son The Creator gives himself to us in his Son Christ In giving Creatures to us he gives the Riches of Earth In giving himself to us he gives the Riches of Heaven which surmount all understanding 'T is in this Gift he becomes our God and passeth over the Title of all that he is for our use and benefit that every Attribute in the Divine Nature may be claim'd by us not to be imparted to us whereby we may be deified but employ'd for our welfare whereby we may be blessed He gave himself in Creation to us in the Image of his Holiness but in Redemption he gave himself in the Image of his Person He would not only communicate the Goodness without him but bestow upon us the infinite Goodness of his own Nature That that which was his own End and Happiness might be our End and Happiness viz.
the injuries of men But as it signifies a willingness to deferr and an unwillingness to pour forth his wrath upon sinful creatures He moderates his provoked justice and forbears to revenge the injuries he daily meets with in the World He suffers no grief by mens wronging him but he restrains his arm from punishing them according to their merits And thus there is Patience in every cross a man meets with in the World because though it be a punishment 't is less than is merited by the unrighteous rebel and less than may be inflicted by a righteous and powerful God This Patience is seen in his providential works in the World He suffered the Nations to walk in their own way and the witness of his Providence to them was his giving them Rain and fruitful seasons filling their heart with food and gladness Act. 16.17 The Heathens took notice of it and signified it by feigning their God Saturn to be bound a whole year in a soft cord a cord of wool and exprest it by this Proverb The Mills of the Gods grind slowly i. e. God doth not use men with that severity that they deserve The Mills being usually â—â—nn'd by criminals condemn'd to that work * Rhodigi l. 6. c. 14. This in Scripture is frequently exprest by a slowness to anger Psal 103.8 sometimes by long suffering which is a patience with duration Psal 145.8 and Joel 2.13 He is slow to anger he takes not the first occasions of a provocation He is long suffering Rom. 9.22 and Psal 86.15 he forbears punishment upon many occasions offer'd him 'T is long before he consents to give fire to his wrath and shoot out his Thunderbolts Sin hath a loud cry but God seems to stop his eares not to hear the clamor it raises and the charge it presents He keeps his Sword a long time in the sheath One calls the Patience of God the sheath of his sword upon those words Ezek. 21.3 I will draw forth my sword out of his sheath * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Theodoret in loc This is one remarkable letter in the name of God he himself proclaims it Exod. 34.6 The Lord the Lord God merciful gracious and long suffering And Moses pleads it in the behalf of the people Numb 14.18 where he placeth it in the first rank The Lord is long suffering and of great mercy 'T is the first spark of mercy and ushers it to its exercises in the World In the Lord's Proclamation 't is put in the middle link Mercy and Truth together Mercy could have no room to act if Patience did not prepare the way And his truth and goodness in his promise of the Redeemer would not have been manifest to the World if he had shot his Arrows as soon as men committed their sins and deserved his punishment This perfection is exprest by other phrases as keeping silence Psal 50.21 These things hast thou done and I kept silence 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it signifies to behave ones self as a deaf or dumb man I did not fly in thy face as some do with great a noise upon a light provocation as if their Life Honour Estates were at the stake I did not presently call thee to the bar and pronounce judicial sentence upon thee according to the Law but demean'd my self as if I had been ignorant of thy crimes and. had not been invested with the power of judging thee for them Chald. I waited for thy Conversion God's Patience is the silence of his Justice and the first whisper of his mercy 'T is also exprest by not laying folly to men Job 24.12 Men groan under the oppressions of others yet God layes not folly to them i. e. to the oppressors God suffers them to go on with impunity He doth not deliver his people because he would try them and takes not revenge upon the unrighteous because in Patience he doth bear with them Patience is the Life of his Providence in this World He chargeth not men with their crimes here but reserves them upon impenitency for another tryal This attribute is so great a one that it is signally called by the name of perfection Matt. 5.45 48. He had been speaking of Divine goodness and Patience to evil men and he concludes be you perfect c. Implying it to be an amazing perfection in the divine nature and worthy of imitation In the prosecution of this 1. Let us consider the nature of this Patience 2. Wherein 't is manifested 3. Why God doth exercise so much Patience 4. The VSE 1. The nature of this Patience 1. 'T is part of the divine goodness and mercy yet differs from both God being the greatest goodness hath the greatest mildness Mildness is always the companion of true goodness and the greater the goodness the greater the mildness Who so Holy as Christ and who so meek God's slowness to anger is a branch or slip from his mercy Psal 145.8 The Lord is full of compassion slow to anger It differs from mercy in the formal consideration of the object Mercy respects the creature as miserable Patience respects the creature as criminal Mercy pities him in his misery and Patience bears with the sin which engender'd that misery and is giving birth to more Again Mercy is one end of Patience his long suffering is partly to glorifie his Grace so it was in Paul 1 Tim. 1.16 As slowness to anger springs from goodness so it makes mercy the butt and mark of its operations Isa 30.18 He waites that he may be gracious Goodness sets God upon the exercise of Patience and Patience sets many a sinner on running into the armes of mercy That mercy which makes God ready to embrace returning sinners makes him willing to bear with them in their sins and wait their return It differs also from goodness in regard of the object The object of goodness is every creature Angels Men all inferiour creatures to the lowest worm that crawls upon the ground The object of Patience is primarily man and secondarily those creatures that respect mens support conveniency and delight But they are not the objects of Patience as consider'd in themselves but in relation to man for whose use they were created and therefore God's Patience to them is properly his Patience with man The lower creatures do not injure God and therefore are not the objects of his Patience but as they are forfeited by man and man deserves to be depriv'd of them As man in this regard falls under the Patience of God so do those creatures which are design'd for mans good That Patience which spares man spares other creatures for him which were all forfeited by man's sin as well as his own life and are rather the testimonies of God's Patience than the proper objects of it The object of God's goodness then is the whole Creation not a Devil in Hell but as a creature is a mark of his goodness but not of his patience There is a kind
than I thou hast rewarded me good whereas I have rewarded thee evil And shall we not relent at God's wonderful long suffering and silencing his anger so much He could puff away our lives but he will not and yet we endeavour to strip him of his being though we cannot 1. Let us consider the wayes how slowness to anger is abused 1. 'T is abused by mis-interpretations of it when men slander his Patience to be only a carelesness and neglect of his providence as Averroes argued from his slowness to anger a total neglect of the Government of the lower World Or when men from his long suffering charge him with impurity as if his Patience were a consent to their crimes and because he suffered them without calling them to account he were one of their partisans and as wicked as themselves Psal 50.21 Because I kept silence thou thoughtest I was altogether such a one as thy self His silence makes them conclude him to be an abetter of and a consort in their sins And think him more pleased with their iniquity than their obedience Or when they will inferre from his forbearance a want of his Omniscience Because he suffers their sins they imagine he forgets them Psal 10.11 He hath said in his Heart God hath forgotten Thinking his patience proceeds not from the sweetness of his nature but a weakness of his mind How base is it instead of admiring him to disparage him for it and because he stands in so advantageous a posture towards us not to own the choicest prerogatives of his Deity This is to make a perfection so useful to us to shadow and extinguish those others which are the prime flowers of his Crown 2. His Patience is abused by continuing in a course of Sin under the influences of it How much is it the practical language of men Come let us commit this or that iniquity since Divine patience hath suffered worse than this at our hands Nothing is remitted to their sensual pleasures and eagerness in them How often did the Israelites repeat their murmurings against him as if they would put his patience to the utmost proof and see how far the line of it could extend They were no sooner satisfied in one thing but they quarrelled with him about another as if he had no other attribute to put in motion against them They tempted him as often as he releived them as though the declaration of his name to Moses 34 of Exod. To be a God gracious and Long-suffering had been intended for no other purpose but a protection of them in their Rebellions Such a sort of men the Prophet speaks of that were setled in their Lees or dregs Zeph. 1.12 They were congeal'd and frozen in their successful wickedness such an abuse of Divine patience is the very dreggs of sin God chargeth it highly upon the Jews Isaiah 57.11 I have held my peace even of old and thou fearest me not my silence made thee confident yea impudent in thy sin 3. His patience is abused by repeating sin after God hath by an act of his patience taken off some affliction from men As mettals melted in the fire remain fluid under the operations of the flames yet when removed from the Fire they quickly return to their former hardness and sometimes grow harder than they were before So men who in their afflictions seem to be melted like Ahab confess their sins lye prostrate before God and seek him early yet if they be brought from under the power of their afflictions they return to their old nature and are as stiff against God and resist the blows of the Spirit as much as they did before They think they have a new stock of patience to sin upon Pharaoh was some what thaw'd under judgments and frozen again under forbearance Exod. 9.27.34 Many will howl when God strikes them and laugh at him when he forbears them Thus that patience which should melt us doth often hard'n us which is not an effect natural to his patience but natural to our abusing corruption 4. His patience is abus'd by taking encouragement from it to mount to greater degrees of Sin Because God is slow to Anger men are more fierce in sin and not only continue in their old Rebellions but heap new upon them If he spare them for three transgressions they will commit four as is intimated in the first and second of Amos Mens hearts are fully set in them to do evil because sentence against an evil work is not speedily executed Eccles 8.11 Their Hearts are more desperately bent before they had some waverings and pull-backs but after a fair Sun-shine of Divine patience they entertain more unbridled resolutions and pass forward with more liberty and licentiousness They make his long-suffering subservient to turn out all those little reletings and regrets they had before and banish all thoughts of barring out a Temptation No encouragement is given to men by Gods patience but they force it by their presumption They invert Gods order and bind themselves stronger to iniquity by that which should bind them faster to their duty A happy escape at Sea makes men go more confidently into the deeps afterward Thus we deal with God as Debtors do with good natur'd Creditors Because they do not dunn them for what they owe they take encouragement to run more upon the score till the summe amounts above their ability of payment But let it be considered 1. That this abuse of patience is a high Sin As every act of forbearance obligeth us to duty so every act of it abused encreaseth our guilt The more frequent its sollicitations of us have been the deeper aggravations our sin receives by it Every sin after an act of divine patience contracts a blacker guilt The sparing us after the last sin we committed was a superadded act of long-suffering and a laying out more of his riches upon us And therefore every new act committed is a despite against greater riches expended and greater cost upon us and against his preserving us from the hand of Justice for the last transgression 'T is disingenuous not to have a due resentment of so much Goodness and base to injure him the more because he doth not right himself Shall he receive the more wrongs from us by how much the sweeter he is to us No mans Conscience but will tell him 't is vile to preferre the satisfaction of a sordid Lust before the Councel of a God of so gracious a disposition The sweeter the nature the fouler is the injury that is done unto it 2. 'T is dangerous to abuse his patience Contempt of kindness is most irksom to an ingenuous spirit and he is worthy to have the arrows of Gods indignation lodg'd in his heart who despiseth the Riches of his long-suffâ—â—â—ng For 1. The time of patience will have an end Though his Spirit strives with man yet it shall not always strive Gen. 6.3 Though there be a time wherein Jerusalem might
know the things that concerned her peace yet there is another period wherein they should be hid from her Eyes Luke 19.43 Oh that thou hadst known in this thy day Nations have their day and persons have their day and the day of most persons is shorter than the day of Nations Jerusalem had hâ—â— day of forty years but how many particular persons were taken off before the last or middle hours of that day were arriv'd Forty years was God griev'd with the Generation of the Israelites Heb. 3.11 One Carcass dropt after another in that limited time and at the end not a man but fell under the judicial stroke except Caleb and Joshua One hundred and twenty years was the Term set to the mass of the old World but not to every man in the old World some fell while the Ark was preparing as well as the whole stock when the Ark was compleated Though he be patient with most yet he is not in the same degree with all every sinner hath his time of sinning beyond which he shall proceed no further be his lusts never so impetuous and his affections never so imperious The time of his patience is in Scripture set forth sometimes by years three years he came to find fruit on the Fig-tree sometimes by days some mens sins are sooner ripe and fall There is a measure of sin Jer. 51.13 Which is set forth by the Ephah Zach. 5.8 Which when it is fill'd is seal'd up and a weight of lead cast upon the mouth of it When judgments are preparing once and twice the Lord is prevail'd with by the intercession of the Prophet The prepar'd Grashoppers are not sent to devour and the kindl'd Fire is not blown up to consume Amos 7. from ver 1. to ver 8. But at last God takes the plumb-line to sute and measure punishment to their sin and would not pass by them any more and when their sin was ripe represented by a basket of Summer fruit God would withhold his hand no longer but brought such a day upon them wherein the Songs of the Temple should be howlings and dead bodies be in every place Amos 8.2.3 He lays by any further thoughts of patience to speed their ruine God had born long with the Israelites and long it was before he gave them up He would first break the bow in Jezreel Hos 1.5 take away the strength of the Nation by the death of Zachariah the last of Jehu's race which introduc'd civil dissentions and ambitious Murders for the Throne whereby in weakning one part they weakned the whole or as some think alluding to Tiglah Pilezar who carried Captive two Tribes and a half If this would not reclaim them then follow 's Loruhamah I will not have Mercy I will sweep them out of the Land verse 6. If they did not Repent they should be Loammi verse 9. You are not my people and I will not be your God They should be discovenanted and stript of all federal relation Here patience for ever withdrew from them and wrathful anger took its place And for particular persons the time of life whither shorter or longer is the only time of long-suffering It hath no other stage than the present state of things to act upon There is none else to be expected after but giving account of what hath been done in the Body not of any thing done after the Soul is fled from the body The time of patience ends with the first moment of the Souls departure from the Body This time only is the day of Salvation i. e. The day wherein God offers it and the day wherein God waits for our acceptance of it 'T is at his pleasure to shorten or lengthen our day not at ours 'T is not our long suffering but his he hath the command of it 2. God hath wrath to punish as well as patience to bear He hath a fury to revenge the outrages done to his meekness when his Messages of peace sent to reclaim men are slighted his Sword shall be whetted and his instruments of War prepar'd Hos 5.8 Blow ye the Cornet in Gibeah and the Trumpet in Ramah As he deals gently like a Father so he can punish capitally as a Judge Though he holds his peace for a long time yet at last he will go forth like a mighty man and stir up jealousie as a man of War to cut in pieces his Enemies 'T is not said he hath no anger but that he is slow to anger but sharp in it He hath a Sword to cut and a Bow to shoot and Arrows to pierce Psal 12.13 Though be be long a drawing the one out of its Scabbard and long a fitting the other to his Bow yet when they are ready he strikes home and hits the mark Though he hath a time of patience yet he hath also a day of rebuke Hos 5.9 Though patience over-rules Justice by suspending it yet Justice will at last over-rule patience by an utter silencing it God is Judge of the whole Earth to right men yet he is no less Judge of the injuries he receives to right himself Though God a while was pressed with the murmurings of the Israelites after their coming out of Egypt and seemed desirous to give them all satisfaction upon their unworthy complaints yet when they came to open hostility in setting a Golden Calf in his Throne he commissions the Levites to kill every man his Brother and companion in the Camp Exod. 32.27 And how desirous soever he was to content them before they never murmured afterwards but they severely smarted for it When once he hath begun to use his Sword he sticks it up naked that it might be ready for use upon every occasion Though he hath feet of Lead yet he hath hands of Iron It was long that he supported the peevishness of the Jews but at last he captiv'd them by the arms of the Babylonians and laid them wast by the power of the Romans He planted by the Apostles Churches in the East and when his Goodness and Long-suffering prevail'd not with them he tore them up by the roots What Christians are to be found in those once famous parts of Asia but what are overgrown with much error and ignorance 3. The more his patience is abus'd the sharper will be the wrath he inflicts As his wrath restrained makes his patience long so his compassions restrained will make his wrath severe As he doth transcend all Creatures in the measures of the one so he transcends all Creatures in the sharpness of the other Christ is describ'd with feet of brass as if they burn'd in a Furnace Revel 1.15 slow to move but heavy to crush and hot to burn His wrath looseth nothing by delay it grows the fresher by sleeping and strikes with greater strength when it awakes All the time men are abusing his patience God is whetting his Sword and the longer it is whetting the sharper will be the edge The longer he is fetching
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
is no relation one man can stand in to another wherein God doth not more highly appear to man If we abhor the unworthy carriage of a Child to a tender Father a Servant to an indulgent Master a Man to his obliging Friend why do men dayly act that towards God which they cannot speak of without abhorrency if acted by another against man I God a being less to be regarded than man and more worthy of contempt than a Creature * Reynolds It would be strange if a benefactor should live in the same Town in the same house with us and we never exchange a word with him yet this is our case who have the works of God in our eyes the goodness of God in our being the mercy of God in our daily food yet think so little of him converse so little with him serve every thing before him and prefer every thing above him Whence have we our mercies but from his hand Who besides him maintains our breath this moment Would he call for our Spirits this moment they must depart from us to attend his Command There is not a moment wherein our unworthy carriage is not aggravated because there is not a moment wherein he is not our guardian and gives us not tasts of a fresh bounty And it is no light aggravation of our Crime that we injure him without whose bounty in giving us our being we had not been capable of casting contempt upon him That he that hath the greatest stamp of his Image Man should deserve the Character of the worst of his Rebels That he who hath only reason by the gift of God to Judge of the equity of the Laws of God should swel against them as greivous and the Government of the Lawgiver as burdensome Can it lessen the crime to use the principle wherein we excel the beasts to the disadvantage of God who endowed us with that principle above the beasts 1. T is a debasing of God beyond what the Devil doth at present He is more excusable in his present state of acting than man is in his present refusing God for his Rule and End He strives against a God that exerciseth upon him a vindictive Justice We debase a God that loads us with his dayly mercies The despairing Devils are excluded from any mercy or divine patience But we are not only under the long suffering of his patience but the large expressions of his bounty He would not be governed by him when he was only his bountiful Creator We refuse to be guided by him after he hath given us the blessing of Creation from his own hand and the more obliging blessings of Redemption by the hand and blood of his Son It cannot be imagined that the Devils and the damned should ever make God their end since he hath assured them he will not be their happiness and shut up all his perfections from their experimental notice but those of his power to preserve them and his Justice to punish them They have no grant from God of ever having a heart to comply with his Will or ever having the honour to be actively employed for his glory They have some plea for their present contempt of God not in regard of his nature for he is infinitely amiable excellent and lovely but in regard of his administration towards them But what plea can Man have for his Practical Atheism who lives by his power is sustained by his bounty and sollicited by his Spirit What an ungrateful thing is it to put off the nature of Man for that of Devils and dishonour God under mercy as the Devils do under his wrathful anger 2. T is an ungratefull contempt of God who cannot be injurious to us He cannot do us wrong because he cannot be unjust Gen. 18.25 Shall not the Judge of all the Earth do right His nature doth as much abhorr unrighteousnes as love a Communicative goodness He never Commanded any thing but what was highly conducible to the happiness of man Infinite goodness can no more injure man than it can dishonour it self It lays out it self in additions of kindness and whiles we debase him he continues to benefit us And is it not an unparalleld ingratitude to turn our backs upon an object so lovely an object so loving in the midst of varieties of allurements from him God did Create intellectual Creatures Angels and Men that he might Communicate more of himself and his own goodness and holiness to man than Creatures of a lower rank were capable of What do we do by rejecting him as our Rule and End but cross as much as in us lies Gods end in our Creation and shut our Souls against the Communications of those perfections he was so willing to bestow We use him as if he intended us the greatest wrong when t is impossible for him to do any to any of his Creatures 3. Consider the misery which will attend such a temper if it continue predominant Those that thrust God away as their happiness and end can expect no other but to be thrust away by him as to any relief and Compassion A distance from God here can look for nothing but a remoteness from God hereafter When the Devil a Creature of vast Endowments would advance himself above God and instruct man to commit the same sin he is Cursed above all Creatures * Gen. 3.14 When we will not acknowledge him a God of all glory we shall be separated from him as a God of all comfort All they that are afar off shall perish Psa 73.27 This is the spring of all woe What the Prodigal suffered was because he would leave his Father and live of himself Whosoever is ambitious to be his own Heaven will it last find his Soul to become its own Hell As it loved all things for it self so it shall be grieved with all things for it self As it would be its own God against the right of God it shall then be its own tormenter by the Justice of God 2. Duty Watch against this Atheism and be dayly employed in the mortification of it In every action we should make the inquiry what is the rule I observe Is it Gods Will or my own Whether do my intentions tend to set up God or self As much as we destroy this we abate the power of sin These two things are the head of the Serpent in us which we must be bruising by the power of the Cross Sin is nothing else but a turning from God and centring in self and most in the inferior part of self If we bend our force against those two self-Will and self-Ends we shall intercept Atheism at the Spring head take away that which doth constitute and animate all sin The sparks must vanish if the fire be quencht which affords them fuel They are but two short things to ask in every undertaking Is God my Rule in regard of his Will Is God my End in regard of his glory All
sin lies in the neglect of these all grace lies in the practice of them Without some degree of the mortification of these we cannot make profitable and comfortable approaches to God When we come with Idols in our hearts we shall be answered according to the multitude and the baseness of them too * Ezek. 14.4 What expectation of a good look from him can we have when we come before him with undeifying thoughts of him a Petition in our mouths and a Sword in our hearts to stab his honour To this purpose 1. Be often in the views of the excellencies of God When we have no intercourse with God by delightful Meditations we begin to be estranged from him and prepare our selves to live without God in the world Strangness is the Mother and Nurse of disaffection We slight men sometimes because we know them not The very beasts delight in the Company of men when being tamed and familiar they become acquainted with their disposition A dayly converse with God would discover so much of loveliness in his nature so much of sweetness in his ways that our injurious thoughts of God would wear off and we should count it our honour to contemn our selves and magnifie him By this means a slavish fear which is both a dishonour to God and a torment to the Soul * 1 Joh. 4.18 and the root of Atheism will be cast out and an ingenious fear of him wrought in the heart Exercised thoughts on him would issue out in affections to him which would engage our hearts to make him both our rule and our end This course would stifle any temptations to gross Atheism wherewith good Souls are sometimes haunted by confirming us more in the belief of a God and discourage any attempts to a deliberate practical Atheism We are not like to espouse any principle which is confuted by the delightful converse we dayly have with him The more we thus enter into the presence Chamber of God the more we cling about him with our affections the more vigorous and lively will the true Notion of God grow up in us and be able to prevent any thing which may dishonour him and debase our Souls Let us therefore consider him as the only happiness Set up the true God in our understandings possess our hearts with a deep sense of his desirable excellency above all other things This is the main thing we are to do in order to our great business All the directions in the world with the neglect of this will be insignificant Ciphers The neglect of this is Common and is the basis of all the mischiefs which happen to the Souls of men 2. To this purpose Prize and study the Scripture We can have no delight in Meditation on him unless we know him and we cannot know him but by the means of his own Revelation When the Revelation is despised the Revealer will be of little esteem Men do not throw off God from being their rule till they throw off Scripture from being their guide and God must needs be cast off from being an end when the Scripture is rejected from being a Rule Those that do not care to know his Will that love to be ignorant of his nature can never be affected to his honour Let therefore the subtilties of reason vail to the Doctrine of faith and the humor of the Will to the Command of the word 3. Take heed of sensual pleasures And be very watchful and cautious in the use of those comforts God allows us Job was afraid when his Sons feasted that they should Curse God in their hearts * Job 1.4 It was not without cause that the Apostle Peter joyned sobriety with watchfulness and Prayer 1 Pet. 4.7 The end of all things is at hand be ye therefore sober and watch unto Prayer A moderate use of worldly comforts Prayer is the great acknowledgment of God and too much sensuality is a hindrance of this and a step to Atheism Belshazzars lifting himself up against the Lord and not glorifying of God is charged upon his sensuality Dan. 5.23 Nothing is more apt to quench the Notions of God and root out the Conscience of him than an addictedness to sensual pleasures Therefore take heed of that snare 4. Take heed of sins against knowledge The more sins against knowledge are committed the more careless we are and the more careless we shall be of God and his honour We shall more fear his judicial power and the more we fear that the more we shall disaffect that God in whose hand vengeance is and to whom it doth belong Atheism in conversation proceeds to Atheism in affection and that will endeavour to sink into Atheism in opinion and Judgment The Sum of the Whole And now consider in the whole what has been spoken 1. Man would set himself up as his own Rule He disowns the Rule of God is unwilling to have any acquaintance with the Rule God sets him negligent in using the means for the knowledge of his Will and Endeavours to shake it off when any notices of it breaks in upon him VVhen he cannot expel it he hath no pleasure in the Consideration of it and the heart swels against it VVhen the Notions of the Will of God are entertained it is on some other Consideration or with wavering and unsetled affections Many times men designe to improve some lust by his truth This unwillingness respects Truth as t is most Spiritual and holy as it most relates and leads to God as it is most contrary to self He is guilty of Contempt of the Will of God which is seen in every presumptuous breach of his Law In the natural aversions to the declaration of his Will and mind which way soever he turns In slighting that part of his Will which is most for his honour In the awkwardness of the heart when it is to pay God a service A constraint in the first engagement slightness in the service in regard of the matter in regard of the frame without a natural vigour Many distractions much weariness in deserting the Rule of God when our expectations are not answered upon our service in breaking promises with God Man naturally owns any other Rule rather than that of Gods prescribing The Rule of Satan the Will of Man In complying more with the dictates of Men than the Will of God In observing that which is materially so not because it is his Will but the injunctions of Men. In obeying the Will of Man when it is contrary to the Will of God This Man doth in order to the setting up himself This is natural to Man as he is corrupted Men are disatisfied with their own Consciences when they contradict the desires of self Most actions in the world are done more because they are agreeable to self than as they are honourable to God As they are agreable to natural and moral self or sinful self 'T is evident in neglects of taking Gods