to the living God though they were in jeopardy of being stoned by them This is indeed the constant disposition of all upright-hearted men that they had rather suffer any Indignities Injuries Dammages Calamities themselves then have God's Glory and Honour be eclipsed they are willing that any Crime Shame Falshood should be imputed to them rather then the least Ignominy or Disgrace cast on God that their Names should become odious then God's have the least blemish And the Reasons are 1. Because they esteem themselves as nothing in comparison of God and therefore count it a small matter what Evil befalls them so that God be magnified When Abraham bespeaks God he useth this self-debasing preface Gen. 18.27 Behold now I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord who am but dust and ashes And Jacob Gen. 32.10 I am not worthy of or as it is in the Hebrew I am less then the least of all the Mercies and of all the Truth which thou hast shewed unto thy Servant And Job 40.4 Behold I am vile what shall I answer thee I will lay my hand upon my mouth Chap. 42.5 6. Now mine eye seeth thee I abhor my self And David 1 Chron. 17.16 Who am I O Lord and what is my house that thou hast brought me hitherto 1 Chron. 29.14 15. Who am I and what is my people that we should be able to offer so willingly after this sort For we are strangers before thee and sojourners as were all our Fathers our days on the earth are as a shadow and there is none abiding On the other side they ascribe all Greatness unto God Moses in his Song Exod. 15.11 Who is like unto thee O Lord among the Gods who is like thee glorious in holiness fearfull in praises doing wonders Deut. 32.3 4. Because I will publish the Name of the Lord ascribe ye Greatness to our God He is the Rock his work is perfect for all his ways are Judgment a God of Truth and without Iniquity Just and Right is He. Psal 145.1 2 3. saith David I will extoll thee my God and my King and I will bless thy Name for ever and ever Every day will I bless thee and I will praise thy Name for ever and ever Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised and his Greatness is unsearchable The four living Creatures rest not day and night saying Holy Holy Holy Lord God Almighty which was and is and is to come They give glory and honour and thanks to him that sitteth on the Throne who liveth for ever And the four and twenty Elders fall down before him that sate on the Throne who liveth for ever and ever and cast their Crowns before the Throne saying Thou art worthy O Lord to receive glory and honour and power for thou hast created all things and for thy pleasure they are and were created Rev. 4.8 9 10 11. Many more such expressions there are in the Songs of Hannah the blessed Virgin the 14000 Virgins and other Hymns of the Saints in the Old and New Testament which do fully shew that this is the constant disposition of all Holy hearts to nullify all their Excellency when it is compared with God and to extoll the Name of God as infinitely exceeding all created Beings and therefore they conceive it most equall that they should count the Disparagement of God as a more heavy Affliction then their own Sufferings 2. They know that God's Name is most tenderly regarded by him Num. 14.21 the Lord said Truly as I live all the Earth shall be filled with the Glory of the Lord. Deut. 32.26 27. I said I would scatter them into corners I would make the remembrance of them to cease from among men Were it not that I feared the wrath of the Enemy lest their Adversaries should behave themselves strangely and say Our hand is high and the Lord hath not done all this Isa 42.8 I am the Lord that is my Name and my Glory will I not give to another neither my Praise to graven Images Isa 48.11 For mine own sake even for mine own sake will I doe it for how should my Name be polluted and I will not give my Glory to another Ezek. 20.9 But I wrought for my Name 's sake that it should not be polluted before the Heathen among whom they were in whose sight I made my self known unto them In the Third Commandment Exod. 20.7 God chargeth Thou shalt not take the Name of the Lord thy God in vain for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his Name in vain And therefore the Godly are sensible of his Glory above their own Peace and more affected with any dirt cast on God's face then any wound given to their own persons 3. They know it is the Duty of all created Beings to prefer their Maker their Father their King and Lord before themselves They know they are engaged to fear this glorious and fearfull Name The Lord their God Deut. 28.58 as the Father that begat them the Rock that formed them Deut. 32.6 15 18. When S. John would have worshipped the Angel he forbade him See thou doe it not for I am thy fellow-servant and of thy brethren the Prophets and of them which keep the sayings of this Book worship God Rev. 22.9 As David's people counted their King as all good Subjects do worth ten thousand of themselves 2 Sam. 18.3 and all honest Servants count their Master's Wel-fare and Credit far before their own yea his Life before their own so do all Holy persons God's Glory as being their Master their Father their King Croesus his Son that never spake before opened then his mouth and said Kill not King Croesus when a Souldier was about to slay him So will every Child of God be moved when his heavenly Father is blasphemed and his Name stricken through though he be silent when himself is abused Christ bids us pray Our Father which art in Heaven Hallowed be thy Name before he directs us to pray Give us this day our daily bread And forgive us our debts The Relation of Creatures Children Subjects and Servants to God oblige every Holy person to mind and seek the sanctifying of God's Name though it be with never so great diminution and detriment to himself 4. And lastly They know that thus doing they shall best provide for themselves When David was little in his own eyes God chose him to be head of his people Israel He knew it to be true which God said to Eli 1 Sam. 2.30 Them that honour me I will honour and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed As all Princes of worth will reward their loyal Subjects all good Parents their dutifull Children all wise Masters their obedient Servants so God will doe to all his true-hearted Subjects Children and Servants And this makes them regardless of themselves in comparison of God as knowing that they best provide for themselves when they are careless of their own
that I desire besides thee My Flesh and my Heart faileth but God is the strength of my Heart and my portion for ever It is good for me to draw near to God I have put my Trust in the Lord God Such Apprehensions as these do affect the Spirits of a man as the breaking out of the Sun doth the Eyes after it hath been overcast with thick Clouds in the day or concealed by the Darkness of the night Then the Light is sweet and it is a pleasant thing to behold the Sun So it is with the Soul after such Perplexities and Affrightments and Disconsolations of Spirit as are incident to the most holy Saint by reason of the seeming Disorders and dismall Occurrences in the world which are obvious to him When he recollects himself and determines against all Arguings ad oppositum that the Lord God is a Sun and a Shield the Lord will give Grace and Glory no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly O Lord of hoasts blessed is the man that trusteth in thee Psal 84.11 12. then he delights himself in the Lord as the most pleasant and eligible Good thing as his Sun and his Shield and accordingly fixes his Contemplations on God quickens chears confirms raises up his Spirits in the remembrance of him expresses himself in holy Hymns in devout Prayers in wise Observations of his Doings in commemorating of his Works and his Word in holy Conferences and such like ways as shew that none is so amiable to him as God none to be adhered to in comparison of him none to be glorified like unto God Conformably hereto he delights in the Consideration of God's most excellent Being that he is not like the Vanities of the Nations that he is the living God and an everlasting King that in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting Strength that there is none holy as the Lord no Rock like unto our God that great is our Lord and of great Power his Vnderstanding is infinite that he is mercifull and gracious abundant in Goodness and Truth He delights also in the beholding and observation of his Works which however they are not minded by them who are alienated from the Life that is in God yet to the Godly enlightned Soul they appear Great so that in Admiration of them he is affected like the Psalmist Psal 8.1 O Lord our God how excellent is thy Name in all the Earth who hast set thy Glory above the Heavens Psal 104.24 In wisedom hast thou made them all and rulest all He is holy in all his Ways and righteous in all his Works and therefore are they sought out of all them that have pleasure therein His Work is honourable and glorious and his Righteousness endureth for ever And hereupon the Psalmist resolves Psal 104.34 My meditation of him shall be sweet I will be glad in the Lord. Nor is his Delight less in God's Word then in his Works I will praise thy Name saith David Psal 138.2 for thy Loving-kindness and for thy Truth for thou hast magnified thy Word above all thy Name And thus he often professeth that the Word of God his Judgments were more to be desired then Gold yea then much fine Gold sweeter then Hony and the Hony-comb that not onely his Word of Promise was his Comfort in his Affliction for by it he was quickened but that he greatly delighted in God's Commands they were the Joy of his heart And Holy Job 23.12 I have esteemed the Word of his mouth more then my necessary Food But Holy mens greatest Delight in God is when by Faith in Christ they apprehend God to be their God and they his People that he dwells in them they are his Temple that they are made by him Kings and Priests to him by his Spirit that he is their Father through Christ they his Children that they have access to him by the Faith of Christ and are assured of an Inheritance above with him When they understand this that Christ is All to them they delight in the Almighty and lift up their face unto God with Joy as it is Job 22.26 Now this indeed is best for the Godly thus to delight themselves in the Lord even in their own lowest Conditions and their Oppressours highest because the greatest Good that Evil men have is but vain Be it Plenty Peace Honour Liberty Power Pleasure or what-ever else is valued by men that have their Portion in this life it is but an imperfect fading vexing Good much of it is such as Beasts injoy more fully then they who have more Delight in their Food and sensitive Pleasure then Men have Applause Honours Wealth are but Toys such as Childish persons delight in rather then wise Men. Philosophers by the Light of Nature have censured them as empty of reall Worth not good because they made not the Possessours of them good Wisedom and Vertue are by them preferred before them Yea they bring often much Vexation in stead of Delight In acquiring and Using them is much Vanity In the midst of Laughter the Heart is sorrowfull Solomon styles it Madness But Delight in the Lord is the most rationall exquisite durable Delight far above not onely Epicurus his Pleasure and Zeno's Vertue and Seneca's Tranquillity of mind but also Solomon's Glory his Wisedom his Knowledge of the Properties of Natural bodies and what-ever Excellency short of Acquaintance with God he was endued with He confesseth as much in the close of his Penitentialls and before him his Father David Psal 4.6 7. There be many that say Who will shew us any Good Lord lift thou up the light of thy Countenance upon us Thou hast put Gladness in my Heart more then in the time that their Corn and their Wine increased This makes the Saints delight in Prayer and Praise and other Worship of God it being their Privilege as well as their Duty to delight themselves in the Lord Isa 58.14 and according to the Desire of their Heart Which brings me to the II. OBSERVATION That they who delight themselves in the Lord shall have their Hearts Desire and in fine speed better then they who are in the most illustrious estate of Wicked men The principal Desire of one that delights himself in God is to glorifie God that is the main End of such as glory in God that they may doe all to his Glory Therefore are they taught to make this their first Petition Hallowed be thy Name and to that end to pray Thy Kingdom come Thy Will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven Even in God's most severe Dealings with them they say with those Isa 26.8 Yea in the way of thy Judgments O Lord have we waited for thee the desire of our Soul is to thy Name and to the Remembrance of thee To which that of the Apostle Phil. 1.20 is consonant According to my earnest expectation and my hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed but that with all boldness as always
some Persons more intensive then in others yet in all that believe in Christ it was and is bottomed upon the same Ground a Fruit of the same Faith shewing it self by the same Expressions of Thanksgiving and Love Praising God Following Christ and Loving all his Members So that we may say All Abraham's Children by Faith rejoyce to see Christ's Day they see it and are glad And thus my Text comes home to you all APPLICATION You profess your selves Believers in Christ and Abraham to be your Father if you be in truth such then it will concern you to walk in the Steps of the Faith of Abraham who rejoyced to see the Day of Christ and he saw it and was glad I deny not that in this time of Advent there uses to be much Rejoycing pretended to be in Remembrance of Christ's Nativity yea that many long for this Time as the Time in which they are wont to rejoyce nor do I except against Rejoycing at this Time But is our Rejoycing such as was in Abraham a Rejoycing at Christ's Day out of Faith a Rejoycing at the Performance of the Divine Promise for the bringing of Light and Salvation into the world whereby all the Nations of the Earth should be blessed Is the sense of the Spirituall Blessings in Heavenly things I mean the Knowledge of God's Counsell the Mystery of his Will in Reconciling the World to himself by Jesus Christ not imputing their Trespasses unto them the Adoption of us Gentiles into his Family with other Riches of his Grace the grand Motive of our Joy Are the Expressions of our Joy like those of the Shepherds who glorified and praised God of the Blessed Virgin who brake out into her Magnificat Anima mea My Soul doth magnifie the Lord and my Spirit hath rejoyced in God my Saviour like those of Zacharias in his Benedictus Blessed be the Lord God of Israel for he hath visited and redeemed his people like those of the Heavenly Hoast who sang Glory be to God in the highest These Hymns I acknowledge are sung in our publick Meetings and it is the Wisedom of the Church that you are prompted to remember them But what is done in your Houses Is any such Spiritual Rejoycing there any such Praising of God for sending his Son into the world that you might live by him Are not rather your Rejoycings carnal more like the Heathen Saturnals full of Looseness vain Sports and Debauchery Are not your Feasts like the Riotous Bacchanals rather then Christian Festivals Yea is not impious profaning of God's Name more frequent there then holy Conference of such as are filled with the Spirit of God singing and making Melody in your Hearts to the Lord If it be so I may say to you as Christ did to the Jews If ye were the Children of Abraham ye would doe the Works of Abraham If Abraham were your Father indeed if you did believe in Christ as Abraham did you would rejoyce in the Remembrance of Christ's Day as Abraham did you would rejoyce in Christ as born a Saviour from Sin a Teacher sent from God to direct you in your way to eternal Life that so you may live as Abraham did as Pilgrims on Earth as those that seek a City to come even an heavenly Heb. 11.10 13 16. Oh that your Faith your Joy in Christ might be such a Fruit of the Spirit of God as may make your Conversation such as becomes the Gospel of Christ not such as is more like theirs whose Belly is their God whose Glory their Shame who mind Earthly things Let our Conversation be in Heaven from whence we look for Christ to change our vile Bodies into Bodies of Glory like his and to give us an Inheritance above Which God of his infinite Mercy grant unto us all for the Merits of his Son To whom with the Blessed Spirit be ascribed c. Amen LAVS DEO ABRAHAM's PILGRIMAGE The Thirty-first SERMON GENESIS xij 1. Now the Lord had said unto Abraham Get thee out of thy Country and from thy Kindred and from thy Father's House unto a Land that I shall shew thee THAT after so great a Defection of the World from God as was upon the Dispersion of Mankind occasioned by the Giant-like Attempt of building the Tower of Babel God might have a Race of men who should own and adhere to him he singled out Abraham from his Fathers who dwelt on the other side of the Floud and served other Gods as it is Josh 24.2 3. And having removed him with his Father from Vr of the Chaldees where it is likely the Sun was worshipped in stead of God unto Charran his Father being dead he translated him into the Land of Canaan which he promised to give him for a Possession as it is in S. Stephen's Oration Act. 7.4 5. consonant to the words I have now read to you Now the Lord had said unto Abraham Get thee out of thy Country c. Sundry ways God used to speak to the Ancients by Prophets Dreams and Visions So Gen. 15.1 The word of the Lord came unto Abram in a Vision and Gen. 17.1 The Lord appeared unto Abram and speaking of this very Precept here given him S. Stephen saith Act. 7.2 The God of Glory appeared unto our Father Abraham Some kind of glorious Apparition there was then when God gave Abraham this Mandate The Business no doubt being as in After-ages so in Abraham's days most famous God would have it begun by an illustrious Manifestation of himself that he might be known to be the God of Glory and all the Gods that Abraham's Fathers served to be but Vanities and Lies not Numina but Nomina not Gods though so called And that there might be the firmer Impression on Abraham thereby God thus shews himself and speaks However God speaks to us we are to hearken be it in a Dream or by a Prophet if it be God's Voice it must be obeyed But then most heed is to be taken when God makes known his Pleasure in an illustrious Apparition This Command to Abraham was doubtless of very great Concernment both to God's own Glory and Abraham's and all Believers Advantage And therefore it is of no small importance for us to consider the Charge which God here gives to Abraham Get thee out of thy Country and from thy Kindred and from thy Father's House unto a Land that I shall shew thee Wherein we have 1. A Journey or Motion commanded him Get thee or Goe thou 2. The Terminus à quo of this Motion or the Place whence he was to goe Out of thy Country c. 3. The Terminus ad quem or the Place whither he was to goe Vnto a Land that I shall shew thee 1. The Journy or Motion which is here injoyned Abraham is a Transmigration expressed thus in the Hebrew Lec Leca as if it were Vade tibi Goe thou or Goe to thy self which is by some conceived a Pleonasm or Redundance of speech
by reason of his Sin then his Sufferings that his Groaning and Tears are from the sense of his own Displeasing God more then from the sense of the Pain which God inflicts on him is apparent from the Instances we have of such Penitent persons In David's penitential Complaints it is his Sin that he still complains of Psal 31.10 My life is spent with grief and my years with sighing my strength faileth because of mine Iniquity and my bones are consumed Psal 38.3 4. There is no soundness in my flesh because of thine Anger neither is there any rest in my bones because of my Sins For mine Iniquities are gone over my head as an heavy burthen they are too heavy for me He saith not his Pain was too heavy a Burthen for him but his Iniquity which is indeed so heavy a Burthen that the Shoulders of Christ himself the Lord of Glory were so pressed with it as to make him cry out My Soul is heavy unto the death and My God my God why hast thou forsaken me Again Psal 40.12 he bemoans his case that innumerable Evils had compassed him about his Iniquities had taken hold upon him so that he was not able to look up they were more then the hairs of his head therefore his heart failed him It was not by reason of the multitude of his Evils but the multitude of his Iniquities that his heart failed him Outward Evils reach but the outward man Sins remembred lie heavy on the Conscience Now as Solomon saith Prov. 18.14 The spirit of a man will sustain his Infirmity but a wounded spirit who can bear Those Philosophers that could endure the greatest Tortures of body inflicted by cruel Tyrants while they had 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Tranquillity of mind within yet could not bear the least Pain when the Conscience of some foul Evil haunted them A great Burthen will be born by a whole Shoulder but the least Burthen pains intolerably when the Bone is broken or it lies on a Sore place A broken spirit drieth up the bones Prov. 17.22 My Sin saith David is ever before me and that brake his Bones Where Sin as it is said of Antipheron Oretanus that his Shadow was always before him is still before a man it haunteth and vexeth him as a Hornet or as the Poets feign of the Furies which the Oratour interprets of a guilty Conscience it still affrights him Lament 1.14 The yoke of my Transgressions is bound by his hand The yoke they felt they term the yoke of their Transgressions intimating that by reason of their Transgressions their Afflictions were as a yoke bound by God's hand and wreathed and came upon their neck And in like manner Isa 64.5 6 7. the afflicted Penitents pour out their Souls before God thus Behold thou art wroth for we have sinned We all do fade as a leaf and our Iniquities as the wind have taken us away Thou hast hid thy face from us and consumed us because of our Iniquities Herein there lies a great difference between the Sufferings of a meer Natural man and one Renewed or Regenerated by the Spirit of God The one complains of his Pain of his hard Fortune his ill Luck he frets and vexeth at his Disappointment his Sighs and Groans are that he is crost and cannot have his will he imputes his Misery to Chance Stars and the like If he weep as Esau it is not for his Profaneness but for his missing the Blessing Heb. 12.16 17. His Crying and Bitterness of spirit is not to God but Isaac Gen. 27.34 with a murtherous mind towards Jacob vers 42. Cain tells God Gen. 4.13 14. My Punishment is greater then I can bear Behold thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth and from thy face shall I be hid and I shall be a Fugitive and a Vagabond in the earth and it shall come to pass that every one that sindeth me shall flay me Not a word that shewed his Repentance for his devillish act in murthering his Brother It is otherwise with the Penitent S. Peter goes out and weeps bitterly not for his Danger but for his Sin The Regenerate bemoan their sinfull Corruptions not their Sufferings S. Paul that could take pleasure in Afflictions and Reproaches yet groans in his earthly Tabernacle by reason of the Sin that dwelled in him This indeed is the nature of true Repentance it begetteth a Sorrow after God such as produceth Carefulness Self-clearing Indignation Fear vehement Desire Zeal Revenge as they are said to be in the Corinthians 2 Cor. 7.11 When they remember their ways and their doings wherein they have been defiled true Repenting persons will not inveigh against others cry out of their Destiny nor censure others or impute their Evils to forrein Causes but take shame to themselves and loath themselves in their own sight for all their Evils that they have committed Ezek. 20.43 And the reason hereof is because it is their Sin which is indeed their Evil. It is that which is simply Evil their Affliction is but Malum secundùm quid Evil in some respect Evil that hath something of Good in it and which tends to some Good not onely to God's Glory and other Warning but also to his own good who is afflicted by humbling and bettering him that is truly Penitent It is good for me that I have been afflicted saith David that I might learn thy Statutes It is Sin that is the cause of all the Misery he feels and therefore that must be more evil then his Misery If a Potion be bitter by reason of Gall and Wormwood the Gall and Wormwood that makes it so must be more bitter Thine own Wickedness shall correct thee and thy Backsliding shall reprove thee know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bitter that thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God and that my fear is not in thee saith the Lord God of hoasts to the Jews Jerem. 2.19 And indeed this is the onely way for remedy of Afflictions to be sensible of the Sin more then the Sufferings to groan and shed Tears because we have offended God not onely because we have brought Trouble on our selves It is the way to take away the Cause of the Evil and so the Bitterness of the Affliction Death it self were it not for the Sting of Sin could not harm us take away the Conscience of Sin and the weight of our Sufferings will be removed If Sin be forgiven if the Conscience be purged from dead works either God will take away the Rod or the Smart of it Now the onely way to effect that is to be affected with the Sin and to loath it to be weary of it more then the pressure of the Cross If we take any other course though we houl on our Beds though we should be weary with Groaning every night and all the night make our Bed swim and water our Couch with Tears though we should wear Sackcloath cast
our Spirituall Voiage towards Heaven and our Christian Warfare The Presence of God is All in all without God's Presence we can doe nothing though we should have all the furniture of wit strength wealth and the assistence of men yet should we not be able to goe one step forward in the way to Happiness we of our selves should not be sufficient to think any thing as of our selves for all our Sufficiency is of God 2 Cor. 3.5 Yea our Adversary the Devil would easily devour us if the Lord should depart from us On the other side If God be for us who can be against us Neither life nor death nor Angels nor Principalities nor Powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth nor any other creature shall prevail against us The auxiliary force of God's Presence makes a Believer in Tribulation distress persecution famine nakedness peril sword to be more then a Conquerour even to triumph and to glory in the Lord as knowing that his Riches exceed Croesus his wealth his Glory Solomon's glory and that he may truly say without Thrasonicall vaunting Whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or things present or things to come All are mine I being Christ's and Christ God's 1 Cor. 3.22 23. Thus did the Psalmist express his apprehensions of the benefit of God's Presence in relation to his Safety Comfort and Happiness That he restored his Soul and led him in the paths of Righteousness for his Name 's sake Yea though he did walk through the valley of the shadow of death he would fear no evil for God was with him his Rod and his Staff did comfort him Psal 23.3 4. That his Goodness and Mercy should follow him all the days of his life vers 6. That he would shew him the path of Life in his Presence was fulness of Joy at his right hand Pleasures for evermore Psal 16.11 As to be near such a King as Solomon was counted so great a Happiness that the blessedness of Solomon's Courtiers was magnified with admiration by the Queen of Sheba so much more blessed are they that are acquainted with God and are near to him In his Favour is their life Psal 30.5 The light of his Countenance is better then life it self Man being Animal sociabile a sociable Living creature needs Society it is most joyous for him to be with them whom he loves and who love him and can help him But such is none now in comparison of God and therefore no Company to a Holy heart like to God's David's Soul thirsted for God panted after him to come and appear before him But his Tears were his meat day and night in his absence from God and it was as a Sword in his bones to be reproached with this demand Where is thy God When God hid his face he was troubled Which comes to pass by our departing from God and that brings me to the II. OBSERVATION That the committing of great and enormous Sins endangers the Privation of God's Presence It is true that God sometimes to try his most upright Servants doth withdraw from them the light of his Countenance not out of Indignation against them for any great Transgression committed by them Thus he dealt with Job when he exercised his Patience which made him expostulate the matter with God Job 13.24 Wherefore hidest thou thy face and holdest me for thine Enemy vers 26. For thou writest bitter things against me and makest me to possess the Iniquities of my youth And Heman the Ezrahite Psal 88.14 Lord why castest thou off my Soul why hidest thou thy Face from me But this casting off and hiding God's Face is but for a time and not in wrath but like a Father's dealing with his Child when he for a little while sequesters himself to make experiment of his Child's Affection and to excite him thereby to seek him the more earnestly Nevertheless even this also tends to bring them to the acknowledgment of their Sins therefore the Prophet Hosea 5.15 brings in God thus saying I will goe away and return to my place till they acknowledge their Offence and seek my Face in their Affliction they will seek me early Even Job wanted God's Presence till he confessed himself vile and repented abhorring himself in dust and ashes Job 42.6 But there is a more direfull Casting out of God's Presence with utter Forsaking so as to cast a people or person out of his sight for ever by leaving them to be a Prey to those who waste and oppress them as when he threatned Jerem. 7.15 to cast the Jews out of his sight as he had cast out all their brethren the whole seed of Ephraim which he accomplished in the Babylonish Captivity as it is Jerem. 52.3 Through the Anger of the Lord it came to pass in Jerusalem and Judah that God cast them out of his Presence especially because of all the Provocations that Manasseh had provoked him withall 2 King 23.26 And indeed though Manasseh repenting was not utterly and for ever cast out of God's Presence yet by reason of the hainousness of his Sins the Lord brought upon him and his people the Captains of the hoast of the King of Assyria which took him among the thorns and bound him with fetters and carried him to Babylon 2 Chron. 33.11 And David himself when he had by his great Transgressions provoked the Lord to Anger in the matter of Vriah the Hittite found God's favourable Presence so removed from him that in his House he suffered by his Children great Calamities which were inflicted by God to shew his Indignation so that though he were not Filius Irae a Child of Wrath cast away with utter Dereliction as a Reprobate yet he was Filius sub Ira a Child under Wrath for that present which made him dread his Danger and to be thus importunate with God not to cast him out of his Presence And indeed in case of great Sins committed presumptuously against Warning or Conscience enlightned and continued in with Impenitency it is inconsistent with God's Holiness and Honour to afford his Presence it being contrary to his Nature and Glory to countenance Evil who is not a God that hath pleasure in Wickedness neither shall Evil dwell with him The foolish shall not stand in his sight he hateth all workers of Iniquity Psal 5.4 5. He is of purer eyes then to behold Evil and cannot look on Iniquity Hab. 1.13 As it is with a gallant Prince who cannot brook a base Coward or a neat and cleanly Nobleman who cannot endure in his company a sordid and nasty Sloven but will thrust or keep such out of his presence so it is with God When a Man or Nation have defiled themselves with such odious Iniquities as God abhors till they be washed with true Repentance and new cloathed by putting on the Lord Jesus there is no hope of finding God ready to admit them near to him Wherefore
of his Holiness in my Text. Now he is so termed in opposition to the unclean Spirit Matth. 12.43 or evil Spirit and Spirit of Devils which are in some men as the Holy Spirit is in others For as the Heathens imagined that every man had his good Genius or his bad his good or bad Angel so the Holy Scripture expresseth the Motions of men to be from the Spirit of God's Holiness in them who are sanctified and from Satan in them who are unholy as in Cain and Judas Now the Spirit of God is sometimes spoke of as God's Instrument by which he works in the works of Creation Psal 104.30 Thou sendest forth thy Spirit they are created and thou renewest the face of the Earth Job 33.4 The Spirit of God hath made me and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life When God bringeth any great thing to pass he doth it by his Spirit Zech. 4.6 Not by might nor by power but by my Spirit That which is in Matth. 12.28 If I cast out Devils by the Spirit of God is in Luk. 11.20 If I with the finger of God cast out Devils whence it appears that the Spirit of God is Digitus Dei God's Hand or Finger whereby he works But especially the works God doeth in and for the Saints are ascribed to the Spirit of God All these things worketh that one and the self-same Spirit dividing to every man severally even as he will 1 Cor. 12.11 All those precious Qualities and Operations whereby we please God are termed Fruits of the Spirit Gal. 5.22 23. 2. This helps us to understand how the Holy Spirit may be taken from a person to wit by withdrawing from him those Operations of the Holy Spirit which are amiable to God or comfortable to us Now in this Petition it is to be considered that notwithstanding David's Sins he was not utterly bereft of God's Spirit for in this Psalm his humble Confession his ardent Supplication shew that there was some fire of God's Spirit remaining in him all the sparks were not gone out Yet he felt so little of the Vigour and Consolation of the Spirit that he feared its utter Extinction And because this would leave him in utter Darkness therefore he is importunate with God that he would not take his Holy Spirit from him but as it is in the next verse restore unto him the joy of his Salvation and uphold him with his free Spirit The Petition thus opened yields us these Observations 1. That the having of God's Spirit in us and with us is the most beneficial Gift which God gives to a Repenting Sinner 2. That great Transgressions endanger the Loss of God's Spirit 3. That a Repenting Sinner is an earnest Suitour to God for the Continuance of it to him Of these in their order I. OBSERVATION That God's Spirit is the most beneficial Gift that God bestows on a Repenting Sinner This is manifest from the words of Christ Luk. 11.13 If ye then being evil know how to give good Gifts to your Children how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him Which shews that the Gift of the Holy Spirit is a greater Gift and far better then that which earthly Parents give to their Children as bodily Food and the like and that God in giving his Holy Spirit to those that ask him shews an Affection far exceeding that which Parents have for their Children when they supply them with Corporall sustenance Adde hereunto that the Apostle 2 Cor. 13.14 in his Benediction of the Corinthians prays thus for them The Grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the Love of God and the Communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all Amen Whereby it is manifest that the Communion of the Holy Spirit is ranked among the best things he could beg for that people to wit the Grace of Christ and the Love of God Nor is this without reason for the Spirit of God removes all that Evil which is odious to God and noisome to our selves it washes away that Filthiness of flesh and spirit which is loathsome to God it cures that Blindness of Mind that Hardness of Heart that Perverseness of Soul that Impotency of Faculties which make us unable to doe any thing that may please God or rectify our own Actions It is this clean Water which being sprinkled on us by God makes us clean in his eyes so as to cleanse us from all our Filthiness and all our Evils It is that by giving of which we have a new heart and a new spirit is put within us God takes away the stony heart out of our flesh and gives us an heart of flesh which causeth us to walk in God's Statutes and to keep his Judgments and doe them Ezek. 11.19 20. In whom the Spirit of God dwells not there is a Spirit of Slumber Eyes that they should not see and Ears that they do not hear even the Gospel is hid to them the God of this world blinds their minds lest the Light of the glorious Gospel of Christ who is the Image God should shine unto them they are held in the Snare of the Devil and are taken captive by him at his will An evil Spirit possesseth them so that they want the Consolations of God the Peace which passeth understanding which guards the minds of them that believe through Christ Jesus they are filled with Horrour of Conscience are under the spirit of Bondage they sow to the Flesh and of the Flesh reap Corruption On the other side where the Spirit of God inhabits it renews a man in the spirit of his mind so that he knows the things that are freely given him of God spiritually discerns the hidden wisedom of God in a mystery which God hath ordained before the world to our glory even those things which eye hath not seen nor ear heard nor have entred into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him Even to Babes are these things revealed by God's Spirit which the Princes of the world knew not but they were hid from the wise and prudent Matth. 11.25 Whence it is that they are made the Epistle of Christ written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God not in Tables of Stone but in fleshly Tables of the Heart with open face beholding as in a glass the Glory of the Lord they are changed into the same image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord 2 Cor. 3.3 18. By which means they are made the Temple of God in that the Spirit of God dwelleth in them vers 16. and holy unto God an habitation of God through the Spirit they are joyned to the Lord one Spirit with him new Creatures in Christ and conformed to him Whence it is that Sin bath not dominion over them nor the Wicked one toucheth them They are delivered from the Law that being dead wherein they were held
Conscience exagitate him when he went out from the Presence of the Lord and dwelt in the Land of Nod as a Renegado from God and one that was pursued by his own Bloud-guiltiness Nor is the Case of Judas less pregnant to demonstrate how furious and inevitable is the pursuit of a guilty Conscience He had sold his Master the Lord of Glory for thirty pieces of Silver but his Mony was as Fire in his Bosome the remembrance of his devillish Act did so envenome his Spirit that he could find no Rest till he had disgorged his Money and rid himself of his Life too So that of him was verified what Zophar spake of others who sin in like manner Job 20.12 13 14 15 16. Though Wickedness be sweet in the Mouth though a man hide it under his Tongue Though he spare it and forsake it not but keep it still within his Mouth Yet his Meat in his Bowells is turned it is the Gall of Asps within him He hath swallowed down Riches and he shall vomit them up again God shall cast them out of his Belly He shall suck the poison of Asps the Viper's tongue shall slay him How many Myriads of men have there been in the Ages of the world who have ventured upon Sin without Fear have blessed themselves in the Success of their unrighteous Projects have delightfully for a season satiated themselves with the enjoyment of their prohibited Lusts yet in the conclusion the Remembrance thereof hath been as a Fire in their Bones as a heavy Burthen that neither their own strength nor the help of other men could support them under And the Reason hereof is Because to them that obey Vnrighteousness there is Indignation and Wrath from God and consequently Tribulation and Anguish upon every Soul of man that doeth evil Rom. 2.8 9. And this is that which makes the Heart to be affected as Belshazzar's was When he saw the finger of a man's hand writing over against the Candlestick and upon the plaister of the Wall of the King's Palace his Countenance was changed and his Thoughts troubled him so that the Joynts of his Loyns were loosed and his Knees smote one against another How shall thy hands be strong saith God to the Jews Ezek. 22.14 when I shall deal with thee The Sinners in Zion are afraid fearfulness hath surprized the Hypocrites who among us shall dwell with the devouring fire who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings Isa 33.14 Therefore the Lord saith I will not contend for ever neither will I be always wroth for the Spirit should fail before me and the Souls which I have made Isa 57.16 Which leads us to that which is intimated OBSERVATION That though the Spirit of man when it is wounded with worldly Sorrows or with Conscience of Sin cannot sustain it self from sinking yet the Lord can and doth support it This is verified by experience in holy Job then whom none was ever more sorely handled except our Lord Christ when he bare our Sins in his Body on the Tree insomuch that he complained Job 6.4 For the Arrows of the Almighty are within me the poison whereof drinketh up my Spirit the Terrours of God do set themselves in array against me yet did the Consolations of God so support him that he could allege Behold my Witness is in Heaven and my Record is on high Job 16.19 so as that he could never be drawn to disclaim his own Uprightness or God's Righteousness Holy Paul though he were abundant in Sufferings so that he had the sentence of death in himself yet he would not relinquish his Trust in God whom he found the Father of Mercies and the God of all Comfort so as that with the abounding of his Sufferings he had also abounding Consolation After the like sort was it with Christ Jesus who though he was in great Agony in the Garden so that his Soul was heavy unto death in the days of his flesh he offered up Prayers and Supplications with strong Crying and Tears unto him that was able to save him from death yet he was heard in that he feared Heb. 5.7 David after he had committed that Sin against Vriah the Hittite when Nathan had discovered the Evil thereof His Bones waxed old through his Roaring all the day long Day and night the Hand of God was heavy upon him His moisture was turned into the drought of Summer His Bones his Soul were sore vexed Innumerable Evils compassed him about His Iniquities took hold upon him so that he was not able to look up therefore his heart failed him yet God restored unto him the Joy of his Salvation upheld him with his free Spirit took away his Sackcloath and girded him with Gladness The waies that God takes to sustain the Spirits of men in their Infirmities are various Sometimes by allaying the Sharpness of their Afflictions sometimes by a mixture of outward or inward Refreshings sometimes by moderating their Temptations not suffering them to be tempted above that they are able but with the Temptation making a way to escape that they may be able to bear it making it short though it be sharp But the chief way whereby the Lord supports the Spirit when it sinks of it self is by giving to some the tongue of the learned that they may know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary Isa 50.4 whose business it is first to humble to search the Wound and then to pour in Oil first to discover the Malady and then to apply the Medicine This method is described at large by Elihu Job 33. from vers 15. to v. 29. When God hath spoken to man in sleep and otherwise to open his ears to seal his Instruction to withdraw him from his purposes to hide Pride from man He chasteneth him upon his Bed and the multitude of his Bones with strong pains so that his Soul draweth near unto the Grave and his Life to the Destroyers Yet if there be a Messenger with him an Interpreter one among a thousand to shew unto man his Vprightness to make known to him the Atonement which is made by the Bloud of the everlasting Covenant when he washeth himself with penitentiall Tears and sprinkles his Conscience with the Bloud of Christ by Faith Then he is gracious unto him and saith Deliver him from going down to the Pit I have found a Ransome He shall pray unto God and he will be favourable unto him and he shall see his face with Joy for he will render unto man his Righteousness If when God looks upon men they say We have sinned and perverted that which was right and it profited us not He will deliver their Soul from going into the Pit and their Life shall see the Light Thus did Hezekiah find it as he acknowledgeth Isa 38.16 17. O Lord by these things men live and in all these things is the life of my Spirit that is by God's undertaking for him vers 14. so wilt
in his Bloud to declare his Righteousness for the Remission of Sins that are past through the forbearance of God Rom. 3.25 that God doth forgive any Sins of any persons Eph. 4.32 Not for any Saint's or Martyr's Intercession or any Surplusage of Merits in the Treasury of the Church distributed by the Pope's Indulgence or for the bare Work done of saying Mass singing Dirges or other Offices for a person deceased or merely for the Priest's Absolution upon Auricular Confession in the Sacrament of Penance or for any humane Satisfaction whatsoever but by the Expiation of Christ's Bloud and his Intercession for them to whom Sins are forgiven though not without their due Qualifications which are next to be considered III. The Persons to whom God forgives Sins are not all whatsoever There are that after their hardness and impenitent Heart treasure up unto themselves Wrath against the day of Wrath and revelation of the righteous Judgment of God Rom. 2.5 Nor all that are in the visible Church that have been baptized into the Name of Christ Notwithstanding Simon Magus believed was baptized continued with Philip and wondered beholding the Miracles and Signs which were done yet when by his offer of Money for the power of bestowing the Holy Ghost his Heart appeared not right in the sight of God S. Peter admonisheth him to repent of that his Wickedness and pray God if perhaps the thoughts of his Heart might be forgiven him Act. 8.13 21 22. But 1. They to whom God forgives Sins must be real and unfeigned Penitents such as are sensible of their Sins and the Desert of them such as are humbled in their own eyes yea so as to loath themselves for their Iniquities such as have that Sorrow which is after God that worketh Repentance not to be repented of Such a Repentance as is not for some Sins onely but for all not onely for Sins open and notorious but also for Sins secret and known to themselves and God alone not onely for Sins of outward Action or Words but also for Sins of Thought of evil Concupiscence not onely for Sins of Commission but also for Sins of Omission and according to the degrees of them with a proportionable degree of Sorrow so as to mourn much where the Sin hath been very hainous as David's was And that not onely by reason of the Affliction consequent Danger of Hell or Infamy but also for the Dishonouring of God and the Offending of him not onely as a severe Judge but also an indulgent Father Against thee thee onely have I sinned and done this Evil in thy sight saith David Psalm 51.4 And Father saith the prodigal Son Luk. 15.21 I have sinned against Heaven and in thy sight and am no more worthy to be called thy Son Thus S. John Baptist preached the Baptism of Repentance for the Remission of Sins Mark 1.4 S. Peter Act. 2.38 Repent and be baptized every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ for the Remission of Sins And Repent and be converted that your Sins may be blotted out Act. 3.19 To them that thus Repent there is Forgiveness of Sins not to the Impenitent and unrelenting 2. To Repentance must be joyned Confession of Sin If we say that we have no Sin we deceive our selves and the Truth is not in us If we confess our Sins God is faithfull and just to forgive us our Sins and to cleanse us from all Vnrighteousness If we say that we have not sinned we make him a Liar and his word is not in us 1 Joh. 1.8 9 10. How full is the Scripture against all Self-justitiaries Pharisees Philosophers Votaries Pelagians Quakers and other Perfectionists that boast of their own Good works and their being free from Sin No marvel that they that think they have no need of Pardon should find none God filleth the Hungry with good things the Rich he sendeth empty away The proud Pharisee that talked of his own Well-doings the boasting Papist that is confident of his own good Merits from God are not capable of Justification It is the poor Publican that is sensible of his Sin that stands afar off that will not lift up so much as his eyes to Heaven as being dejected by the sense of his Sins but smites on his breast saying God be mercifull to me a Sinner that goes home justified rather then the other as Christ himself hath determined Luk. 18.13 14. When I kept silence day and night saith David to God Psal 32.3 4 5. thy Hand was heavy upon me I acknowledged my Sin unto thee and mine Iniquity have I not hid I said I will confess my Transgression unto the Lord and thou forgavest the Iniquity of my Sin There was no necessity of Auricular Popish Confession to a Priest his purpose of doing it to God seriously and with true Compunction and Contrition of Soul was sufficient for his Pardon David said unto Nathan I have sinned against the Lord and Nathan without injoyning him Penance for Satisfaction tells him immediately The Lord also hath put away thy Sin A free and unfeigned Confession of Sins to God never goes without Pardon if it be with real Sorrow and giving to God the Glory of his Justice if other Qualifications be withall added which are also to be considered whereof the next and third is That there be a Forsaking of the Sin in Heart and in Act. 3. That Sin that shall be pardoned must be hated must be left He that covereth his Sins shall not prosper but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have Mercy Prov. 28.13 While we love and cherish Sin we bid defiance to God and shew our selves Enemies to him and therefore can expect no Favour from him for he is not a God that hath pleasure in Wickedness neither shall Evil dwell with him saith the Psalmist Psal 5.4 For a man to say he is sorry for his Sin as often men do and yet to commit it customarily again is indeed to belie himself True Sorrow would make men fearfull and wary how they fall into that for which they say they are sorry Piscator ictus sapit If they were sensible of the Evil of Sin they would dread a Relapse into it And besides it is no better then a mocking of God to confess Sin and pray him to forgive it and yet to continue in the practice of it It is all one as if thou shouldst beg of God to give thee a Licence or Dispensation to sin as if thou shouldst tell him thou hast sinned indeed but thou hopest he will not be angry though thou doe so again as if thou shouldst ask of God that he would make void his Law for thy sake let thee live as if thou owedst no Subjection to him It is to declare thy self a professed Rebell against him to tell him that he shall not rule over thee and in effect to say Depart from me for I desire not the knowledge of thy ways Much more evil is it when men
God's Mercy is the practice and delight of them that have a Spirit of Holiness in all Generations They write Ex dono Dei on all they have they ascribe all they doe to Mercy all their Prosperity Victory Success they account as Mercies from God When they cast up the Inventory of their Good things they have enjoyed all that they possess the Summe totall is innumerable Mercies How precious are thy thoughts unto me O God how great is the summe of them If I should count them they are more in number then the Sand Psalm 139.17 18. The Law of Gratitude then which none is more equal ties every one to magnify God's Mercy What hath any which he hath not received 1 Cor. 4.7 And who can look upon his Receipts as due Wages and not rather pure Alms Who hath not received loads of Benefits from God and all out of pure Mercy Our Forming in the womb is a prime Mercy our Birth our Education our Instruction our Preservation our Salvation That I be not infinite in this Account Our Life Breath and all our Ways all our natural Parts and Abilities all our Motions and Proceedings all our Escapes from Dangers from Sicknesses from Death and most of all from being a Prey to the Devil and our Deliverance from Hell are Evidences of transcendent Mercy in God which all God's people are sensible of And this leads us to the VI. OBSERVATION That the apprehension of God's great Mercy encourageth his People to hope and wait on God for a Consummation of their Welfare The greatness of God's Mercies encouraged David to cast himself into God's hand rather then to fall into the hands of men 2 Sam. 24.14 And Holy Daniel in that effectual fervent Prayer Dan. 9.8 9. to appeal to God's Mercy O Lord to us belongeth Confusion of face to our Kings to our Princes and to our Fathers because we have sinned against thee To the Lord our God belong Mercies and Forgivenesses though we have rebelled against him Vers 18. We do not present our Supplications before thee for our Righteousnesses but for thy great Mercies Psalm 138.8 The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me Thy Mercy O Lord endureth for ever forsake not the works of thine own hands Isa 63.15 Look down from Heaven and behold from the habitation of thy Holiness and of thy Glory where is thy Zeal and thy Strength the sounding of thy Bowells and of thy Mercies towards me are they restrained Psal 130.7 Let Israel hope in the Lord for with the Lord there is Mercy and with him is plenteous Redemption Not one of all the Holy Saints in all the Bible hath ever dared to utter such Expressions to God or men as if they could challenge the least Relief in Trouble the least Abatement of Sufferings much less eternall Life and Reward in Heaven upon account of their own Merit as Pharisaicall Self-Justitiaries have presumed to doe Holy Jacob on the contrary Gen. 32.10 tells God I am not worthy of the least of all thy Mercies and of all the Truth which thou hast shewed unto thy servant And Nehemiah when he allegeth his Actings for God Neh. 13.22 thus bespeaks him Remember me O my God concerning this also and spare me according to the greatness of thy Mercy This is the Plea of all upright humble Souls this is the Anchora sacra the sure Anchour upon which their Spirits are stayed in all their Fluctuations this is that Gale of wind which carries them on comfortably in all their Voiages They have learned from the Psalmist Psal 33.18 Behold the Eye of the Lord is upon them that fear him and that hope in his Mercy and therefore they say vers 22. Let thy Mercy O Lord be upon us according as we hope in thee They have found this Address to God always prosperous and therefore they joyn with the Holy Prophet in the words of my Text and the two following verses It is of the Lord's Mercies that we are not consumed because his Compassions fail not They are new every morning great is thy Faithfulness The Lord is my Portion saith my Soul therefore will I hope in him APPLICATION And now what is more necessary more just more meet for us to doe then to joyn in consort with the Holy Prophet in this passage Surely we may each of us say that it hath been of the Lord's Mercies that we have not been consumed in this most deadly Pestilence which hath swept away in our great City and the neighbouring places not many short of an Hundred thousand and yet we have hitherto been preserved alive to be Monuments of his Mercy Have not his Mercies been new to us every morning when we have heard either the dolefull Knells or the hideous voice of Carr-men Bring out your Dead or the Reports of the Weekly Bills of Mortality so many Hundreds in such a Parish so many Thousands in the whole dead of the Plague and yet we alive It was thought by God no small Mercy to Baruch when the common Calamity added Grief to his Sorrow when he fainted in his Sighing and found no Rest to give him his Life Behold I will bring Evill upon all flesh saith the Lord but thy Life will I give unto thee for a Prey in all places whither thou goest Jer. 45.5 And should you not count it a great Mercy to you that in this common and sore Judgment in which perhaps you have lost Wives Husbands Children Friends Neighbours Goods in which you have been filled with Fears oppressed with Griefs that yet you are not consumed that yet the whole City the whole Land is not consumed that yet our King our Nobles our Teachers our Government our Glory is not buried in perpetual Oblivion It is true it is a heavy Calamity but we have deserved worse It is true we have lost our Friends but our Lives are not lost our Souls are not lost unless our Unthankfulness our future Disobedience our Murmuring provoke God to bring a worse Misery the casting of Soul and body into Hell-fire which our Sins have merited Oh then let us still all our impatient Complaints let us quiet our Spirits in the present estate we are in let us be thankfull to God that we are not in Hell let us confess our Unworthiness let us be humbled for the great Depravedness of our former sinfull ways let us justify God in his inflicting Vengeance on us and our Land let us forsake those Sins which we have been guilty of that we have reason to conceive added fewell to this Fire that hath burnt so fiercely and wasted so extremely Let every one of us bewail the Plague of his own Heart let us lay to heart and mourn for the Sins of the City and the whole Nation their Pride Uncleanness Riot Oppression Unrighteousness Profaneness and the iterated Rebellions first open and hostile secondly more secret in Non-Conformity to Laws and Government and this maintained even against the unparallel'd Goodness
for then all minding and intending other Business and other Duties whether Sacred or Civill yea the due use of Recreation by eating and drinking sleep and other Refections of the body which God allows yea commands should be sinfull But as we interpret other like Passages concerning continual Praying against the Dotage of Euchites or Messalians of old who as the Monkish Fraternities since thought they were to doe nothing but pray Shall not God avenge his own Elect which cry day and night unto him Luke 18.7 Without ceasing I have remembrance of thee in my Prayers night and day 2 Tim. 1.3 of a constant course of doing this Duty when other Duties Offices and Necessities permit So in this Meditating of David in God's Law we are to conceive he resolves so to doe it as not to omit it out of Slothfulness or sinfull Avocation not out of averseness of Heart to desist from it but as often and as much as Opportunity Divine Providence and the Use of it did permit and require he would be occupied therein Concerning which profitable Exercise of Meditation many Directions might be given in respect of the Acts Degree Manner End and Use thereof As God appointed the King of Israel when he sate on the Throne of his Kingdome that he should write him a Copy of God's Law in a Book out of that which was before the Priests the Levites and that it should be with him and that he should reade therein all the days of his life that he might learn to fear the Lord his God to keep all the words of the Law and the Statutes to doe them Deut. 17.18 19. So he injoyned the rest of the People that the words which he commanded should be in the Heart of the whole People of Israel and that they should teach them diligently unto their Children and should talk of them when they sate in their houses and when they walked by the way and when they lay down and when they rose up Deut. 6.6 7. Which brings us to the II. OBSERVATION That God's Precepts are to be the matter of a Godly man's Talk Yea God commands that they should bind them for a Sign upon their Hand and that they should be as Frontlets between their Eyes and that they should write them upon the Posts of their houses and on their Gates Deut. 6.8 9. And that this Precept was not confined to the Five Books of Moses but that it exended to the rest of the Holy Scriptures that which is said of Timothy 2 Tim. 3.15 that from a child he had known the Holy Scriptures which were able to make him wise unto Salvation doth evince It is also manifest that the people of the Jews as they do to this day did conceive themselves bound by God old and young of all Sexes and Ranks to exercise themselves in reading and meditating on the Holy Scriptures which God vouchsafed to them in all the Books that were by any of the Prophets delivered to them To which accords that of the Apostle Rom. 15.4 Whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning that we through Patience and Comfort of the Scriptures might have hope It is then evident that it was God's Institution and Design in vouchsafing to communicate to the sons of men the great Treasure of his Oracles that they should busy their Minds and Members about them Nor is this sufficient that they have them in their Houses or that the Grandees of the Earth for Parts and Learning the Clergy Priests and Religious Votaries do reade or study them while the Laiety or simpler sort do onely by an implicit Faith rely on their Rulers or Rabbins as heretofore the Judaicall Pharisees and at this day their Successours the Popish Clergy craftily and deceitfully insinuate into peoples minds But as God hath promised to write his Laws in their hearts and put them in their minds that they shall all know him from the least to the greatest so it is the Duty and Property of all that expect Mercy and Favour from God to imploy their own Eyes to reade and their own Ears to hear what God hath vouchsafed to impart of his Mind in them to the sons of men And not onely so but also to search into the Sacred Scriptures as our Lord requires Joh. 5.39 to seek after the Wisedom therein as for Silver and search for it as for hidden Treasure Prov. 2.4 and when any Doctrine is taught as from God to doe as it is said of the Beroeans Act. 17.11 who searched the Scriptures daily whether the things S. Paul preached were so or no and withall speaking the truth in love to edify one another by communicating what they have found and learned And indeed the Law of Gratitude binds us to meditate on God's Precepts it being one of the greatest Favours from God to Men that he is pleased to reveal his Will to them Among the many Mercies for which the Psalmist extolls God's Goodness after the Commemoration of his Providence in his ordering Peace and Plenty he concludes thus Psal 147.19 20. He sheweth his Word unto Jacob his Statutes and his Judgments unto Israel He hath not dealt so with any Nation and as for his Judgments they have not known them Praise ye the Lord. Which plainly intimates this to have been the top or chief of his Goodness to Israel not that he seated them in a Land flowing with Milk and Honey which was the glory of other Lands Ezek. 20.6 but that he revealed his Counsells to them whereby he advanced them above all the people of the Earth as Moses tells them Deut. 4.8 What Nation is there so great that hath Statutes and Judgments so righteous as all this Law which I set before you this day It would therefore be an high Provocation of God to Anger so far to neglect the great Favour he hath shewed in giving us such Holy Precepts and beneficial Revelations of his Counsell as not to make them our Study not to consider the Usefulness of them not to observe our Concernments in them not to set forth to his Praise his gracious dealing in his notification of them to us But besides as it is an extreme Neglect of God not to meditate on his Precepts so it is a most injurious Neglect of our selves and our own Good to take our selves off from the Contemplation of them For thereby men deprive themselves of that means which might make them wiser then those who neglect them or imploy their minds on any enquiry after Wisedom without them Which it were easy to demonstrate by comparing the Wisedom that may be got by them with the Wisedom of the most renowned Philosophers and the most profound Rabbins among the Jews or acutest Schoolmen among the Christians who have sought the knowledge of Morality or Religion from Inventions and Traditions of men from their own Reasonings or devised Rules without the excellent Directions of the Holy Scritures Holy David professeth his own
his Will before the supplying of our Bread the Remission of our Sins or our Deliverance from the Evil one's Temptations from the Exceptions God takes against them that built themselves cieled houses when God's House lay waste them that had in their flock a male and vowed to the Lord a corrupt thing from his punishing such Slighting of him and asserting his Regal Majesty to convince men of the transcendent Regard that is due to him above all Potentates from the Protestations and Practice of Saints and Holy persons preferring the well-being of God's House and Service before their chief Mirth peremptorily refusing Delights neglecting any other Glory or otherwise desirable Advantage when God's House or Honour is impaired Mourning for it more then for their own Losses and reckoning them for their best-deserving Friends that promote the Service of God and them for their greatest Enemies that hinder it The Reasons of which are 1. On God's part His superlative Excellency in comparison of whom all the Glory Beauty Goodliness Power Wisedom or what-ever else is magnified in Creatures is but a Shadow yea Vanity or a mere Nothing All the Nations of the Earth in respect of him are as a drop of a Bucket counted as the small dust of the balance as Nothing Isa 40.15 17. And therefore to prefer our own Honour the Honour of any of the Grandees of the world or the glorious Spirits of Heaven before the Worship the Regalia or Royalties of the Great God who is King of Kings and Lord of Lords is to prefer a Torch-light before the Sun-light to esteem a Candle more then the glorious Lights of Heaven As there is in God more Glory then in all the Creatures so his Name his Service should be magnisied and adhered unto above and against all the Services and Names that stand in opposition to or competition with his 2. Nor is this Prelation less due on our part because of our Obligation of Gratitude to him Justice exacts it from us It is Debitum morale and naturale that we should honour our Father that begat us our Preachers that instruct us our Princes that protect us our Benefactours that help us All these is God to us in a superlative manner He is the Father that begat us the Rock that formed us we are the Work of his Hands and the Sheep of his Pasture He is our Shepherd therefore we lack nothing on him we depend from our mother's womb It is he that teacheth us Wisedom more then the beasts of the Earth He is a Sun and a Shield to us what-ever good we receive from any it is first derived from him He is the Fountain of living waters all Creatures are but broken Cisterns that can hold no water And therefore undoubtedly he should be preferr'd before all and by all Which that it may be done we should have the like Affection as David had and that is the next thing observable in this Text. II. David's Joy at the People's Forwardness to joyn in God's Worship As David preferred God's Service before his own Dignity so he rejoyced in the Conjunction of others with him therein This was it which gladded his Heart that not onely himself and his own House were ready to goe up to the House of the Lord but all the people of Israel likewise were forward to joyn with him in God's Service When the People offered willingly to the Lord for the building of the Temple it is said David the King also rejoyced with great Joy 1 Chron. 29.9 How often in the Psalms doth he invite all people to praise God Praise him all ye Nations Psal 117.1 is a Prophecy containing his Prayer for the Conversion of the Gentiles Rom. 15.11 Our Saviour teacheth us to pray not onely that we our selves who pray but all others may hallow God's Name When the Pharisees would have had the Children and Multitude that cried Hosanna with his Disciples rebuked our Saviour not onely justifies them but also animates them to it telling the Pharisees that if those should hold their peace the Stones would cry our Luke 19.40 Malignant spirits that seek the Praise of men their own Power and Interest envy the forwardness of people to joyn in the true Worship of God and the Duties of Godliness But to a holy and humble Heart it is a joyous thing As Moses said once to Joshua Enviest thou for my sake I would that all the Lord's people were Prophets and that God would put his Holy Spirit upon them Num. 11.29 Hereto every upright heart is moved both by the Love he bears to Men and the Love he hath to God who is honoured 1. Love to others makes him that loves them not seek his own Good onely but their Good also joyntly with his own Now there cannot be a greater Good to any person then when his Heart and Ways are set to glorifie God The best turn we can doe a man is to bring him into Acquaintance with God so as that his Fellowship be with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ And therefore if we love men indeed we cannot but rejoyce with them when they address themselves to seek God 2. Love also to God will cause this Rejoycing at the Associating of others with us in his Service The Corinthians Bounty to the Saints is commended from hence that it is abundant by many Thanksgivings unto God whiles by the experiment of such ministration they glorifie God 2 Cor. 9.12 13. We pray that all may sanctifie God's Name what we pray for sincerely we desire affectionately and what we desire affectionately to obtain we rejoyce in it heartily when it is acquired No man prays to God rightly but he who earnestly desires God's Glory by all the more therefore glorifie him the more is their Joy increased who love God truly especially when as here the Service is voluntary ready with alacrity when they say as it is in my Text Let us goe into the House of the Lord. Which leads me to some farther Observations III. The People's Willingness and Forwardness They invite each other to goe into the House of the Lord. Not to the house of Mirth and Jovialty not to the house of Bacchus or Baal not to the Idol-Temple or other house of Iniquity And therein is discernible the End and Motive of this their Invitation It was no doubt that they might worship God as those did who went up into the Temple to pray as it is said of the Pharisee and Publican in the Parable or as it is in the fourth verse of this Psalm to the Testimony of Israel to give Thanks unto the Name of the Lord. Thus it is said Luke 1.10 while the Priest burnt Incense in the Temple the whole multitude of the people were praying without And of Anna Luk. 2.37 she departed not from the Temple but served God with Fasting and Prayers night and day And in respect of this Practice our Saviour Matth. 21.13 allegeth out of Isa 56.7
Creatures are good God saw every thing that he had made and behold it was very good Gen. 1.31 Another in genere Moris a Good which makes the person truly good Such is the Goodness of God who is good and doeth good Psal 119.68 even by communicating Good to all Act. 14.17 And indeed He is the chiefest Good He is most transcendently perfectly originally Good from whom every good and every perfect Gift cometh James 1.17 And therefore rightly is it said by our Lord Christ Matth. 19.17 There is none good but one that is God And this Good we are to be Followers of Be ye Followers of God There is also a derivative Goodness from him which is communicated primitively to his Son concerning whom it is the Father's pleasure that in him should all Fulness dwell Col. 1.19 The Spirit is given him without measure Joh. 3.34 While he was upon Earth he went about doing good Act. 10.38 He might truly say I am the good Shepherd Joh. 10.11 And from him Good is redundant to us He hath plenitudinem Fontis and not onely Vasis With him is the fountain of Life and in his Light we see light Psal 36.9 Now the Good we are to be Followers of is also this Good which is in and from Christ the Good of his Word to know it the Good of his Example to imitate it the Good of his Gifts the Gifts of his Spirit to be zealous after them 1 Cor. 12.31 the Good of Righteousness and eternall Life which is from God by Jesus Christ to injoy it the Good of God's Favour in Christ to obtain it the Good of Communion with the Father and the Son to embrace it But though these sorts of Good are to be followed yet that which we are here required more specially to be Followers of is not so much Bonum Beatitudinis the Good of Blessedness for our selves as Bonum Sanctitatis the Good of Holiness whereby we may be like unto God be holy as he is holy 1 Pet. 1.15 16. and Bonum Justitiae the Good of Righteousness towards our selves and others such as may consist with a good Conscience and a good Conversation in Christ the Good of Innocency that we may be blameless and harmless the sons of God without rebuke Phil. 2.15 the Good of Benevolence and Beneficence willing and procuring good unto all Gal. 6.10 as we have opportunity doing good to all especially unto them that are of the houshold of Faith We must endeavour after the good Heart that may out of its Treasure bring forth good things Matth. 12.35 after the good Tongue that speaketh Wisedom and talketh of Judgment Psal 37.30 that uttereth that which is good to the use of Edifying that it may minister Grace to the hearers Eph. 4.29 after the good Hand that may work the thing that is good that it may have to give to him that needeth v. 28. In summe we must labour to become Vessels unto honour sanctified and meet for the Master's use and prepared to every good work 2 Tim. 2.21 created in Christ Jesus unto good works which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them Eph. 2.10 II. How this Good is to be followed 1. Universally all the Kinds of it are to be pursued not onely the Good of Religion towards God but also of Love towards Man The End of our Deliverance from the hands of our Enemies is that we might serve God in Holiness and Righteousness before him all the days of our life as it is in the Benedictus Luk. 1.74 75. The Grace of God hath appeared to all men teaching them that denying Vngodliness and worldly Lusts they should live righteously soberly and godly in this present world Tit. 2.11 12. We know it is S. James his determination 2.10 Whosoever shall keep the whole Law and yet offend in one point he is guilty of all Vertues are chained together the Law is copulative Bonum non nist ex integra causa He that is not intirely good is not good at all He that is all for the practice of Religious Ordinances but no whit for Charity he that is devout at Church but proud vain wanton uncharitable unrighteous intemperate at home is no Follower of that which is Good but an Hypocrite a meer Pharisee or painted Sepulchre And he that is much for Alms and Abstinence from Excess or prohibited Pleasures yet careless of Prayer Reading Hearing God's Word in publick and in private is a profane person be he never so much esteemed by men yet is he abominable before God 2. Nor must we be Followers of all Sorts of Good onely but also of all kinds of Good in the most eminent Degree What the Apostle prays for in the behalf of the Colossians Col. 1.9 10. should be the aim of every sincere Christian that he may be filled with the knowledge of God's Will in all wisedom and spiritual understanding that he may walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing being faithfull in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God So what he prays for in behalf of the Philippians Phil. 1.11 that he may be filled with the Fruits of Righteousness which are by Jesus Christ unto the glory and praise of God that he may be abundant in the work of the Lord 1 Cor. 15.58 As he is unjust that lets not the Buier have his full Measure so is he that doth not afford God the utmost of his Service that doth not love him with all his Mind with all his Soul and with all his Strength In this an Emulation is good which is implied in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as some Copies have it in my Text and it is so rendred by Beza We should vie one with another as desirous to outstrip each other like Runners in a Race that strive who shall run fastest Yea in this it is good to be singular If ye salute your Brethren onely saith Christ Matth. 5.47 what singular thing or more then others doe ye intimating that a Christian that exceeds not a Philosopher or a Jew is not worthy of that name He must not onely doe good to them that love him but even to them that hate him vers 44. Though we own no Popish Evangelical Counsels no Monkish Vows as putting a man into a state of Perfection no Merit or Works of Supererogation yet he that will approve himself to God must endeavour to doe those Good works that are commanded to the utmost Extensivè Works of all Kinds and Intensivè in all their Degrees according to his ability 3. And this we are to doe sincerely as before God not as pleasing Men but God that trieth the heart 1 Thess 2.4 Not like the Pharisees who gave Alms Fasted Prayed that they might be seen of Men and therefore did all with Ostentation but in secret and private as well as in publick we should be Followers of that which is Good looking onely at God's Glory our Obedience to him
Conspiracy to kill him nor for escaping by being let down in a Basket from Damascus though he would not bribe Felix nor remit any whit of his Profession A person may be over-wise and over-righteous and so destroy himself as it is Eccles. 7.16 Therefore run to the Name of the Lord as thy strong Tower and follow that which is Good but withall take Solomon's Counsell Prov. 27.12 A prudent man foreseeth the Evil and hideth himself If God shut thee up in Streights so as there is no escaping learn what follows my Text vers 14 15. be sure to suffer for Righteousness sake and then be not afraid of their Terrour neither be troubled but sanctifie the Lord God in your Hearts Brethren it pleaseth the Lord still to continue our Fears upon us the Angel of God still draws his Sword and cuts down many the Sword of the Enemy is held over our head and we know not but that an overflowing Stream of Bloud may reach even to us No marvel while the Fogs of Sin are in our Consciences if an Earthquake of Trembling is in our Hearts It is a sign that we are not Followers of that which is Good because God raiseth up against us so many Evils It is time then that we should turn unto him that smiteth us and that we should seek the Lord of Hoasts that while we go against our Enemies we should keep our selves from every Evil thing lest the Anger of God be not turned away but his hand be stretched out still Could we cease to doe evil and learn to doe well we need not fear either God's Rod or Mens Rage Till then we can expect no withdrawing of either Oh then be so wise as to avoid Sin if you would prevent Harm Arm your selves with all the Armour of God above all the Shield of Faith that God may be your Sun and Shield Amen LAVS DEO THE WAY OF LIFE DISCOVERED Part I. The Twenty-first SERMON PSAL. xvi 11. Thou wilt shew me the Path of life In thy Presence is fulness of Joy at thy right hand there are Pleasures for evermore THESE words are the Close of a Psalm which is thus entituled Michtam of David that is A golden Psalm of David or David's Jewel or notable Song Cethem is fine glittering Gold from whence this word Michtam may be derived for a golden Jewel and so note the Excellency of this Psalm The like Title is before other Psalms viz. 56.57.58.59.60 Nor is the Title unfit for the Matter or unbeseeming the Authour The Matter being most precious containing that Gold tried in the fire which Christ gives and with it enricheth his Church to all Eternity that Aurum potabile that cures and preserves Life for ever Congruous to David's Spirit who was a man of much Acquaintance with God and of Heavenly Meditations But that may be demanded concerning this Psalm which the Eunuch asked of Philip Act. 8.34 Of whom speaketh the Prophet this of himself or of some other man There are that conceive this Psalm wholly meant of Christ and not of David others that part is meant of Christ onely and not of David others that all is meant of both others that part is meant of David onely and not of Christ at all I will not interpose in this matter It is sufficient for my present purpose that S. Paul Act. 13.35 36 37. makes the tenth verse of this Psalm proper to Christ and S. Peter Act. 2.25 26 27 28. makes the four last verses thereof to be a Prediction of Christ's Resurrection not applicable to David who saw Corruption as his Sepulcher then remaining witnessed Now of those my Text is cited as a part and therefore it may be safely interpreted as the Speech of Christ in an Address to God his Father in which he opened his very Heart declaring the Reason why he was not moved by that Tempest and terrible Storm of Evils that he was to feel how he was kept from sinking notwithstanding those Flouds and Waves that were to goe over his head why he despaired not in that great Earthquake that threw the Temple of his Body to the ground to wit Because he set the Lord or foresaw the Lord always before him or before his face that he was at or on his right hand that he should not be moved Therefore did his Heart rejoyce and his Glory or Tongue was glad his Flesh should rest or dwell confidently in hope he being by Faith assured that his Father would not leave his Soul in Hell in the place or state of the Dead though he descended into it nor suffer or give his Holy one so dear to him to see Corruption but had made known to him the ways of Life or would shew to him the path of Life in raising him up to Life and that he would make him full of Joy with his Countenance as S. Peter reads it or as it is in our Version according to the Hebrew that in his presence was fulness of Joy at his right hand there were Pleasures for evermore Word for word it may be rendred Thou wilt make me know the way of Life Satiety of Joys before thy face Pleasures at thy right hand to perpetuity In which sense the words are to the same effect with what the Authour to the Hebrews speaks 12.2 Looking to Jesus the Authour and Finisher of our Faith who for the Joy that was set before him endured the Cross despising the Shame and is set down at the right hand of the Throne of God And thus secondarily these words might be David's and every Holy Believer's in a qualified sense as being assured of Restitution from Hell of freedom from Corruption of their Flesh of finding the Path of Life of Satiety of Joy with God and Perpetuity of Pleasures at his right hand in like manner as Christ found in his Refurrection they being quickened together with him raised up together and made to sit together in Heavenly places in Christ Jesus Eph. 2.5 6. and thereby animated under all Persecutions and Sufferings to persist in their Adherence to their God unmovably as being assured of Christ's Resurrection and thereby of their own of his being in Fulness of Joys in God's presence and so of their own being of his being at the right hand of God with Pleasures which endure for ever and consequently that it shall be so with them Of which we have a most admirable Example in Holy Job who though under extreme Pains of Body and Anguish of Spirit yet thus expresseth himself Job 19.23 24 25 26 27. Oh that my words were now written Oh that they were printed in a Book that they were graven with an iron Pen and Lead in the Rock for ever For I know that my Redeemer liveth and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the Earth And though after my Skin Worms destroy this Body yet in my Flesh shall I see God Whom I shall see for my self and mine Eyes shall behold
Love they feed heartily and are merry without any Check in themselves or fear of After-repentance It is so with them that feast in Heaven that are called to the Supper of the Lamb that eat and drink in his Kingdom that partake of that Feast full of fat things a Feast of wine on the lees of fat things full of marrow of wine on the lees well refined Isa 25.6 that partake of the Delicacies of Heaven of the Riches and costly Entertainment there they know they are heartily welcome to Heaven that they are not invited as Esther invited Haman to her Banquet to betray him but that they are in God's Presence out of the purest Love out of the most sincere Motive their Faithfulness to him their Sufferings for him and to the most desirable End the mutual Solace and Content of each in other God hath not any intent to make a farther Triall of them as of Adam in Paradise but to put an end to their Sufferings and hard Service that they may keep an everlasting Sabbath with him in Glory I have shewed you in some Adumbration those things which Eye hath not seen nor Ear heard neither hath it entred into the Heart of man to conceive even the things God hath prepared for them that love him 1 Cor. 2.9 Whereby I have given you a little Taste of those Joys the Fulness of which in God's Presence I should now insist on which was my II. PROPOSITION That there is a Fulness in these Joys This might be demonstrated by the Kinds of them they being not onely bodily but Spiritual not mixt but pure not in a less but a most intense degree not for a short time but for ever But this may perhaps be declared more fully in the handling of the III. OBSERVATION That at God's right hand there are Pleasures for evermore III. PROPOSITION That these Joys in God's Presence in their Plenitude or Fulness as they belong to Christ so also to all true Believers This is deducible from our Lord Christ 's words Joh. 16.20 21 22. Verily verily I say unto you that ye shall weep and lament but the World shall rejoyce and ye shall be sorrowfull but your Sorrow shall be turned into Joy A woman when she is in travail hath Sorrow because her hour is come but as soon as she is delivered of the Child she remembreth no more the Anguish for joy that a man is born into the world And ye now therefore have Sorrow but I will see you again and your Heart shall rejoyce and your Joy no man taketh from you Whereupon the Apostle saith 1 Joh. 3.2 Beloved now are we the Sons of God and it doth not yet appear what we shall be but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is The same condition of Joy and Glory though in an inferiour degree shall be to the adopted Sons of God as is to the onely-begotten Son of God and it is God's righteous Judgment that they which sow in Tears should reap in Joy Psal 126.5 IV. PROPOSITION That the Assurance of these Joys set before Christ was the grand Support and Encouragement of him in his Obedience active and passive and is so still to all the Holy Saints who doe and suffer according to the Will of God As concerning Christ it is expresly delivered Heb. 12.2 that for the Joy set before him he endured the Cross despising the Shame And that it is so to all the Servants of Christ is frequently told us Rom. 5.1 2 3. Being justified by Faith we have Peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ By whom we have access by Faith into this Grace wherein we stand and rejoyce in the hope of the Glory of God And not onely so but we glory in Tribulation also 2 Cor. 4.16 17 18. For which cause we faint not but though our Outward man perish yet the Inward man is renewed day by day For our light Affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of Glory While we look not at the things that are seen but the things which are not seen for the things which are seen are Temporal but the things which are not seen are Eternal APPLICATION I do but cursorily pass over these Points that I may make some Application to your use and that shall be 1. To refute the Censures of Carnal men who count the Course of the Righteous to be Madness and his End without Honour and therefore have him in Derision and as a Proverb of Reproach as it was observed long agoe in the Book of Wisedom Chap. 5.3 4. They can discern no Joys in the humble penitent Believers either at present or for the future They are no whit acquainted with the Joy of the Holy Ghost nor the Comforts of Christ nor the Fulness of Joy that is in the Presence of God and for this cause imagine the mortified Christian to be but a melancholick man that foolishly pines away himself not injoying that Mirth and that Benefit of such things as are allowed to the sons of men And therefore if they find a person to be of a wounded Spirit of a troubled Conscience if through Weakness a person of a tender Conscience be pensive afflicted with the sense of Sin and perplexed in Spirit they impute it to Religion to hearing of Sermons and performing other holy Duties while they themselves think there is nothing better then to be merry while they may to eat and drink for to morrow they shall die Come on say they let us enjoy the good things that are present and let us speedily use the Creatures like as in youth Let us fill our selves with costly Wine and Ointments and let no Flower of the Spring pass by us Let us crown our selves with Rose-buds before they be withered Let none of us goe without his part of our Jollity let us leave tokens of our Joyfulness in every place for this is our Portion and our Lot is this Wised 2.6 7 8 9. Come ye say they I will fetch Wine and we will fill our selves with strong Drink and to morrow shall be as this day and much more abundant Isa 56.12 But sure sober Infidels have taken such Speeches to be rather the Speeches of Brutes then of Men. Who can conceive that Man that hath an immortal Spirit breathed into him from the Father of Spirits should have no higher Joys then sensual Delights that he should be satisfied with such Contents as are onely from Sublunary things If the Philosophers knew that Vertue of it self could give such Tranquillity of mind such ample Content as that they could discern the Joys of Sensualists to be but the Foolery of besotted men Christians may discern that the Joys of Philosophers in their dim Light of Reason and Morall honesty together with their glorying in their Idols could be but as Moon-light compared to the Sun and their Joys
in Christ In God's Favour and Presence are the real Joys though obscured from the World by the mean Condition upon Earth of those that possess them 2. Oh then you who have heard what Joys there are in God be persuaded to quicken and comfort your selves by them Let not the Scoffs or Censures of the profane Carnalist affright you from your Choice Place your Hope in the pursuance of those Joys that are Spiritual that are Heavenly David Moses S. Paul and He who was the wisest of men our Lord Christ slighted all the Contents on Earth and patiently underwent all Afflictions all the Reproaches and Persecutions of men that they might attain the Fulness of Joys in God's Presence Surely should all your days on Earth be spent with never so much Mirth yet you would be great Losers should you lose the Joys of Heaven Yea the want of the Peace of Conscience and Joy in the Spirit on Earth will so damp the Joys of the most Atheistical Voluptuaries on Earth that they will find them to be far short of that Sweetness they imagine in them and in the end to be as Gall and Wormwood in their Bowells On the other side the Joys of Christ and Christians in present fruition and future hope will countervail all those bitter Potions they drink here and fill them with endless and unmeasurable Satisfaction hereafter Let then the Joy of the Lord be your strength Nehem. 8.10 your Encouragement to follow all the Holy ones of God chiefly our Lord Christ running with patience the Race set before you and looking unto Jesus the Authour and Finisher of your Faith Amen LAVS DEO MAN'S Guide to Glory The Twenty-third SERMON PSAL. lxxiij 24. Thou shalt guide me with thy Counsell and afterwards receive me to Glory WE have in this Psalm whether composed by or for Asaph to sing a Skirmish between the Flesh and the Spirit with the Victory of the Spirit thereby strengthened to stand for God and to adhere to his Party The Combat arose from the Quarrel that humane Reason had against Divine Providence as either unequall or impotent in that the Wicked prospered in the world when the Godly as poor Abjects were depressed and trampled upon by the Nimrods of the Earth As if this did argue either that God was ignorant of humane Affairs that he saw not through the thick Clouds that according to the Epicurean Fancy he followed his Pleasure in Heaven and let things below run at randome leaving them to Chance or that he would not or could not remedy such Irregularities as fell out in the Government of this lower World To which the Spirit opposeth after some Staggering this Defence That the Prosperity of the Wicked was but for a moment an empty Bitter-sweet a fansied Dream a meer Vanity ending in Terrours which suddenly and irresistibly cast them down like a Hurricane and so carry them away to Destruction and Consumption That on the other side the Godly are preserved and guided to Glory And thence is the Spirit 's Io Paean its triumphant Song ascribing Happiness to men of pure Hearts and expressing a Resolution to hold fast to God as being well assured of Divine Guidance and Advancement in the words read to you Thou shalt guide me with thy Counsell and afterwards receive me to Glory In which words the Psalmist expresseth the Foundation of his future Happiness as in the Verse before he declares the Cause of his present Standing notwithstanding the Storm of Temptation that was upon him upon what Bottom he secures his Soul notwithstanding such Onsets and Perills of wandering out of his way to Blessedness For attaining of which Felicity he ascribes nothing to a fansied Light within him or power of Free will but to that special efficacious Grace which is preventing and sustaining that worketh in God's people both to will and to doe of his good pleasure Phil. 2.13 His Tuition and his Guidance is the entire and onely Cause of a Saint's assured Beatitude And this the Authour of the Psalm doth acknowledge whilst he expresses the sense he had of his own nearness to Ruine when as it is vers 2. he found that as for him his Feet were almost gone his Steps had well-nigh slipt had not God been with him continually and held him by the right hand guided him with his Counsell and led him to Glory From whence these Observations offer themselves 1. That when God leaves a person to his own Counsell it is a Forerunner of his Perdition 2. That it is the Safety of God's Servants that they are guided by his Counsell 3. That those whom God guides by his Counsell he doth bring to Glory I. OBSERVATION That when God leaves a person to his own Counsell it is a Forerunner of his Perdition That which is said Psal 81.12 that God gave the people of Israel up unto their own hearts Lust and they walked in their own Counsells and therefore he did not subdue their Enemies nor turn his hand against their Adversaries vers 14. doth sufficiently intimate that the Cause of their wasting and spoiling by their Enemies was God's leaving them to their own Hearts Lusts and their walking in their own Counsells The like Speech we have in the New Testament in that Sermon which was made by S. Paul and Barnabas at Lystra when to take them off from their intention of sacrificing to themselves they told them of the Evil of their doings and of the pernicious Consequence of their practices in sacrificing to them that were but Vanities and how that God in times past suffered all Nations to walk in their own Ways Which Passages do evince that the reason why both Jews and Gentiles were under Sin all the World were become guilty before God all had sinned and came short of the Glory of God Rom. 3.9 19 23. were under Wrath and Condemnation was because they were left to their own Counsells For in that case as it is Rom. 1.18 they held the Truth in Vnrighteousness vers 22. professing themselves wise they became fools Wherefore God also gave them up to Vncleanness through the Lusts of their own Hearts to dishonour their own bodies between themselves Who changed the Truth of God into a Lie and worshipped and served the Creature more then the Creatour who is blessed for ever Amen vers 24 25. For this cause God gave them up unto vile Affections And even as they did not like to retain God in their Knowledge God gave them over to a reprobate mind to doe those things which are not convenient vers 26 28. which brought upon them the Judgment of God And to like purpose is that Prediction which is upon cogent reason conceived to be verified in the Roman Apostasie 2 Thess 2.10 11 12. Because they received not the love of the Truth that they might be saved for this cause God shall send them strong Delusions that they should believe a Lie That they all might be damned who believed
not the Truth but had pleasure in Vnrighteousness And it is indeed just with God that they who forsake him should be forsaken by him which must of necessity be their Downfall for mens own Counsells are but as rotten Posts which if they be shaken the House will fall of it self All the Thoughts and Devices of man are but vain even the Wisedom of the world is Foolishness with God for it is written He taketh the wise in their own Craftiness and again The Lord knoweth the Thoughts of the wise that they are vain 1 Cor. 3.19 20. It is with Men as with Sheep that wander from their Pasture and Shepherd they are caught and made a Prey to Wolves and Foxes so those who leave God's Counsell and chuse their own Ways are easily beguiled and enslaved by Satan to their Destruction But which is the II. OBSERVATION It is the Safety of God's Servants that they are guided by his Counsell There is a twofold Counsell of God The first is that Counsell by which he guides himself of which the Apostle speaketh Ephes 1.11 that God worketh all things after the Counsell of his own Will and of which the Psalmist saith Psal 33.10 11. that The Lord bringeth the Counsell of the Heathen to nought he maketh the Devices of the people of none effect The Counsell of the Lord standeth for ever the Thoughts of his Heart to all generations And this Counsell of God is oft times contrary to Man's and clean different from Man's Imaginations For though there are many Devices in man's heart nevertheless the Counsell of the Lord that shall stand Prov. 19.21 Hereby he asserts his own Singularity Independency and Sovereign Dominion as Isa 46.9 10. Remember the former things of old for I am God and there is none else I am God and there is none like me declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times the things that are not yet done saying My Counsell shall stand and I will doe all my Pleasure This is not that Counsell of God by which he guides his Servants to Glory this being the Secret which belongs onely to the Lord. But it is the Thing revealed which belongs to us that we may hear it and doe it it is this Counsell of God whereby he guides his people and brings them to Glory And though it be true that even this is a Secret in respect of the World the Great things of God's Law are strange things to them the Mystery of Godliness is so profound so confessedly great as that none of the Princes of the world knew it yea when it was in Christ opened it was the hidden Wisedom of God in a mystery containing such things as Eye had not seen nor Ear heard nor had entred into the Heart of man to conceive even the things which God hath prepared for them that love him Yet it was ordained by God before the world to our Glory and revealed to his people by his Spirit who have received not the spirit of the world but the Spirit which is of God that they might know the things which are freely given them of God as it is 1 Cor. 2.12 This Secret of the Lord is with them that fear him and he will shew them his Covenant This is not either an imaginary Light in every man conceived by deluded Quakers as sufficient to guide them to God nor is it any peculiar Enthusiasm such as Fanatick spirits have been deceived by nor any such Dreams and Apparitions as Friers and Monks have themselves been abused by and miss-led other persons in times of Ignorance nor any such vain Raptures or Conceits as those whereby men have been so lifted up as to despise others as Pygmies in Knowledge in respect of themselves or to fansie as if they were of God's Privy Councill But the Counsell of God by which he guides his Servants is his Word containing his Precepts his Promises and what-ever Revelations in Holy Scripture he hath delivered for our learning that we through Patience and Comfort of the Scripture might have hope especially the word of the Truth of the Gospell such as S. Paul meant Act. 20.20 21 24 26 27. when he said to the Ephesians that he kept nothing back that was profitable to them but testified to Jews and Greeks Repentance towards God and Faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ the Gospell of the Grace of God so that he was pure from the bloud of all men in that he had not shunned to declare unto them the whole Counsell of God This is that Counsell of God which makes men wise unto Salvation or brings to Glory And with this Counsell of his he guides his Servants 1. By the Preaching of it in the Ministry of the Gospell of Christ which is the Power of God unto Salvation Rom. 1.16 2. By the Operation of his Spirit by which they with open face behold as in a Glass the Glory of the Lord and are changed into the same Image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord 2 Cor. 3.18 Hereby they have the mind of Christ 1 Cor. 2.16 To which may be added such speciall Guidance as either by joynt or solitary Prayer Christian Conference Self-examinations particular Experiments secret Motions Illuminations and Warnings remarkable Providences God vouchsafes some of his Children in Temptations against fears of Persecution attempts of Corrupters apprehension of Divine Desertion against all such Scandalls and other Evils as become Precipices into which Souls are cast or Snares and Stumbling-blocks by which they are apt to be overthrown And by this Counsell of God their Feet are guided into the way of Peace and Safety and they after brought to Glory Which is my III. OBSERVATION That those whom God guides by his Counsell he doth at last bring to Glory The Glory which the Psalmist may here mean especially if David were the Penner of this Psalm is not unlikely to be the Glory which he expected in being made King of Israel it being probable that this Psalm was composed in the time of his Persecution under Saul during which he complained that his Enemies did live and were mighty and they that hated him wrongfully were many in number Psal 38.19 Yet no doubt he also had an eye to the Glory which he expected after this Life So Psalm 17. having prayed to the Lord vers 14 15. to deliver his Soul from the Wicked which were his Sword from the men of this world which had their portion in this Life whose bellies God filled with his hid treasures so as that they were full of Children and left the rest of their Substance to their Babes he declares his expectation to be of a higher kind vers 18. As for me I will behold thy face in Righteousness I shall be satisfied when I awake with thy likeness And this the phrase of receiving him to Glory after his guiding him by his Counsell doth most clearly intimate And indeed this is the thing which
is the grand Expectation of the Saints That God will not fail to lead them in his Paths for his Name 's sake and so to order their Steps in his Word that no Iniquity get dominion over them that the Spirit of God will so quicken them as they may run the way of his Commandments that he will enable them to live by Faith in Christ and thereby preserve them to his heavenly Kingdom It is that exceeding and enduring weight of Glory which is wrought by Afflictions and the Guidance of Divine Teachings and Providences that causeth them to look not at the things which may be seen which are but temporall but the things which are unseen and eternall 2 Cor. 4.17 18. For which reason the same Apostle tells the Thessalonians 2 Thess 2.13 14. We are bound to give thanks always to God for you because God hath from the beginning chosen you to Salvation through Sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the Truth Whereunto he called you by our Gospell to the obtaining of the Glory of our Lord Jesus Christ APPLICATION For Application hereof If the Apostle had cause to be thankfull for the Thessalonians because of God's calling them to the obtaining of the Glory of our Lord Christ much more hath each believing Christian cause to be thankfull to God to rejoyce and take Comfort in this so blessed a Condition of God's Guidance by his Counsell so as to bring him to Glory And since the leaving a man to his own Counsell is the Forerunner of Perdition how ought he to dread as a direfull Omen of the most execrable Condition the being given over to follow his own Counsell to be carried away by his own Lusts as being a certain sign of God's Desertion and exposing of him as a Prey to the Devill Wherefore it highly concerns every one who desires his own Salvation to follow that Admonition Psal 2.11 to serve the Lord with fear and rejoyce with trembling or as it is Phil. 2.12 to work out his Salvation with fear and trembling When we consider our own Ignorance in the Way which leads to eternall Life our Folly and Unskilfulness in finding it out our Negligence in inquiring after it our Inadvertency to that Teaching and direction which might guide us in it when we ponder the vanity of humane Reason our Frailty and Easiness in hearkening to Deceivers the incessant Diligence and Vigilancy of the old Serpent in perverting us the impossibility of our attaining to Salvation by our own Wisedom and Strength and the extreme perill of Erring so as to perish eternally if we have not God's Guidance we shall see great cause to fear our selves find great reason to seek the Guidance of God's Counsell and to walk always by it to follow that Light which he hath held forth before us in his Word of Truth especially by his Son the Light of the world the Way the Truth and the Life by whom alone we can goe to the Father without whom we walk in darkness and know not whither we goe Without this Guidance we can doe nothing as we ought but as men driven by our Lusts or seduced by Satan we are hurried violently or tamely drawn into those By-paths which lead down to the Chambers of eternall Death Alas our Temptations which are many and with so much Wiliness laid to insnare us our Insufficiency to think any thing of our selves as of our selves the sad Experience we have of the Falls of many most precious Saints the frequent Complaints of the most mortified Christians who bemoan their Wretchedness by reason of that Body of Death which still depresseth them our Childishness in affecting what is most pleasing to Sense and our little apprehension of our own Necessities our undervaluing of spirituall Blessings in heavenly things in Christ the Prevalency of the Carnall mind in us which is too often as the Biass that turns us that inclines our Free will to Earthly things but is Enmity against God being not subject to God's Law neither indeed can it be All these things I say should make us suspect our selves and examine our Thoughts and Ways whether they be according to God's Counsell or not they should make us consider what Spirit we are of even in our Religious Duties how we are acted not onely in Secular affairs but also in our exercise of Godliness even in our Prayers and most zealous Service of God Solomon's Counsell is very necessary to be followed Prov. 3.5 6. Trust in the Lord with all thine heart and lean not to thine own Vnderstanding In all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths This is the great Stay and Comfort of a self-knowing Christian that observes himself his own Weakness but yet is possessed with the taste of God's Grace That though he be weak and foolish yet he is guided by God's Spirit that he orders the Motions of his life by the Rule of Christ and still seeks to Heaven for Light from thence to lead him that God will guide him with his Counsell and then bring him to his Glory Amen LAVS DEO A BELIEVER'S SAFETY PEACE REST. The Twenty-fourth SERMON PSAL. xl 8. I will both lay me down in peace and sleep for thou Lord onely makest me dwell in Safety WHAT was the Occasion of composing this Psalm is uncertain Whether it were after or before his Entrance into his Kingdom before or after his Victory over Absalom sure it is it was made by David when he was in an holy frame of Spirit And in it he first bespeaks God as a Supplicant v. 1. then expostulates with his insolent Adversaries for their Malignity towards him vers 2. declares his Assurance of Divine Election and Tuition vers 3. admonishes them how to rectifie themselves vers 4 5. mentions the Study of the generality of men with his Request for himself vers 6. acknowledges the meliority of his Choice vers 7. and thereupon infers this Resolution which I have read I will both lay me down in peace and sleep c. There is no difficulty about the Reading or Meaning of the words whether we reade together in id ipsum as the Vulgar Latin or both as our Translation whether we reade Thou Lord onely referring to his single Help or Thou Lord makest me alone though I have no other with me dwell in Safety Hope Confidence or Security This Passage shews his settled Acquiescence in the Tuition of the Almighty grounded upon his experience and knowledge of his Love and Favour without any such anxious Thoughtfulness enfeebling Fears distracting Perplexities as others in the like Distresses and Destitutions to those he was in were wont to be oppressed with It is likely David when he speaks of his laying himself down in peace and sleeping meant it onely of his natural Sleep and his addressing himself thereto To which sense those words lead us Psal 3.5 where he saith I laid me down and slept I awaked for the Lord sustained
there be any After-dutifulness which might be accounted a fit and just Compensation on our part for such Love Who is there that gives any thing to God first Rom. 11.35 Surely when we bring forth any Fruit to God it is but what is of his own Culture Christ is the Vine his Father is the Husbandman and we are God's Husbandry 1 Cor. 3.9 he it is that purgeth the Branches in Christ that they may bring forth more Fruit Joh. 15.1 2. Neither is he that planteth any thing nor he that watereth but God that giveth the increase 1 Cor. 3.7 Who maketh thee to differ from another and what hast thou that thou didst not receive saith the same Apostle 1 Cor. 4.7 Yea were it imagined to suppose an Impossibility that we could of our selves by our own Free will by the Light of Nature so ingratiate ourselves with God as to procure his Favour that we could obtain Arte propriâ by our own Skill or Marte proprio by our own Ability our Filiation our Regeneration our Adoption to be God's Sons yet were not God ingaged by any Worth of our Actions to yield it us this were no Purchace no Exchange of quid pro quo no advantaging God that he might benefit us Rightly saith Elihu Job 35.7 8. If thou be Righteous when givest thou to him or what receiveth he of thy hand Thy Wickedness may hurt a man as thou art and thy Righteousness may profit the son of man But alas all that in such a case we could doe all that Adam himself in his Innocency and Integrity could have done could not have given us such a Claim as that we could have challenged our Adoption as due to us according to distributive Justice in an Arithmetical or Geometrical proportion between our Actings and God's Adoption but that still it must be taken as the free Gift liberrimi Agentis of the most free Agent as the effect of the purest and most immense Love And therefore well said the Apostle Behold what manner of Love the Father hath bestowed on us of free Gift that we should be called the Sons of God Which is the next thing to be considered IV. The effect of this Love of God that we should be called c. The Sons of God are of many sorts The Magistrates are so by Office Psal 82.6 the Angells by Dignity Job 1.6 Adam by Creation Luk. 3.38 and so all other men Act. 17.29 the Posterity of Seth as it is conceived Gen. 6.2 by Profession our Lord Christ is his own Son by peculiar and eternal Generation Rom. 8.32 All Believers are his Sons by Regeneration As many as received him to them he gave power to be the Sons of God even to as many as believe in his name which were born not of bloud nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man but of God Joh. 1.12 13. By Adoption God having predestinated us unto the Adoption of Children by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his Will to the praise of the glory of his Grace Eph. 1.5 6. Regeneration is by a Change of us inwardly whereby we are renewed in the Spirit of our minds and put on the New man which after God is created in Righteousness and Holiness of truth Eph. 4.23 24. Adoption is an Act which alters the outward Estate whereby a person becomes as a Son to another as Moses was to Pharaoh's Daughter Heb. 11.24 It is Naturae similitudo ut Filium quis habere possit quem non generaverit Gaius Inst l. tit 5. an Imitation of Nature whereby a person may have another man's Child as if he were his own Son so that he is his Child by a Legal Right though not by naturall Birth and is to own his Adopter as his Father and he the adopted as his Child And it is this that S. John here means Behold what manner of Love the Father hath given us that we should be called by reason of our Regeneration and Adoption the Sons of God And not onely that we should be so called as if it imported a meer Title Appellation or nudum inane Nomen a bare and empty Name Sure this Adoption as it is by the best highest richest Father so it is to the best greatest and most ample Benefits He that is thus the Son of God by Faith in Christ Jesus hath the Name the Dignity the Honour of a Son of God hath the Spirit of his Son crying Abba Father Gal. 4.6 hath the Apparel of a Son of God the white Linen which is the Righteousness of Saints hath the Provision Protection Attendance of a Child of God the Angells are ministring Spirits to him Heb. 1.14 The Spirit of God is his he is a Member of Christ's Body the Promises are his He hath the Society of Saints on Earth and is come to the Church of the first-born that are written in Heaven All things are his Paul Apollos Cephas Life Death things present things to come and he is Christ's and Christ God's 1 Cor. 3.22 23. If he be a Son then an Heir an Heir of God a Joynt-heir with Christ Rom. 8.17 And can more Favour be desired or imagined to be done by the most Holy and High God to such Beggars Malefactours Rebells condemned Prisoners such base contemptible Wretches as we are We may here cry out with the Apostle O the depth of the Riches both of the Wisedome and Knowledge I may adde and Love of God! how unsearchable are his Judgments and his Ways past finding out Rom. 11.33 With the greatest reason then doth S. John call upon us to behold this which is the last thing to be considered V. The Adverb of demonstration inviting us to consider this Love Behold what manner c. And this may also serve for the APPLICATION This is then the Use to be made of what hath been said and did time permit might be more amply declared of the Love of God in our Adoption that we are to behold it not so much with the Eye of our Body as with the Eye of our Mind Sure the Apostle S. Paul thought this to be of so great consequence that he ceased not to make mention of the Ephesian Believers in his Prayers that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ the Father of Glory might give them the Spirit of wisedom and revelation in the knowledge of Christ that the eyes of their Vnderstanding being enlightned they might know what is the hope of his Calling and what the riches of the glory of his Inheritance in the Saints and what is the exceeding greatness of his Power to us-ward who believe Eph. 1.16 17 18 19. This of all things is most worthy our Contemplation our most full constant accurate Meditation We should behold it in all the Effects of it in us and towards us Every Motion of his Spirit every Providence in escaping Temptations every Gospel-Sermon every Prayer we make invite us to this
shall enquire 1. What is this Walking in a man's Vprightness 2. How this demonstrates the Fear of the Lord 3. What Advantage accrues to a man that walketh in his Uprightness and feareth the Lord. Of these in their order I. What it is for a man to walk in his Vprightness Walking in the primitive acception thereof imports a natural progressive Motion of the Body and Vprightness is that Position of the Body according to which it is so placed as not to incline to one hand more then the other but to be even set between both But in the Metaphorical sense in which hundreds of times this Expression is used in Holy Scripture it signifies the moral Motion of the Mind and Members of a Man as he is a rational Being to be regulated by the Law of his Maker And so it supposeth the Actings of the Understanding Will Affections and Members of a man in an orderly and constant Course out of a vital spiritual Principle in him by a certain Rule from one term of his Motion to another for the attaining of his End Whence it is evident that as to Bodily Walking there are many things requisite or presupposed so to the Spiritual Walking of the Soul or Man in his Uprightness there belong sundry things either as presupposed or required without which he cannot be said to walk in his Uprightness As it is with our Body while we live on Earth there will still be some Motion Man is born to Labour as the Sparks fly upward God hath given to the sons of men sore Travail to be exercised therewith so it is also with the Soul there are stirrings of Thoughts Desires which cause elicit Acts of the Will in its Purposes and imperate Acts in setting the Members of the Body on work for avoiding Evil or obtaining some supposed Good And as corporal Motion is not in an instant but requires Time more or less so for the contriving and prosecuting such Designs as the Will pitches upon the whole Life of man is imployed Likewise as there is in Walking some Place or Person from which or from whom the Motion begins and to which or whom it tends which are called in Philosophy the Terminus à quo the bound from whence and the Terminus ad quem the bound to which it is directed so are there in the moral Actions of the Soul and Members some like Bounds persons are either turned from God after Satan or they are turned from the power of Satan unto God they either move from or to Heaven or Hell Life or Death And as there is a Way in all Walking of the Body in which the Motion is performed Motus est super immobile there must be some fixt and settled thing which men ordinarily walk upon they do not move as Fishes in the Sea or Birds in the Air whose Way hath no fixed Path so it is in mens Walking spiritually there is a broad Way which leadeth to Destruction or a narrow Way which leadeth to Life a Way of Satan's or a Way of God's in which every man walks And as there is in man's Walking a vital locomotive Principle which is well or ill ordered according to the Sight and the state of the Members and such Guidance as is from others Direction so that sometimes for want of Sight or Light a person stumbles and falls or by reason of Mistakes from himself or Mis-direction of other persons he errs and never attains to that which he moves towards sometimes he prospers in his Motion seeing his Way aright heeding it not fainting but holding on to the end of his Journey So it is in mens Spiritual Walking there is a wrong and a right Principle which moves their Mind and Will they walk after the Flesh or after the Spirit their Way is either Satan's or God's his Dictates or God's Precepts they walk in Darkness or in the Light either they are weary of well-doing and goe back to Perdition and turn aside to crooked Ways or else they discern the Errour of their ways chuse the Way of Life goe on with Alacrity and liveliness therein and persevere to the end Also as in Bodily Walking the Motion is not per Saltum one Step or Leap doth not begin and end it but it is progressive there is Step after Step one slower another quicker one part of the Way is sooner and with less trouble and danger passed over then the other So it is in the Spiritual Walking the Actings of the Mind and Will are not performed all together neither the immanent nor transient Acts of a man whether right or wrong are done at once but some one hour some another with various Success with diversity of Ability and Speed and Event by reason of the Assistence or Hindrance of concurrent Accidents or Causes which do frequently alter both the Motion and the Consequence of it such as are the Temptations of Satan or the Influence of God's Spirit the Society of evil Company or the Converse with Godly persons corrupt Teachers or holy Pastours outward estate of Prosperity or Adversity with many other things which occasion mens Progress to be more or less expedite either to the better or the worse Thus I have somewhat opened to you what this Walking is in general It is now farther necessary that I shew you more specially what is this Walking of a man in his Uprightness which shews he fears the Lord. 1. For a man who feareth the Lord to walk in his Uprightness it is necessary that he set his face towards God that is that he propound God's Glory and the obtaining of his Favour as his End In all such Actions as are rational it is the End propounded by the Doer which hath a chief sway in the denominating of them good Finis dat Mediis Amabilitatem Many brave Exploits done by heroical men onely to immortalize their Names to spread their Fame though they were advantageous to the people of their Generation yet being not acted out of Dutifulness to God as the impulsive to exalt God as the final Cause they were but splendida Peccata glistering Sins like Gloe-worms or Wood that seems to shine in the dark but is nothing else but rotten matter or mere Dirt. He that walks uprightly stoops not down to the Earth nor pores on his own Cloaths but looks upwards to something higher then himself towards Heaven Pharisees Alms Fasting Prayers though much esteemed by themselves and other men were not regarded by God as being done for themselves not for God But such Actions as are done without Ostentation with an eye to God's Approbation though in secret and of no account with men yet are they in the sight of God of great price as S. Peter saith 1 Pet. 3.4 of the hidden man of the Heart in that which is not corruptible even the ornament of a meek and quiet Spirit The Rectitude of the Heart is most conducible to a man's upright walking which emboldned Hezekiah thus to
mind God in his Prayer Isa 38.3 Remember now O Lord I beseech thee how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect Heart and have done that which is good in thy sight Which acquaints us with the next Condition of this Walking 2. It must be a Walking in God's Ways It is not enough for him that walks in his Uprightness that his Intentions be good but he must also chuse the Paths of Uprightness he must doe what God requires to be done and to be done by him He that ran well but extra Viam out of the Way appointed him beyond his Line had not the Crown assigned him by the Judges in the Greek Games Neither hath he the Approbation or Reward of upright Walking who walks by another Rule then God commands They that chuse either their own Conceits or the Tradition of the Elders or any other humane Authority for the Square of their Actions are judged to worship God in vain to draw near him with their Mouth and to honour him with their Lips but to remove their Heart far from him whose Fear towards him is taught by the Precepts of men Isa 29.13 They are such as eye the Dictates of Rabbins the Decrees of Popes the Canons of Councils above or equally with the Precepts of Christ they make Conscience of the Vow of Corban not of honouring Father and Mother they will by no means break the Rules of the Founder of their Order but scruple not the violating of Christ's Commands Neither can those be said to walk in their Uprightness that make Conscience of keeping one Command but not of another that will not swear yet will lie that will pray to God and yet defraud men that will give Alms yet adore a Crucifix that will pay Tith of Mint Anise and Cumin and leave the weightier matters of the Law Righteousness Judgment Faith and the Love of God that abhor Idols yet commit Sacrilege All upright Walking is copulative takes in its Walk all God's Commands it excludes none but observes all in their due order and place Then shall I not be ashamed saith David Psal 119.6 when I have respect to all thy Commands Yet herein there must be heed taken that we regard each in its proper time To keep the Sabbath by Rest to attend the Sacrifice was a Duty but not when Mercy was to be shewed Vice is to be reproved but in fit season Sin is to be punished but by him that is thereto authourized Sacrifice is to be offered but by the Priest He that walks in his Uprightness must not onely look that the thing he does be commanded but that it be commanded to him Each must walk in his own Path in his own Rank if he will walk in his Uprightness 3. He that walks in his Uprightness must walk warily steadily evenly constantly according to that of Solomon Prov. 4.25 26 27. Let thine eyes look right on and let thine ey-lids look straight before thee Ponder the Path of thy feet and let all thy ways be established Turn not to the right hand nor to the left remove thy foot from Evil. So saith the Apostle Eph. 5.15 16. See that ye walk circumspectly not as fools but as wise redeeming the time He that walks in his Uprightness hath his Eyes in his head to keep his Way gazeth not about to satisfie his Curiosity but minds his Journey the Way he is to walk in the Work he is to doe listens not to seducing Company that seeks to divert him out of his Path takes heed of such Offers such Temptations as may be Stumbling-blocks to him to cause him to fall sets his Foot his Purposes firmly that he may not slip looks not back like Lot's Wife to Sodom to his former Pleasures He goes not on weeping like Phalti when he restored Michal to David but like David with enlarged heart he lifts up his feet to run the way of God's Commands He is not slothfull but a diligent follower of them that through Faith and Patience have inherited the Promises He looks to the Cloud of Witnesses that have gone before him and keeps company with them who confess themselves Pilgrims and Strangers on Earth and thereby declare plainly that they seek another City to wit an heavenly He casts away every weight and the Sin that doth so easily beset him that he may with patience run the Race that is set before him Such do arm themselves against Encounters of Spiritual Wickednesse that may rob or spoil them of their Provision for their Journey They goe on as David said of himself Psal 71.16 in the strength of the Lord God Their Strength is in him in whose Heart are the ways of them they goe from Strength to Strength Psal 84.5 7. The Joy of the Lord is their Strength his Love heartens them the Hope of Glory keeps them from fainting it is as an Anchor of the Soul firm and stable and which entreth into that within the Veil They look unto Jesus the Authour and finisher of their Faith who for the Joy that was set before him endured the Cross and despised the Shame and is set down at the right hand of God They endure Contradiction of Sinners and resist unto bloud striving against Sin In a word Faith in God through Jesus Christ Joy in the Holy Ghost Love to Christ Hope of the Inheritance above animate them to holy Resolutions of Obedience to God confirm them against Difficulties keep them from fainting under any Pressures till they get to the end of their Journey and that Rest which is prepared for them that walk uprightly II. How this Walking of a man in his Vprightness doth demonstrate the Fear of the Lord. Such Walking doth evidently demonstrate the Fear of the Lord that is that reverential Regard of God as their Lord and Master the Supreme Law-giver and Judge to whom they are subject to be the Principle that acts them and carries them on with vigour to walk in their Uprightness For 1. In that they set their faces towards God they shew that their Walking tends to please God to gain his Approbation which is the greatest sign of Fear in a Servant to his Master a Child to his Father a Subject to his Prince for in all these Relations it is the Reverence of Superiours which moves the Inferiour to put forth his ability for the Superiour So it is the Fear of God that moves the upright Walker to glorifie God in his Body and Spirit which are God's to present his Body to him as a living Sacrifice in his reasonable Service to devote himself to God and to gratifie him with what Offering he hath with what Performance he is able to doe 2. A man's Choice of God's Commands as his Path shews his Subjection to him and that is the greatest proof of an holy Fear of the Divine Majesty He is a man after God's own heart who will doe all his Will as it is said of David Act.
13.22 Which is the great Scope of him that walks in his Uprightness and consequently a proof of his owning God's Sovereignty and uniting of his Heart to fear his Name 3. A man's Walking in his Uprightness proceeds from that Faith whereby the Believer presents God to himself sets him before his face sees him that is invisible as Moses did Heb. 11.27 which begets Fear of God takes away servile Fear of others keeps him in even and constant Obedience as Enoch Noah Abraham and all the Holy Patriarchs who walked with and before God without Fear of their Enemies in the Fear of God depending on his Protection and subjecting themselves to his Direction which engaged the Lord to be their God III. What Advantage accrues to him that walketh in his Vprightness and feareth the Lord. Of which very briefly The Psalmist tells us in few words Psal 84.11 that the Lord God is a Sun and a Shield the Lord will give Grace and Glory no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly Psal 97.11 Light is sown for the Righteous and Gladness for the Vpright in heart And after him the Apostle Gal. 6.16 As many as walk according to the Rule of the new Creature in Christ Jesus Peace be on them and Mercy and on the Israel of God Whence it is rightly inferred that all such as walk in their Uprightness out of a Fear of the Lord are assured of Light to guide them Protection to preserve them Peace to quiet them Supply of good things to chear them Assistence to help them Favour to comfort them and Glory to advance them APPLICATION And now what remains but that each of us as the Prophet minds the Jews Hag. 1.5 consider our Ways whether we have chosen the Way that leads to Life or that which is the Path to Destruction whether we walk uprightly in the Fear of God or perversly in Compliance with Satan All of us have a Journey to goe here we have no continuing City We may say as David 1 Chron. 29.15 We are Strangers before God as were all our Fathers our days on the Earth are as a Shadow and there is none abiding no expectation of a settled Mansion here We must arise and depart for this is not our Rest because it is polluted Mic. 2.10 Oh then how much doth it concern us to heed which Way we take whether the tendence of our Course of life be to walk in our Vprightness as those that fear the Lord or our Conversation be in the Lusts of our Flesh fulfilling the desires of the Flesh and of the Mind whether we devote our selves to the Fear of God spend our lives imploy our time and estate to please him to doe his Will or our Walking be according to the course of this World according to the Prince of the power of the Air the Spirit that worketh in the children of Disobedience If you say you fear God and expect Heaven you must manifest it by departing from your sinfull Ways by serving him in Holiness and Righteousness before him all the days of your life They must walk before God in their Uprightness here who would stand before God in Happiness hereafter Not Words but Works not a Form of Godliness but the Power of it prevails with God Be not deceived saith the Apostle Gal. 6.7 8. God is not mocked for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he reap For he that soweth to his Flesh shall of the Flesh reap Corruption but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap Life everlasting Follow therefore Holiness without which no man shall see the Lord. Walk with that Company here with which you would have your Lot hereafter Walk not in the way with them with whom you dread to be associated at last Take heed of Complying with the World in your Life with whom you would not be condemned at your Death Consider the End of your Life and follow their Faith whose End you would purchase at the greatest rate Remember the Advice of the Prophet Jerem. 6.16 Thus saith the Lord Stand in the ways and see and ask for the old Paths where is the good Way and walk therein and ye shall find Rest for your Souls I direct you not to follow any New Lights neither to seek any new Ways but I advise you to goe to Christ that you may find Rest for your Souls to take his Yoke upon you and to learn of him to receive him and to walk in him rooted and built up in him and established in the Faith as he hath taught you abounding therein with thanksgiving Believe in the Light that ye may be the Children of Light Walk as Children of Light and walk as such while you have the Light Casting off the works of Darkness and putting on the Armour of Light walk honestly as in the day not in Rioting and Drunkenness not in Chambering and Wantonness not in Strife and Envying But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the Flesh to fulfill the Lusts thereof To all which let me adde that of the Apostle Eph. 5.1 2. Be followers of God as dear Children and walk in Love as Christ also hath loved us and hath given himself for us an Offering and a Sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour Amen LAVS DEO THE IMPIOUS CONTEMPT Part II. The Twenty-eighth SERMON PROVERBS xiv 2. But he that is perverse in his Ways despiseth him OF all Points of Wisedom this is the Inlet and as it were the Door to fear the Lord and of all Ways of Folly this is the greatest to despise him The one is demonstrated by a man's walking in his Vprightness of which I have already spoken the other by Perverseness in a man's Ways which is now to be considered II. PROPOSITION He that is perverse in his Ways despiseth the Lord. Concerning this three Quaere's are to be answered like as there were in handling the former Proposition 1. Who is meant by him that is perverse in his Ways and when a man is said to be so 2. How such an one despiseth the Lord. 3. What is the Evil of such Despising the Lord. Of which in their order I. Who is meant by him that is perverse in his Ways By Ways as hath been already said are meant the Actions of a Man as he is a Rational Being whose Motions should be ordered by such a Rule as his Creatour hath made known and should tend to his Maker's Honour For God at first made Man upright or simple so as that he had no other Way but that which was God's but they have sought out many Inventions saith Solomon Eccles. 7.29 Whence it comes to pass that there are many and various Ways in which men now walk contrary to God's Way that is his prescribed Will which is the Way that every man should walk in and then he walketh in his Vprightness But when he chuseth any Invention of his own to direct the
To whom those are near of kin of whom S. Paul speaks in his Farewell-Sermon to the Ephesians Act. 20.29 30. I know this that after my departing shall grievous Wolves enter in amongst you not sparing the Flock Also of your own selves shall men arise speaking perverse things to draw away Disciples after them All which perverse Proceedings are much aggravated by the Opposition in them not onely to the Law but also to the Gospel For as the carnal Mind is Enmity against God in that it is not subject to the Law of God Rom. 8.7 so it is much greater Perverseness in a man's Ways to neglect so great Salvation which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him God also bearing them witness both with Signs and Wonders and with divers Miracles and Gifts of the Holy Ghost according to his own will Heb. 2.3 4. And therefore our Saviour saith Joh. 3.19 This is the Condemnation per Eminentiam the great Condemnation that Light is come into the World and men loved Darkness rather then Light because their deeds were evil It is also so much the greater Perverseness and renders it incurable unpardonable for men after their profession of the Truth after Vows to God of adhering to Christ after they have been once enlightned have tasted of the heavenly Gift and been made partakers of the Holy Ghost have tasted of the good Word of God and the powers of the World to come then to fall away so that they crucifie the Son of God afresh and put him to an open shame Heb. 6.5 6. This is the most contumelious way of Despising the Lord among all the sorts and degrees of Perverseness in our Ways as may be discerned in answering the Second Quaere II. How he that is perverse in his Ways despiseth the Lord. Despising saith Aristotle in the Second of his Rhetoricks in the Chapter of Anger is the Act of Opinion in not shewing any regard of a thing or person And it hath its Effects in divers degrees Sometimes there is onely Slighting making none or little Esteem of either Sometimes Damnifying daring to harm because there is so mean a Thought thereof as not to fear any Revenge Sometimes there is insolent Scorning thereof as of no value And in all these degrees a person is despised when the Contempt is offered either immediately or directly as when a King is reviled to his face his Person kicked spurned derided openly or mediately when any such Usage is shewed to that which doth more peculiarly pertain to his Dignity as when his Image Coin Laws Son Friends Servants Officers Embassadours are vilified or abused The Contempt of whom though it be first terminated on them yet when it is offered for the King's sake out of Enmity to or Disesteem of him or Affront to his Government the Relation to him being known it is either actually or by interpretation a Despising of the King himself Now as the Prophet Malachi hath it 1.14 I am a great King saith the Lord of hoasts and my Name is dreadfull among the Heathens He is the true God the living God and an everlasting King Jer. 10.10 There is none like unto him he is Great and his Name is great in might vers 6. According as his Name is glorious and fearfull Deut. 28.58 so are all the things pertaining to his Essence and to his Greatness there is some Reverence due to them And God is despised not onely when he is disclaimed as he was by Pharaoh Exod. 5.2 or not minded as by those wicked ones who through the Pride of their countenance will not seek after God God is not in all their thoughts Psal 10.4 or when he is reproached and blasphemed as he was by Rabshakeh Isa 36.20 or when his Worship is neglected as it was Mal. 1.6 7. or his Providence denied as when it was asked Where is the God of Judgment Malach. 2.17 But also when his Works are undervalued He that mocketh the Poor reproacheth his Maker saith Solomon Prov. 17.5 Specially when his Children are despised He that despiseth despiseth not Man but God who hath also given unto us his Holy Spirit 1 Thess 4.8 In like manner to slight God's Laws his Threatnings his Judgments is an high Contempt of God But God is most of all despised when the Gospel the Grace of God in Christ the Embassadours that bring it the Son of God himself the Image of the invisible God are contemned and the Spirit of God despighted He that despiseth you despiseth me saith Christ and he that despiseth me despiseth him that sent me Luk. 10.16 And in this respect he that is perverse in his Ways despiseth the Lord because he despiseth God's Commands his Gospel his Messengers but most of all his Son in whom he is well pleased and his Spirit of Grace the chiefest of all the Gifts that he communicates unto men Whence may be discerned III. What is the Evil of such Despising of the Lord. Of which in a word All Indignities offered to a King are high Misdemeanours to rebell against his Crown to speak evil of his Person are Crimina laesae Majestatis amount to High Treason and are usually avenged by the most shamefull and tormenting Death Doubtless the Perverseness of his Spirit who is obstinate in his Ways and despiseth God's Statutes and his Judgments is no less High Treason against the Heavenly Majesty his Crown and Dignity chiefly when his Grace is rejected his Son is not kissed his Spirit is despighted there being no greater Affront to him who is the blessed and onely Potentate King of Kings and Lord of Lords then when his Grace in Christ is rejected when men will not have Christ to rule over them but prefer the Prince of this World before the Lord of Glory the Prince of Life and in stead of welcoming the Spirit of Life embrace the accursed Fiend the Authour of Death This makes the Wrath of God hot so that they perish from the way when his Wrath is kindled but a little Psal 2.12 Such men make God a Liar 1 Joh. 5.10 And that doth in effect un-God him and dethrone him By despising the Riches of his Goodness after their impenitent hard Heart they treasure up to themselves Wrath against the day of Wrath and revelation of the righteous Judgment of God Rom. 2.4 5. Which can be no less then fiery Indignation which shall devour the Adversaries who tread under foot the Bloud of the Son of God count the Bloud of the Covenant wherewith persons are sanctified an unholy thing and doe despight to the Spirit of Grace Heb. 10.27 29. APPLICATION Oh that these things were seriously pondered and laid to heart by you How many thousands of holy Monitions to turn from your evil Ways have some of you had How often hath God spoken to you by his Judgments from Heaven on your selves or others How often hath Christ stood at the door of
your Souls and knocked that he might be let in that he might sup with you and you with him How frequently have the Preachers of the Gospel the Servants of Christ invited you to his Supper to be partakers of that Grace of God which exceeds in worth all the Treasures of the Earth all the Pleasures under the Sun which is of greater Necessity and Advantage then all the Traffick by Land or Sea and yet his Word is not believed Oxen and Farms and Wives yea that which is worse Dalilah's Idols are minded more esteemed then Christ then his Love his Spirit his Kingdome his Righteousness Where is the man that is willing to deny himself his own Contents unjust Gains unclean Affections injurious Projects yea his vain Opinions and to take up Christ's Cross after him Where is he that will suffer I will not say Loss of Life or Goods or Credit with men for Christ but even a Divorce from his Lusts that will forbear a profane ungodly Oath a devillish Revenge or undergoe so much as a Scoff or Reproach that he may follow Christ and be his Disciple If this be not Perverseness in our Ways the Despising of the Lord in the most vilifying way I know not what is I beseech you bethink your selves in good earnest what will be the End of these things Think of that Wisedom Solomon speaks of Prov. 1. v. 22. and so forwards The very reading of it methinks should awaken and affright as many of you as yet persist in your Perverseness and will none of Wisedom's Counsel but despise all its Reproof As therefore you would not be rejected by Christ despised by him in that Day when he shall bid some depart from him into everlasting Fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels deny I beseech you your Vngodliness and worldly Lusts obey the voice of Christ trust in him and he will then receive you and ye shall be where he is Which the Lord grant c. Amen LAVS DEO THE SAINTS Future Glory The Twenty-ninth SERMON REVEL vij 15. Therefore are they before the Throne of God and serve him day and night in his Temple and he that sitteth on the Throne shall dwell among them YOU have here exhibited to your view the most happy and glorious Spectacle which humane spirits are capable of Brave Shows as at Princes Coronations and Marriages do greatly attract the Eyes of men One of the ancient Fathers wished much to see a Roman Triumph in its greatest Glory The Queen of Sheba was so affected with the Glory of Solomon and his Court that she took a great and costly Journey to behold them and was so transported with what she saw and heard that there was no more Spirit in her But I may well say A Greater then Solomon a braver Sight then Solomon's Court or a Roman Triumph is here Here is the God of Glory on his Throne Here the Court of glorious Spirits which are made perfect have their most splendid Robes on and the Ensign of their Victory in their hands that Palma nobilis which carries to God the Offscouring of the Earth and makes them that hid themselves in Dens and Caves of the Earth to be advanced to the Habitation of God in the highest Heavens And therefore this Show is worth your beholding which I shall endeavour to present to you though not in its Splendour yet so as I hope it may raise you up as to an Admiration and Extolling of the Divine Excellency so also to an Imitation of and a Following after those glorious Saints of whom it is said in the Verse before my Text that they came out of great Tribulation and washed their Robes and made them white in the Bloud of the Lamb and in this Verse Therefore are they before the Throne of God and serve him day and night in his Temple and he that sitteth on the Throne shall dwell among them In which two Verses you have described 1. The Exploits and Estate of these noble Warriours or Combatants on Earth They had a great Fight of Afflictions They wrastled not onely against Flesh and Bloud but against Principalities and Powers against the Rulers of the Darkness of this world against Spiritual Wickedness in high or heavenly places And though they had sore Falls yet they washed their Robes and made them white in the Bloud of the Lamb and by the word of their Testimony at last they overcame Satan and the World not loving their Lives unto the death This was their gallant Fight of Faith this their glorious Victory over their proud and most treacherous Enemies 2. Their Triumph their Ascent into the Capitol their Reception into Heaven They are before the Throne of God and serve him day and night in his Temple and he that sitteth on the Throne shall dwell among them Their present State there may be seen in these Particulars 1. In the place where they are they do not as they did on Earth wander about in Desarts and Mountains and in Dens and Caves of the earth but are about the Throne of God Nor are they cloathed with Sheep-skins and Goat-skins but have Royal or Priestly Robes like the Servants of Solomon about his Throne or the Priests in their Garments at the Altar or in the Temple 2. Their Imployment is not to grind in Mills or make Brick under a cruel Pharaoh but like the Priests and Levites at the Temple they day and night serve the Great the Glorious and Blessed Potentate who is King of Kings and Lord of Lords who onely hath Immortality and dwelleth in Light incomprehensible And their Service is the most pleasant and without any Tediousness to wit to praise and magnifie him everlastingly 3. Their Company is not base sordid and vexing Men or malicious and cruel Devils but he that sitteth on the Throne the King of Glory who hath all Beauty and Loveliness who will dwell among them so as to protect them and satisfie them with his Presence I shall not have time to insist upon the description of the Conflict and Atchievement of these Blessed Saints when upon Earth though the particle Therefore referring thither might induce me to consider thereof Nor is it necessary to inquire into the Time of that great Affliction which these are said to come out of I will without limitation of it to one sort of Saints as Martyrs at one time whether in the Ten first great Persecutions under the Pagan Roman Emperours or those under the bloudy Roman Popes by Burnings and most cruel Massacres apply this to all Saints and thence observe 1. That Afflictions Persecutions yea Death do not extinguish the Being of Saints who wash their Robes and make them clean in the Bloud of the Lamb. 2. That when they are removed from Men below they are placed before the Throne of God 3. That there they serve God in his Temple in Heaven perpetually 4. That they have God everlastingly cohabiting with them Of which in their order
as being before his Throne and there serving him for ever Which brings us to the III. OBSERVATION That the Saints serve God in his Temple in Heaven perpetually The Service of a great and gracious Prince though but in the meanest Office about him is an Employment much sought after for the Advantages it brings of Safety free Access Esteem and other Privileges concomitant but to attend him in a higher quality is still more desirable for the Dignity and Nearness of it to such a Majesty David chose rather to be a Door-keeper in the House of God then to be as Haman the great Favourite in the Palace of Shushan with Ahasuerus King of Persia Yet these are but petty and low Advantages in comparison of what accrue by the Service of the Great God who filleth Heaven and Earth Surely it was a Happiness to be a Servant to God though but a Hewer of wood or a Drawer of water for the House of God as the Gibeonites were they were yet far more blessed that dwelt in his House as Priests and Levites to minister before him and to serve at his Altar but it is superlative Happiness to serve God in his Temple in Heaven and to doe this for ever without any intermission especially when the Service is no other then Service of Gratitude and Praising of the Great Creatour and Benefactour of the world even him who is Optimus as well as Maximus the Best of Beings as well as the Greatest even him who is the Father of Lights from whom every good and perfect Gift cometh in whom is no Variableness nor shadow of turning They that are still praising God on Earth are blessed Psal 84.4 As all God's Works do praise the Lord so his Saints do bless him they shew forth the Glory of his Kingdom and talk of his Power Psalm 145.10 11. Much more joyous and blessed a thing is it when the great Consort of Heaven do there perpetually sound forth the high Praises of their God where they have nothing else to doe but to sing Blessing and Honour and Glory and Power be unto him that sitteth upon the Throne and unto the Lamb for ever and ever where this New Song is sung with the best Musick of Heaven concerning the Lord Jesus Thou art worthy of all Benediction for thou wast slain and hast redeemed us to God by thy Bloud out of every kindred and tongue and people and nation and hast made us unto our God Kings and Priests and where with a loud voice with the greatest Shout of Angels and glorified Saints this Acknowledgment is echoed forth Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive Power and Riches and Wisedom and Strength and Honour and Glory and Blessing Oh how glad are men to tell of the Good they have received by such and such Benefactours If a gracious Prince hath but admitted them to kiss his Hands hath deigned to speak kindly to them to promise them Preferment at Court how do men like Haman tell their Wives and Friends of it with rejoycing how highly do they esteem themselves what Regard do they expect from others how do they please themselves in the expectation of his Performance how thankfully do they receive any Intelligence of him any Message from him And yet it often falls out that Princes Favourites be as a wise Heathen said like Counters which one day stand for pounds another day are of no value So that perhaps whom they magnified to day him they will curse to morrow whom they gloried in one day him they are displeased at the next It is otherwise with the Saints in Heaven then with Courtiers on Earth Once in God's Favour and they never lose it They have no fear of Frowns when once before him in his Temple they have no occasion of Dislike at any of his Looks or Speeches There is all Serenity of Aspect Entertainment with perfect Friendship matter of eternal Love everlasting Preferment And therefore with the greatest Freeness and Chearfulness without Intermission or Weariness the Saints do serve God in their Hymns in Heaven and that in his Presence for he that sitteth on the Throne doth dwell among them Which was my last Observation and is now to be considered as the Top of all their Happiness securing it from all Loss Disturbance or Diminution IV. OBSERVATION That the Saints have God everlastingly cohabiting with them Among the Promises and Preferments which are by God bestowed on his Servants this is the chiefest That as they are his Jewells a peculiar people to him are as lively Stones built up a spiritual House an holy Priesthood to offer up spiritual Sacrifices acceptable to him by Jesus Christ so they become the Temple of the living God as God hath said I will dwell in them and walk in them and I will be their God and they shall be my People 2 Cor. 6.16 The Presence of God is counted so necessary to his People that Moses had rather stay in the vast howling Wilderness among fiery stinging Serpents then goe onward toward Canaan without it Exod. 33.15 On the other side the Psalmist professeth that though he walked through the valley of the shadow of death he would fear no evill because God was with him his Rod and his Staff did comfort him Psal 23.4 And indeed the chiefest Joy of Christians as well as Safety is in God's Company When God hides his Face the holiest Souls are troubled Satan affrights them the men of the World vex them their own Consciences bring their Sins to remembrance and cause Gripings and Pain in their very Bowells But when God returns when all the Clouds and Storms are dispersed Blessed saith the Psalmist is the people that know the joyfull sound they shall walk O Lord in the light of thy Countenance Psal 89.15 How much do Holy Saints here disquiet themselves by reason of their Cohabitation with profane and unrighteous persons When they are forced to dwell with them that are Enemies they are as a Sword in their bones when reproachfully they say daily to them Where is thy God How do they long for the Christian Society of sincere Believers and heavenly-minded Christians But their chief Prayer is Lord lift up the Light of thy Countenance upon us Their Soul thirsteth for God for the living God When shall we come and appear before God A wise and single-hearted Companion is justly valued as a most precious Jewell As Ointment and Perfume rejoyce the Heart so doth such Acquaintance a man's Spirit But the best of men are imperfect the purest Churches have their Spots Christ's own Disciples had a Judas with them They are not quite free from Satan's Haunts till they be where Christ is But when they behold his Glory are in the Company of the Lamb where he is are in the House where their Father in Heaven dwells have him dwelling with them so as that they behold his Face and are in his Hand then they are filled with everlasting Joy
Desire of all Nations and that he was the Person whom the Godly did delight in and expect for what Reason appears by the III. OBSERVATION That the Certainty of the coming of Christ's Day was the Spring of Joy the Basis of Comfort the Stay and Support of their Spirits to Believers of old in the days of their Pilgrimage on Earth For this we have the words of S. Peter Act. 2.25 26 30. That David being a Prophet and knowing that God had sworn with an Oath to him that of the fruit of his Loins according to the flesh he would raise up Christ to sit on his Throne spake concerning Christ that therefore did his Heart rejoyce and his Tongue was glad and his Flesh did rest in hope And Heb. 11.26 it is said that by Faith Moses esteemed the Reproach of Christ greater Riches then the Treasures in Egypt And of Simeon it is said that he waited for his coming in the Flesh as the Consolation of Israel and accordingly when he had seen him he took him up in his Arms and blessed God and said his Nunc dimittis Lord now lettest thou thy Servant depart in peace according to thy word for mine eyes have seen thy Salvation Luk. 2.25 28 29 30. And conformable to these was also the frame of Spirit in all the Holy Believers when he appeared in the Flesh As persons over-joyed they were in a Rapture of Comfort so as that they could not contain themselves but must break out into holy Hymns of Praise My Soul doth magnifie the Lord said his Mother and my Spirit hath rejoyced in God my Saviour For he hath regarded the low estate of his Handmaiden And Blessed be the Lord God of Israel said Zacharias for he hath visited and redeemed his People and hath raised up an Horn of Salvation for us in the House of his Servant David When the Wise men of the East saw his Star they rejoyced with exceeding great Joy Matth. 2.10 And when the Angel had told the Shepherds that he brought them good Tidings of great Joy which should be to all People of the Birth of Christ in the City of David upon which there were with the Angel suddenly a multitude of the Heavenly Hoast praising God and saying Glory be to God in the highest and on Earth Peace Good will towards men the Shepherds in hast went to view Christ in the Manger and upon their Return glorified and praised God Hallelujahs were then the Exercise of all that knew of his Birth and so they were of all the Holy Patriarchs and Prophets when they did by Divine Revelation foresee and by Faith wait for his Coming And the same spirit of Joy shewed it self after in all those that saw his Day either with their bodily Eyes or by the Eye of Faith When Andrew finds Peter as over-joyed he tells him We have found the Messiah which is being interpreted the Christ When Philip finds Nathanael he is in the same tune We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and the Prophets did write Jesus of Nazareth the Son of Joseph Joh. 1.41 45. And of succeeding Believers S. Peter saith 1 Pet. 1.8 Whom having not seen ye love in whom though now ye see him not yet believing ye rejoyce with Joy unspeakable and full of Glory So that I may by an Induction of Particulars raising the Observation from the Hypothesis to the Thesis conclude universally That the Day of Christ is to all Believers the Spring of their Joy the Basis of their Comfort the Stay and Support of their Spirits in the days of their Pilgrimage upon Earth The Reasons whereof are common to all Believers Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and to day and for ever Though the Mystery of the Gospell was not so clearly nor so fully revealed before as it was by the Apostles Preaching but from the beginning of the world was in a sort hid in God yet in no Age was there Salvation in any other none other Name under Heaven given among men whereby they must be saved He onely hath been the Way the Truth and the Life so that none come to the Father but by him Abel Enoch Noah Abraham Moses David and all the rest of the Holy Saints in foregoing Generations had Salvation by Faith in Christ as really as S. Peter and S. Paul or any of the Holy Martyrs and Confessours in the Catholick Church It is true the Knowledge of Christ was not so clearly revealed to the sons of men before his Coming in the Flesh as it was after when the Day-spring from on high visited us to give Light to them that sit in Darkness and in the Shadow of Death to guide our feet into the way of Peace And therefore John Baptist exceeded all the Prophets foregoing he being the man that could say Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the Sins of the World Yet the Apostles yea the least in the Kingdom of Heaven that can preach Christ Born Baptized Preaching Dying Rising Ascended into Heaven is greater then John the Baptist as having seen and heard that which many Prophets and Kings desired to hear and see but did not The Knowledge the Patriarchs had was Vespertine the Apostles and ours comparatively Meridian Besides before Christ's Ascension the Knowledge of him was not so amply revealed for though a few of the Gentiles found Christ yet the Way of Salvation was not prepared before the face of all People so as that Christ became a Light to lighten the Gentiles as well as to be the Glory of his people Israel But when S. Paul was made the Apostle of the Gentiles Christ was set to be a Light to the Gentiles that he might be for Salvation unto the ends of the Earth Act. 13.47 S. Peter was taught to call none common or unclean but to preach to the Gentiles as being those to whom also God had granted Repentance unto Lefe Act. 11.18 Whence the same way of Salvation was vouchsafed to Cornelius that was to Abraham Cornelius had his Faith imputed to him for Righteousness as well as Abraham God put no difference between them and us having purified their Hearts by Faith saith S. Peter Act. 15.9 He was the God not onely of the Jews but also of the Gentiles seeing it was one God which should justifie the Circumcision by Faith and Vncircumcision through Faith Rom. 3.29 30. And hence as Abraham rejoyced to see Christ's Day so did the Wise men of the East and in all that were made Holy Converts by the preaching of the Gospel there was the same Joy for the kind which was in Abraham all with the same Spirit of Faith glorified Christ though some with more enlarged Hearts then others In the Effects of this Joy Praising God Loving Christ and Adhering to him there is the same Mind in all the same Hope the same Expressions though not to the same degree in all In some Ages the Joy was more extensive then in others in