with the error of the world and so fall from your own stedfastness if you be carried down with the swinge and with the current of the times and of the places where you live do not deceive your selves you are yet of this world I must confess it is a very strong temptation when the stream runs in a wrong course and often shakes the holiest Saints But yet in such a case they that belong to Jesus Christ must consider with themselves that they are of another world and therefore are not much to eye the fashion and the wayes of this They must behave themselves according to the fashion of their own Country They must conclude with holy Joshua 24.15 If it seem evil to other men to serve the Lord if they will forsake God and forsake his worship let them serve whom they will for me as for my own part I am at a point for that I and my house will serve the Lord. And they must say in such a case as David did Away from me ye wicked I am not for your company because I am not for your courses away from me ye wicked I will keep the Commandements of my God If you be now no longer of this world but of the other your language is not of this world but of the other You speake the language of the world and of the Country you belong to You are full of good discourse your heart boyles with good matter as the expression of the Prophet is Psal 45.1 It is like a boyling pot for that is the similitude that is alluded to it is alwayes bubling up and running over and then it speaks of good things as it is added there in that place The heart within boyles and the tongue without speakes and as the boyling Pot runs over with the self same matter which it hath within it so it fares with such an heart It bubleth up with good matter the matter which it hath conceived and meditated touching Christ this is that which is so readily and freely uttered with the tongue My heart is enditing of a good matter I speak of the things which I have made touching the King Such are the hearts and tongues of those that are of the other world their speech is gracious and either tends to glorifie their God or to edifie their Brethren this is the language of their Country What think we then of those whose language is alwayes vain and frivolous it doth not benefit the hearers it ministreth no grace for there is no grace in it or which is worse it is wicked and pernitious Their speech is rotten and corrupt there is no salt to season it and make it wholesom and hence their throat is likened to an open Sepulchre Rom. 3.13 which breathes and steames up nothing else but odious smells and loathsom exhalations or else at best their speeches and discourses are of nothing else but earth and earthly things Talk with them while you will you hear of nothing else but worldly matters from them Of what Country do you think are these men The Apostle John tells you 1 John 4.5 They are of the world and they speak of â—he world Shibboleth never descryed so many Ephraimites as this doth worldly wrerches They are of Galilee they are of this world for their speech bewrayeth them Shall I believe they are Inhabitants of the Celestial Canaan who cannot speak almost without an oath whose tongues are alwayes dipping in that blood which alone can cleanse them from all sin Shall I say that such a man or woman is of heaven whose tongue is set on fire of hell Brethren do not deceive your selves if you cannot spake the language you belong not to that Country If you be now no longer of this world but of the other you have a dear affection to your Contrymen to those that are given up to Christ out of the world as you are If travailers and strangers meet with any of their Country-men in a remote and forreign Land how lovingly do they embrace them what kindness do they shew them how are they knit together in a bond of love Just so it is with those who are of the other world If they light any time on any of that same world which they themselves belong to they are extreamly taken up with joy although they never saw them nor had acquaintance with them in their lives before and presently their hearts and their affections do wonderfully close together And therefore they are gross dissemblers who would be thought to be given up to Christ out of the world and yet their bosom friends and their Companions are all of them of this world These are the men which they converse withall and which they take delight in Nay which is worse then this they hate the men whom Jesus Christ hath called and chosen out of the world They persecute them with the hand and with the tongue and do them all the spight and all the mischief that they can Suppose thou wert in Italy or Spain or any other forreign Land and there shouldst meet an Englishman wouldest thou mock and scoff at him wouldest thou deride and jear at the fashion of his cloaths the manner of his complement his gate and carriage and the like wouldest thou procure him to be taken up imprisoned put to death thy Earthly Country would not own thee if thou shouldst be so unworthy And truly heaven will not own the men who deal thus basely and injuriously with the Inhabitants of that Country Use 3 Are there some certain men whom God the Father gives to Jesus Christ out of the world so that however they were once the worlds now they are of the world no longer You then that find you are given up to Jesus Christ think it not much if you have but ill usage and untoward entertainment in the world Truly my Brethren if you consider whence you are and to what Country you belong there can no other be expected by you if you were of the world the world would love her own but because you are not of the world but Christ hath chosen you out of the world therefore the world hates you And it shall be your wisedom to look out and to provide for such usage If Turks or Spaniards walk along the streets every one will gaze upon them they will wonder at their gate and at their habit and the like Every one will be ready to abuse them and to put them to the worst for they are friendless being in a strange Country And are not you my Brethren of another Country yea of another world are you not men of singularity are not your wayes and fashions diverse from the fashions of this world No marvel then though you be men of wonder as the Prophet speakes though you be pointed at and though you be made spectacles and gazing stocks Though every one presume to injure you and wrong you and deal unworthily and basely with you
having heard the Word keep it and bring forth fruit with patience That is the Word is fruitful in them notwithstanding persecutions and afflictions So was it in the Thessalonians as the Apostle testifies of them 1 Epist 2.13 When ye received the Word of God said he ye received it not as the word of man but as it is in truth the Word of God which effectually also worketh in you And what was this effectual operation Constancy in sharp sufferings as you may see in the next verse And yet they would not let it go though they suffered much for it That of the Prophet David is remarkable Psal 119.161 Princes have persecuted me without cause but my heart standeth in awe of thy Word He had rather have them against him then have the Word of God against him They threatned him if he obeyed and kept the Word The Word on the other side that threatned him if he renounced and disobeyed it Whom did he fear most why saith the Psalmist My heart standeth in awe of thy Word Though they be Princes very great men and though they threaten me and persecute me too yet I fear the Word of God more then I fear them I dare not disobey it how much soever I displease them how much soever I may suffer from them This is to keep the Word by obedience passive for it Thus much shall serve for the Explication of the point Now is it so that they whom the Father gives to Jesus Vse do keep his Word Here is a touch-stone then my Brethen by which you may try your selves whether you be given up to Christ or no. I have shewed you heretofore of how great Consequence it is for every one of us to be among the number of the men whom God makes over to his Son Christ Indeed so great that all our happiness both in the present life and that to come consists in it If God the Father bestow us not on Jesus Christ it had been infinitely better for us that we had never been born that he had never made us For we continue in the power and the possession of the Prince of this world his we are and with him must remain for ever Now my Beloved would you know whether you be yet made over to the Son of God or no Examine diligently whether you have kept the Word of God Thine they were saith Christ to God the Father and thou gavest them to me and they have kept thy Word And is it so with you my Brethren Consider it a little and proceed in the discovery according to the branches laid before in Explication of the point Have you kept it in your memories Abundance of you have read and heard much of the Word of God These many years it hath been preached to you you have had precept upon precept and line upon line here a little and there a little you have not been overlaid and dulled ouâ— with long Sermons but you had a little and a little A little on a Sabbath day and a little on a Lecture day Your lessons have been short that you might the better learn them But what have you retained of all this Indeed some of you have laid up these sayings in your hearts as Mary did you have them sure and safe there You have them ready and at hand to bring them forth on all occasions for the Direction and the Consolation of your selves and of your Brethren But for the greater number they have lost all nothing at all sticks by them The Word of God hath come to them as the Apostle says and they have let it go again I must acknowledge there is difference in the memories of men and some are subject to a natural defect so that they fail them strangely in their own affairs which are of most concernment to them But when the memories of men are sure and faithful to them in all other things but hold the Word of God no better then a Sive holds water that lets every drop go this is a very sad case It is a shrewd presumption that they are none of Christs Disciples But you will say How shall we amend this how shall we do that we may keep the Word of God in this respect I will give you two or three Directions 1. Keep your minds close to it let them not rove and wander while you hear it if they do you lose all This is the Apostles counsel to give earnest heed to be intent upon the things we hear to watch the words as they come forth out of the Preachers mouths Heb 2.1 and why so least at any time we let them slip If we would remember well there must not be the least diversion 2. Get a good understanding in the Word of God The observation of the Holy Ghost is notable for this purpose Luk 2.19 They understood not the sayings which he spake unto them But Mary kept all these sayings in her heart They kept them not because they did not understand them that which is not understood will very hardly be remembred They are our understanding hearers that carry all away while ignorant and sottish people keep nothing 3. Value the Word of God more and you shall find you will remember it the better See the necessity the excellency of it and then you will be careful how you lose it Esteem it as the Prophet David did above gold yea above fine gold He whose memory is weakest seldom forgets where he hath laid his gold 4. Strengthen memory by meditation repetition conference of what you hear If it be hard to take in holy Truths chafe them in rub them in and settle them by this means Let them be as a nail well fastned as the expression of the Wiseman is and set home with many strokes that they may not out again 5. Set instantly upon the practice of the truth delivered to you assoon as you hear it act it That which you do you will remember Mark that of the Apostle James 1.25 Not being a forgetful hearer but a doer of the Word The doer then is no forgetful hearer Many men remember nothing because indeed they do nothing 6. When holy truths are gone with you when they are slipt away entreat the Holy Spirit to recal them Mind him humbly of his Office and of the end for which your Saviour sent him down into this lower world to bring things to remembrance which have been taught you Joh. 14.26 JOHN 17.6 And they have kept thy Word TO pass on to the Second branch of this discovery Have you kept the Word of God in your Hearts by believing This is a degree higher and reaches further then the other Many keep it in their memories who do not keep it in their hearts Many remember it who do not believe it And yet unless we do both we can have no assurance that we belong to Jesus Christ by the donation of the Father And is it so with you
to God the Father for us and takes our Suites into his hands That he excuses what is wanting in our prayers and supplies it in his own That he is lively there where we are dull that he is quick where we are flat that he is full where we are short My Clyent saith our Advocate means this and this this is the meaning of the spirit in him He is not able to express himself as many others can but this is that which he intends and aims at His words are not so ready and so apt but he hath as sincere a heart as the most voluble and fluent of them all and he is one for whom I have laid down my life and shed my blood for whom I have deserved all the good that he can ask and stand in need of And therefore I beseech thee Father let him have what he desires give him a speedy and a gratious answer for my sake Ah my beloved is it not able to fill our hearts brimfull of joy when we remember that we have such an Advocate as this is The knowledge of our Saviours Intercession for his people is a means to comfort them in reference to the defects of all our graces For we come short in all of them there is not one of them compleat There is much lacking in our faith as the Apostle speaks 1 Thes 3.10 and so there is in all the rest which spring from faith For if there be a failing in the root there cannot choose but be a failing in the branches And this is that which makes us walk so heavily and sadly many times when we consider with our selves how slender the degrees and measures of our graces are so that we know not where to find comfort What shall we do in such a case to keep our spirits from despondency Why truly among many other wayes this is a very special one to fix our thoughts upon the intercession of our Saviour for us and to consider seriously with our selves that this is one great business that he urges to his Father that he would sanctifie his people That he would give them out more grace and more holiness This prayer of our Saviour in my text as I have hinted formerly is but a Counterpane of the perpetual intercession that he makes for his in heaven And it consists especially of two branches which comprehend the two main things that he desireth of his Father for his people Preservation and Sanctification The latter he is large upon sanctifie them with thy truth and so on They were sanctified before for they were not of the world and he desires they might be sanctified yet more That they might have larger measures of all the graces of the spirit And is not this an extraordinary comfort to those who are but meanly furnished and who have but a slender stock of grace that Jesus Christ is alwayes interceding to his Father in their behalf for a more full supply It was a suit that he begun on earth and he is still pursuing it in heaven to this day and will do to the worlds end he will never give it over so that we may be confident we shall have such degrees of holiness and grace bestowed upon us as are necessary for us The knowledge c. as it assures us of his dear love to us and his tender care of us What our Saviour doth in heaven in a way of Intercession if it were unknown to us though it might profit us and benefit us very much it could not comfort as at all But when we know that Jesus Christ hath such a singular regard to us and that his heart and his affections work towards us so sweetly and so strongly now he is in heaven at so great a distance from us I mean as he is man that he is always taking all advantages to further and promote our business with his Father and speaking to him upon all occasions for our good and in a word that he is so extremely kind and loving to us so infinitely tender of our welfare every way This cannot choose if it be duly weighed but fill our hearts up to the brim and make them over-flow with joy Vse 1 Now is it so my Brethren that the assured knowledge of our Saviours Intercession is one c. If then we would abound in this heavenly affection let us exactly study and throughly pâ—y into our Saviours Intercession that we may know as much of it as we are able to attain to We are here in an unquiet and unstable world in which we meet with many causes of discomfort from within and from without and many times they take extremely deep upon us so as almost to make our lives a burthen to us Now if we would be free from such distempers let us endeavour to look more into our Saviours Intercession And if we understand it well it will fill us full of comfort that will swell high exceedingly above all the afflictions of this present life Indeed the intercession of our Saviour is of it self a large volume too much for us to read over and that Volume sealed too shut up in heaven that we cannot open it or look into it But he hath given us a brief compendium and a short abridgement of it in the Prayer that he made for his Apostles and Disciples and in them for all the Church that is or shall be to the worlds end that we may read it and acquaint our selves with it He spake that prayer in the world that they might hear it from him and so might have his joy fulfilled in them And that we might hear it from them and so might have his joy fulfilled in us In which regard my Brethren it is left upon record in publique in the Church for ever that all his people might have recourse thereto on all occasions for their Comfort And therefore when we are in any trouble when sorrow seizes deep upon us let us study this prayer in all the parts and branches of it that from thence we may conjecture what he doth in our behalf now he is fitting at the right hand of his Father And this let us depend upon that if he spake one word in our behalf in any case while he was here upon earth he speaks a hundred for us now he is heaven And truly if this Counterpane of our Saviours Intercession were dived into and studied more there would be more holy joy among the Saints Their troubles and their sorrows would be less and they would be more full of comfort then they are JOHN 17.14 I have given them thy Word and the world hath hated them AND thus of the first argument with which our Saviour presseth and enforceth his Petition to his Father in behalf of his Apostles and Disciples that he himself would undertake the keeping of them Which hath been taken as you may remember from his own effectual preservation of them during the time that he had
us that there should be consideration had not only of the matter but even of the circumstances c. What then it may be you will ask me do our gestures or doth the manner of presenting our requests to God the outward manner with the voice or otherwise fall under the command of God Are we expresly bound to pray in such a posture in such a way or manner of expression Do these external circumstances appertain to Gods worship I answer No in no case the difference is wide between the bodily exercise and the Spiritual service We are not under any ceremonial Law that binds us to an outward circumstance to a place or to a posture as the Jews of old were And yet there should be due consideration had not only of the matter but even of the circumstances c. and that especially upon these two grounds For These outward circumstances may in case promote the spiritual service Reason 1 The very gesture or the utterance of a prayer may help sometimes to raise and quicken the affection which is the life and Soul of prayer Our hearts are naturally dead and stupid and prophane and stand in need of all good outward helps to stir up zeal and reverence and devotion in them And to this end they have been used by the Saints in Scripture and that not only in their publike but even in their private and their secret prayers when their submiss and humble gestures could have no influence upon other men And consequently had no other use but to help their own hearts As Daniel was exact in this even in his chamber and it is carefully recorded Dan. 6.10 He kneeled upon his knees three times a day and prayed He prayed three times a day and still he was in this posture And it is noted of our Saviour that he kneeled down and prayed Luke 22.10 and this was in Private too So that he did it not with reference to others and therefore a most eminent and worthy man observeth that undoubtedly he saw he needed it himself And if that be admitted assuredly we need such helps and furtherances much more These outward circumstances if they do not further yet they express Reason 2 the spiritual service They testifie the sorrow the humility the affection and the devotion of the heart and the reverence of the soul As in my text our Saviours lifting up his eyes to heaven discovered where his heart was And therefore humble gestures are especially required in publike worship because God will be honoured in the sight of others yea they are sometimes put for all his service Rom. 14.11 As I live saith the Lord every knee shall bow to me And seeing hypocrites in matter of the worship and the service of the Lord are alwayes ready to pretend they have as good hearts as the very best Therefore the Lord is wont to call so often and so earnestly for the external Service of the body and that in the new Testament as well as in the old as you may see that place for instance 1 Cor. 6.20 Glorifie God saith the Apostle there and that not in your Spirit only but in your body also which is Gods Use 1 Now is it so that there should be consideration had not only of the matter but even of the circumstances c. Then First it serves to let them see their error and mistake who utterly neglect such things as these are who take no notice of their outward carriage in such holy duties but rather look upon it as a thing below the observation of a Christian who should be wholly and entirely taken up with their spiritual service And yet as you have heard the Holy-Ghost takes notice of a gesture a cast of the eye in Prayer and sets it down in white and black we need not doubt for our information I must confess the great defect is on the other side men are imployed so much about the form the surface and the outside of religious duties many times that they neglect the main business Their thoughts are exercised so far about the gesture of their body the composure of their words the framing of their voices and the like especially in publike prayer that they have no regard at all to the inward and spiritual service The outward work is infinitely more easie and there is much more ostentation in it And hence it is that the greater part of men are wholly taken up with that which they themselves can do and being done procure them most applause from other men But yet their placing all in forms and outsides and minding nothing else in holy duties doth not justifie at all our running off to the Extream upon the other side No it is possible that even as hypocrites and rotten-hearted wretches may be so intent upon the outside that they have no regard unto the inside So on the other side the holiest and sincerest Christians may be so intent upon the inside that they have no regard at all unto the outside They may so far look after the affection and the zeal and the devotion of the heart which is indeed the main thing to be looked to that they may have no thought at all of the External circumstances of their prayers the gesture or the manner of their utterance which are Considerable notwithstanding as I have made it plain enough and therefore to be wholly careless of them is a failing yea though it should be in the best of Gods people Use 2 And therefore in the second place let me perswade you to think such outward circumstances worthy of your thoughts the very gesture and the utterance of your prayers Let there be due consideration had of such things as these are I would by no means hinder you from having your especial eye on that whereon the eye of God is most when you are making your approaches and addresses to him I mean the carriage of the soul and spirit the inward fervor and humility affection and devotion of the heart without which all the rest is worth nothing But yet let not the gesture of your bodies the utterance of your voice in prayer be utterly neglected by you concerning both of which because I find them in my Text I shall give you some directions As for the gesture of your bodies I shall commend these few things We are not bound to all the self-same gestures which were in use among the people of the Lord of old we read that Joshua and the Elders when they were routed at the Siege of Ai and came before the Ark of God to pray they rent their cloaths and put dust upon their heads Joshua 7.16 And Hezekiah when he came into the house of God to pray at the time when Senacherib besieged Jerusalem he rent his cloaths and put on Sack-cloath Isa 37.1 And this they did not that these fashions were appropriated to the worship of the Lord but because they were in use in those times and
when we threaten judgement when we retain the sins of men when we give them up to Satan either in preaching or in Church-censures when we say of any person Take him Satan our aim must be that Christ may have him that his corruption may be mortified and that he may be saved by this means And therefore let the Ministers of Jesus Christ have this continually in their eye how they may reach this great end Let all his under-officers in the administration of the power which Christ hath put upon them drive at that for which Christ received his that they may bring his people to eternal life as you have it in my Text. Is it so that the authority of Jesus Christ with which c. is chiefly Use 3 for the good c. Then let us apprehend it to be so and let us look upon it so when he is executing this authority and this judiciary power of his upon the enemies of his people even to their utter ruin and destruction When he destroyes his Churches enemies when he consumes them that they may not be as this he doth sometimes by vertue of this power which God hath put into his hands and we have seen it in these latter days let us consider that he doth not this so much for their hurt as for the good of his people That his aim is not so much at the destruction of the one as at the preservation of the other When he is laying on upon them with his keen and glittering sword let this be our meditation Now Christ is doing something for his poor people And this the Saints of old have done And therefore David or whoever else it be that is the author of Psal 136. recording many judgements of the Lords which he had brought upon the Churches enemies makes this the running verse between continually For his mercy endureth for ever He smote all the first born of Aegypt For his mercy endureth for ever He overturned Pharoah and his Host in the red Sea For c. He smote great Kings and slew famous Kings as Sihon King of the Amorites and Og c. For his mercy endureth for ever A man would think he should have rather said he did such things as these because his anger and his wrath endures for ever What mercy was it for the Lord to slay Kings and to destroy Nations truely it was none to them that were destroyed but it was sweet and precious mercy to them for whom they were destroyed And Christ would have it known that in the execution of his vengeance on the wicked he hath not an aspect so much upon the misery he brings the wicked to no his thoughts are taken up with the mercy and the love he manifests to his people And when he layes about him and slashes down the enemies in heaps he seemeth to forget the hatred that he bears to them and to think of nothing else but mercy mercy to his Saints Thus I kill them and destroy them because my mercy c. And therefore let us learn to look upon it so to have such thoughts and apprehensions upon such occasions And that the rather because there is an inconveniency in it many times when we behold Christ in another way We look upon the Judgements which he wreaks and executes upon the Enemies and persecuters of the Church as if he brought them on them out of such a hatred to them as we our selves are apt to have And so our hearts are carried out in wayes of malice and we make Christ upon the matter but the instrument of our revenge Whereas if we did apprehend him as aiming not so much at the destruction and ruine of the wicked as at the good and preservation of his people and as administrations of his power which he sees necessary for the peace and welfare of the Saints our hearts would be in a more sweet and holy temper then they are sometimes in such cases For then my brethren we should see the Love of Christ in all these dispensations of his wrath the more his anger is declared at any time against the wicked the more we should be taken up with thoughts and apprehensions of his love to us The greater fury and displeasure he reveals against them the more we should be led to contemplation of his mercy to our selves Oh what are we that he should have such dear respects to us That he should be so angry with poor creatures and execute such heavy judgements on them for our sakes Use 4 Is it so that the authority c. is chiefly for the Good c. This then methinks should prevail with wicked men yea though they perish to have better thoughts of Christ and milder apprehensions then they have For you must know my brethren that Christ hath many Enemies there are abundance in the world that hate him whose very hearts do rise against him And whence is this but because they look upon him as one that aims at their destruction as one that means to have their blood to ruine them and damn them in the pit of hell for ever Now I beseech you my beloved do not so mistake your selves think not so hardly of the Lord Christ Believe it Jesus Christ hath other purposes then these whatever you conceive of him he came not to judge the world but that the world by him might be saved He came not to destroy you but to save his own people And therefore if you be destroyed thank your selves and not him Your help if you have any is of him but your destruction is of your selves Do but consider I beseech you what Christ hath done what means he hath afforded you for your salvation He hath assumed your nature who are reprobates as well as yours who are elect He hath laid down a price of worth sufficient in it self for your salvation so that there is not one of you excluded from it because it will not reach to you as well as others because it is too narrow and too scant to satisfie for all if all should apprehend it and lay hold upon it No he hath ordered matters so that there is enough put in not for believers only but for them that perish too And that which is put in as it is sufficient for you so it is applicable to you as well as others As it was paid in your nature so any of your nature may partake it if they will lay hold upon it It is a satisfaction which nothing but your unbelief and your refusal can make you uncapable of And hence the Lord will have a tender of it to be made the Gospel to be preached to you as well as others so runs the tenour of his own Commission Go preach the Gospel to every creature Tell every man without exception that there is good news for him that Christ is dead for him if he embrace him Yea Christ himself doth by his Messengers perswade you yea intreat
be a God at all or if there be whether ours which we have chosen be the right and true God it is impossible but we should so far as those doubts prevail upon us go out from him and apply our selves to those things which are obvious to the sence which we see and know to be The more undoubtedly and firmly we believe that our God is the true God the more perfectly and fully we shall serve him and obey him the more we shall trust in him the more we shall seek to him the more we shall strive to please him according to the strengthening or weakening of our faith in this particular will be the measure of our service and obedience to him of our reliance and dependence on him For even as if a man believe there is no God at all he will not serve him he will not roll himself upon him whom he thinketh not to be So if he believe it weakly and with many haesitations that there is a God or that the God which he hath chosen is the true God he will fear him and he will trust him very weakly and remisly He will be on and off and up and down according to the ebbings and the flowings of his faith But if we have a strong and an unshaken confidence that our God is God indeed then we will set our selves to serve him fully and without halting Then we will trust him perfectly we will apply our selves to please him in all our ways and all our actions But you will ask me then how shall we do to put this matter out of all question that our God is the true God and what means shall we use to satisfie our selves and to confirm our faith in this particular because it is a Point of such concernment and hath such influence in our lives I shall give you some Directions First Endeavour to the utmost of your power to give compleat and full assent and credit to the Scripture admit not any doubt in that particular One main thing that the Scripture doth is to give testimony to the God whom we worship and if we can but say that this witness is true there is an end of this business So far as we believe the Scripture we cannot but believe without any haesitation that our God is the true God If we be satisfied of the one we cannot possibly have any scruple of the other And therefore we should spend our thoughts upon such meditations as will settle us in this We should consider with our selves the strange Consent of Scripture-writers living in so many Ages the strange accomplishment of Scripture-Prophesies the strange effect of Scripture-admonitions exhortations threatnings Though it be carried in a low and easie stile how it commands us and prevaileth more upon us then all the Eloquence of men and Angels could ever do were it united altogether Especially we should observe we that are God's I mean for to such I now speak what admirable operation it hath had upon our own hearts how it hath pierced in and made a separation between our very joynts and marrow how it hath even told us all that ever we have done how it hath cast us down with sorrow unconceivable and then raised us up again with joy unspeakable and glorious how it hath altered and changed us and turned us clear about and made us to renounce our profits pleasures and delights our wills our reasons and desires yea to deny our selves that we might walk by this Rule Such things as these methinks should mightily confirm us in the truth of this that the Scripture is the very Word of God And then this cannot chuse but follow out of all dispute that our God is the true God Secondly Examine all pretenders to the Godhead and see if any of them have so good a Plea so good a Title to the Deity as the God whom we worship This I suppose is out of question with you that there is a God this is apparent by the current and the joynt-consent of men in all times and in all places For this is not a thing that hath been taught by this or that sect or held by this or that people But all sects how much soever they have differed in all other things have held this and all Nations how wide soever each from other in place or manners have taught this But now the thing we are upon is who this God is whether ours or any other And truly my Beloved if this be once admitted that there is a God our God will carry it from any other that hath laid any claim to it As for the Idols of the Heathen stocks and stones I know you will not think it worthy your consideration whether any of them were the true God And for the gods which the Barbarians worshipped the Sun the Moon the very beasts themselves of every sort they are no great pretenders neither we need no more then ordinary reason to convince us that these can be no Gods For to say truth they are below men The Romane gods are more considerable then the other and yet they were but men as Jupiter and Saturn and the like Yea to say truth they were vile and wicked men addicted to the grossest vices and such as led most prophane and lewd lives Yea they were mortal men and therefore certainly they were not Gods And hence their very Worshippers would shew you in one place a Temple and in another place a Sepulchre erected to the same God which is a most apparent Contradiction And truly if a man consider who have pretended to the Godhead besides our God and what poor things they were it will exceedingly establish and confirm him in this business You cannot think that if there be a God as that is granted of all hands he is concealed from the world till this time And truly for the other gods that have been worshipped if you will but examine them you will apparently discover them to have deluded and deceived the world so that you may exceedingly confirm your faith in this respect by an induction of particulars This god and that god cannot be the true God and so along in all the rest And therefore our God is undoubtedly the true God And you shall find the Lord to have such poor Competitors that you will certainly cry out at last as being fully satisfied The Lord is God the Lord is God Be sure to sift this business to the full when you set your selves about it and not to leave it undetermined in your own thoughts Never give over till you be resolved and till you be established in the present truth It is the fault of many men yea I believe of many good men that when some thoughts of Atheism are cast in and when they have some doubts arising in their hearts whether the Lord be God or no as this the very best may have they do not altogether scatter them before they leave them but
with Christ hereafter but by suffering with him here and by suffering willingly as he did For if you do it of necessity and of constraint as the Apostle tells us in another case you have your reward But if you suffer willingly as he did then you shall reign as he doth And though you be not worthy yet you shall be counted worthy of the Kingdom for which you suffer as the Apostle Paul speaks 2 Thes 1.5 Vse 2 Is it so that Jesus Christ was ordered by his Father as in his work of Satisfaction so in his work of Application Did he apply the merit and the vertue of his satisfaction to none but those to whom the Father ordered him Let no man then find fault with Christ that no more are saved by him and that no more are made partakers of the benefit and profit of his passion Alas my Brethren Jesus Christ as Mediator is not to choose to whom he will apply the satisfaction which himself hath made no he must follow the direction and order of his Father in this business The work which his Father giveth him to do that he must do and no other If he bid him save a man and apply his merits to him he must do it If he bid him pass him by he must leave him in his sins to perish and be damned for ever I am come down from heaven saith our Saviour not to do my own will but the will of him that sent me And this is the Fathers will that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing Joh. 6.39 I am precisely ordered to see that not a man of them perish As for the rest they may they must be lost for me it is not in my power to help them All that the Father gives him he can keep and save further then this his Commission doth not reach No doubt the will of Jesus Christ as he was Man would have carryed him to save those whom his Father had appointed to destruction But he must stoop in this to the will of him that sent him There is no question if he had been free in this regard he would have pitched upon his own Countreymen his own Allyes his own Kindred before others But the Evangelist observes he came to his own among them he began his Ministry but he did no good there his own received him not And therefore you shall find it in his story that as man he was extreamly troubled at the unbelief and hardness of the peoples hearts He wept over Jerusalem with many tears Why you will say what needed this he might have wrought upon them and converted them and saved them No my Beloved he could not do it he had no order for it from his Father This belonged not to the work which he had given him to do And yet as Man he pittied and lamented their condition as we should do in such a case he being in all things like unto us sin only excepted And certainly this pity over lost Creatures was no sin Now this me thinks should overcome and melt the hearts of Reprobates themselves to Jesus Christ and make them to relent towards him Alas he pitties you and mourns over you his very bowels yern towards you he delights not in your ruine and destruction No he hath such a tender heart though yours be hard that it is troublesome and grievous to him But why then doth he not relieve and help us you will say Why he hath no order for it His Father hath appointed him to whom and whom alone he shall apply the merits of his passion and you perhaps are none of that number So that it is not any of the business that he came into the world about to save you The work of your salvation is not given him to do and if it be not given him he cannot do it so that the fault is not in Jesus Christ if any of you perish and be lost for ever Neither is there any reason why you should be exasperated and incensed against him Is it so that Jesus Christ was ordered by his Father in the work c. Vse 1 And why then should not we be ordered by him too in all the work we do in this world Shall Jesus Christ be in subjection to the Father more then we Shall he be ordered by him more then we Shall he be at the Fathers pleasure and command in every thing and we be free What an unreasonable and incongruous thing were this Nay my Beloved should we not in imitation of our blessed Saviour stoop to God as he did and do the work which he hath given us to do and so walk as we have Christ for an Example But alas how do the greater number of us swerve from this pattern Either we do the good or else we do the evill which God hath not given us to do I shall speak a word to either First some do the good which God hath not given them to do the work is good but it is not their work It is given other men but yet it is not given them to do The work that Vzziah did was for the matter of it very good The incense which he meant to offer was such as was prescribed in the Law the place in which he meant to offer was the Temple the Altar upon which he meant to offer was consecrated to the Lord the God to whom he went to offer was the true God But he was not a person qualified and fit to offer he was not called to that service This good work was not given him to do And therefore God was very angry with him and he was stricken with a foul disease The like we see exemplified in Saul the error was not in the Sacrifice he offered nor in the object of his offering the person unto whom he offered but only in the person that did offer The work was good but it was not his work he had no order for the doing of it and therefore he was utterly ejected from the Kingdom 1 Sam. 13.13 There are some works that belong to some callings as proper and peculiar to them Some works that are peculiar to the Magistrate or else the Magistrate hath no distinct calling Some works that are peculiar to the Minister or else the Minister hath no distinct calling For that is no distinct calling that hath not some distinct work Some works there are which God hath given to the Magistrate as a Magistrate to do Some works there are which God hath given to the Minister as a Minister to do and these works they that are not called to them may not do Or if they do when they have ended them they cannot say to God as Christ doth I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do Secondly as some do the good which God hath not given them to do so some others do the evill which God hath given none to do They do that usually which God
are they that hear the word of God and keep it But not to stay upon the proof in general because the term is for somewhat dark I shall proceed to shew you more particularly and distinctly what it is to keep the word of God which is the main thing in the observation They whom the Father gives to Jesus Christ do keep his word Now this imports and carries in it divers things To keep the word of God is to retain it in the memory not only to receive it but also to retain it there To hold fast what we have received as the expession is Rev. 3.11 Reprobis effluit sermo dei saith Calvin on my Text. The word of God flows away from reprobates and wicked men It is like water shed upon the ground which is gone upon the suddain But it sticks with the Elect it takes deep root there It is observed to the praise of Mary that she kept the sayings of our Saviour all his sayings Luke 2.50 Others lost them but she kept them and therefore she is set in opposition to them They understood not the sayings which he spake to them they knew not what he meant and therefore it was quickly gone with them for what you do not understand you shall be hardly able to remember But Mary kept these sayings in her heart while many others who understood not these discourses of our Saviour let them go They valued them as things of nothing and looked upon them but as loose words and therefore had no mind to keep them She laid them up with extraordinary care as singular and choice things And this is that which the Apostle Paul exhorts us to Heb. 2.1 We ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard that is to the words of God least at any time we should let them slip 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 least we prove like leaking vessels that hold not what is poured into them but leak it out again upon a suddain Lest we forget the word of God That is the first thing then to keep the word of God is to retain it in the memory And those whom he bestows on Christ do thus keep it And as there is a keeping of it in the memory so in the second place there is a keeping of it in the heart As in the memory by retaining so in the heart by believing And of this sort of keeping speaks our Saviour John 8.51 Verily I say unto you if a man keep my saying he shall never see death His saying is the doctrine of the Gospell which is more properly the word of Christ He cannot mean if a man keep my saying if he remember it he shall never see death But if a man keep my saying if he believe it if he keep it in his heart for with the heart a man believeth to salvation then he shall never see death And so the words are parallel with those which he delivers in another place John 11.2 Whosoever believeth in me shall never die That is the second sort of keeping then in the heart by believing There is a keeping of the word of God as in the mind by remembring and in the heart by believing so in the affections by loving They are the Cabinet in which it is laid up and it is very safe there So David kept the word of God very dear in his affections as he professeth very often sometimes he saith that it is sweeter to him then hony or the hony-comb sometimes that is dearer to him then thousands of Gold and Silver That he loves it above Gold yea above fine Gold He loves it not as Silver but as Gold not equall unto Gold but above Gold Not above ordinary base Gold but above fine Gold That place is notable in which he seems to be transported Psal 119.97 O how do I love thy Law It is out of all measure it is so great that I am no way able to express it There is a keeping of the word as in the mind by remembring and in the heart by believing and in the affections by loving so in the life by obeying And in this sence the phrase is usually taken in the Scripture to keep and to obey is all one And so the Lord himself explains it Deut. 13.4 Ye shall walk after the Lord your God and keep his Commandments And what is that you shall obey his voice and serve him as it is added in the next words Now the word of God is kept as I shall shew you very clearly both by active and by passive obedience First it is kept by active obedience to it and Secondly it is kept by passive obedience for it 1. There is a keeping of the word of God by active obedience to it by doing that which it commands and by avoiding that which it forbids This is the common acceptation of the term This sense the Holy Ghost himself the best Interpreter gives of it 1 John 5.22 Whatsoever we ask we receive of him because we keep his Commandments Keep his Commandments how so you have it clearly in the following words And do those things that are pleasing in his sight And thus you must conceive the meaning of the Holy Ghost in the forealledged Scripture Luke 11.28 Blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it that is that hear it and obey it 2. And as the word of God is kept by obedience active to it so by obedience passive for it And this is clearly intimated in the attestation that he gives the Church of Sardis Apoc. 3.10 thou hast kept the word of my patience that is as thou hast kept my word in general so more particularly thou hast kept those portions of my word and those parcels of my truth which must have patience to the keeping of them A man may keep some part of Gods word without patience as being as being universally received by all opposed by none But then there are some other portions of the Word and Truth of God which if a man maintain and hold and practise he shall surely suffer he shall be persecuted for them A man might have gone clear along with some truth even in the Marian days themselves But if he held and openly professed the truth against the real Presence in the Sacrament and so in many other things he brought himself into extream danger And so in every age there are some passages of holy Scripture and the truths delivered in them that are more opposed then others so that whoever sticks to them shall be sure to meet with trouble and so to exercise his patience And he that keeps these notwithstanding that maintains them and that yeilds obedience to them he keeps the Word of Gods patience And therefore it is noted of the good ground that it receives the Word of God aright and brings forth fruit with patience Luke 8.15 That on the good ground are they which in a good and honest heart
my Brethren Do you believe the Word of God Do your hearts say Amen to every particle and tittle of it If God should come and put the question to you concerning those particulars of holy Truths which seem most hard to be believed most difficult to be accomplished as once our Saviour did to Martha when he had said I am the Resurrection and the life he that believeth in me though he were dead yet shall he live And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die Believest thou this Joh. 11.26 Can you return the same answer yea Lord I believe as she did May not the same be charged on abundance of you which God so sharply reprehends in Israel Psal 106.24 They believed not his Word and hearkned not to the voyce of the Lord. Are there not multitudes among us who give no credit to the Word at all who when they hear the truths of God delivered to them do not enquire with Nicodemus only How can these things be but even peremptorily determine they can never be And here because they are of many sorts who do not keep the Word of God in their hearts by believing I will set them in their ranks and proceed with them in order Some there are who question all the Word of God throughout from the beginning of it to the end do not believe one word of it Either they throw it off as false and vain without Consideration in a rash and wilde way or else they soberly resolve the Scripture to be nothing else but the invention and device of Politick and subtile heads to keep fools in awe withal And so they say upon deliberation as David in his haste and in his passion All men are lyars the very Pen-men of the Word of Truth it self The Prophets the Apostles all are lyars As that blasphemous Pope who stiled the Gospel the Fable of Christ These men are flat Atheists what ever their professions be We want not some in these times who are so bold as to declare themselves in this particular and openly to renounce the Word of God And certainly however other men conceal themselves for shame yet there are more of this opinion then we are aware of They do not say with their tongues perhaps but yet with Davids fool they say it in their hearts the Scripture is not Gods Word yea there is no God at all to be Author of the Scripture Others there are who though they do not question all the Scripture yet they do not believe it all they give not absolute belief to every part and parcel of it And since the Word hath in it precepts promises and threatnings and there are some that question one and some another of them we will proceed with them distinctly and in order 1. Some there are who do not give assent to the Divine Authority of all the Precepts of the Word of God Some deny some certain Precepts ' and Commandements by themselves apart The Papists they deny the second Precept Vasques acknowledges that this Commandement interdicts not only the adoring of an Image under the notion of a God but also the adoring of the true God in an Image And further he confesses that they do the very thing that is condemned in this Commandement What then because it will not be obeyed it must be cancelled and repealed and not admitted to have any place among the Moral precepts of the Law of God It was saith he a positive and Ceremonial Law and therefore ceases now in our days And thus they make the Commandement of the Lord of no effect through their tradition Others deny the fourth Commandement and affirm that is also vanished with the Ceremonials that it belongeth not to Christians save only in regard of Moral equity in which respect the Moral and Judicial Laws belong to us also And yet the Lord you see hath placed it in the middle of the Decalogue and hedged it in on every side with other precepts that it might be the safer from the violence of those who seek to raze it out of the Tables But that which these men do by parcels and retail there are another sort who do in gross and as it were by whole sale cast off all the Precepts and Commandements of the Law of God together affirming they are all abolished not only in regard of irritation malediction condemnation but even in regard of obligation And thus with those in Davids time they make void the Law of God These men cannot pray to God as David doth Psal 119.66 Teach me good judgement and knowledge for I have believed thy Commandements And verily if all that are bestowed on Jesus Christ do keep the Word of God in the heart by believing they that renounce it thus seem to be in an ill Condition and they have reason to consider well whether they be given up to Christ or no. Others there are who give no credit or belief to the threatnings of the Word who when they hear them thundered out against them say it is not be with Israel neither shall we see Sword nor Famine Jer 5.12 And are there not a multitude of this opinion For tell me my Beloved when you that know your selves to be unclean livers have heard that dreadful commination Whoremongers and Adulterers God will judge when you that are so glewed to the world that nothing can divide you from it have heard that flaming sentence That no covetous person hath any inheritance in the Kingdom of God when you that wallow in your filthiness you that are lyers swearers drunkards enemies of all goodness have heard that nothing that is filthy or unclean shall come within the new Jerusalem that without shall be lyars and dogs that bark and snarl and snap at holiness that such shall have their portion in the lake c. have you believed these threatnings have you assented to the truth of them Alas my Brethren it is Evident you have not For 1. First If you believe the threatnings you will quake and tremble at them This disposition is observed in the Saints of God in Scripture that as they had believing so they had tender trembling hearts in relation to his threatnings Such a heart had good Josiah his heart was tender when he heard the words that is the threatning words of God his words against Jerusalem 2 King 22.19 not to it to instruct nor for it to comfort but against it to affright Such a heart had holy David Psal 119.12 My flesh trembleth for fear of thee and I am afraid of thy judgements He speaks not of his Judgements actually inflicted for they are felt but of his judgements threatned only and hanging in the Commination for they ate feared I am afraid of thy judgements Of such a temper was the Prophet Hab. 3.16 when I heard my belly trembled my lips quivered at the voyce c. And such a disposition they discovered of whom the Propeht Ezra speaks ch 9. ver 4. they
did otherwife as the Apostle testifies of them to their commendation 1 Thess 2.13 The word which ye heard of us saith the Apostle there ye received it not as the word of men though ye received it of us who are but men yet ye received it not as the word of men but as it is indeed the word of God Is it so that they that will give the word of God such entertainment Vse 2 as it ought to have must know c. You see then what you are to do if you desire to entertain the word aright and to receive it in such a manner as you ought to do you find perhaps much slightness and irreverence and stubbornness and disobedience in your hearts against it you cannot bring your hearts to such a temper in the reading or the hearing of it as you unfeignedly desire to do your thoughts are wandring or your hearts are unbelieving or your lusts are struggling or your corrupt and carnal reason is gainsaying while you are attending on it Something or other there is still that hinders you from a right receiving of it And this is a continual grief and burthen to you Now my Beloved I will shew you how you shall help all this at once You must come to be assured to know for certain that that which is delivered in or from the Scripture is the word of God If you have any secret unbelief of this any doubt in this particular do what you will in all respects besides and labour what you can you will never bring your selves to give the word such entertainment as it ought to have This one defect will hurt you more then all the means that you can use besides will help you And truly Satan knowing well of how great consequence it is endeavours what he can if not to overthrow us utterly at least to weaken us in this assurance And if he can but weaken us in this and make as faint in this assurance that that which is delivered in or from the Scripture is the word of God he knows he doth much work at once He weakens by proportion our Reverence our Assent Submission and Obedience with it And verily my Brethren though it may not be perceived yet this is that which lies at the bottom and is the main original of all that slightness and incredulity and obstinacy and disobedience which many of the pretious Saints of God discover in themselves in relation to the word and know not how to remedy They are not firmly and inviolably setled and confirmed in this perswasion that it is the word of God Their faith is weak in this particular and so accordingly they are weak in all those things which concern the due and right receiving of it For even as if a man believe it not to be the word of God at all he will give it no fear no faith no submission no obedience So on the other side if he believe it weakly and with many hesitations he will accordingly be weak in all these he will be on and of and up and down according to the ebbings and the flowings of his faith And therefore I beseech you my Beloved strive and labour what you can to strengthen and fortifie your selves in this perswasion which is of such concernment to you And certainly the best among us have need of Confirmation here for we are apt sometimes to waver and to have doubtful thoughts about it And they that are most free from these have yet defects and imperfections in their faith of this as well as other parts of holy truth They have not yet attained to such a pitch but they may be adding to it and go on to further measures and degrees And therefore let it be our labour and endeavour to encrease our faith in this particular and to grow up to full assurance of this inviolable principle that That which is delivered in the Scripture is verily the word of God Now that you may know this for certain I shall do two things First I shall lay down such considerations as make it credible And in the next place I shall shew you what you are to do that it may be certain to you As for the first of these my Brethren there are many things that make it very credible that whatsoever is delivered in or from the Srripture is the word of God I shall name a few of them as 1. The evident accomplishment of all the prophesies contained in it I mean of all excepting those the time of whose fulfilling is not come in It hath been Ruled long ago that De futuris contingentibus non datur determinata veritas Man cannot certainly determine of future things that are contingent He cannot do it of himself and by his own fore-sight Now this the Prophets and Apostles did as by the issue and event is manifest and therefore it appears that in their prophesies they were directed by the All-knowing and Omniscient God 2. It is made credible by the harmonious testimony of the Church in every age who have assented to it and acknowledged and received it as that which comprehendeth and containeth the divine and holy Oracles of God himself And however divers Churches have been at very sharp dissentions about divers other things yet herein they have still agreed and none of them have once so much as questioned whether the Scripture be the word of God or no. 3. It is made credible by the almost incredible consent between the Scribes and Pen-men of it who writing in such divers places tongues and seasons must needs unreconcileably have crossed and thwarted one another had they been guided by their own spirits We see how men that write upon the Scripture differ in their Expositions of it and speak directly one against another How more would the Prophets and Apostles then have jarred unless they had been all directed by the same Spirit We know in reason men would far more easily agree in Explicating Principles already made then in composing those Principles and Rules themselves if every man had liberty to frame what Axioms he thought good himself and to set them down for text And therefore certainly the Pen-men of the Scripture were guided all by one viz. the Holy Ghost himself who lead them into one Truth 4. It is made credible by the effectual and mighty working of it on the hearts and souls of men above all other writings whatsoever For however it be carried in a low and easie stile yet it commands us and prevails upon us more then all the eloquence of men and Angels could possibly do were it united all together And herein I appeal to Gods people let them consider with themselves what wonderful effects it hath wrought upon their hearts how it hath pierced in and made a separation between their very joynts and marrow how it hath even told them all that ever they have done how it hath cast them down with unutterable sorrow and then raised
particular dependance of one of them upon the other If you consider them and look upon them in a joynt dependance upon that which goes before So they are both of them the fruit and the effect of the faithfulness of Christ He was exact in the delivery of his message to a word as he declares himself in the fore-going parcel of the verse which we have even now dispatched and the event was this That both his Message and himself were very well received and entertained among his hearers So that here I might lay down this observation DOCTRINE The faithfulness of the Messenger of God in the discharge and execution of his Office is of very great avail and efficacy to commend his Message and himself unto the people I shall but only touch at this because though it be a truth yet it is not a proper and a seasonable truth to be insisted on in this Assembly You see the issue of it in our Saviour here the chief Messenger of God he was absolutely faithful in the trust that was reposed in him by his Father and this was that which came of it and followed it among his hearers Their good reception of 〈◊〉 message they received his words Their good perswasion of himself the Messenger they knew for certain that be came from God And where did ever any Messenger of Christ that was faithful in his place miss altogether of success and good esteem among the people It 's true some will dislike him and oppose him and hate him for his faithfulness as Ahab did Micaiah But the wisest and the best will value him and love him and respect him for it There is a special blessing of the Lord on the fidelity of his Embassadors which is the cause and reason that they seldom fail of doing some good and of finding some fruit and of having some regard from those whom they are sent to And there is something in their faithfulness it self when it comes once to be observed by the people to gain their hearts and to win their good affections and submission to themselves and to their preaching When they are once perswaded and convinced that their Minister is faithful this hath a mighty operation on them if they be not very stupid and prophane to make them hear him and respect him and obey him So that to give you but a word of Application Vse this points us with the finger to the true and real cause why many that pretend themselves at least to be the Messengers of God and the Messengers of Christ do find no better entertainment with the people Their persons are despised their Ministry is slighted themselves and their words are not regarded What 's the reason the people find they are unfaithful and hence it is that they have no opinion of them no regard at all to them And therefore they that would be well esteemed among their hearers that would have their Ministry find some success and fruit and efficacy in them must shew all good fidelity in the discharge and execution of their Office But you will ask me How may this be done and wherein doth this consist I will shew you in a word and pass on to another point of Observation The Messenger of Jesus Christ if he will be well received and well-approved must shew his faithfulness especially two wayes 1. In an active way he must shew his faithfulness in two respects First in a right delivery of his Message as he receives it from his Master and secondly in a delivery of it too for a right end that is for his Masters end and not his own 1. He must shew it in a right delivery of his Message just as he receives it from his Master He must not alter it or change it in the least degree to make it suit with the genius of the times or the pleasure of Superiors or the corruption of the people For if they once perceive that he will scrue the word to any interest and make it to comply with any humor though they may like it well enough whose humors and corruptions he complies with yet they will never like him nor think the better of him but the worse No they will look upon him as a man of no fidelity of no conscience and so accordingly will suspect and undervalue any thing that he delivers Whereas if he deliver what he hath received without fear without favour and will not vary in the least degree to comply with any man they must take it as it comes they will say of him as Ahab of Micaiah 1 King 22.8 I hate him for he prophesies against me still but yet he is a Prophet of the Lord he crosses me and meets with me continually but yet I must confess he is an honest and a faithful man 2. As he must shew his faithfulness in a right and just delivery of his Message so in the second place in a delivery of it too for right ends conceive it for his Masters ends and not his own To advance Christs glory to build up Christs Church to save the souls of Christs people If we would be well received and entertained our hearers must have no occasion to distrust that that which we deliver though for the matter of it right and sound is to satisfie our own passion or to promote our own ends First not to satisfie our own passions They must not think that our seeming heat and zeal is for our selves and not for Christ and this we must be very wary of in the great differences that are on foot at this time Corruption will be apt enough if there were nothing else to make us sharp and bitter against those and their opinions who are it may be violent against us and if they apprehend us so we shall never do them good and therefore we should strive to carry matters so that we may satisfie them and convince them that we speak nothing out of spleen against them And to this end it would be prudence to forbear loose flings and bitter girds at them We must in no wise betray any truth of Jesus Christ by our neglecting to appear and shew our selves for it who ever set themselves against it But we should rather do it in a way of reason and solid conviction then in a way of passion and bitter opposition and in this way undoubtedly we shall do Christ and it most service Secondly our hearers must have no occasion to distrust that that which we deliver aimeth at our own respects That we seek our selves in it our own honour by vain ostentation of wisdom and eloquence and secular learning Our own advantage by insinuation and pleasing and flattery so making merchandize of those that hear us as the Apostles phrase is we must be able to appeal for this as the Apostle did 1 Thes 2.3 Our exhortation was not of deceit or guile but as we were allowed of God to be put in trust with the Gospel so
as they did in the Parable we have born thy name and we have been called Christians and have been accounted thine and wilt thou not acknowledge us and own us now And Christ shall answer them depart from me I know you not go get you over on the other side among the Goats I tell you you are none of mine Ah my beloved this will be a cooling and a killing word indeed Is it so that Jesus Christ is glorified in all those that belong to him Vse 2 Both in their grace and holiness in this world and in their glory in the world to come This then should be a motive and inducement to us to strive and labour after both these both after grace in this world and glory in the world to come both to be holy here and happy hereafter 1. This should quicken us and stirr us up to labour after holiness and grace that Jesus Christ may be glorified in us If grace were only advantagious to our selves and honorable to our selves as to be really and truly gracious is indeed the greatest honour in the world there were no such reason then why we should labour to attain it and abound with it For then you know we could have no higher aim then only to set up a poor Creature But seeing Jesus Christ is honoured in the grace and holiness and the obedience of his people Oh how should this enflame us with restless and unsatisfied desires of these things How should we covet and covet earnestly the best gifts and labour that we may excell in inward grace and outward obedience that we may set up Jesus Christ the more and that his honour may be the more advanced by us When we are seeking to the Lord for holiness and grace that he would give it out to us and give it more abundantly how should we press and quicken our petitions with this prevailing argument that Jesus Christ will be advanced by it and his glory more enlarged Lord give us more faith love hope patience zeal power against corruption strength to new obedience that Christ may have the more glory We seek not these things to promote our own esteem and reputation and that we may be some body among the Saints but that Christ Jesus may be all in all It is thy great design to glorifie thy Son Christ and this is the ready way to accomplish the design on which thy very heart is set if thou give us more holiness and more grace he will have more glory Thou wilt not honour us so much but Jesus Christ thine own beloved Son will be glorified in us And therefore we beseech thee set thy Treasure open to us and give us out a large share In such a manner the Apostle deals with God in his petitions in that memorable place to this purpose 2 Thes 1.11 12. We pray continually for you saith the Apostle there that God would count you worthy of this calling and fulfill all the good pleasure of his goodness and the work of faith with power That he would carry on that work of grace upon your souls till he hath brought it to perfection And why so to what end That the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you not that you may be honoured but that Christ may be glorified in you 2. And as this should stirr us up to labour after grace in this world so after glory in the world to come Since Christ is glorified as in the grace so much more in the glory of his people For glory is compleat grace and therefore Christ is glorified in that to admiration as we have shewed you formerly in explication of the point The Apostle speaks of some who seek glory Rom. 2.7 he means the glory of the other world as it is very evident by that which is joyned with it glory and honour and immortality and Eternal life And truly it is not unlawfull for every one of us to seek glory I mean our own eternal glory in the heavens because while we seek that we seek the glory of Christ in it It s that which troubles many of the Saints they think that they are scarce upright because they have so great an eye upon their own glory They doubt their own sincerity meerly upon this ground Indeed my brethren if your own glory and salvation went single and alone it were a greater cause of scruple But since the glory of the Lord Christ is comprehended and involved in it why should you not desire and seek it as subservient to the great and high end And therefore I beseech you my beloved under this notion have respect to it and draw encouragement and sweetness from it amidst the many heavy labours and bitter sufferings of this present life Look up man to the glory that is set before thee press hard towards it be diligent and patient in the expectation of it strive and labour to obtain it while thou considerest with thy self that when thou art glorified Christ will be glorified in thee And so in aiming at thy own glory do thou intend and seek the glory of Christ And this is that which thou maist do yea this is that which thou must do And therefore go on cheerfully embrace the promise that is yet afar of reach at the Crown of glory that is hung out to tempt thee and to toll thee on And let this animate thee most of all that when thou hast attained it Christ will be glorified and admired in thee He whom thy very soul loveth will have one monument the more of his own praise and glory unto all eternity And thus far of the first Consideration that induced our Saviour to become a Suitor for his Apostles and Disciples to his Father viz. the neer relation which they had to his Father and himself by means of which it came to pass that he was glorified in them The second follows now in order to be handled viz. the sad condition they were likely to be in by reason of the near approach of his departure from them to the Father and leaving them behind in an unquiet and malitious world And now I am no more in the world but these are in the world and I come to thee A dolefull and heart-killing word you must conceive it was to his Apostles and Disciples and now I am no more in the world They who left all for him must needs be very much dejected to be left by him And to be left alone in such a wilderness in such a troublesome unpleasing and a vexatious place as the world hath alwayes been to Christs Disciples As long as he was with them he was a very great support encouragement and comfort to them in all conditions and in all cases And therefore now he is about to leave them he thinks it necessary to commend them to the especial care and mercy and protection of his Father There are two things suggested in this dying Song this last
with God in prayer let us consider what a holy God he is and let us labour to be holy too Let us be separate from the remainder of the world as he himself advises us 2 Cor. 6 17. and touch no unclean thing and then we have his promise that he will receive us The meditation of the holiness of God as it will be very usefull to prepare us and to make us fit for prayer so it will be very helpfull to us in the parts of prayer and that both in confession and petition and thanksgiving 1. It will help to humble us in the confession of our sins While we consider that they are so filthy and unclean and God upon the other side whom we confess them to so holy This cannot choose if it be duely weighed but shame us wonderfully in the presence of the Lord that we have been and are so filthy before such an holy God Indeed we ought to be ashamed to commit iniquity being such an odious thing The Lord hath planted shame in man to be a bridle as it were to check him to curb him and to hold him in from sinfull courses But if we have not been ashamed in the commission we ought especially to be ashamed in the confession as God advises Israel Be ashamed and confounded for your own wayes Ezek. 36.2 To review our sins with shame and to cry out as Daniel doth Dan. 9.8 to us belongeth confusion c. And Ezra in his sad confession Ezra 9.6 Oh my God I blush saith he and am ashamed to lift up my face to thee We should remember our evil wayes and our doings that are not good and loath our selves for our abominations Ezek. 36.30 we should remember and be confounded and never open our mouths any more because of our shame We should cast ashes on our heads and rent our hearts and cry unclean unclean Lev. 13.45 And there is no one thing that will confound and shame us more then the consideration of the matchless purity and holiness of God whom by our sins we hâ—ve offended Oh this will make us wonder that he should endure such filthy persons in his presence 2. As it will humble us in the confession of our sins so it will encourage us in our petitions for the cure of sin As it will make us low in our confessions so it will make us high in our petitions For how is sin which is uncleanness removed and cured in any of us but by holiness And is it not a comfort to us when we are making our requests for holiness that we are praying to the Holy God who is holy in himself and who is the original of all the holiness that is communicated to the Creature who is the Sanctifier of his people Is it not comfortable that when we come to draw that we are at the Well-head If you observe it is the great petition that our Saviour hath to make in the behalf of his Apostles and Disciples verse 17. Sanctifie them with thy truth and this he prosecutes throughout And therefore he begins his prayer for them Holy Father 3. It will enlarge us in our thanksgivings to the Lord for holiness when we consider whence it came and by whom it was bestowed We shall see what cause we have to praise the Lord the Donor and Dispenser of it As David intimateth in that memorable place to this purpose Psal 97.12 Rejoice in the Lord ye righteous ye that are sanctified ye that are holy and give thanks at the remembrance of his Holiness And yet again Psal 30.4 Sing unto the Lord O ye Saints of his and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness And thus far of the Object of our Saviours Prayer as he is mentioned by his title Father and his attribute Holy Holy Father Proceed we now to enter on the parts of it There are two things especially for which our Saviour is a suitor to his Father in the behalf of his Apostles and Disciples Preservation and Sanctification To these may be reduced and referred all that he desires for them preservation in my text and onward to ver 17. Sanctification in the rest that follow First he desireth preservation Keep them through thy own name And this desire of his he backs especially with two reasons and they are weighty and of great importance First he would have his Father keep them now because he himself had kept them and kept them very safe till now While I was with them in the world saith he I kept them and none of them is lost but the Son of perdition but he who was designed to be lost And now I come to thee saith Christ I am to be no more among them and therefore I beseech thee now receive them into thy special care and tuition Here I resign them safe and whole and sound to thee I pray thee keep them henceforward as well as I have done to this time Secondly he would have his Father keep them because they were in such a dangerous place where they were in great peril every day and every hour where they were hated and maligned upon all hand and that for the truths sake I have given them thy word and the world hath hated them and so on And therefore I beseech thee Father look to them and keep them from the evil as it is added in the next verse The evil of fault and the evil of pain Some other things are interposed and touched incidentally which shall be handled in their places The thing desired is first in order to be handled before we pitch upon the Arguments and Reasons with which our Saviour presseth and enforceth this desire of his and this as we have heard is preservation And here we have to be considered two things First the means by which our Saviour here desires that his Apostles and Disciples might be kept and that is by or through his Fathers name Holy Father keep through thy own name those whom thou hast given me And Secondly the end for which he prayes they might be kept that they may be one as we are So that you see the supplication of our Saviour Christ is full he prayes both for the Means and End desireth that the end might be attained for them by the means Begin we with the means by which our Saviour here desires that his Apostles and Disciples might be kept and that is through his Fathers name Holy Father keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me The name of God is generally taken for any thing that makes him known to men as one man is distinguished from another by his name Particularly it imports sometimes the attributes of God now one and then another of them Sometimes his attribute of mercy as that is called the name of God Exod. 34.5 6. The Lord descended in a Cloud and there proclaimed the name of God And what was that The Lord the Lord God mercifull and gratious and
in their judgements constantly agree they might be quickly brought if not wherein they err to change their minds yet to allay them so with humility and love that they should never break forth into bitterness against their brethren But while they have such a deal of pride among them while they are so alike in this regard it is impossible they should agree together 2. It is impossible even for the Saints to be in all respects at unity among themselves because as they are too proud so they are too selfish Herein they are too near alike easily to close together This is indeed the great make-bate it hath a special hand and is a violent eager stickler in all the quarrels that are driven to and fro among men From hence it is that men are so inflexible and so extremly stiff in their opinions that they will abate nothing nor yield to nothing for quietness and peace sake it is their love not to the truth but to themselves it is their self-love And so it is the selfishness of men that makes them so intent upon their own things that they will have the utmost in a business and urge extremity of right and will not part with any thing almost to purchase pretious peace It is because they love themselves too well and because there is so much of this even in the Saints this makes it wonderfully hard for them to be at unity among themselves I might name other things in which they are too much alike to close so nearly as they should but these shall serve for that branch It is a hard thing for the Saints to live at unity among themselves because as there are some things in which they are too much alike So there are other things in which they differ overmuch so close so nearly as they should together For differences make divisions many times even among Christs Disciples And that you may the better look into the business I will shew you many things in which they differ many times which render a conjunction and a perfect union infinitely hard to be made and kept among them 1. They are of divers tempers and of divers constitutions and those will hardly close together As divers strings unless they be of purpose tun'd alike will not be unisons they will not be of one sound They may be very sweet apart but if you strike them all together they will make a discord So it is in this case some of the Saints are of a melancholy sad and others of a sanguine cheerfull temper The melancholy doth not like the cheerfull the cheerfull doth not like the melancholy Saint Or if he like him in his judgement he cares not to converse with him or not so much at least as with another because he doth not suit his disposition One Saint by reason of his constitution which grace doth never wholly alter is very hot and very active Another Saint is very cold and very dull Those two being so unlike will continually be disliking one another and it may be censuring so that it will be very hard to bring them to so near a close as should be between Christs Disciples 2. They are of divers stations and conditions in the world and in the Church Some are high and some are low some are rich and some are poor The high are ready to despise the low the low are ready to envy the high The rich are ready to despise the poor the poor c. One of them will be apt on all occasions to be perking at the other And this will make a perfect union extremly difficult between them 3. They are of divers interests by reason of their callings judgements opinions habitations outward substance and estates and differences will arise and grow from all these So that it will be hard to keep them quiet and to hold them close together Meum and tuum is the rise of all dissentions it is this same thine and mine that setteth men yea the best men sometimes together by the Ears This is my right and that is thine this is my place and that is thine this is my opinion and that is thine If the interest were one they would be one but sure it cannot be avoided but it will be so different in this world there will be differences now and then even among the Saints themselves It was upon the point of interest that Abraham and Lot fell out though they were both good men And it is noted by the Holy Ghost himself as one especial reason of the strange consent and harmony that was among the primitive Saints because their interest was one Acts 4.32 The multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul How so They had all things common neither said any of them that any of the things which he possessed were his own The state of those times my brethren both admitted and required it and we see the fruit of it It is not so and to say truth cannot be so in our dayes and therefore it is much the harder to keep perfect unity among the Saints When once they shall come all to be in one place in one condition of one opinion and to have one inheritance and so to have one common interest among them all when God shall be all in all there will be no more divisions but in the mean time it is impossible they should in every thing agree together 4. They are of divers qualifications There are diversities of gifts saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 12.4 Now these I must acknowledge are intended to beget union But yet by accident by reason of remainders of corruption in the Saints they cause divisions While some are of more judgement and other some of more affection while some are of greater and other some of meaner gifts here are occasions I say not causes but occasions of dissention while some are supercilious and the other envious As soon as the Apostle layes down the distinction between strong and weak Christians Rom. 14.1 there follows disputation and division presently The one despises and the other judges The strong Christian is ready upon all occasions to despise the weak The weak Christian is apt upon the other side to judge the strong The strong slights and the weak censures and so there is a wofull breach of unity and peace among them By these things it is evident my brethren that it is a matter of wondrous difficulty even for Christs Disciples to be at unity among themselves And truly if we seriously consider how like they are in regard of some corruptions and how different they are in Constitutions Stations Interests and Qualifications we will not wonder that the Almighty power of God is invocated by our Saviour to effect it JOHN 17.11 That they may be one as we are AND this for clearing of the former member of the point It is a matter of wondrous difficulty for Christs Disciples to be at nearest unity among
and nourish discords and dissentions For these if we will give them entertainment will set our hearts on fire of hell And therefore when our thoughts begin to work apace in any injury or provocation that is offered to us and to tell us strange things that it is not to be born and that it may not be endured let us smother and suppress them let us not give place to them no not for an hour no not for a moment It is observed of Abraham that when the fowls came down upon his sacrifice he drove them away Gen. 15.11 so when such foul and noisome thoughts as these offer to pitch upon our heart let them have no footing there no let us watch them narrowly that we may suddenly chase them away And let us follow the advice of the Apostle Heb. 10.24 Let us consider one another to provoke to love Let us consider that and think on that which may stir us up to love let our imaginations work and dwell upon such thoughts as these and not those which lead on to Contestation and Dissention As we should chase away the thoughts so we should avoid the persons that make and nourish breaches and divisions It is the Apostles Counsel that we should mark them that cause divisions and offences and avoid them Rom. 16.17 Mark them not to join with them but to decline them and avoid them Brethren you shall observe that there are some of all hands whose work it is to make peace and to compose breaches And there are others on the other side who are as busie as it is possible for men to be to make rents and separations and divisions And it is our unhappiness that these dividers work goes onward faster then the others Indeed it is an easie thing for one to rip faster then two or three can sow Alas how many are there in these wrangling times who are continually medling and who make this their work and business to see how they can set men one against another how they can blow the coals of discord and kindle them into a flame how they can heighten the contention and the animosity that is too high already among those who are in name at least and in profession Christs Disciples Now I beseech you my beloved as the Apostle doth the Romans in the fore-alledged Scripture Mark these men let them be of what side they will if they be of this spirit do you set a mark upon them that you may know them another time and that you decline them and avoid them It is a bitter imprecation of the Apostle Pauls Gal. 2.12 I wish they were cut off that trouble you Truly I wish that they who are the troublers of our Sions peace the main and unwearied sticklers in our Church-divisions who would not have things come to an accord and a friendly composition for ends which they best know I wish they were cut off from all communion with the Saints That all the people of the Lord on all sides would look aloof upon them and avoid them as the pests of this Nation And certainly if all men would avoid them and keep off from them they would have the less work and we should have the less trouble If we would be at nearest unity among our selves we must be furnished with abundance of that wisdom which cometh from above as the Apostle cals it James 3.17 For that is gentle peaceable easie to be be entreated full of mercy and good fruits Contentious persons may applaud their own wits and think themselves extreamly wise and subtil in making good the quarrels which they undertake But what saith the Apostle ver 14. if you have bitter strife and envy in your hearts glory not lye not against the truth This wisdom descendeth not from above And if it come not from above from heaven it cometh from beneath from earth from hell it is earthly sensual devilish What ever mens abilities or parts or reaches are if they be alwayes quarrelling and falling out as many are it is apparent that they want this blessed wisdom To say the truth my brethren it is want of wit that is much of the cause of all this Anger resteth in the bosom of fools and so the wise man tells us that every fool will be medling Prov. 20.3 It is an honor for a man to cease from strife but every fool will be medling It is the property of every fool to do so You have a sort of men my Brethren that will be at the end of every quarrel If there be any difference or strife near them they will be sure to have a finger in the pie they will never sit out Now would you know what kind of men these are They are a company of fools a company of busie medling fools and were it not for such Idiots we might have much more peace then we have at this day If men were ballasted with wisdom they would not be a tempering and a making variance as they do And if indignities and wrongs were offered to them they would easily digest them and possess their souls in patience and therefore let us labour after this wisdom and let us follow the advise and counsel of our Saviour Mar. 9 50. Have salt in your selves and have peace one with another First let us have the salt of wisedom in our selves and then we shall have unity and peace with others If we would be one and if we would have peace the blessing we must be under the commanding and the ruling power of peace the vertue It must sit upon the throne in our hearts as the Apostle Paul exhorts Col. 3.15 Let the peace of God rule in your hearts Brethren when you are any way exasperated or provoked so that your passions rise or swell and are ready to break out into intemperate words or actions when you are hardly able to contain your selves then let the ruling power of peace appear by stilling and composing all again And let this holy disposition be so strong within you that neither pride nor wrath nor malice nor any other lust may be able to controll it There is a story that the Swevians had a Law among them that in a fray where swords were drawn if a woman or a child did cry but peace a great way of they were bound to end the quarrel or else he died that struck the next stroke after peace was named So if your passions be at war within you to use the Apostles phrase if they be up in arms and you do but think of peace or any friend perswade to peace let all be husht and quiet presently and let that passion die let it be crucified that dares to stir when peace is mentioned So let the peace of God rule in our hearts let it triumph in all and over all our provocations that we may bear them all with an unmoved and undisturbed spirit Let us be earnest with the Lord in prayer that he would make
sheep were not his own he might leave them as a prey to the devouring and ravening Wolf as he himself informs us in that same Similitude Joh. 10.12 The hireling flees and leaves the sheep because the sheep are not his own and cares not for the sheep and the Wolf catcheth and scattereth the sheep But Jesus Christ is not the Shepherd only but the owner of the sheep he keeps them not for wages but for love and for the property he hath in them and therefore certainly he will be careful of them to the utmost Those whom the Father gives him he will keep Indeed they are the Sons portion The Lords portion is his people Deut. 32.9 And what follows He kept them as the Apple of his Eye What do you think that Jesus Christ will lose his portion which his Father gives him That he will be so wretchless that he will not keep his own his own goods Nay more then so his own members the very apples of his Eye Will he suffer men or Devils to rent away his limbs from him to pluck his very eyes out of his head take this and take all We may be sure that Jesus Christ will keep us safe who are bestowed upon him by his Father as for his Fathers sake and for his own sake so for our sakes too And that upon a double reckoning or account For first of all we cost him dear and secondly we are very dear to him 1. We cost him dear he paid a great price for us and therefore he will know how he goes from us We cost him prayers he hath not one of us among the Gentiles without asking Ask of me and I will give thee the Heathen for thine inheritance saith the Father to the Son Psal 2.7 Otherwise I will not Christ is faign to beg for us before he gets us of the Father Nay more then so we did not cost him breath only but we cost him blood too He is the Lord that bought us as the Apostle Peter calls him and bought us not with gold and silver and such corruptible things but with his own most pretious blood 1 Pet. 1.19 And if he lose us in the end he hath a very ill bargain No my Beloved we may rest upon it that Jesus Christ will never suffer the purchase of his prayers the purchase of his blood to perish he never spent his breath and much less will he spend his blood in vain 2. And as we cost him dear so we are very dear to him His heart is infinitely set upon his Church and people he loves them out of all measure so that you may be sure he will be loth to see them perish He looks upon them as his Jewels Mal. 3.17 and as his own peculiar treasure Psal 135.4 And he will keep his Treasure and his Jewels safe take his trash who will And thus you have seen the grounds on which you may be confident that if the Father have bestowed you on the Son he will not lose you No you are safe enough depend upon it it is impossible that you should ever perish or miscarry But you will interpose and say perhaps Object This Doctrine serves to make men negligent and careless and secure For if they be preserved and kept so absolutely safe by Christ they need to take no care to keep themselves For answer let it be considered 1. Sol. That Christ doth keep men by themselves And hence saith the Apostle James This is Religion for a man to keep himself unspotted of the world James 1.27 And Paul advises Timothy to keep himself pure 1 Tim. 5.22 And 2. if any of you who belong to Christ remit your watch and grow secure and neglect to keep your selves though Christ will not lose you yet you may lose Christ as the Church did when she lay upon her bed and would not open Cant. 5.6 You may be wofully deserted by him both in regard of grace and peace And though you cannot fall away yet you may fall most fearfully to the dishonor of the Lord and of Religion and the irreparable wounding of your Names while you have a day to live Though you cannot wholly lose the inward habits of your graces yet you may lose the exercise of them And though you cannot lose the Essence yet you may lose the sense and comfort of all the graces that you have Though it be utterly impossible that you should perish in reality yet you may perish in your own conceit and apprehension you may be brought to such a sad condition that you may look upon your selves as reprobates and cast-aways and think your selves undone creatures And though Christ will not suffer you to go to hell yet he may make you cry in your heart and in your bones as David did and set you on the rack of such unutterable agonies and horrors and affrightments that you may feel a Hell in this world Now for a last use of the Point this may afford a seasonable admonition Vse 3 to all the Deputies and under-Officers of Jesus Christ If Christ who is the Fathers servant and the Fathers Shepherd do keep them safe who are committed to him by the Father you then who are the Servants and the Shepherds and the Officers of Christ should learn of him to keep them safe as far as lies in you who are committed to your custody and care by Jesus Christ 1. Ministers are Christs Shepherds in the Church as Christ is the Fathers Shepherd and as the Father commits his people to the Son to keep so Christ commits them to his under-Officers and to his Ministers to keep and therefore it concerneth them to hearken to the advice of the Apostle to the Elders of Ephesus Act. 20.28 Take heed to your selves and to all the flock over which Jesus Christ hath made you Over-seers to feed the Church of Christ which he hath purchased with his own blood yea to the admonition of Jesus Christ himself to Peter Joh. 21.15 Simon son of Jonas lovest thou me dost thou love me dost thou indeed why if thou dost Keep my Lambs feed my Sheep If you have any love to Christ your Master see that none of his be lost by your default by want of any pains you could have taken wâ—th them in heat by day and cold by night for want of any admonition or instruction that you could have given them And be assured of thâ—s that if any of them perish by your carelesness and your neglect you will have a very sad account to make when the day of reckoning comes their blood will Jesus Christ require at your hands Oh let it not be said of you that you do not Custodire gregem sed perdere non pascere sed mactare Not keep the sheep but lose them not feed the flock but feed upon it Be sure that you be faithful to your great trust that you may give up your account with joy and that when Christ shall call
you undervalue heaven and the incomparable riches of Christs mercy to your souls And whence proceedeth this but from the fleshiness of your corrupt hearts while you walk by sense only and therefore I beseech you take a little pains to make your selves conceive and understand your happiness and spend a little time upon the contemplation of the blessedness that is reserved for you in the heavens and this will draw and swallow up your present sorrows and afflictions Is it so that Jesus Christ would have his people full of holy joy you Vse 3 then who have your hearts replenished with it take heed that neither sin nor Satan steal away this Jewel from you which is the legacy that Christ bequeathed you when he was even about to leave this world But first before I press you any further in this kind this caution would be fitly interposed be sure the joy you have be Christs joy the joy which he works by his Spirit which he would have you to be full of and that you have his joy fulfilled in your selves for you must know my Brethren that as there is a kind of joy that is a fruit and effect of the Spirit as the Apostle Paul stiles it Gal. 5.22 so there is another kind that is a fruit and effect of the flesh there is a laughter that is madness a rejoycing that is not good as the Apostle hath it Jam. 4.16 And nulla est verior miseria quam falsa laetitia There is no truer misery then false joy and feigned felicity A very hypocrite may have his raptures and flashes of exceeding comfort The second ground you know received the Word of God with joy and those that followed John the Baptist rejoyced in his sight and such as after fall away may find a kind of taste and sweetness in the Word of God and in the powers of the world to come And therefore we had need to prove the joy and comfort that we have whether it be Christs joy the joy which he works in his people by his Spirit The marks to try it may be such as follow The joy of Christ which he works by his Spirit is chiefly moved with spiritual things It 's true there is a joy allowable for earthly blessings as when the Lord vouchsafes us rain and fruitful seasons and the like in doing so he fills our hearts with joy and gladness Act. 14.17 But this is as if we rejoyced not as the Apostle Paul speaks 1 Cor. 7.30 it is not worthy to be named with the joy that ariseth from the sense of the favour of God and spiritual blessings conferred on our souls Here then examine my Beloved when your joy is most when you are freed from some affliction or when you have obtained conquest over some corruption when inward grace or else when outward wealth when Corn and Wine and Oyl increaseth Alas how evidently do the greatest part of men discover the unfoundness of their joy who take abundantly more comfort in these outward things the thriving of their Trades their speeding of their pleasures and past-times then in the thriving of the means of grace or any other thing that most especially concerns Gods glory or the Churches good They make it to appear where lies the toot and Fountain of their joy and consequently of what kind it is which if they be deprived of their riches or honors their hearts like Nabal dye within them their joy is dashed and their comfort gone Whereas the Saint of Christ whose heart is filled with spiritual joy retains it in a measure in the loss of earthly things and professeth with the Prophet Habbakuk chap. 3.17 Though the fig-tree shall not blossom neither shall there be any fruit in the Vine if the labour of the Olive fail and the field yeild no meat if the Flock be cut off from the fold and there be no Herd in the stall yet I will rejoyce in the Lord yea I will joy in the God of my salvation The joy of Christ which he works by his Spirit proceeds from a conscience testifying good and not from a conscience testifying nothing For our rejoycing saith the Apostle is this the testimony of our conscience 2 Cor. 1.12 There is as Barnard stiles it Conscientia mala quieta an evill conscience that is quiet which being lulled asleep by Satan saith nothing to disquiet him that owns it and so he lives as jocund and as metry for a time as he whose heart most really acquitteth him from any thing that may disturb or interrupt his joy But yet this kind of comfort beause it comes from nothing else but a Vacation in the Court of Conscience if I may call it so a respit of the accusations there is most uncertain and unfound Assoon as term begins again when Satan as he seeth occasion shall set the sins of such a man before his face when conscience shall awaken and accuse that joy and comfort will be turned into sorrow yea into such tormenting pangs of horror that no tongue is able to express But if thy joy arise from a conscience testifying good that in simplicity and sincerity of heart thou hast had thy conversation in the world this is the joy that Christ would have fulfilled in thee The joy of Christ which he works by his Spirit hath its matter within and not without the person rejoycing There be many my Beloved That have nothing in themselves whereof they have a just occasion to rejoyce and therefore seek it up and down without And from this kind of joy the Apostle Paul disswadeth as unsound Gal. 6.4 Let every man prove his own work and he shall have rejoycing in himself alone and not in another Now men are said to rejoyce in another especially in two cases As first when they compare themselves with such as are extremely vitious and prophane and finding that themselves are not so bad as many others are they cheer and comfort up themselves with this as the Pharisee did I thank thee God saith he that I am no extortioner c. I am not as other men are nor as this Publican Luk. 18.11 and yet they may be bad enough for all this And secondly when men take comfort only in the good opinion that others have conceived of them and not in any good that hath a true and real being in themselves And this St. Paul suggesteth is a false deceitful joy and therefore presseth every man to prove his own work to sift and try his own actions and if on tryal they be good indeed then he hath ground and matter to rejoyce in himself and not in another And now my Brethren are there not too many such among us who when they look on drunkards whoremongers blasphemers and men of the most infamous and vitious lives that pass them and exceed them in prophaness take joy and comfort in themselves but never prove their own works their own lives And thus while they compare
Brethren they have not gone beyond their line they have not strayed beyond the bounds of their Commission Christ doth not send his Ministers as you have heard particularly or restrictively to any Countrey or to any Nation but their Commission leaves them free to all the world Even the Commission not of Apostles only but of the ordinary Ministers of Christ as I have shewed before in Explication of the point so that they are within their compass still though they be among the Indians even at the other end of all the Earth And it is to be very much observed that Christ hath given abundant testimony to this glorious work of theirs in the incredible success of their endeavours there so that poor naked souls come continually to Jesus Christ stoop to the Government and Scepter of his Kingdom desire to be acquainted with his will to be instructed in the way of his worship to have their children brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord And in a word they shame us who have so long enjoyed the Gospel that we are even weary of it and begin to put it from us and so to judge our selves unworthy of eternal life The Lord in mercy grant it go not from us to the Indians who prize it more are more eager after it and more fruitful under it according to their light then multitudes of us professed Christians are Now I beseech you my Beloved cast an eye upon them travail thither in your thoughts and meditations there you shall see some Ministers of Jesus Christ once our fellow-Labourers spending themselves undergoing difficulties without number or measure to convert souls and gather Churches among blind Heathens There you shall see the Gospel blossoming the Church enlarging her Tent and stretching forth the Curtains of her habitation the Doves flocking to the windows of the Ark the Church of Christ the fulness of the Gentiles now beginning to come in and in a word that great work going on which is incomparably the most remarkable that Christ hath yet to do in this world What shall we do now my Beloved and how shall we behave our selves under such a dispensation shall we as many have done heretofore and it may be yet do condemn the Instruments as if they went beyond themselves in this business Shall we mock at these beginnings of the building of the Temple shall we despise the day of small things shall we as Gallio care for none of these matters Truly the least that we can do is to comply with Jesus Christ in this design of his for which he sends his Ministers into the world and to promote this glorious work to the utmost of our power It is in the hands of those for whom as you have heard it is too heavy so that they cannot mannage it they are not able to go through with it They seem to call over to us as the man of Macedonia Come to America and help us Oh let not such a work miscarry and fail of being driven on for want of any help that we can yield to it a work that is so purely Christian as this is But which way can we help it on it may be you will say to me Truly my Brethren if no other way we may promote and help it on at least without purses and our prayers This we may do at this distance I shall speak a word to either 1. We may promote it with our prayers This was the course the Prophet took as you may see Isa 62.1 In the precedent chapter he is very large and eloquent on this business shewing the future glory of the Church by the addition of the fulness of the Gentiles in all Countries and in all Nations And having done with the description of it in two whole Chapters me thinks he is an end to hasten the fruition of it For Zions sake I will not hold my peace saith he and for Jerusalems I will not rest So we my Brethren having heard of the beginning of this great work in America let us do as Isaiah did let us be always crying to the Lord let him be hard beset on all hands let him not have a quiet hour The Lord hath set his Watchmen on the walls of his Jerusalem to this purpose Isa 62.6 that they may watch such opportunities as these are And least he should forget this great work when it is upon the wheel he hath appointed some remembrancers to mind him of it and therefore let us be continually minding God of this business beseeching him to go on with this work till he hath brought it to perfection till the whole fulness of the Gentiles be come in till Christ inherit all Nations Let us remember that we have a little sister in America and that now is the day of speaking for her for now her case and business is in agitation and therefore now let us be earnest with the Lord let us pray and pray hard let us not be cold or dead in such a suit as this is We may promote it with our purses and estates And this is that especially we have in hand at this time There are very many things in that great business now on foot that need pecuniary helps as hath been said The charge that lies on these that are the agents in it is exceeding great and indeed too heavy for them and therefore we me thinks that share not in the difficulties and the labours that other of our Brethren undergo among the Indians should be content to share a little in the costs for who would willingly sit wholly out in such a blessed work as this is Alas my Brethren how much idle mony do we spend a hundred ways that might be saved for such a purpose And truly I believe we never had occasion to lay mony out to a better end then this Now we may help in a qualified sense to purchase souls with money to further the accomplishment of the Gospel promises with money we may make temporal and earthly things serve spiritual and heavenly ends And therefore I beseech you my Beloved enlarge your bounty more then ordinary in such a choise and extraordinary work as this is Let love to Christ and to his Church compassion to those blind Americans draw out your very hearts to them that those poor Indian souls whose Conversion and Salvation you may further by this means may bless you Thus make you friends of the unrighteous Mammon that you may render up a good account when the day of reckoning comes Is it so That Jesus Christ sends forth his Ministers into the world and Vse 2 that as I have said to gather Churches and erect his Kingdom over all the world Then let this raise our hearts my Brethren in reference to this work which is indeed the greatest and the most eximious that Christ hath yet to do in this world Oh let our hearts be lifted up towards it and that especially three ways in
therefore my Beloved when there are any such abroad as some have been in our days who say that they are Christ you shall do well to call one of them who are in Christ to tell you whether this be Christ indeed or no. This being in the Father and the Son importeth ready easie and familiar access to the Father and the Son They are in one another and therefore they must needs be much together Believers need not to go far to speak with God he is at hand continually for they are in him So that they have his ear and heart too they can come to him and speak with him when they please Others that are abroad they hear him when he speaks in publick in the open Congregation and when he cryeth in the place of concourse as the wise man speaks But alas they have no private talk with him as these have when there is none but God and them together And therefore they that are without that live without God and without Christ are fain to use those that are in God and Christ sometimes to promote their suits to him If they have any special business to prefer to God they that are without must be beholding to them that are within to tender their Petitions for them as Pharaoh was in such a case Send for Moses and Aaron and let them use their interest in my behalf let them pray to God for me This being in the Father and the Son doth carry in it a more immediate enjoyment of all the comforts satisfactions and contentments that the soul of man can reach after For God involves and comprehendeth in him all the good that can be thought upon and infinitely more then the poor narrow heart of man can reach to We would think abundance of us that we were very well if we had all the happiness that all the creatures in the world could yield us If we had such a wife house gardens servants in-come by the year honors pleasures and delights as we would fancy to our selves then we would think that we were happy men indeed Why my Beloved whatsoever good there is to please or give us satisfaction in the creatures any way if we had them all together is eminently and transcendently in God They had it all from him and therefore certainly he hath it all in him and that without dregs too The spirits and the quintessence of all these comforts are in God refined from the drossie part so that in having him we have all A naked God a naked Christ is infinitely more to make a man compleatly happy then all the comforts in the world without him Or if it were not so my Brethren our state in heaven would be worse then it is here upon the earth the happiness of Heaven would be much below and much inferiour to our earthly happiness In Heaven we shall have nothing else but God no Sun no Moon Apoc. 21.23 The Creatures shall not give us comfort as they do in this world No God shall be our Sun and Moon there he shall be every thing to satisfie us and content us and to make us happy He shall be all in all 1 Cor. 15.18 Now if the Lord have not as much in him as all the creatures which we leave when we are taken hence by death we are losers by the bargain whereas we know the heighth and the perfection of our happiness is there where we have nothing else but God And therefore certainly we stand in need of nothing else to make us absolutely and compleatly happy And whensoever we have least of creatures and most of God in this world then we are nearest to that full beatitude Now God we have if we be in him my Beloved and so we have the Fountain of all happiness and satisfaction He that is in God in the Father and the Son must needs have all that is in God so far as it is necessary for him And that indeed is all that can be This being in the Father and the Son doth carry in it admirable safety He is secure enough from any hurt that is in God For what should seize upon him to annoy him there You know the Lord is often called a house a habitation in the Scripture and to make up the Allegory the Saints are said to dwell in God 1 Joh. 3.24 He that keepeth his Commandements dwelleth in him and he in him So that believers are in God as in a house where they are warm and well and safe however matters go abroad what ever storms there be upon land they are not like to the Egyptian servants in the storm of hail they are not left abroad in the woods and in the fields to be smitten and destroyed No God hath fetched them into house into himself they are in God who is the habitation of his people and there they are secure enough as the Psalmist intimates Psal 91.1 He that dwelleth in the secret of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty So that when the storm is fiercest he can stand quiet and look out at window and see others perish in the tempest He is in the Ark in God and a few more with him while all the world besides are drowned in the deluge It matters not to him what waves and floods there are abroad he is where he is safe enough Nay God is not resembled to an ordinary habitation only but to a place of refuge and defence Psal 18.2 A Castle and a strong Tower c. So that they that are in God are in a Castle and a strong Tower that never was and never will be taken by assault and what need they fear there They that are without indeed are in very great danger they are exposed to the mercy of the Enemy because they know not whether to betake themselves for shelter but they that are within may say as David when the Drums beat and the bullets flie I will lay me down in peace and sleep for thou Lord only makest me dwell in safety Psal 4. ult and that because I am in thee thou art thy self my Castle and my refuge and my strong Tower This being in the Father and the Son doth carry in it certainty of perseverance What my Beloved do you think that it is in and out In God to day and out to morrow as Arminians teach It is a most uncomfortable Doctrine which they have broached Ah my Beloved what solid and induring satisfaction will the best condition that they can be in afford them if they be not sure to keep it Now here Beloved is the fullest and the best assurance against this discomfort that is contained in the Book of God You hear that true believers are in God in the Father and the Son yea they are so in God so in the Father and the Son as they are in one another I pray for them saith Christ that they may all be one as thou Father art in me
ought not to condemn and censure him again If he chide us we ought not to chide him again But if he love us we may we must love him again Yea he expecteth that we should return him love for love for he loves to be beloved Is it the will of Jesus Christ that true believers should be one in God Vse in the Father and the Son by sweet agreement and consent Then I beseech you my Beloved comply with Jesus Christ in this particular As God and Jesus Christ agree in every thing so do you agree with them Bring your mind to the mind of God and to the will of God that you may be of one mind and one will Have you no judgement of your own as different from Gods but judge of things as God doth Let his wisdom be your wisdom his reason your reason and his determination your determination Have you no wills of your own my Brethren but let the will of God be your will let it rule and order you Let your will be so melted and resolved into the will of God that as far as it is possible God and you may have but one will That he may never cross you and you may never cross him Consent to him in every thing if he say any thing true Lord if he do any thing good Lord Yea though it be against you in your ends and in your natural desires yet say as Hezekiah to the Prophet when he received a heavy threatning Good is the word of the Lord which he hath spoken Take heed there be no difference between God and you in any thing let not him say one thing and you another will one thing and you another But say you as God says and will you as God wills that so you may be swallowed up in God and that you may be one in him And to this end I propound three things 1. If God and you agree not every way in all respects you are out and not he And therefore it is best in all things to conform your minds and wills to his His mind and his will is always right and yours if they dissent are always crooked and oblique and therefore it is best to bring your mindes and wills to his and not to think to bring his to your own The Malon when he tries the wall that he hath builded by his rule and findes them not to suit together he doth not go and cut the rule and bring it to the wall but he goes and mends the wall till he have brought it to the rule So if your minds and wills do not agree with God's the fault is not in his but yours and therefore you must bend your minds and wills till you have brought them straight like his and not endeavour to make his crooked like your own 2. If God and you agree not every way as you are irregular so you are undutiful You are his servants and you are his creatures and therefore ought in all things to be ruled by him The Masters will must be the servants will in lawful things and therefore in the Civil Law the servant is accounted in the Master and not as a distinct person And much more the Creators will must be the creatures will He gives it being both the beginning and continuance of it and he that gives being may give Law to regulate the motions and the operations of the being that he gives and may not be contested with in any particular 3. If we agree not all in God our agreement and accord among our selves is worth nothing So far it is to be approved as it doth unite in God Then it is good and right indeed when as the Father and the Son agree together so we agree with both of them in the very same things If we be of one mind and heart in things wherein the Father and the Son are not of one mind with us it were better we did differ then unite for we unite not in a right center But if as we be one among our selves so we be one in the Father and the Son this is indeed a blessed union If Brethren so dwell together in unity that all of them do dwell together in this one God this is a happy and a heavenly conjunction And therefore I beseech you my Beloved let us look to this that as we all agree so we all agree in God and Jesus Christ Let us examin still whether our consent in any thing do meet and unite with theirs Let us see what their mind and will is and let us all accord in that together For though we be not one against another if God be against us all it is a very sad case The Apostle John makes mention of love in the truth 2 Joh. 15. Love in error is not to be accounted of but to be avoided rather but love in truth is very pretious consent in error is not to be rejoyced in but consent in truth my Brethren is a comfortable thing For this is consent in God who is so often called Truth in Scripture And if we so agree and so consent we may depend upon it we have Gods agreement and consent with us and therefore let this be our great care that Jesus Christ may have his will in this business according to his prayer in my Text That they may be one as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they also may be one in us JOHN 17.21 That the world may believe that thou hast sent me VVE are upon the matter of our Saviours Prayer for them who should believe in him by his Apostles word And there are two main things as I have noted formerly that he desires in their behalf First that they might be all one Then that they might be all in one place The first of these requests of his he propounds and prosecutes propounds it in the verse which we have even now insisted on That they all may be one c. And then he prosecutes it with divers arguments and reasons in this and the succeeding verses Whereof the first is taken from the furtherance that this neer unity of theirs would be to the acceptance of our Saviour in the world That the world may believe that thou hast sent me That they may all be one as c. Why so That the world may believe c. For Explication of the terms the difficulty lies especially in this viz. what sort of people our Saviour Christ intendeth by the world here For to say truth the world is taken divers ways I think more differently then any other phrase almost in Scripture Sometimes we find it used for elect and sanctified and sometimes for reprobate and unsanctified persons Sometimes we find it taken for believers and sometimes for unbelievers as I could give you instances of both these And when for unbelievers sometimes for those who believe not for the present but shall believe in after times sometimes for those who
such grounds and reasons as his spirit naturally is not likely to suggest because they do not any way concern him as a natural man as when upon the apprehension of some great dishonour that will come to God if such a thing should be denyed a man is much enlarged and quickned in his prayers yea when his prayers are against his natural desires when he is earnest with the Lord in secret to help him to pluck out a right eye or to cut off a right hand to mortifie and curse and kill those lusts and those corruptions which naturally are extreamly dear to him and that upon such grounds and motives wherein there is no self respect When he shall seriously and sincerely beg the Lord to give but a little wealth a little honour if he perceive that more will do him spiritual hurt that it will puff him up and make him proud as Agur did Give me not riches feed me with food convenient for me left I be full and deny thee and say Who is the Lord this man is like to act by Christs Spirit If we act by Christs Spirit in our prayers we strive most for spiritual things What do you think the Spirit of Christ will make us long more after earth and earthly things then Christ himself that it will make us more importunate for wealth then grace more earnest after temporal and worldly blessings then after those spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus as the Apostle calls them Ephes 1.3 Is it a likely thing my Brethren that the Spirit should make us struggle more for bodily and outward things then for those things that are more agreeable and suitable to it more near to its own nature I make no question David acted by the Spirit in that Petition and request of his Psal 4.6 There be many that will say Who will shew us any good you must conceive it any temporal or worldly good many that look after this But this is that which I desire saith he Lord lift upon me the light of thy countenance and when thou hast done this Thou hast put gladness in my heart much more then in the hearts of worldly men when their corn and wine increaseth If we act by Christs-Spirit we pray for temporal and worldly things in reference to spiritual ends They that have the Spirit of Christ and they that are devoid of it do both pray for earthly blessings For there are promises of these as well as of the other But now the difference lies in this both aim not at the same ends He that hath the Spirit of Christ desires these outwards blessings moderately with submission that he may serve God with them that he may promote his ends that he may be the abler instrument to help his Church to support his people to advance his glory to appear for his cause Even these desires of his are spiritual although not for the matter of them at least for the end of them But now my brethren on the other side he that hath not Christs spirit desires these outward blessings that he may consume them on his Lusts as the Apostle speaks Jam. 4.3 Ye ask and receive not because you ask amiss that you may consume it upon your lusts That you may make provision for the flesh with it and that it may be oyle to nourish and to feed the sinfull flames that are within you And thus it is my brethren with a multitude of men they pray to God for some thing to bestow upon their sensual appetite to serve their carnal turns to satisfie their brutish and voluptuous pleasures and desires They would be in place and power that they may raise their names and families that they may swell and swagger over their inferiours that they may plague their enemies and pleasure those that are observant of them They would have wealth and riches in abundance that they may swimm in full delights and fare delitiously every day Agur measures the conveniency or inconveniency of his outward state as it would fit him more or less for Gods service Not poverty least I deny thee not riches left I forget thee But these men measure it by nothing but their sensual appetite and so their prayers serve their lusts and they would have God himself to serve them too if they could prevail with him And are such desires as these like to be raised by the spirit of Christ what will the spirit stir men up to pray for any thing to nourish and maintain the flesh the carnall part which is the spirits enemy The flesh lusteth against the spirit and the spirit lusteth against the flesh for those two are contrary one to another And will the spirit notwithstanding strive for that which shall uphold and feed those lusts against which the spirit lusteth Believe it brethren they that pray for any blessings to maintain their lusts with them their pride intemperance c. do not act by Christs spirit Object But you will ask me then How shall we know whether we pray for blessings to consume them on our Lusts how shall we discern that I shall give you some discoveries 1. If you will observe deal impartially and freely with your selves you shall know it by your thoughts The end is first in the intention and last in execution and therefore certainly the heart works much upon it Now my beloved consider what runneth often in your thoughts when you are sick and pray for health and continuance of your lives are your aimes as Davids were that you may praise and glorifie the Lord among the living Psal 6.5 as Hezekiahs were Loth he was to die poor man but wherefore was he so averse from death The grave cannot praise thee death cannot celebrate Isa 38.18 Or do you feed your minds with nothing but pre-apprehensions of the carnal pleasure and delight and satifaction you shall have when you recover So when you pray for outward things do you entertain your spirits with pleasing dreams of honour and ambition by this you may discover what your aims are 2. You shall discern it by the manner of your prayers whether you pray for blessings to consume them on your lusts or no. If so you will be absolute and peremptory in your prayers Carnal desires will make the spirit of a man impetuous and impatient of denial He that aims at satisfaction of his lusts will not be at Gods disposal there will be no sweet submission to the will of God No he must have this or that and he cannot bear a check as Rachel must have children or she dies when once the heart is set on any thing that serves to feed a sensual appetite whether it be the lust of the flesh or the lust of the eye it is violently bent and it must not be denyed 3. You shall discover it by the effect I mean the use of those external blessings which you pray for you pray for health you pray for riches
other saving graces are it comes down from the Father of lights as the Apostle James speaks Chap. 1.17 And as the stars shine with a borrowed Luster even so do believers too If there be this or any other brightness in them it is a beam of the divinity a streak and ray of the divine glory They shine because their light is come viz. from God and the glory of the Lord is risen upon them Isa 60.1 And in a word this is a stream of his fountain which runs down from God to us All our fresh springs are in him as the Prophet David speaks Psal 87.7 and consequently all our streams of living waters are from him First the springs of our streams are in him and then the streams of his springs are in us The love wherewith he loveth is in us So that God doth not only teach us love as the Apostle saith ye are taught of God to love 1 Thes 4.9 but more then so he gives us love He doth not only teach it as a Master but he bestows it as a Donour and Dispenser Yea as a Donour of himself to us for when he gives us love he gives us down himself in some measure And therefore by this love he is said to dwell in us Mark that Expression of the Apostle John 1. Epist 4.10 God is love and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in him God is love properly essentially for whatsoever is attributed to God is God and he is the Original and Fountain of that love that is communicated to the Creature and by this love he dwells in us So that whoever hath this love in him hath God in him God in the beam as we are wont to say The room that hath the beam in it hath the Sun in it That place of the Apostle John is full 1 Epist 4.7 Love is of God saith he and every one that loves is born of God while he participates in this of Gods nature even as the Son is made partaker of the nature of the Father The Point you see is fully proved The love which is in true believers comes from God Reason And it must needs be so because it is not neither can it be originally in or of or from our selves The heart of man is naturally averse yea even abhorrent from the Love of God And therefore in the state of nature men are said to hate God Rom. 1.30 as in divers other places of the Scripture Indeed it seems to be a little strange that men should naturally hate the chiefest good And true it is that nothing apprehended and presented under the notion reason and the name of goodness can be hated and abhorred But yet the chief good looked upon as evil either in it self or else to him that so conceives and apprehends it may under such a notion be so far from being loved as that indeed it may be hated And thus it is with all unsanctified men So that of our selves you see it is impossible to have the love of God in us But whence must we have it then if we be partakers of it The Apostle clearly shews us Jam. 1.17 Every good and perfect gift is from above From above what 's that why it cometh down from the Father of lights that is from God who is the fountain of it And if every gift be from him every good and perfect gift then surely love which is in some respect the choicest of all other guifts as the Apostle shewes at large is from him too The love which is in true believers comes from God But yet this Caution let me interpose before I come to application You must not apprehend the love which is in true believers to come immediately from God without the use of second means as some have seemed to infer from that place of the Apostle 1 Thess 4.9 As touching love you need not that I write to you for you your selves are taught of God to love As if his meaning were I need not teach it you at all I need not strive to work it and beget it in you by my preaching for you are taught immediately of God himself Whereas indeed he speaks comparatively not as though they had no need at all of his instruction but not such need as many other men who were not taught of God to love As such expressions are very usual in the Scripture which in shew are universal yet to be understood ex parte and in comparison as that for instance John 9.4 If ye were blind ye should have no sin saith Christ none in comparison not simply none But as for love that it is mediately wrought by means as by the preaching of the Gospel is very manifest by this that the Apostles Paul and John especially do so frequently and earnestly perswade and press to it which they need not to have done if God did work it in the hearts of his people immediately by the teaching of his spirit Indeed my brethren every saving grace flows clearly from the upper spring but yet there are some pipes that carry and convey it down to us as the Word and Ordinances and the like And he that lives above them lives above grace too And therefore in my text our Saviour makes his declaration of his Father name by himself and his Apostles and their Successors in the Church the means of working love in the hearts of his people I have declared unto them thy name and will declare it that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them Now is it so my brethren that the love which is in true believers comes Vse 1 from God Here then we are directed where to go and to whom to have recourse for this grace If any man lack wisdom saith the Apostle let him ask it of God And so say I in this case If any man want love to God or to his Brethren let him ask it of God Let him go to God the Fountain and the spring of it and beseech him earnestly to give it down to poor creatures If we find our hearts are cold and dull and flat if they be not inflamed with the love of God let us entreat him to kindle them at his fire Let us begg him that the love which is in him may be in us Let us pray with the Apostle The Lord direct our hearts unto the love of God 2 Thess 3.5 They cannot find the way themselves the way of peace and so the way of love they have not known Now the good Lord himself direct them and guide them into that way It cannot choose but be a pleasing and a lovely suit indeed to be importunate with God to make us love him and to endear our hearts to him A man would think that such a sweet request as this should not be turned off with a denial And that we may the rather struggle in it I shall propound two things 1. Love as it comes from
commandeth not at all neither comes it into his heart They look not what the Lord hath ordered them to do Their eyes are not upon him for direction any way but what they have themselves a mind to do that they are imployed in They are a rule unto themselves and walk according to their own counsels They follow the way of their own hearts and the sight of their own eyes They are not guided by the will of God but by the will of man and the will of the flesh as it is called 1 Joh. 13. which stands in opposition to the will of God God may order what he will and they will do what they please For tell me my Beloved when you swear and when you are unclean and when you run out to all excess of riot when you prophane the Sabbaths and the Ordinances of the Lord when you do things that are apparently and grosly evill which admit of no excuse Are these the works which God hath given you to do Can you look him in the face and tell him so When you lie and when you cozen and deceive do you these things by his order No my Beloved no such matter This is the will of God even your sanctification that as he who hath called you is holy so you should be holy in all manner of conversation And therefore while you wallow in your lusts while you defile your selves with every sin you do not follow Gods order you do not walk by his rule but are a rule unto your selves I wish that such would seriously consider but these two things First It is the fearfullest and the extreamest judgement that God can bring on any man in this life to give him so far over to himself to neglect his order the direction he is pleased to give him and to walk according to his own counsel who when he permits men as he did the Gentiles Act. 10.16 to wallow in their own ways the ways which of themselves they choose and follow This is a formidable thing indeed And therefore he is wont to execute this in the close of all as the heaviest of his judgements as having nothing left but this to shew the fierceness of his wrath and fury on a person or a people When he hath proved and tryed men every way and nothing will prevail with them this is the last the parting blow he gives them over to themselves and so he leaves them And this is certainly the worst that the Almighty God can do to them Secondly If you will not be ordered by the Lord in one way you shall be ordered by him in another If you will not be ordered by the precept you shall be ordered by the threatning If you will not do his will his will shall certainly be done upon you If you submit not here to his commanding will you shall be forced to submit to his condemning will hereafter Here you say you will not hear you will not do the Lord commands you this and that but you resist and stand it out and you will not be obedient But tell me Brethren are you able to out-stand the curse and vengeance of the Lord in the last and dreadful day when he shall be revealed from Heaven with his mighty Angels And when the Lord shall order you to go to Hell and say Depart you cursed into everlasting fire will you be able to resist and to disobey that order Will you be able to controle him and hinder him from executing the sentence of the Law upon you No no you break the bonds and cords of God here but then the Lord will bind you fast enough in everlasting chains of darkness break and rent them if you can The haughtiness of men shall be brought low and God alone shall be exalted in that day And therefore I beseech you my Beloved eye the Lord in all your ways and see what work it is that he giveth you to do Be sure he give it you before you do it And this indeed is to be men after Gods own heart when you do Gods will I have found David saith the Lord Psal 89.20 called Act. 13.22 A man after my own heart who will do all my wills And if you thus do God will own you in the latter day and liberally reward you too After you have done the will of God you shall receive the promise that is the happiness and mercy promised Heb. 10.36 In doing of your own will or the wills of other men perhaps you may attain some transitory riches pleasures honors poor fleeting things which in the end will perish with you But if you do the will of God this will perpetuate and Eternize you and make you to endure for evermore 1 Joh. 2.17 The world passeth away and the lusts thereof but he that doth the will of God abideth for ever JOHN 17.4 I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do AND thus far of the first Particular considered in the words what it was that Christ did the work which God had given him to do The Second follows now in order to be handled viz. The manner how he did it he did it absolutely and compleatly I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I have made an end of it Now a work is ended then when it is so dispatched that there is no remainder of it to be done When there is nothing left of it imperfect and unfinished So that there can be nothing added to it any way to make it more accomplished and compleat And this is that which Jesus Christ affirmeth of himself in relation to the work that was committed to him of his Father saith he I have gone through with it I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do or I have brought it to a full end But had he so compleated it and ended it indeed when he put up this supplication to his Father Was there no remainder of it to be done Why the great work of all was yet behind the offering of himself upon the Cross as an oblation and Sacrifice to God the Father He had not yet laid down his life for his people Yet this he was designed to do his Father had appointed him to tread the Wine-press of his wrath and to become an offering for sin In which respect the holy Ghost affirmeth of him that it behoved Christ to suffer There was a necesse in it because it was the Fathers pleasure that it should be so it was the work that he had given him to do and how then saith our Saviour here before his passion and before his suffering I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do To this Interpreters give various answers according to their various apprehensions of our Saviours meaning in the words Some think he speaks by way of prophesie and so makes mention of that which was indeed to come as if it had been past