when we are once in Christ believe in Christ all the Scripture speaks comfort to us if we come in and receive him as he is offered upon his terms to be our Governour our King our Priest and Prophet then all the promises are Yea and Amen to us As for instance forgivenesse of sins if we receive Christ God will forgive us our sins and be reconciled to us for Jesus Christs sake We have an advocate with the Father and he is the propitiation for our sins The blood of Christ shall cleanse us from all sins These promises shall be Yea and Amen to thee if thy sins trouble thee they shall be done away How many promises to this purpose have we of the forgivenesse of sins Again if so be thou find want of Grace all the promises in Christ are Yea and Amen he hath promised his holy Spirit to them that ask him Luke 11. There is a promise shall be Yea and Amen if thou beg it He hath promised the fundamentall graces He will put his fear in our hearts that we shall never depart from him He will teach us to love one another you are taught of God to love one another He hath promised private blessings in this kind to circumcise and cut off the fore-skin of our hearts If a naughty and stonie heart vex thee he will take away that and give thee an heart of flesh a tender heart So these promises in Christ shall be Yea and Amen if we apply and believe them to take away our corruption and subdue that and to give and plant Graces he hath promised to do this therefore make use of them not only of the promises of pardon and forgivenesse of sins but of grace necessary Art thou sensible of thy imperfections that thou canst not go about the duties of Religion and of thy particular calling what saith Moses Who gives a mouth is it no tGod that gives a mouth And Be not afraid saith Christ you shall have speech and a spirit given you that all shall not be able to withstand Be not afraid God that calls us he will enable us You have a promise of sufficiencie of gifts If any man lack wisdom let him ask it of God If any man lack wisdom to manage his affaires to beare crosses and afflictions let him ask it of God a rich promise in that kind And so art thou doubtful for the time to come what shall befall thee God in Christ Jesus hath made a Promise That where he hath begun he will make an end Philip. 1. 6. He that hath begun a good work will finish it to the day of the Lord. Christ is Alpha and Omega too and What shall separate us from the Love of God in Christ Neither things present nor things to come nor any thing else why because it is the love of God in Christ. Gods love is founded in Christ and he will love thee eternally There is a ground of perseverance Therefore be sure to take in trust the time to come as well as the present he will be thy God for the time to come as well as for the present he will be thy God to death Jesus Christ is yesterday to day and to morrow and the same for ever He was and is and is to come He was good to thee before he called thee he is good to thee now in the state of Grace and he will be for ever Why shouldest thou stagger for the time to come Take in trust all that shall befall thee for the time to come as well as for the present for he is Yea and Amen himself and all his Promises are Yea and Amen Christ is Amen the true witnesse Thus saith Amen Rev. 1. and all his Promises are like himself Amen Oh but I may fall away my grace is weak I stagger often But are the Promises founded upon thee No the Promises are founded in Christ. Christ receives Grace for thee and he is a King for ever and a Priest for ever to make intercession for thee and he is faithful He is beloved for ever and as long as he is beloved thou shalt be beloved because thou art in him God is in Christ and thou art in Christ how canst thou miscarry God is in Christ for ever and thou art in Christ will he lose a limb will he lose a member No the Promises in him are Yea and Amen and not in thee They are in thee Yea and Amen thou hast the benefit of them because they are in him Amen first I but for the troubles of this world for afflictions and crosses what promises have we to build on for them God in Christ is Yea and Amen to us and the promises are Yea and Amen in that kind In all things necessary for this life Heb. 13. Let yourconversation be without covetousnesse for he hath promised he will not fail thee nor for sake thee It is taken along from Joshuah's time it was a promise made to Joshuah and is enlarged to all Christians He hath promised he will not fail thee nor forsake thee Therefore Let your conversation be without covetousnesse Insinuating the reason why men are covetous because they do not trust that promise I will not fail thee nor for sake thee For if men in their calling as they should do would trust in God without putting forth their hands to ill meanes their conversation would be without shifting and covetousnesse Therefore covetous men are faithlesse men they believe not the Promise that God will not fail them nor forsake them for then they would not live by their wits and by their shifts but by faith in this very promise which is Yea and Amen to all that believe it God is a Sun and shield Psal. 84. and no good thing shall be wanting to those that lead a godly life Would you have more he is a Sun for all good he is a Shield to keep from all ill I am thy buckler and thy exceeding great reward saith God to Abraham I am thy buckler to keep thee from all ill and thy exceeding great reward to bestow all good having these promises why should we stagger they are Yea and Amen in Christ God is Al-sufficient in Christ. For the issue in our labours Oh what will become of it we take pains to no purpose we rise early and go to bed late what will become of all in the issue What saith Saint Paul 1 Cor. 15. Be constant alway abounding in the work of the Lord be ye abundant in the work of the Lord knowing that your labour is not in vain in the Lord therefore abound you in the work of the Lord let the issue go to God you have a rich promise Knowing this that your labour is not in vain in the Lord. Therefore you know when Peter had fished all night and had caught nothing when Christ bids him cast the net into the Sea saith he We have fished all night
hath all to do again Another man sees an end of his work but in this the Devil and corruption hath undone all again We enforce good things on people on the Lords day but within one day ill company and imployment in worldly businesse overthrowes all the Sea banks are down they must be new repaired Therefore there is a necessity laid on us of the Ordinances to our lives end till our soules be in heaven there is a necessity of repairing them We cannot be too diligent in our places And those that have the oversight of others let them make conscience of it it is needful And mark here in the next Point the language of Canaan the language of the Spirit of God that he puts the name of Grace upon every benefit especially those that concern a better life Grace usually we take to be nothing but a gracious frame of heart the new creature as we call it but indeed in the language of the Holy Ghost every free gift of God that concerns our soules any way is a grace The very Ministery is a grace It is the grace and free love of God to give us the Ministery The very heart to imbrace it and to hear it is a grace The very heart to give almes is a grace saith S. Paul 2 Cor. 9. Thanks be to God for this unspeakable gift for this unspeakable grace that you had a heart to give so that every thing that is good it is a Grace a gift of God Saint Paul conceived of his coming to them as a grace Indeed the Grace of God moved and directed S. Paul to come to them It is Grace that God directs the Preacher to speak to the people It is a grace that the Minister speaks gracious things It is a greater grace when you close with and entertain that which is spoken all is of Grace Your ready minds to do good it comes of God it is a grace your acceptance of God as well as eternal life all is of free grace The ground of it is this as Austin as I said defines Predestination well It is a destinating and ordaining to a supernatural end to everlasting salvation in the world to come and a preparing of all means to that end Why now as it is a grace that God pulls oft some men to an eternal estate of salvation in heaven to a supernatural estate that they could never attain without his especial Grace so the preparing of all means to that end it falls within the compasse of Predestination within the grace So when we have any means prepared to bring us to that end the offer of the Word and the Spirit of God disposing us to imbrace the Word this preparing of the means to that end it falls within the compasse of Predestination we may gather our Election by it when we see the Word sent in favour and have gracious hearts to receive it this is a preparation wrought to bring us to heaven a man may know his Election by it all is of grace that falls within the decree of grace When God decrees to bring a man to heaven all that helps to the main must needs be grace The Minister is a grace the Word a grace opportunities to do good a grace the communion of Saints a grace all that helps a man forward is a grace A gracious heart sees God in every thing it sees Gods love in every thing it considers of every thing that befalls it as a Grace Why From this disposition especially because with the grace there is grace to make a blessed use of and to improve every thing If this be so let us look upon every benefit that concerns salvation though it be remote even the very direction of good speeches to us account it a grace It is the grace of God that I have this opportunity especially the publick Ministery Saint Paul calls it a grace let us think of it as a grace And as we do in Clocks we go from the hammer that strikes to the wheeles and from one wheel to another and so to the weights that make it strike we go to the first weight the first wheel that moves all and leads all So when we see good done look not to the good done onely but go to the wheeles to the weights what moves it and makes it strike what sets all a going The grace and free love of God when good things are spoken when any good is done go higher to the first wheel that sets all a going to the grace and free love of God This is the language of the Scripture and of the Spirit of God thus we must speak and think to the end that God may have the glory of his grace in whatsoever good is done or offered When Abigail met David and diverted him from his bloody intention to kill Nabal and gave him counsel another way O blessed be God and blessed be thou and blessed be thy counsell So when opportunities are offered to do good and to hinder us from evil intentions O blessed be thou and blessed be thy counsel When a benefit is done if it be a benefit of this life take it as a grace coming freely from God So a poor man his almes is a grace Thanks be unto God for this unspeakable gift saith S. Paul It is grace in him that hath it that God should respect him so much as to relieve him It is grace in the party that gives it that he hath a heart enlarged to do it So when any thing outward or spiritual is done that is good look on it as a grace put that respect on it and that will make you holy-minded to give God his own Our life should be a praising and blessing of God we should begin the employment of heaven while we are on earth How should we do that In all things give thanks Every good thing from God take it as a grace as a largesse not as due not as coming by chance but as a grace and this will make us improve it as a grace for the best it will make us to give God the glory and improve it to our own good when we are thankful for grace that we may have cause to account it a grace Our hearts would not be so full of Atheisme and our tongues so full of blasphemies if we had learned this lesson our lives would be a praising of God And that we may not want matter to feed a thankful spirit alway consider what good things we have are of grace we deserve not so much as a crumb of bread therefore we pray Give us this doy our daily bread Every thing is a Grace especially the things of a better life How shall I know that the Minister is a grace or a good speech from a Minister to be a grace as S. Paul saith here I intended you a second grace that is to speak gracious thing to you I shall know it if by that
especially weighty without invocation and dependance A Christian is wondrous weak a man is vanity in himself but take him as he is built upon the promises and as he is in the love of God and Christ he is a kind of almighty man then I can do all things in Christ that strengtheneth me A Christian is omnipotent if he depend upon the Promise and commit his wayes to God but he is impotent and weak in himself It is God that must stablish us A man that is vanity he makes him firm a man that is weak he makes him strong a man that is unsettled he settles him The Word is a firm thing and God that builds us on the Word is as firm and Christ in whom we are built is as firm Peter when he built on the Word he was wondrous firm he was a rock too A man that stands on a rock is firm Now in believing the Gospel and in being built on the Gospel upon the Prophets and Apostles upon Apostolical truth now we that are weak in our selves are firm The weakest creatures have the strongest shelters and weaknesse is turned by God to be a help for conscience of weaknesse makes us seek for strength out of our selves You know the Conies as Solomon saith they hide themselves in the rock they flee to their burroughs The birds because snares are laid for them below they build their nests on high to secure themselves that way We see the Vine a weak plant it hath the Elm to prop it weak things must have a strong support So man being weak in himself weak in judgment weak in affections he is stablished by God God herein triumphing in our weaknesse over strength For when we have strong Adversaries and we are weak Satan is a strong enemy God himself puts upon him the vizor of an enemy sometimes as in Job's case and Christs on the Crosse when God personates an enemy and the devil is a real enemy And the devils instruments Hereticks and Seducers are strong strong in wit and parts every way and we are weak to encounter with God to wrastle with him and we are weak to encounter with Principalities and powers and with men of stronger parts that are besotted and intoxicated with Satanical temptations and labour to draw all into the snare of the devil with themselves Now when God in weaknesse shall triumph over strength here is glory to God in stablishing us It is God that must stablish us And as God must onely do it so he is ready to do it for in the Covenant of grace it lies upon him God hath promised there to confirm it and therefore the Apostle 1 Cor. 7. 8 9. binds it with the faithfulnesse of God Faithful is he that hath promised who also will do it God is content that our confirmation should lye upon his faithfulnesse and therefore when he accepts us into the Covenant of grace he performs our part as well as his own God is faithful saith the Apostle 2 Cor. 9. who hath called us to the fellowship of Christ who will confirm us to the end he is content to hazard his reputation as it were and to be counted unfaithfull else so that strengthening grace is of God he hath bound himself by his faithfulnesse to confirm and to stablish those that are his Mark here by the way before I come to handle the Doctrine of perseverance what an invincibld Argument you have to prove that a man that is once in Christ can never fall away Say they Indeed God for his part is ready to maintain us to do this but we for our part are subject to fall away as if the carrying of us along in the course of grace to salvation did not lye upon God and Christ. God is faithful to confirm us to the end we being once in the Covenant of grace he doth our part and his own too how can those then that are in the state of grace ever finally fall away Now God doth confirm us by working such graces in us by his Spirit by which we are stablished As for instance I will put my fear into their hearts that they shall never depart from me he stablisheth us by fear Make an end of your salvation with fear and trembling for it is God that works in you both the will and the deed he puts a spirit of jealousie into a man over his corruptions and a reverential filial fear which keepeth him from presuming And likewise he preserveth us by Wisdome as it is Prov. 2. 10 11. When wisdome entreth into thy heart discretion shall preserve thee and understanding shall keep thee And by Faith You are kept saith the Apostle by the mighty power of God through faith to salvation And by Peace of Conscience which is wrought in the heart by the Spirit The Peace of God which passeth all understanding shall guard for so the word signifieth your hearts and minds that is a true Believer that is once in Christ he finds such joy in the Holy Ghost such inward peace of conscience as preserves and guards him from despair from the temptations of Satan from the seeming wrath of God So that God as he stablisheth us so he stablisheth us as it becometh Christians as it becomes men by sanctifying our understandings by working grace in our hearts the grace of fear of wisdome of faith of peace c. so that a Christian now cannot presume save in a holy kind of presumption that God will finish his own good work But of this I say I shall have fitter occasion to speak hereafter To conclude therefore God you see must stablish and God will stablish It is a Point of great comfort every way Comfort from the foundation and root in whom we are stablished and from him that hath taken upon him to stablish us God by his holy Spirit If a Christian should fall God must be unstable or Christ the foundation must be unstable or the holy Spirit by which we are stablished must be unstable but it were blasphemy to think thus I come now to the last thing The subject or the persons that are stablished us with you He that stablisheth us with you We should have honourable conceits of all Christians there is an oyntment runs down upon the very skirts of Aaron's garment there is not the lowest Christian but he receiveth something from Christ the head Perhaps thou hast one grace in an eminent manner it may be he hath another more eminent then thou hast thou may est have more knowledge he may have more humility thou mayest have more strength of judgment he may have more sense of his own wants There is somewhat in every Christian that is valuable that is estimable and precious not only in the eye of God who valued him so as to give his Son for him but should be so also in the eye of stronger Christians therefore S. Paul here a strong Christian out of
a Christian to be cowardly because he hath death and hell conquered and every thing is made serviceable to help him to heaven But for another man to set light by these things it is more madnesse No man but a Christian can be stout and couragious except it be from a false spirit especially in things that are above mans natural power as death it is eternal and what man can stand out against the eternal wrath of God And therefore those that put on a Roman stoutnesse and courage though they seem to have strong spirits it is but false either they are besotted with sensuality or else with a spirit of pride When they look before them and see eternity and see their sins and that they must all appear at the day of Judgment they cannot be strong Let us labour therefore to have our hearts stablished by the Spirit of God and try our selves often by propounding Queries how we do things with what minds and upon what grounds Again another Evidence whereby we may know that we have spiritual strength and stability in Christ wrought in us by the Spirit of God is this when it makes us desire the coming of Christ when it makes us think of death and of the time to come with joy and comfort and that for the present it gives us boldnesse to the Throne of Grace in extremities He that in extremity can go to God in Christ it is a sign his heart is established Hypocrites in extremity flye to desperate courses as Saul and Achitophel did but in extremity the soul that is stablished goes to God My God my God saith Christ so Job Though he kill me yet will I trust in him I say it is an evidence of a soul stablished upon Christ by the Spirit of God to have boldnesse to the Throne of Grace in extremity nay when God seems to hide himself which is the principal extremity of all as in Divine temptations when God seems to be an enemy then for a man to fight and wrastle with God and tug with the temptation and not to let God go though he kill him this is a true Israel a conquerour of God this is a heart fortified by the Spirit It is an argument of a heart established when besides for the present for the time to come he can chearfully and boldly think how it will be with him when death shall come that he shall go to Christ that the Match shall be fully made up that is begun by God between Christ and him for the contract is in this world but the nuptials are celebrated in heaven and in confidence hereof can say Come Lord Jesus come quickly A heart that is not stablished saith Oh come not Wherefore art thou come to torment us before our time say the Devils to Christ so an unstablished heart at the hour of death is afraid it shall be tormented before the time and therefore come not come not saith such a soul. But the soul that is stablished upon Christ and upon the promises in Christ of forgivenesse of sins and life everlasting by the Spirit of Christ that saith Come Lord Jesus come quickly I have been larger upon this Point then I intended these unsettled times moved me to speak a little more then ordinary that we might labour to have our hearts stablished that whatsoever comes we may have somewhat that is certain to stick to that our estate in Christ may be sure whatsoever becomes of our state in the world otherwise VERSE XXII Who hath anointed us and also sealed us and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts THe Apostle having formerly laid open the riches of a Christian In this Verse he cometh to shew his strength His riches consisteth in the promises of God in Christ His strength in being stablished upon those promises Now that which he had spoken of more generally in the word stablishing he unfolds in three borrowed Terms Anointing Sealing Earnest Implying therein the manner of the Spirits establishing a Christian. He who stablisheth us how is that wrought By the Spirit anointing by the Spirit sealing and by the earnest of the Spirit which three terms do all argue assurance For you know that in the old Law Kings Priests and Prophets were anointed that is they were authorized and confirmed in their places And for sealing Writings among our selves are sealed for security And an Earnest secures Contracts and Bargains So that whatsoever may serve to strengthen a Christians faith and assurance is here laid down God to help our soules by our senses fetcheth it from humane affaires applying words borrowed from earthly commerce by a heavenly anagogical sense to spiritual things First the sure estate of a Christian is set down in the general by stablishing and then in particular we are anointed and sealed and have the Earnest of the Spirit God in the Covenant of grace doth our part and his own too he gives faith and strengthens faith and seales us he gives us promises he doth stablish us upon those promises and works our hearts to an embracing of them he anoints us and seales us and gives us the Earnest of the Spirit All in the Covenant of Grace depends upon the faithfulnesse of God and not upon ours but upon ours dependantly as he is faithful in stablishing us Now because the holy Apostle would have us settled in the excellency of the state of a Christian in the Covenant of grace you see how large-hearted he is he useth four words implying one and the same thing Stablishing Anointing Sealing and giving Earnest all of them words used in ratification amongst men God is pleased to stoop to speak to us in our own language to speak of heavenly things after an earthly manner and therefore he sets down the certain estate of a Christian by borrowed speeches This is a gracious condescending of God stooping as it were lower then himself and indeed so he alwayes abaseth himself when he deales with man coming down far below himself To come to the words in particular And hath anointed us This word hath a double reference The holy Ghost carries our minds first to the relation and proportion that is between the graces of the Spirit of God and the oyntment with which in former times they were anointed in the Jewish Politie And it hath reference likewise and relation to the persons that were anointed The persons were Kings Priests and Prophets Now God hath anointed us in Christ. The order is this First Christ himself as Mediatour is anointed with the oyl of gladnesse above his fellowes but for his fellowes The oyntment is first poured on the head of spiritual Aaron and then it runs down to all the skirts of his garment that is to the meanest Christian. Even as the least finger and toe is actuated and enlivened and moved by the soul and spirits that the head and the chief vital parts are so every Christian though he be but as the toe or
When a man is without grace he goes lumpishly and heavily about the service of God he is drawen and forced to prayer and to hearing and to conference and meditation he is dead and dull and frozen to good works but when a man hath received this sweet anointing of the Spirit his heart is enlarged to all duties whatsoever he is prepared to every good work Again oyl makes chearefull so doth grace it makes chearful in adversity chearfull in death chearful in those things that dismay the spirits of other men so much grace so much joy for even as light and heat follow the fire so the spirit of joy doth follow this spiritual anointing Conscience of the interest he hath in the favour of God in Christ and the evidences of grace stamped upon his heart an assurance of a better estate in the world to come wonderfully enlarge the soul with spiritual joy that which makes a man lumpish and heavy and earthly is not the Spirit of God the Spirit of God is a Spirit of joy and it puts a gracious chearfulnesse in the heart of a Christian if there be mourning it is that it may be more chearful for light is sowen to the righteous sometimes in mourning God loves a chearful giver and a chearful thanksgiver all must be sweetened with chearfulnesse now this comes from the Spirit of God and he that is anointed with the Spirit in some measure partakes of spiritual joy and chearfulnesse Againe ointment you know is of a healing nature as Balme and other sweet ointments have a healing power and vertue the Scripture makes mention of the Balme of Gilead so grace hath a healing power repentance that is of a purging spiritual joy of a healing nature there must you know be first a cleansing and then a healing and strengthening so some graces are purgative and cleansing some againe are strengthening and healing repentance is a good purgation it carries away the malignant and evill matter but the Cordial that strengthens the soul is joy The joy of the Lord is your strength Nehem. 8. and so the grace of faith and love tend to cherrish and corroborate the soul so that I say these graces this Balme of the Spirit hath a special Soveraign power to heale us to heale us both from the guilt of sin and from the dominion and rule and filthy stain of sin it hath both a purging and a Cordial vertue Thus you see that upon good grounds the graces of Gods Spirit that he communicates to the Elect and only to them that are in Christ they are called anointing and they will have the effect of an ointment in us if we receive this anointing Let us therefore try our selves by these whether we be anointed or no what chearfulnesse is there what joy what strength what nimblenesse to that which is good what soveraignty hath grace in our hearts you have a company that professe Religion but make it serve their owne turne that make heaven to come under earth that make the service of God to stoop to other ends Beloved grace it is a superiour thing and Religion makes all subordinate Grace and Religion wheresoever it is in truth is of a ruling nature and so it is sweet and it is strong wheresoever it is it is curing and purging and cleansing wheresoever it is therefore I beseech you let us not deceive our selves I need say no more of the Point you may enlarge it in your own meditations I come to the persons As this anointing hath reference to the ointment so it hath relation to the persons that were anointed Now the persons anointed were first dedicated by anointing they were consecrated to God and separated from the world And as they were dedicated and separated so they were dignified by this anointing it raised them above the common condition And likewise with this anointing God gave them qualifications suitable You have three eminent persons that were anointed and so raised above the common condition of other men Prophets to teach the people Priests to offer sacrifice Kings to govern them Now Christ is principally all these He is the principal Prophet of his Church the Angel of the Covenant He is Logos the Word because as the inward word the mind of a man is known by the outward word so Christ is called the Word because as a Prophet he discovers his Fathers mind and makes known his Fathers will unto us And he is the great high Priest he makes atonement between God and us he stands between his Father and us And he is the great King of his Church that rescues it from all its enemies to protect and defend it But as Christ hath received this anointing primarily and above his fellows yet as I said before he hath received it for his fellows Every Christian hath his anointing from Christs anointing all our graces and all our oyatment is derived from him He saith the Appostle Rev. 1. hath loved us and washed us in his blood he loved us first which is the cause of all and then he washed us in his blood he did not onely shed his blood for us but he washed us in his blood he hath applied his blood to our souls and by applying that and sprinkling it upon our souls he hath made us Kings and Priests to God his Father And indeed the great King of heaven and earth he is and will be attended upon by none but Kings and Priests he hath no servants but such as are anointed he is followed of none but eminent persons such as are separated from the world and dignified above all other people for the glory of his followers tends to his honour therefore those whom God chuseth to be his atendants he qualifies them gives them the hearts of Kings royal qualifications and the hearts of Priests and the hearts of Prophets But this in the general To shew it therefore in particulars A Christian is anointed he is a person severed from the world dedicated to God and dignified above others and that from good reason because God hath given him an inward qualification which is the foundation of all And first he is a true Prophet for he hath received the anointing of the Spirit 1 Joh. 2. whereby he is enabled to discern of things he knowes what is true honour to be the child of God he knowes what is true riches Grace he knowes what is true Nobility to be born of God what is true pleasure Peace of conscience and joy in the Holy Ghost he can discern between seeming and reall things and onely he that hath received this anointing of the Spirit And again as a Prophet he knowes not onely the things but the doing of the things he hath with the anointing of the Spirit ability to do that which he knowes the grace of God teacheth him not onely the duty that he should live justly and soberly and godly but teacheth him to do the things for God writes his Lawes in
their worst if you will needs fear I will tell you whom you shall fâ—…ar Fear him that can cast both body and soul into hell So if we be forced to suffer the losse of any thing that is good in the world or be cast into any ill condition what saith S. Paul The troubles and afflictions of the world are not worthy of the glory that shall be revealed Let us set that glory before us and that will prevail against that all the world can threaten or take from us what is all to it nothing Therefore by faith we stand we keep our own standing and withstand all oppositions whatsoever Oh but what if there come more subtile temptations end the Lord himself seemes to be our enemy that we have sinne and God is angry and we see he followes us with afflictions that are evidences of his anger how shall we stand now and keep our selves from despair This is a fiery dart of Satan when a man hath sinned and conscience is awakened to make him sink in despair O but faith will make the soul to stand in these great temptations against those fiery darts faith puts a shield into the hand of the soul to beat back all those fiery darts For faith will present Christ to God Indeed I have been a sinner but thou hast ordained a Saviour and he is of thine own appointing of thine own aâ—…ting a Saviour of thine own giving and thou hast made a promise that Whosoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life I cast my self upon thy mercy in him hereupon faith comes to withstand all such fiery temptations whatsoever nay against God himself Lord thou canst not deny thine own Saviour thou â—…mest to be an enemy and though I be a sinner and have deserved to be cast into hell yet I come to thee in the Name of thy Son that is at thy right hand and pleads for me by vertue of his blood shed for me I came in his Name thou canst not refuse thy owne Son For all temptations when a man hath faith in him it will send Satan to Christ to answer for him Go to Christ he is my husband he hath paid my debts he hath satisfied for my sins So that whatsoever the temptation be make it as subtle as you will there is a skill in faith to stand against it and to beat back all the fiery darts of Satan Therefore to end all we see here what an excellent estate a Christian is in above all others that he hath a better standing then others have not onely a better standing in Religion then the Papists have but in the profession of Religion he hath a better standing then common professors why he stands by faith by sound faith He stands not upon opinion or because he hath been bred so he stands not upon his wit because he sees reason for it he stands upon faith and faith stands upon divine authority he stands partly upon his own experience that seconds faith Those then that care not for Religion what standing have they those that stand only in pleasures and profits and in the favour of great men what standing have they They stand as the Psalmist saith in slippery places There is no man but if he nave not faith he stands slippery though he be never so great if he be a Monarch alas what is it to stand a while all these things are but uncertain though they yield present content they are but uncertain contentments the Wise-man saith they are but vanity they are like the reed of Egypt that will not uphold they will not sustein the soul in the time of trouble there is nothing that a man can stand upon and fasten his soul upon if he be not Religious that will hold scarce the fit of an ague that will hold in the pangs of death even in the entrance of it that will hold in terrours of conscience How little a trouble will blow away all those that stand on so weak a foundation as an earthly thing is For they have but an Imaginary good to speak of and that Imagination is driven out by the sense of the contrary Let contrary troubles come and all their fooles Paradise and their happinesse they had before is at an end it goes no deeper then Imagination All the things in this world stablish not the heart Those that do not stand by faith in the favour of God in Christ let their standing be what it will it will soon be over turned by any temptation they can stand out against nothing Therefore let us labour above all things in the world to have that faith strengthened by which we stand and let us often be encouraged to strengthen our faith by all means that we may stand the better upon it and try our faith before we trust it it is that that we must trust to and stand to in life and death Therefore let us often think Is my faith good is it well built Let us oft put this query to our soules I believe the Religion I professe but upon what grounds I believe the truths in the Word of God but upon what grounds have I a clear understanding of them because they are divine doth the Spirit of God open them and shew a light in the Scripture that is divine doth the Spirit of God give me a relish of the Scriptures above all the pleasures in the world Do I find God speaking to my heart in the Word do I find the Spirit of God with his Ordinance then my knowledge and my faith will hold out I can stand by that faith in the Word that is wrought by the Spirit and fastened upon the Word with the Spirit But if I believe the Religion I professe only because the State doth so and if the King and State should do otherwise I would change my Religion or if it be because my parents were so or my friends and Patron is of that religion whom I depend upon or because I see greater seeming reason for this then for the other I can hold argument for this and not for the other Alas this will not hold But labour to know the truth of the Word of God by experience as much as we can and by the Spirit of God giving evidence to our soules from the inward grounds of Scripture that it is the Word I know whom I have trusted I know the promises are good I have felt them in my soul the Spirit hath reported them to my soul they are sweeter then all the things in the world It is a sure Word I bottome upon it I have found the comfort of it before therefore I will build upon it We can never stand unlesse we can make our knowledge spiritnal it is but acquisite knowledge else We fall in three things vilely we labour that our knowledge of Religion be spiritual and fetched divinely out of the Word of God together with the Spirit We
strength of love of ours it is his own free grace and love which is shed by the holy Ghost and springs only from his own goodnesse and loving nature and not from us at all this is Grace It must be distinguished from the fruits of it as the Apostle doth distinguish them Rom. 5. 15. Grace and the gifts of grace There is favour and the gifts of favour which is grace inherent in us Here especially is meant the fountaine and spring of all the favour of God with the manifestation of it with the increase of it with the continuance of it He wisheth these things the favour of God with the manifestation of it to their souls that as God would be gracious to them so that he would shew his Grace that he would discover it and shine upon them and to that end that he would give them his holy Spirit to shed his love into their hearts This shining of God into the heart this shedding of the love of God into the heart is the Grace here meant Gods favour with the manifestation of it to the soul and with the continuance of it and the increase of it still Grace unto you As if he should have said I wish you the favour of God and the report of it to your souls that as he loves you through his Christ so he would witnesse as much by his holy Spirit to your souls And I wish you likewise the continuance of it and the increase of it and the fruits of it likewise for that must not be excluded all particular graces which are likewise called Graces They have the name of favours because they come from favour and favour is the chief thing in them What is the chief thing in joy in faith in love they are graces they cannot be considered as qualifications as earthly things in us they proceed from the grace and love of God and have their especial value from thence So I wish you the manifestation the continuance and increase of favour with all the fruits of Gods favour especially such as concern a better life The word is easily understood after the common sence Grace is the loving and free respect of a superiour to an inferiour the respect of a Magistrate to such as are under him such a one is in grace with the Prince we say we mean not any inherent thing but free grace So in Religion it is not any inherent habitual thing Grace but it is free favour and whatsoever issues from free favour This must be the rather observed this phrase against the Papists we say we are Justified by Grace and so do they what do they mean by being justified by Grace that is by inherent Grace we say No we are justified by Grace that is by the free favour of God in Jesus Christ so is the acception of the word But to come to the point that which I will now note is this that A Christian though he be in the state of Grace and favour with God yet still he needs the continuance of it He stands in need of the continuance of God St. Paul here prayes for Grace and peace to those that were in the state of Grace already Why The reason of it is that we run into new breaches every day of our selves as long as there is a spring of corruption in us a cursed issue of corruption so long there will be some actions and speeches and thoughts that will issue that would of themselves break our peace with God or at least hinder the sweet sence of it therefore we have continual occasion to renew our desires of the sence and feeling of the favour of God and to renew our pardon every day to take out a pardon of course as we have now the liberty to do so oft as we confesse our sins he is mercifull to forgive us and to win his favour we have need every day still still of Grace I list not to joyn in conflict here with the Papists concerning their opinion I will but touch it by the way to shew the danger of it They will not have all of meer Grace but Christians are under Grace while they are in this World as St. Paul saith all is Grace Grace still nay at the day of judgement The Lord shew mercy to the house of One siphorus at that day at the day of judgement Grace and mercy must be our plea till we come to heaven They stand upon Grace to enable us to the work and then by the work we may merit our own salvation and so they will not have it of Grace of gift but as a stipend a thing of merite Directly contrary to St. Paul Rom. 6. ult Eternal life is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the word comes of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of gift The gift of God a free gift through Jesus Christ our Lord. So from the first Grace to Eternall life which is the complement of all all is Grace As for the New Testament it is the Covenant of Grace the whole carriage of our salvation is called the Covenant of Grace because God of Grace doth enter into Covenant with us He sent Christ of Grace who is the foundation of the Covenant The fulfilling of it on our part is of Grace he gives us faith Faith is the gift of God he puts his fear in our hearts that we should not depart from him And when he enters into Covenant with us it is of Grace and love It was of Grace that he sent Christ to be the foundation of the Covenant that in the satisfying of his justice he might be gracious to us without disparagement to his justice Of Grace he fulfils the condition on our part we are no more able to believe then we are to fulfil the law but he inables us by his word and spirit attending upon the meanes of Salvation to fulfil the Covenant And when we have done all he gives us of Grace Eternal life all is of Grace There is nothing in the Gospel but Grace therefore in the Ephes. 1. it is stood upon by the Apostle To the praise of the Glorie of his rich Grace From Election to Glorification all is to the Glorie of his Grace We ought to conceive of God as a Gracious Father withholding his anger which we deserve to be poured upon us by the intercession of Christ withholding that anger and the fruits of it And notwithstanding we are in Grace if we neglect to seek to God the Father if we neglect to seek to Christ who makes intercession for us then though we be in the first Grace still we are not east away yet we are filii sub ira sons under wrath we are under Anger though not under hatred Therefore every day we should labour to maintain the Grace of God with the assurance of it It is a great matter to carrie our selvs so as we may be under the sence and feeling of the Grace of God It
Esay 28. you have made a covenant with hell and death with Gods judgments but hell and death hath not made a covenant with you You make a covenant think you shall do well but God is terrible to such his wrath shall smoak against such as make a covenant with his judgments and treasure up wrath against the day of wrath Take heed if the proclamation of mercy call thee not in if thou stand out as a Rebell and come not in but go on still then justice layes hold on thee Gods wrath shall smoak against thee As we see in Prov. 1. I will laugh at your destruction speaking of those that would not come in Chidas it is in Esay 27. 11. He that formed them and made them will have no mercy on them nor shew them favour He will have no delight in them They are Ignorant sotts and will not labour to know God and his will to do and obey it he that made them will have no delight in them and he that formed them will reject them It is a pittiful thing when God that made them and formed them in their mothers womb whose creatures they are shall have no delight in them when he that made them his heart shall not pittie them Ezek. 18. 18. he that goes on in a course of sin presumptuously and doth not repent Gods eye shall not pittie him he that made him will have no delight in him Therefore the Apostle because we are disposed and prone to abuse the goodnesse and long suffering of God and the mercies of Christ he saith Be not deceived be not deceived he oft presseth this for neither the covetous nor licentious persons shall enter into heaven Though God be mercifull if thou live in these sins be not deceived thou shalt never enter into heaven God will not be mercifull to the most of those that even now live in the bosome of the Church because they make mercy a band to their sinful courses God will harden himself he will not blesse such he hath no mercy for such to such he is a God of vengeance His mercy is to such as are weary of their sinful courses as I said he is mercifull but so as he is wise What Prince will prostitute a pardon to one that is a Rebell and yet thinks himself a good Subject all the while he is no Rebell cares he for a pardon And shall he have a pardon when he cares not for it Those that are not humbled in the sight and sence of their sins that think themselves in a good estate they are Rebells that have not sued out their pardon there is no mercie to them yet He that made them will not pittie them because they are Ignorant hardned wretches that live in blasphemy in swearing that in corrupt courses in hardnesse of heart that live in sins that their own conscience and the conscience of others about them know that they are sins devouring sins that devour all their comfort and yet notwithstanding they dream of mercy mercy Hell is their portion and not mercy that make an Idol of God Thus it is with us we are prone to presume upon Gods mercy I speak this that we should not surfet of this sweet doctrine that God is the father of Mercies He is so to repentant sinners to those that believe to those mercy is sweet We know oyl is above all other liquors Gods mercy is above all his own works and above our sins But what is the vessel for this oyl this oyl of mercy it is put in broken vessels it is kept best there a broken heart a humble heart receives and keepes mercie As for proud dispositions as all Sinners that go on in a course of sin the Psalmist terms them proud men he is a proud man that sets his own will agaist Gods command God resists the Proud it is the humble yeelding heart that will be led and lured by God that is a vessel to receive mercy It must be a deep vessel it must be a broken vessel deep with humiliation broken by contrition that must receive mercy And it must be a large vessel laid open capable to receive mercy and all mercy not only pardoning mercy but healing mercy as I said out of that Psalme That forgiveth all thy sins and healeth all thy transgressions Therefore those that have not grace and mercy to heal their corruptions to dry up that issue in some comfortable measure thay have no pardoning mercy and those that desire not their corruptions to be healed they never desired heartily their corruptions to be pardoned those mercies go together He is not the Father of mercy but of all mercies that belong to salvation and he gives them every one and he that desires the one desires the other Let us consider how the sweet descriptions of God and how his promises work upon us If they work on us to make us presume it is a fearful case it is as bad a sign as may be to be ill because God is good to turn the Grace of God into wantonnesse But as we are thus prone to presume so when conscience is awaked we are as prone to despair therefore if they work with us this way there is mercy with God therefore I will come in therefore I will cast down my weapons at his feet I will cease to resist him I will come in and take terms of peace with him I will yeeld him obedience for the time to come therefore I will fear and love so good a God If it work thus it is a sign of an elect soul of a gracious disposition And then if thou come in never consider what thy sins have been if thou come in God will imbrace thee in his mercy Thy sins are all as a spark of fire that falls into the Ocean that is drowned presently so are thy sins in the Ocean of Gods mercy There is not more light in the Sun there is not more water in the Sea then there is mercy in the Father of mercy whose bowels are opened to thee if thou be weary of thy sinful courses and come in and imbrace mercy In the Tabernacle we know there was a mercy Seat we call it a propitiatory In the Ark which this mercy Seat covered was the Law now in the Law there were curses against all sinners The Mercy-Seat was a Type of Christ covering the Law covering the curse though thou be guilty of the curse a thousand times God in Christ is merciful Christ is the Mercy Seat come to God in Christ there is mercy in Israel notwithstanding thy great sins If we cast away a purpose of living in sin and cast away our weapons and submit our selves to him he is the Father of mercies that is he is merciful from himself he is the spring of them and hath them from his own bowels they are free mercies because he is the Father of them For he is just by our fault he is severe
because men are ready to trample upon and to rase out the writing of conscience but the Book of God they cannot therefore that is added to help conscience And God adds his Spirit to his Word to convince conscience and to make the witnesse of the Word more effectuall for although the Word say thus and thus yet till the Spirit convince the soul and set it down that it is thus till it convince it with a heavenly light conscience will not be fully convict That conscience therefore may be able to witnesse well Let us regard the notions of nature preserve them if we do not God will give us up to grosse sins Let us labour to have right principles and grounds to cherish principles of nature common with the Heathens and to lay up principles out of the Word of God to preserve the admonitions and directions and rules of the Word And especially the sweet motions of Gods blessed Spirit For conscience alway supposeth a rule the rule of nature the rule of the Word and the suggestions of the blessed Spirit with the Word Therefore to note by the way an Ignorant man can never have a good conscience especially a man that affects Ignorance because he hath no rule he labours to have none It is not meerly ignorance but likewise obstinacy with ignorance He will not know what he should lest conscience force him to doe what he knowes What a sottish thing is this It will be the heaviest sin that can be laid ro our charge at the day of judgment not that we were Ignorant but that we refused to know we refused to have our conscience rectified and instructed And those that avoid knowledg because they will not do what they know they shall know one day that their wilful Ignorance will be laid to their charge as a heavy sin Labour to have right principles and grounds What is the reason that commonly men have such bad consciences They have false principles they conclude may I not do what I list may I not make of my own what I will and every man for himself and God for us all diabolicall principles And so commonly if a man examine men that live in wickednesse they have false principles God sees not God regards not and it is time enough to repent The cause that men live wickedly is false principles therefore they have so vile consciences as they have their hearts deceive them and they deceive their hearts They have false principles put into them by others they are deceived and they deceive their hearts they force false principles upon themselves Many study for false grounds to live by for their advantage There are many that are Atheisticall that live even under the Gospell and what rule have they the example of them by whom they hope to rife they study their manners they square their lives by them that is all the rule they have And again the multitude they do as the most do and custom and other false rules These rules will not comfort us to say I did it by such an example I did as others among whom I live did or I did it because it was the custom of the times these things being alledged will comfort nothing For who gave you these rules doth God say any where in his Word you shall be judged by the example of others you shall be judged by the custom of the times you live in No you shall be judged by my Word The Word that Moses spake and the Word that I speak shall judge you at the last day They that have not the Word shall be judged by the Word written in their hearts Those that have sinned without the Law shall be judged by that without the Law of Moses God hath acquainted us with other rules We must take heed of this therefore thatwe get good rules take heed that they be not false rules for the want of these directions men come to have ill consciences Where there is no good rule there is a blind conscience where there is no application of the rule there is a prophane conscience And where there is a false rule there is an erroneous a scrupulous a wicked conscience A Papist because he hath a false rule he cannot have a good conscience The abomination of Popery is that they sin against conscience and conscience indeed is even with them for it overthrowes the most of their principles They sin against conscience many wayes I mean not against their own conscience but they sin against the conscience of others For what do they That they may rule in the consciences of men for that is the end of their great Prelate the Tyrant of souls they have false rules that the Pope cannot erre their rule is the authority and judgement of him that cannot erre and he for the most part is an unlearned man in Divinity that never read over the Scriptures in all his life and he must judge all controversies Where this is granted that the Pope cannot erre he fits in the conscience to do what he list And he makes divine Lawes and cursed is he saith the Councel of Trent that doth not equalize those traditions with the VVord of God From this false rule comes all even rebellion it self If he give dispensation from the oath of Allegiance because he cannot erre therefore they ought to obey him and rebell against their Governours All rebellion is from that rebellious rebellion that comes from false principles These men talk of conscience and they come not to Church for conscience sake what conscience can they have when they have false rules To equivocate and lie sins against nature And other rules that give liberty against the Word that children may disobey their Parents and get into a Cloyster c. The most of Popery though there were no VVord of God it is against nature against conscience which God hath planted in man as his deputy his tenant And as they sin against conscience so as I said conscience is even with them For let a man trust to his conscience and he can never be a sound Papist except he leave that and go upon base false grounds because other great men do it and because his predecessours have done it c. I appeal to their own consciences if any man at the day of death think to be saved by his merits doth not Bellarmine after long dispute of salvation by merits disclaime it doth he not put away merits for the uncertainty of his own righteousnesse So their own consciences do wring away the testimony of trusting to merits Again that Original sin is no great sin it is but the cause of sin and it is lesse then any venial sin Oh but when conscience is awaked to know what a corrupt estate it is it will draw from them that which it drew from Saint Paul Oh wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of death Conscience when it is awaked
by the grace of God which is the ground of all joy and comfort as S. Paul saith here How shall a man know whether he lead his life by this spiritual gracious wisdome or no I answer mark the opposition here Not with fleshly wisdome but by the Grace of God He then doth lead his life by the Grace of God that doth renounce carnal and fleshly wisdome Carnal wisdome is a false rule and it cannot stand together with grace they one expell another A double-minded man saith S. James is unconstant in all his waies that is he that hath two strings to his bowe he that will be content to be led by the grace of God and by the Word of God which is the Word of his Grace and yet notwithstanding he will have carnal policies he will have shifts too he is a double minded man he is not now under the government of grace he halteth as the Prophet tells the Israelites Why do you halt so he halteth between carnal and heavenly wisdome He is loath to renounce carnal wisdome no he thinks if he do he shall be a fool he shall lose this way of getting and that way of rising But he that is under the Spirit of God that is under Grace and is guided by it he will renounce the motions and stirrings of carnal wisdome When Carnall Wisdome like to Eve or like Job's Wife or like Peter shall suggest Oh spare your self why will you do this why will you go on in these courses yet notwithstanding he is able to renounce it The most of Gods Judgments in this world on his Children it is for this halting they have much carnal wisdome in them and God to work it out of them is forced to crosse them sharply in their projects and courses and all to bring them to rely on Grace to rely on his Government in the use of good meanes For we must serve Gods providence in the use of good means A man may know by Gods afflicting of his Children that they deal too much in carnal wisdome for if it were not for carnal wisdome if we would submit our selves to his sweet and easie guidance and use the lawful means that he hath discovered in a lawful calling if we would observe lawfull courses alas we should see a clear light and an easie passage we need not to use these shifts but because we cannot do so we are loath to trust him but we are double-minded we will be ruled by him a little but we will be politick and subtile therefore he sends crosses upon crosses upon our carnal ends and projects especially those that are his Children he will not suffer them to prosper in ill courses That is one sign those that are led by the grace of God they will not be led by Gods enemy and the enemy of their own soules now God and our own soules have not a worse enemy then carnal fleshly wisdome that is evident from the opposition Those that deny carnal wisdome that deny themselves and put themselves upon God it is a good Evidence And as it is a sign so it is a cause You see in holy Abraham when he had put himself on God and left his Countrey and his fathers house God guided him God took him into his government I am God Al-sufficient walk before me and be perfect God meanes this That by leaving all other things and cleaving to me thou shalt lose nothing thou shalt have all in me I will be al-sufficient therefore walk before me and be perfect be sincere A man shall never know what God will do for him till he put himself upon him and cease to try him and begin to trust him trust him once honour him of his Word have not a double eye partly to carnal means and partly to him but have a single eye to his wisdom and know that he will reward thee and keep promise It is an excellent thing to deny carnal wisdome How many Cavils might blessed Noah have had before he built the Ark The world would scorn him as an old doting man that would go about to be wiser then all the world besides But he denies all carnal reason and rejects the scornes of sinful persons and obeyes God and we see how God protected him and went on with him And so in David and S. Paul And to adde a little to that I touched before God usually strangely crosses carnal wisdome because men will not deny their carnall will and their carnal wit There was never any Politician in the world that ever was but complained of it if he lived any time in the world that God went beyond him Saith the Heathen man Tully I thought my self wise but I never was so and so they may all take up the same complaint God dashes the Imaginations of the proud They build a Babel a confusion to themselves and others that are led by carnal wisdome that will not trust to the grace of God Let no man flatter himself but trust in God and not rely upon carnal wisdome and such courses Those that will bring Religion to reasons of State and policy and subject the highest thing in the world to the basest thing which is carnal wit as I said before we see what they do The nature of man infinitely desireth the accomplishment of their will We see that where corruption may have the greatest advantage in greatnesse let them have their will they will overthrow a world to have it their wit is bent to serve their will All witty men that account it a heaven upon earth to have their will instead of law and conscience and all they set their wits on the strain to serve their will and so set themselves against God Is it not Gods honour to set himself against them Was there ever any fierce against God and prospered saith Job Denial of fleshly wit and will and wisdome it is both a sign and evidence of grace and it is a meanes likewise why Gods grace will lead us when we deny that which is strong in us God will make a supply by his Grace we are no losers by it Again you see here in the Text where the life is led by the Grace of God by the Spirit of God stirring us acting us leading moving and strengthening of us there a mans courses are in simplicity and sincerity the soul that is under grace will put it self simply upon God that soul will be no wiser then the Word of God makes it to be it will be no happier no richer then God makes it it will use no other meanes then what God allowes this is plainnesse and singlenesse and simplicity of heart Again it will be in sincerity where a man leads his life graciously his actions are sincere this grace as it comes from God so it tends to God sincerity looks to God it doth things as to God So that where Grace is it carries a man above himself to
stones and pearles Solomon presseth it have a high estimation of wisdome of the government of Gods Spirit as the best government And be out of love with carnal reason with carnal affections and their guidance account them as base things not worthy to come into the esteem of a Christian heart Those that highly prize wisdome God will lead them by it those that sell all for the pearl shall have it There must be a high price set on the guidance of Gods Spirit and on grace as indeed it is worthy of it and then we shall have it Again if we would lead our lives according to spiritual and heavenly wisdome according to grace and gracious wisdome let us learn as it is Job 22. to be more and more acquainted with God by prayer for grace comes not from within us Grace is in Christ as in the root as in the spring as in the Sun we have it but as the beam as the stream therefore let us learn to be acquainted with God and with Christ by prayer and meditation and search into his Word by reading and by hearing him speak to us and let us often speak to him Let us acquaint our selves with him by prayer and by hearing his Word and then we shall have his grace to guide us For grace is a fruit of his peculiar love he gives grace to his own peculiar people How do you think shall he have a peculiar delight in us if we labour not to be more and more acquainted with him by often speaking to him by often hearing of him by coming into his presence and attending as much as we can upon his holy Ordinances by conversing as much as we can in the holy things of God Those that will be warm they come under the beams of the Sun those that would have the Spirit work effectually they must come where the Spirit is effectual where the Spirit works Now the Spirit is effectual in the Word preached the Spirit fell upon Cornelius and the rest when they were hearing of S. Peter And the Spirit is where there is conversing in good company Where two or three are met together I will be in the middest of them saith Christ. If we walk with the wise we shall be wiser It must be the heavenly wisdome of a Christian if he would lead his life by grace to attend upon all the meanes of grace because the Spirit of God is effectual by his own means he works by his own means therefore use the meanes that the Spirit hath sanctified for the working of grace I do wonder at a company of vain sottish creatures that carry themselves according to their vain conceits according to the whirling of their own brain in toyes and baubles that come into their heads they care not for the hearing of Gods blessed truth either they abstain altogether or else they hear it carelesly as if it were a thing that concerned them not Oh but those that will lead their lives by grace they come to it by the Spirit and the Spirit is onely effectual in holy Ordinances It must be our wisdome therefore to bring our selves under some meanes or other that the Spirit may be effectual The wisest and the best men in the world are no longer gracious then they are wise this way if they neglect good company good acquaintance if they neglect the hearing of the Word if they neglect prayer they will grow dead and dull and carnal-minded they will be possessed with base thoughts How do men differ one from another not so much by any habitual grace that is in them as by avoiding all that might prejudice them in a Christian course and by using all means whereby the Spirit of God may be effectual Again the way ro be under the grace of Gods Spirit is often to meditate of the grace of God the free love of God in Jesus Christ for so it comes first The first grace of all is Gods free love in the forgiving of our sins and accepting us to life everlasting and then he doth alter and change our natures more and more he transforms us more and more when we find therefore any defect of grace in our hearts when we find coldnesse and deadnesse and dulnesse go to the first fire to the first Sun to the free grace of God in Christ pardoning all our sins and accepting us to life everlasting and promising us grace to lead our lives in the mean time If you have fallen into any sin by the temptation of Satan or your own weaknesse beg not first grace to alter your course to sanctifie your life but renew every day your interest in the first grace in the forgivenesse of sins and your acceptation to everlasting life For till God have pardoned your sinnes and have witnessed to your soules that you stand reconciled he will not give the best fruit of reconciliation which is grace Therefore every day examine your lives if you have offended God in what termes you stand with God and if you stand in ill termes that there is any sin against conscience the best way is not presently to amend that for that will not be except the heart be warmed with Gods love and favour in the pardon of your sins first and in the acceptation of you in Christ notwithstanding your sins as he justifieth us every day not onely in the first act of conversion but daily he acquits our consciences daily from our sins and therefore in the Lords Prayer Christ teacheth us every day to say Forgive us our sins And then after forgivenesse of sins to beg the particular graces for our lives that we want I would this were better thought on Challenge likewise the Covenant of grace we have a promise of all grace and the spring of all grace We have a Promise of Love God will teach us to Love one another We have a promise of Fear he hath promised that He will put his fear into our hearts that we shall never depart from him We have a promise of the holy Spirit Let us challenge these Promises every day So much for the Directions how to lead our lives by Grace But by the Grace of God Saint Paul here makes it the ground of his rejoycing that he led not his life by fleshly wisdome but in simplicity and sincerity and by the Grace of God and all that are led by S. Paul's spirit live thus There is a Religion in the world that bears it self very big on high terms of Universality Succession Antiquity c. and they will have it thought to be a spiritual and holy Religion Well if a man be a carnal man that is led with fleshly wisdome and not by the grace of God that Religion must needs be a naughty Religion that hath onely the support and the foundation of it in fleshly wisdome which is an enemy and opposite to the grace of God and to simplicity and sincerity But Popery is this
me so you will judge of me to the end Why hath S. Paul such a trust of them as of himself Among many reasons this is one He knew that where God had begun a good work he would finish it he saw that he had begun a good work in them and therefore he knew that he would go on with it And then again God planted in him a good hope and trust of them because hope and trust stirre up indeavour to the thing hoped for Desperation doth quell all courage and cool all endeavour Now God because he would have us constant in our carriage and in the expressions of our love to other men he stirres up in us a trust that all shall be well with them Likewise S. Paul sets down his hope that God had put into his heart of them for his own comfort for it is a great comfort to a Minister or to a Christian when he is to deal with such as he trusts are good and will be good it is a heaven upon earth and therefore God doth plant good conceits of other men in us for this end partly to stirre up our endeavour to do all good to them and partly to comfort us For if the finall estate of any man were discovered to us that God had no delight in them concerning their salvation who would do any service of love for them or who would have comfort in conversing with them But when God stirs up in our hearts a good opinion of them partly it is good for them to stirre up our endeavour to do all good for them and it is good for us it is a great comfort And again it was an encouragement to them when they heard of Saint Paul's trust of them to the end that they should continue as they were For to have a good conceit and opinion of another man especially the good conceit of a Pastor it is a great encouragement And the best Christians in the world have need of it oft-times Besides the judgement of themselves which is sometimes shaken by Satan that they give a false witnesse of their own estate Oh it is comfortable that a man have the judgment of a man that looks without passion and temptation on him you have been thus and my trust and confidence is in God and the promise of God looking to your former course that you will be so to the end he gives not a false witnesse Saint Paul speaks thus to stirre up his own endeavour to do good to them and to comfort them that so great an Apostle should have so good an opinion of them Therefore let us labour I say to entertain as good a conceit of them among whom we live as their carriage will bear Two things usually are the object of our hope and trust while men are here before their estate be determined of in hell God may have mercy on them and deliver them out of the snares of Satan that hope should stirre up some endeavour to pray for them seeing their estates are not desperate they are not yet sunk into Hell Or else if we see them in the state of grace we should expresse our love in the services and offices of love because God hath already set his stamp on them There is no man living but we may trust and hope of him one way or other Those that we see no grace in as the Apostle saith 2 Tim. 2. we may have patience towards them seeing if at any time God will have mercy on them to deliver them out of the snare of the Devil It is not good to cast off all conceit and all hope of any man living the worst sign is when we see men malicious and oppose known truths because it comes near the sin against the Holy Ghost but because we may erre in that it is good to take the safest way But where we see evidences of grace though in never so little a measure let us entertain and cherish a good hope because it will cherish that which we are all bound to to love one another We are bound to love one another and to shew all the offices of love now that which stirres up love and all the offices of love is Hope Faith works by Hope as well as by Love Faith works by Love in all duties and it works by Hope in this duty if we hope that God will have mercy on them that will stirre up our endeavour but we are not much in this errour we are rather ready to conceit over-well then too ill of men I trust you shall acknowledge to the end Saint Paul here besides his good conceit of them to the end doth imply his own resolution and purpose to hold on in good courses to the end My trust in Gods grace is that you shall acknowledge to the end what I have written to you of mine own courses As if he had said I am Paul now and you shall find me Paul hereafter you shall find me alwaies an honest man like my self for as he whom I have trusted is yesterday to day to morrow and the same for ever so likewise by Gods grace I hope to be the same that I have been I hope I shall be like my self The grounds of S. Paul's trust that he should be so is partly the act it self together with the endeavour I trust I shall be so to the end because I trust in God to the end and God is good to them that trust in him how often is it repeated in the Psalmes He is the God of them that trust in him he is a Sun and a shield he is all that is good and he keeps away all evil All the promises are entailed to trusting in God Now because I have confidence in it that God will do so I stirre up my endeavour to shew that it is not a presumptuous trust I trust in him that will perform the conditions of the Covenant which is made to them that honour him by trusting in him Saint Paul knew what God had done he knew that he that had bestowed the first fruits he would make up the harvest he knew that he that had laid the first stone he would set up the roof he knew that God had begun a good work in him by experience and that he would finish his own work that he knew by former experience And then he knew the promises of God the promises of the Covenant Many such grounds Saint Paul had to bear him up that he should continue to the end in a course of simplicity and sincerity and in the grace of God But withall Saint Paul did adde a holy and heavenly course to come to this end together with his trust What course did Saint Paul take Saint Paul that he might hold out constantly in holy resolutions to the end First he did judiciously consider what might hinder him between that and the end of his race and course he balanced all things
to their Childrens good I come to bestow a grace on you How this is observed I list not to speak therefore I leave it and come to that which concerns us all I was minded to come to you To bestow a grace on you We see then That The Preaching of the Gospel is a special Grace It is a free and bountiful benefit of God Gracce implies freedome and mercy and bounty It is a free mercy of God to have the Gospel Why Because this is the means to work all that is savingly good in us This is a means to open to us Gods love in Christ and to work in us a disposition answerable to his love therefore it must needs be a grace Heaven is a grace life is a grace reconciliation a grace and such like therefore the Word must needs be a grace by which all these are communicated Therefore the Word hath the name of these things It is the Word of the Kingdome of heaven It is called the Kingdome of heaven the preaching of the Gospel because it puts us into the state of the Kingdome of heaven and the Word of reconciliation because by it we know our reconciliation with God it is offered and wrought in our hearts and faith to apply it by this Word It is the Word of life Act. 20. the life of grace and the life of glory all come by this Word I commend you to God and the Word of his Grace saith the Apostle All grace and spiritual life is wrought in us by the Word therefore the Word preached it is a special grace and favour of God Saint Paul here calls his coming to them to strengthen and confirm them a grace For all means come under the same decree of Gods eternal love with the decree it self When God out of grace resolves and sets down that he will bring such a one to heaven of his free love he doth out of the same grace fit him with opportunities of persons and means he accommodates him with all means for he intends in such a way to bring him to heaven And therefore S. Austin doth well define Predestination it is an ordaining to salvation and a preparing of all means tending thereto Therefore all fall in the compasse of grace both the free favour of God setting a man down to make him happy and likewise by sending men that have an outward calling and inwardly furnishing them with gifts and whatsoever all is of Grace The preaching of the Word is a grace It concerns us therefore so to esteem it Do not many sit in darknesse and in the shadow of death Is it not a grace therefore that we partake of the means of salvation What is in us by nature better then in Turks and Pagans or then many other people under Satan and under Popish Teachers and so rot away in their Ignorance nothing we differ onely by the grace of God therefore let us esteem it as a grace How shall we esteem it as a grace Receive it thankfully as a largesse and bounty and free grace of God receive it as a bounty with thankful hearts Grace begets grace it begets thankfulnesse so to receive it as a grace is to receive it with thankful minds to be more thankfull for the means of salvation then for any outward thing How shall we come to be thankful Never unlesse we find some grace wrought by the Word of Grace Therefore to receive it as a grace is to receive it as a free loving gift of God and to yield to it when by it holy motions are stirred in our hearts not to suppresse and quench holy motions but to yield to them Not to quench and resist the Spirit but to yield our selves pliable to the Word This is to acknowledge it a grace to be thankfull for it because you find your hearts wrought to holy obedience by it Give it way in your soules that it may be an ingraffed Word that all the inward and outward man may be seasoned with it and relish of it that the Word may season your thoughts and speeches and desires and season your course of life that what you think may be in the relish and strength of the Word in the strength of some Divine truth and the guide of your actions may be Divine truth or some motives from it Then you will give thanks for what is wrought on you when it is an ingraffed Word in your soules and all relish of it your speeches and actions and your whole course when a man may know by your carriage that there is something invested and ingraffed in your soules that gives a blessed relish to all the expressions of the outward man Such a one indeed will account the Word a special grace by a sweet experience wrought in his heart I will not presse that Point any further Again whereas S. Paul saith he would come to bestow a second grace on them we see here That Those that are in the state of Grace already they need a second grace Those that have initial grace to be set in a good course they need confirming and strengthening Grace S. Paul had planted them before I but he must come to water them there is alway somewhat left for the Minister to do till he see their soules safe in heaven he hath alway somewhat to do to the Christian soules under him For he must not onely get them out of Satans Kingdome into a good estate but he must labour to build them up he must water them and fence them and strengthen them against all discouragements A man is never safe till he be in heaven therefore he saith I will come to you but I will come to bestow a second Grace on you you have need of it and my love is such to you that you shall have it To enforce this a little because we set termes to our growth and go on plodding in a course and many years after we are no better then we were at the first and some out of a prophane fulnesse out of a Laodicean temper they think they have enough they are rich when indeed they are empty and miserable and wretched and poor and if temptations set upon them they have nothing in them To let you see that we stand in need of a second grace and of a third grace and a fourth grace that we need continual building up First look within what opposition there is to saving goodnesse within what rebellion of lusts what Ignorance and blindnesse and darknesse and indisposition what head the flesh makes in us against the Word of God Let a man a little continue out of the means and he shall see what growth of corruptions there will be a distasting of all means that a man shall be ready to begin anew with them almost having a double principle in them of grace and corruption there needs continually strengthening and stablishing Grace Consider outwardly what discouragements from the ill
and serious and weighty and firm in their resolutions that they may build on them and know where to have them as we say it breeds authority and maintains authority For then what they say is regarded and how their affections stand if it be love it is much sought after if displeasure it is much feared for they are men of a fixed disposition it gains wondrous respect Let men be never so great if they be such as S. Paul here declines from himself that they use lightnesse they lose their authority Authority is the special help that Governours have to rule and that Ministers have to prevail now nothing weakens esteem and authority more then when men are tossed between the waves of contrary affections when men are such as we know not where to have them as we say off and on fast and loose one while fitting another standing no man will build on them or much regard their love or hatred Now you know Authority is a beam of Majesty and God hath put it upon Magistrates above others and imprinted likewise the respect of it in the peoples hearts to maintain the World the pillars of the earth will shake else as the Psalmist saith What would become of the Pillars of Government if it were not for Authority in them that are above and respect of that Authority an impression of it in them that are under Now there are many grounds of Authority as successe when God blesseth them with it wonderfully to admiration and good parts c. but one main Ground of Authority is Constancy and firmnesse this raiseth a high respect in the hearts of the people I will not multiply reasons why those that are in place should avoid the imputation of lightnesse Ministers especially should take heed of it because they are Ministers of Gods truth and if they take not heed of it people will be ready to go from their moral civil carriage to their doctrine and think there is an uncertainty in that they speak because they do not regard what they say But let me adde this by the way Mater erroris similitudo Likenesse is the mother of errour so there is somewhat like Constancy in Governours and others when they are nothing lesse but meerly refractory and obstinate to maintain the reputation of constancy they will run into the fault of wilfulnesse Such as are subject that way had need of strong wits to rule their strong wills to guide them or else wo be to those that have to deal with them that I thought good to adde left we mistake We should all labour to avoid inconstancy and lightnesse in our resolutions in our purposes and affections If we ought to avoid it how shall we come to know it what is the ground of lightnesse The grounds are many Sometimes from the temper of the body some are of a moveable temper of a moveable quick spirit that they cannot out of their constitution fix long except they set weights upon nature I am by disposition thus but my resolution shall be otherwise as where Grace and wisdome is it will fix the temper and fix the resolution and the thoughts This I could not do if I should yield to my own disposition but this I will do and I should do there are many resolutions as in the younger sort and some out of their very temper are more fixed and resolved But now consider it as it is in Religion Lightnesse comes out of the disposition of the mind Inconsideration oft-times is the ground when we do not see the circumstances of a thing that we promise or purpose You know there is nothing comes to action but it is beset with circumstances there are advantages of it and there are stops and hinderances of it somewhat may fall out Every thing that comes to action is besieged with circumstances circumstances you know have their name of standing about a businesse about a thing now when the things that are about the impediments and the hindrances and le ts are not weighed a rash man sees not the things he considers not the things that he enters upon he resolves without considering the circumstances that beset the thing he never considers what oppositions he may meet with or what advantages there be which perhaps he neglects but he thinks of the thing it is good and suitable to his purpose he resolves and never considers the circumstances about a thing but runs on in confidence of his own wit and parts and thinks to rule all by the strength of his wit not foreseeing not casting in his mind to prevent before-hand what may fall out It is just with God to shame such men frustration of their purposes it is a just reward of their folly Therefore we should take heed of Inconsideration and have our eyes in our heads to set the soul to foresee what possibility there is of the businesse and what may fall out this is the right way if we would avoid imputation of lightnesse Again another ground of lightnesse and of that decay in authority and respect that comes from it is the passion of men therefore they are light they are carried with the hurry and wind of their passion And Satan joynes with passion A passionate man is subject to Satan more then a man that is led by reason or with grace For that is a beam of God even reason it self judgment it is an excellent thing and it prevents many temptations Give not way to passion for those are unreasonable things As we see Saul in his passion Satan the evill spirit mingled with his passion of anger So let men be in any passion over-joy or be over-angry let them give the rains to unruly passion and they give advantage to Satan that we cannot settle our soules in any good resolution Again in the things themselves there is cause of lightnesse and inconstancy from the nature of the things and then it is not so great a fault to change then it is not properly inconstancy but it is inconstancy when the things are mutable and variable and we do not think of it as we should Now the things of this life are variable and uncertain the event of things in this life is wondrous variable Grace and glory they are certain things and the way that God directs us to heaven they are certain promises and certain grounds but the things of this life are subject to much change God takes a great deal of liberty in altering things in this world they fall out divers wayes But now therefore we must take heed that we take not inconstancy for that which is not Every change of opinion and purpose is not lightnesse It is not inconstancy for a man to change his mind and purpose when it is from the things Men are men and the things that we deal with in the world are subject to variety and inconstancy and for a man to alter according to the
the soul under God A man may keep his wisdome and understanding safe still so he keep it under and let Divine truth sway and bring all in us into captivity to it self But alas the scope of the world is contrary instead of bringing the soul into captivity to Gods truth to be led by him to have no thoughts no aimes contrary to Gods will they make Gods truth a captive and prisoner to their own base affections as S. Paul saith Rom. 1. They hold the truth they withhold it as a prisoner under base affections And whereas all should serve the main end and intend better things they make a counterfeit loving of good things to serve their carnal ends they make heaven serve earth they make God serve man the Spirit serve the flesh they invert the order of things clean which is as contrary to nature if they had wisdome to consider it as that the heaven should be under the earth and the water above the air it overturnes all in Religion when we suffer carnal wisdome to rule all to imprison that light that God hath put into the heart and conscience and the light of his Word to base affections and not to bring all into captivity to the Spirit and the Word When we come to hear Gods Word we should consider that we come not for recreation but we come to a Counsellour to that that should sway and direct all our wayes and words to that that is not onely our comfort in the time of affliction but our counsellour as David saith it was the man of his counsel So we come here to be counselled to hear that which must direct us in the way to heaven we must come with a purpose to be guided by that to be taught As Cornelius faith We are here in the presence of God to hear what shall be said to us from God Saint Paul gives this direction 1 Cor. 3. If a man will be wise in heavenly things let him be a fool first It is a strange thing Let him be a fool that is let him be content to be esteemed so let him be content to lose his reputation of wisdome that he may be wise When he knowes others to be fooles let him take a substantial course that the vain world may think him wise It is hard counsel for of all imputations in the world many and the most had rather be accounted wicked then be accounted fooles account them the veriest fools which are unfit to speak think of them in the highest degree of ill you can oh they have wit enough for that they have learning and parts for that take not away their learning and parts account them not fooles account them what you will Religion masters this base opinion Saint Paul saith Let a man be a fool if he will be wise Let no man deceive himself and think Let poor men be so and so Religion is the private mans good and let them make conscience of such things but for us that are in place and authority we must rule by policy and he knowes not how to rule that is not a Politician Let no man deceive himself there is no man great or small but if he will be wise for heaven let him be a fool let him take courses that are conscionable though he be accounted a fool for his pains Let us be jealous of our own hearts in private and publick let us take heed to our own hearts that the flesh come not in Let us labour to be acquainted with Christ that he may be our counsellour and our guide in all things Specially now when we come to the Communion we now renew out Covenant with God and our acquaintance with Christ Jesus we come to feast with him Do we think to have any good by him any benefit by his death except we make him our King and Prophet to rule and guide us except we make him our Counsellour Therefore let us think before-hand we cannot come as we ought to receive the Communion unlesse we intend before-hand to renounce the flesh Christs enemy can you be welcome guests and resolve after to be led and ruled by his enemy If you will have good by Christs death as a Priest to reconcile you to God as this Sacrament seales the benefits of his death the breaking of the bread and the pouring out of the wine come with a purpose to be ruled and guided by this Counsellour in all things he is the great Counsellour Isai. 9. 7. that is willing to advise us by his Word and Spirit in all the particular passages of our lives and the more we enter into acquaintance with him by the Sacrament and maintain it by private prayer and by all sacred means the more ready he will be to do the office of a friend and counsellour in all the passages of our lives to advise us what is best I had occasion in verse 12. to speak at large of fleshly wisdome therefore I passe it That with me there should be yea yea and nay nay This sets down the manner of inconstancy the form of it yea yea to be on the affirmative part once and then nay nay the negative to be of one mind and peremptory in it and then to be of another mind and peremptory in that this is the issue of carnal wisdome and followes on it The things that I purpose do I purpose according to the flesh that with me there should be yea yea and nay nay insinuating that those that purpose things according to the flesh they are yea yea and nay nay Whence first we may observe which I touched before a little but it issues more properly hence from the dependance That Carnal men are alway inconstant men For a fleshly man led with the flesh being led with the things of the world and they being inconstant he must needs be as that which he is ruled by A man cannot stand safe upon the Ice because it self is not safe a man cannot stand in a thing that stands not that hath no consistence Now a Carnal man he hath no prop to hold him but the things below he cleaves to them and they are inconstant and variable and uncertain He that purposeth according to the flesh is yea yea nay nay Therefore his love is yea yea nay nay If he may have good by you he is yea yea he is for you but can you do him no good he is nay nay he will not own you then Therefore one way to be constant is not to be ruled according to the flesh which I spake of before for they that are are yea yea nay nay Therefore take heed how you trust carnal men in near intimate society as in marriage Or in near friendship never take a man that hath his own aimes and ends for he will respect you no more then he can advance his own ends by you Trust not the Wife of thy bosome saith the Prophet if she
certainty of the Subject there is a firmnesse of the Promises in Jesus Christ and there must be a firmnesse in us upon those Promises It is no matter what the certainty of the thing be that we are to build upon if there be not a certainty in the person if there be not a building on that thing God shall lose the glory of his truth and we the comfort unlesse we be certain as well as the promises are certain It is no matter what the garment be if it be not put on It is no matter as I said before how firm the rock be if we plant not our selves upon it and therefore besides the writing of Gods Word on Tables unlesse he write it likewise in our hearts unlesse our hearts be stablished on that truth that in it self is certain that it may be certain to us all is to no purpose You see therefore the absolute necessity of the application of the soul unto those truths which are certain and sure in themselves there must be a stablishing of us as well as a stablishing of the promises There is a necessity of the application of the promises to our selves that they be true to us Christ is a garment we must put him on then he is the robes that we appear glorious before God in but we must put him on by faith Christ is the food of life he is so indeed but then he must be digested Meat except it be applyed except the stomach work nourishment out of it by application and so digest it to all the parts the body hath not nourishment from it Christ is the foundation of his Church I but there must be application we as living stones must be built on him Let the foundation be never so strong if the stones be not laid on the foundation the stones cannot stand Though Christ be the Spouse of the Church and be never so rich there must be application and consent we must strike up the bargain and match between Christ and us There must be our consent to tie our selves to him to give up our selves to him So look to all the comfortable relations that our blessed Saviour hath taken upon him in the book of God they all enforce application The ground I say is this that though there be never so much certainty in the thing yet if there be not a certainty in the person to found application upon all is to no purpose These two therefore must go together and they are sweet relatives promises on Gods part and faith on our part The Promises and Christ are nothing without faith For there must be a touch to draw vertue If faith have never so little touch of Christ it will draw vertue but there must be a touch there must be application Christ is nothing without faith and faith is nothing without Christ and the Promises For what is the difference between faith and presumption presumption is an empty groundlesse fruitlesse conceit faith builds on the Promises of the Word we can alledge the Promise It is nothing for a mad man to assume himself to be King of another Countrey why he hath no promise He that made account that all the ships that came to the Haven were his it was but a frantick part of him and so he was accounted So a man that thinks his estate is good and builds not himself upon the promise that hath no ground for it out of Gods Word it is but a presumptuous frantick conceit The promises are nothing without faith and faith is nothing without the promises There must be application This I thought good to observe first in the general To come now more particularly to the words themselves He that stablisheth us with you c. In the words you have first A gracious Act of building or stablishing Secondly The Basis the foundation of that stablishing or building and that is Christ. Thirdly the Authour of this stablishing God Lastly the persons who are built and stablished on that foundation with you He that stablisheth us with you in Christ is God The first thing is the Act Stablishing The point is this first That Stablishing settling grace is necessary It is necessary that there be a stablishing confirming grace It is not sufficient that we be brought out of the Kingdome of Satan for when we are gotten out of his hands and strength he pursues us with continual malice therefore there must be the same power to stablish us still in grace that first brought us into the state of grace For as Providence is a continuall creation so stablishing grace is the continuance of the new creature the same grace that sets us in the state of the new creation in Christ the same stablisheth us Stablishing grace is necessary It is necessary many wayes Man of himself is an unstable creature take him at the best but a creature God found no stability in the Angels take the best of creatures even as creatures they are unstable For God will have a creature as a creature to be a dependant thing upon the Creator who is a being of himself Jehovah There is no stability in any creature Man in his best estate was an unstable creature Since we are very unstable ready to be carried away in our judgment to the wind of any false doctrine ready to be blown over with every little temptation Nay now in the state of grace in our selves we are very unstable ready to fly off presently and therefore we have need to be established of God It is necessary in regard of the indisposition of our nature to supernatural truths we are an unprepared subject for them in our selves The Law indeed we have some principles of it but of the Gospel there are in us no seeds at all of it and that is the reason there are so many Heresies against the Gospel there are none against the Law And therefore Divine truths being contrary to our disposition as there must be a supernatural beginner so there must be a supernatural strengthener he that is Alpha must be Omega As there must be a mighty subduing of the heart to be a vessel to receive these truths an Almighty power to lay the soul on this foundation because of the contrariety of the truth to the natural heart of man so there is need of no lesse then of a Divine and supernatural stablishing Our natures are very inconstant and unsettled and wayward take us at the best before the fall you see how soon we fell being left to our selves and having no stablishing grace Much more now since the fall is there a nenecessity of Divine stablishing when we come to know the truth we are subject to fall away like little children that are ready to sink if they be not upheld by their parents or nurse God must uphold and propus and shore us up we presently sink else Moses was but in the Mount a while and we see how soon
ill upon slight grounds Now this oft-times ariseth and is fed with seeming probability Christ conversed with wicked men here was some colour for them to conjecture him so We say things have two hands a right hand and a left now suspition takes hold of the left hand alwayes if things will admit of a double construction suspition alway takes hold of the worst suspition takes hold of the ill part That is the nature of a diseased soul to take things by the wrong hand We see then it is a disposition that we are subject unto naturally and it is cherished by Satan and Satans instruments wicked men And why doth the Devill so cherish suspition and a jealous disposition Oh it hath been wondrous instrumental to Satan I dare say there is no disposition or frame of soul that hath been the occasion of more blood-shed of more unjustice in the Church and State from the beginning of the world then a jealous disposition especially in great ones Therefore the Devil labours as to breed jealousies of God so of Gods Church and Children from the beginning Was it not ever the disposition of ill-minded men to put jealousies into the hearts especially of those that were in authority concerning men far better then themselves Was it not Hamans policy when the Jewes had angred him Oh they are a people that care not for the Laws c. perhaps they were more obedient then himself had it not been the occasion of their ruine if God had not been more merciful Herod had a jealousie and suspition that Christ when he was born would turn him out of his Kingdome and all Jerusalem was in an uproar Alas Christ came to give a heavenly Kingdome and not to take away earthly yet this jealousie cost the lives of the poor Infants So in the Primitive Church there were wicked men put jealousies concerning the Christians into the heads of the Emperours when alas they reverenced the Emperours next God above all yet alway there were wicked instruments that sought to domineer and have their own ends under the Emperours they conveyed jealousies and thence came so much blood-shed In later times in Popish Countreys if a man read the stories whence came that blood-shed This was one chief cause jealousies and suspitions cast into the heads of Popish Princes by wicked men about them set on work by Satan himself O they are such as will turn you out of your state a people that are rebellious and unquiet This was the policy among us in former times we may consider of later times to see the disposition of a man that was a great States-man in his time and a man of great parts and learning but of a very fierce and cruel disposition I mean Stephen Gardiner The chief hurt that was done in that magnanimous Princes time it was done by him And how By jealousies as appears by his Letters c. Oh if these things prevail this and that will come he cast such jealousies that did affright thas great Prince Oh other Princes will fall out with you if you maintain not these things they will break with you And so upon his death-bed this doctrine of Justification if the people once know it all is gone God shewes that all these jealousies are but follies for all that he feared came to passe In good Queen Elizabeths time Religion that he was so jealous of was established and she cared not for Princes correspondency that were of other Religions further then might stand with reasons of State and did not she flourish and her people in quiet all her time notwithstanding all former jealousies as if Religion established could not stand with peace So that the event proved what kind of jealousies these were Do we think then that a great deal of hurt is not done among particular persons when in States there is such a world of hurt done by Satan and his instruments Well let us take notice therefore of our disposition and of the inclination of men this way that we may the better prevent it and that will appear in the second thing That We should labour by all means to avoid suspition and to decline it as much as we can It should be the care of Ministers and others it generally belongs to all Christians to free themselves from any ill suspition in the hearts of others as much as they can as S. Paul did here the suspition of inconstancy and lightnesse and want of love to them that he did not come among them Suspition is a Canker that eats into the soul where it is and it will consume and waste all love It is the very venome of Love and friendship A little thing will breed it but will not work it out Therefore we ought first of all to take great heed that we give no ground of suspition at all or if we do that we be careful to get it out as soon as we can for usually where it takes place it boyls till it break out into words and then words when they are discovered breed strangenesse and that breeds other inconveniences And the rather we should labour to avoid it because Quod suspectum c. that which is suspected is made unprofitable for a man when he unwarrantably suspects another thing it is unprofitable to him We take little good by those that we suspect are ill or ill-affected to us and then we do little good to them for love is much danted by the ill conceit we have taken against them A man cannot do that good that he might when he is suspected there lies a barre in the way ill suspition in the other party which is an obstruction between him and the good he might do Therefore even for the love of others we ought to avoid suspition as much as may be that they may receive good from us As we ought not uncharitably to suspect others that we may do good to them so we ought to avoid by all means suspition from them left it be a barre for that good we might do towards them Let us labour to clear our selves from all suspition of want of love and ill carriage what we may that so there may be nothing between our spirits and theirs that may hinder the good that might come from us to them but that all may passe clear You see how curious holy men have been in all times to avoid suspition as much as they could Even God himself we cannot have a more glorious pattern what course hath he taken from the beginning of the world with mankind he hath condescended and stooped to mans weaknesse to clear himself of suspition of unkindnesse to man that man might not cherish suspition that he doth not love him For there is that poyson in the cursed nature of man that do God what he can he will lay imputations upon God to bear himself out in stubborn courses as if God delighted not in him