quite contrary they shall be reconciled to agree And the reason is given verse 9. The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord. This knowledge of Christ whereby men are turned to God is the great thing that changes natures alters properties even as that is altered between the kid and the leopard That 's the second Argument Thirdly the greatness of the power that works unto faith in Christ that magnifies the work When Christ cast out Devils and healed all manner of diseases among the people while he lived upon the earth did he not put the world into admiration and astonishment yet this work of Conversion to bring sinful souls to God to pull them out of darkness and the damnable state wherein they lay this Christ makes a greater work in John 14. 12. where he saith He that believeth in me shall do the miracles and the works that I do and greater works then these shall be do when I go to the Father When I go to send the Holy Ghost from the Father unto the world what greater works can there be It cannot be otherwise explained then the Ancients downard from Origen The conversion of the world of the Gentil world from Heathenism and Idolatry and Devillism and vanity to Christ because they work such great conversions to turn men from darkness and Idolatry these are greater works then Christ himself did because he did not convert so many as they This is the Hyperbole of Gods power towards them that believe this is the working of his mighty power There is never a verse expresses it in so full words as that Ephes 1. 19. speaking of the power that he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead This power wrought in you when you believed Read this verse and consider it well I think you will never hereafter look upon it as an easie thing to believe the exceeding greatness of power Learned Divines observe there is an aggravation the raising power whereby Christ rose was a great power he lay under all the sins of mankind the greatest stone lay upon his grave that ever man had every man lay dead to his his own sins Christ lay under all the sins of mankind in their full weight That which went to raise Christ and to roll away the stone was a mighty power indeed and the same is put out in you whereby you are called out of darkness into light and from a natural state to believe in Christ Fourthly this is compared to such works as seem to us and are to mans power impossible to be done As to the Aethiopian his changing of his skin the leopard putting off his spots The Blackmoor cannet change his skin nor the leopard put off his spots Jer. 13. 23. When they can do so then may you that are wicked and accustomed to sin change and turn to God There is another instance in Luke 18. 25. Can a Camel go through the eye of a needle no more can a man that trusts in riches a worldly man believe or repent which are expressions of so great a height that we may well conclude the greatness of the work Fifthly this is a work to which Christ is required and wherein he must appear both satisfying and sanctifying for unless he appear in both there can be no conversion wrought on any man he must come by water and by blood 1 John 5. 6. The satisfaction of Christ that 's the taking away sin by his blood And therefore in John 12. 32. If I be lifted up I will draw all men to me here is another drawing There is Gods drawing by power and Christs drawing by his being lifted up by his meritorious â—ppearing to satisfie justice In the creation of the world there was no need of a satisfying and sanctifying Christ to appear It s true indeed Christ as God and the Son of God did appear for by him the worlds were made but as Mediator there was no appearance of Christ But now if he will convert a sinner and bring one of you home to God out of darkness into light here must Christ as Mediator appear Oh that men would admire the greatness of this work The Use of this part shall be twofold Use 1 The greatness of this work shews the reason of those sayings of Divines which were used by the Fathers of the Church in former times That the Church of God hath still her miracles and is not deprived of that gift Men may say that miracles are put down and ceased but the Church of God hath running and abiding in it the gift of miracles Why so Because God by the Ministry of the Word works after a wonderful and miraculous manner in the hearts of men to bring them out of Idolatry and self-vanity The raising of the Widows son from death to life that we read of in the Gospel and the raising of Lazarus that was four dayes dead in the grave these were great works But if you compare the conversion of sinners with them it is a greater work When Christ raised Lazarus it s said that he groaned in spirit that put him to his groans But when he came to redeem man that put him to his bloodshed And therefore on the sudden to change the heart of man from hating God as every natural man doth to love God from persecuting the truth to die for it from being inwardly possest by Satan to follow the Lord Jesus Christ I would have men to consider it that they may come with thanksgiving to the Table of the Lord. And what faith a reverend Divine that is now with God Conversion is the greatest Miracle that ever God â—â—ought And it is to be compared to the Creation of the world saith another and gives this reason The Spirit of God seems to make it a greater work To the creation of the world nothing was required but the word of God but to the conversion of a sinner the arm of the Lord alluding to Luke 2. the arm of the Lord and to Isa 53. 1. To whom is the arm of the Lord revealed And certainly there appears the most grace in it and a power above any creatures It is the assiduity and commonness of the work not the â—lightness and facility saith Austin that takes off the wonder of it The commonness of the Suns light makes it not so much regarded because it is day those men that have felt the power of God in their own spirits they know it is a wonder In the Gospel it was a Miracle to turn water into wine and is it nothing to change a filthy swine into a sheep and darkness into light The creatures at first were made by the Word of God but this Conversion is caused by the arm of God saith one It hath been Hyperbolically spoken of by the Ancients that lived in this Church of England as a very great work to turn the Gentil world and Heathens from their vanity to
faith and repentance but God requires not the performance of the conditions by mans own power for therefore the Covenant is altered from Do this and live unto Believe in the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved they are both exprest Rom. 10. 5 9. because man fallen man could not abide such a condition of life as must rest upon his own power to performance which was before possible to him while he stood in integrity but now is impossible to him in sin this objection may be further pursued and then I confess you make a hard knot of it Obj. Still it seems the condition continues impossible for man by a natural power cannot perform personal and perfect obedience neither can he believe neither keep the law nor obey the Gospel neither perform the condition of works nor yet of Faith and what are we then the better Answ You must distinguish between a natural power and a power restored by grace as to the natural power there is no more in man to believe in Christ then to perform the law to a natural power both these conditions are impossible let me not offend you in words for to Do this and live you do not pretend to but to Believe and come to Christ that you say you can But the text saith no man can come to me Oh that you could but feel this impotency in your selves but then the power restored is a power to believe in Christ which is not restored to keep the law of works but unfeignedly to believe in and love Christ and this power is given by the drawing of God to all that do indeed come to Christ those that are not drawn do not come all that come are drawn and impowred to believe Gods drawing and mans coming are both of one latitude one measure one extent as many as the Lord works upon and draws they do come ver 45. And those that are not drawn do not come ver 44. and this I call the restored power not restored to man to keep the Law but to believe in and receive Christ Jesus And so the power to perform the condition of the Covenant is a restored power but to perform the condition of the Covenant of works there is no power restored therefore Austin saith God will not that it should pertain but only to his Grace that man should come to him that being come he should not recede from him And that God would not have the condition of this Covenant to be built on mans power of performance I prove by three Reasons Reas 1 First God is pleased that his promise or Covenant should be sure to all the seed Rom. 4. 16. Therefore it is of faith that it may be by grace to the end that the promise might be sure to all the seed not to all the world but to all the seed and how unsure it had been if it had stood and bottomed on man the experience of the first man Adam doth teach who though in his integrity made shipwrack of all by defection from it much more may be said of man under sin were he not supported by the power of a better prop the Mediatour God will have it sure to all the seed And therefore will not establish it on the works of man because he betrayed it and brought shipwrack on it at first and there shall come a shipwrack on it no more Reas 2 Secondly God doth not expect that the conditions should be performed by man only calls for it as a duty that I owe but not as standing in my power But God makes promises of the very conditions which he requires not of the benefits of the Covenant only but of the graces of it that they may keep it Mark the promises of the Covenant I will put my Law into their hearts and write it in their minds and they shall all know me Heb. 8. 10 11. I will put my fear into their hearts that they shall not depart from me Jer. 32. 40. I will will put my spirit within them and cause them to walk in my statutes Ezek. 36. 27. I will take away a heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh Ezek. 11. 19. And who will say that these promises are built on any conditions in man Reas 3 Thirdly Because of this Covenant Christ is surety which in the first Covenant was not If we deal with a poor or suspected man we lie hard at him for a surety happily we will take a rich mans word Though there was no surety of the first Covenant for Adam had none yet now there is a surety given that must stand at stake and therefor it is said God hath made him a Mediator of a better Covenant Heb. 7. 22. and this surety-ship of Christ shews that man is not to be trusted but upon surety And what undertaking Christ performs may be seen in his account he makes of his sheep John 17. 8. I have manifested thy word unto them and they have received it and have known that I came out from thee And believed that thou hast sent me this is an excellent undertaker and a good Accountant for his sheep not one of them is lost they have received thy word they have believed A rare comfort for all that are Christs they are undertaken for Christ is accountable for them to God 7. Lastly Since the glory of God is thus kept intire that all things are of him through him to him Rom. 11. ult and that rectum est index sui obliqui the right line is index of it self and the oblique or Crooked Let whatsoever doctrine that makes not all to be of him through him and unto him be hence confuted by this excellent test as First That which makes man a beginner of Conversion and God a helper of those beginnings that affirms assisting but not preventing Grace that which makes grace the nurse not the mother that brings forth a crutch for the lame but not life to quicken the dead that which makes God the finisher but not the author of Faith this is not Scripture doctrine this makes not all to be of him Secondly That which affirms that though there be no merit in Justification yet there is a power in man for Sanctification because it deals unequally with a long arm and a short one allows no merit and yet assumes a power that sounds not well neither yet this is a thought that is in many a mans heart Oh that God would pardon me and for walking with God let me alone Oh that God would forgive me my sins and I le cleanse my self I le live to God you will not assume the merit of Justification but you may not set your power in the place of the spirit of God in point of sanctification no more then merit in place of the Lord Jesus for Justification for in Psal 103. he forgives all thy sin and heals all thy disease ver 3. where in one verse you may see both
heart I will cause you to walk in my wayes Ezek. 36. 26. I will put my fear in their hearts that they shall not depart from me Jer. 32. 40. The Lord thy God will Circumcise thy heart to love the Lord Deut 30. 6. So in the Text No man can come to me except my Father draw him here is the work of God for believing the drawing of the heart is Gods and then mans work followes and verse 45. Every man that hath heard and learnt of the Father comes to Me. I might multiply Scriptures but these may suffice Secondly Infused habits of Grace are not like acquisite and moral habits moral habits are begotten by Acts precedaneous and foregoing as he that will get an habit of writing must write get a habit by the Act but infused habits are powred in before the Acts because as in that which we call potentia Naturalis the faculties of seeing hearing and sence we do not by seeing and hearing learn to see and hear but we perform the Act by the habit First there is a power to see and hear and then we see and heare So 't is in these infuâ—ed habits that God powres into us by his Spirit there is an habit and then there followes an Act a faculty of knowing God and then an Act of loving God follows we do not acquire them by acts of our own we have the facultie the power first given and then we act Thirdly If God do but set the will of man in aequilibrio like a paire of even scales not determining it to conversion then he concurs but contingently but concomitantly upon condition that the will do and move it selfe and this indeed would be no great matter for by this meanes God doth lesse in the Conversion of man then man doth for the will of man gives the act turnes the scales specifies the event not the grace of God and how disgraceful is this to the will of God that the will of man should do it and the grace of God not so it would be if God should do no more then set the will of man in equipoise only make him able to turn himself Fourthly observe this Converting grace is given with that intention by God that the will and heart of man should be determined that the scales should be turned and man saved or else I pray what should the meaning of that be which is called the calling of God according to his purpose Rom. 8. 29. as those that love God are said to be such as are called with an intention of God to bring them to himself and oh how powerful and infrustrable is that grace which comes and is given by God with an intention to save you for if that grace should not save you you must say that God is not able to save you Oh! But may some say the hard heart of man may refuse rebel and resist not the intention of God certainly not the purpose of God doubtlesse Austin speaks very well to this purpose illa à nullo duro corde respuitur quia durities tollitur this grace this converting grace is refused by no hard heart because it 's therefore given that the hard heart of man may be taken away and as a man may properly convey it to you by this comparison light being given to take away darkness the darkness cannot resist the light because it 's therefore made that the darkness be expelled so that grace which is therefore given and intended to take away the heart of stone that is the resisting heart cannot be resisted because the intention carries it I will take away the heart of stone saith God and so to the comfort of a man thus converted by grace be it spoken the very stonie heart the hard heart cannot resist Fifthly If converting grace give not an ability or sufficiency but an indifferency onely and a power that a man may be saved if he will but no act is determined the elect have no more then other men a power only but they have no more reason of gratitude because it s their own will that inclines them to be saved when others are lost the Act of God therefore must be first otherwise men might say it 's true Lord thou gavest me a sufficiency and a power to be converted but the act the determining casting voice that turned the scale was my own therefore thou gavest me no more then thou gavest to Judas and others as well as to me And here beloved in the Lord you may see from this observation First Why God will have all the praise of Salvation to be to his grace Secondly why God will have all the glorying to himself for it would not be just with God to rob the will of man of glorying if man himself deserved it First God will have all the praise to be to his grace Eph. 1. 6. that we may be to the praise of the glory of his Grace 't is glorious grace indeed and that we may be to the praise and glory of it therefore God shewes and sets it forth in all the great Turnes of the Salvation of man the first step is Election then Calling Justification and glorification in all which grace is set forth that so all may be to the praise of glorious grace Secondly God will have all the glorying to himself and truly this is the great mark of Gospel doctrine that it brings the glory to God only in 1 Cor. 1. 3â— that be that glorieth may glory in the Lord therefore he hath made Christ to be Wisdome Righteousnesse Sanctification and Redemption made Christ to be all that he that glorieth may glory in the Lord which could not be if man glory in himself or have works of his own Observ 2 Secondly That Gods drawing is the cause of mans coming here is Gods mission of Christ and here is Gods traction of man the Father sent me the Father drawes man there must be both had God sent Christ into the world and had not also drawn man to Christ then had been nothing done it was not indeed mans faith but Gods meer grace and mercie without the faith of man that sent Christ into the world it was not looking up that was required to the setting up of the serpent on the pole but God required mans looking up for his being healed by it so it was not mans Faith that was required to Christs mission but it is required to mans Justification for the reaping of the benefits of Salvation by Christ God requires that every one of you do believe in Jesus Christ and therefore the traction of God is required to this Faith Christ is given and sent to man by God without this Faith but that man may be saved by Christ Faith is required and we are drawn by God to believe in Christ he sends Christ to man and thereby differences Man from Divels to whom he is not sent he drawes man to Christ and thereby differences the Elect from
must be buds before there be ripe fruit in the tree let there be day-break before there be Sun rise but when may it be said now the soul quickens now it lives 't is when God actually puts a principle of life into the Soul and changes it by habitual grace puts in the New creature the Divine nature and gives it power to believe And in this work there are two things that God doth to be considered first his taking away the heart of stone the vicious quality stocking up those roots of gall and wormwood sinne and delight in sinne and turning the heart into a softnesse and wearinesse of sinne and this he cals a taking away of the heart of stone Ezek. 36. 26. And then the second work that joines with and followes upon it is the planting of a new principle in its place as the heart of flesh is given to come in the place of the heart of stone whereby it shall be inclined to the work of faith and love and this shall be as Christ said a well of water springing up to everlasting life John the 7th and this is a work above the power of all means used in themselves till God use this Pen to write by but every tendent and previous act is not regeneration but that which gives a spiritual being and a vital principle for until there be a spiritual being begun there is no new Creature Thirdly There goes to this divine drawing a further work and truely that will not be acknowledged by many great men that out of the heart thus changed and prepared by habitual grace there is drawn out by the hand of God himself the very act of believing in Christ It is a hard thing to conceive how that should be but it is no otherwise then this that as when the wheel is made you put on your hand to turn it so when this habit of grace and new nature is put into the heart of man God puts forth this eximious act doth as it were lay his hand on the wheel turns the heart to draw out this act of Faith and this Christ speaks of heer coming is an act a motion a man cannot come till he move and so in Phil. 2. 13. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And Philip. 1. 19. to you is given to believe not to you is given the power to believe but God works the act the will not only the habitual change of the will when he hath habitually changed the heart then he drawes the act out the reason is if God had given the power and put a new principle into mans heart to turne and come to Christ and then leave him he had done no more for his Elect then he did for Adam when he was in his integrity God gave him a power to obey but he did not give him the act of obedience because there was a habit and a power given him and a sufficient power that he might have used if he would and have stood by it for if God had not only given him a power but this act then certainly he had stood but now the Conversion of man is certain not on a peradventure God puts a habit which he doth not leave to the will of man to act alone if he should I know not how it would succeed he doth not only habitually but graciously perform these great effects in his Elect and this is that which you may pray and look for and though you were possessors of the grace whereby you might be someway inclined yet look for this drawing of God whereby you may be dravvn to believing in Christ Serm. 27 The first part of this text vvhich concerns the impotency of man to come to Christ hath had much of the latter part intervvoven Gods dravving and therefore because I vvill not Tautologize I shall but as they say tie a knot upon the long thred that hath already run out in the handling of these vvords and shall make this point That they that come to Christ do come by the traction of God vvhich point I vvill open briefly in a few particulars First There is a sort of people in the world in whom God will magnifie his great power in drawing them into a state of salvation by bringing them in to Christ Jesus and they are described by a Character that is before hand unknown to us a great secret that they are a people known to him 2 Tim. 2. 19. The Lord knoweth them that are his and by this that they are given to Christ by the Father Joh. 6. 37. 39. they are called the chosen of God unto salvation 2 Thes 2. 13. they are the people of his inward and secret Covenant Secondly For these people that are thus set forth unto you God is the undertaker he undertakes for them to make them a new heart and a new spirit Ezek. 36. 27. to write his law in their minds and put it in their hearts Heb. 8. 10. Thirdly These all and every one shall be drawn to Christ they shall be all taught of God John 6. 44 45. Fourthly This undertaking work is succesful and effectual to these two things To the bringing of them in unto it To the keeping them in that state First To the bringing of them in for all that the Father hath given to me shall come to me vers 37. they shall all know me Jer. 31. 34. they shall all be taught of God v. 45 Secondly to the keeping of them in they shall not depart from me Jerem. 32. 40. they shall not withdraw of these the Apostle speaks Heb. 10. last vers we are not of them which withdraw to perdition And our Saviour Joh. 6. 37. them that come to me I will in no wise cast out And this is promised peremptorily of all that are Confederate or Covenanted persons they shall all come to Christ they shall all know me and I will give them a new heart and a new spirit every one of them shall be taught of God I will saith God and they shall And this Covenant of God thus made with his Chosen before the world began is irreversible not to be frustrated for 't is a purposed grace 2 Tim. 1. 9. There is not one of these in whom this undertaking grace shall not be operative working and succesful this is as the waters of Noah to me Isaiah 54. 9. God compares his Covenant with his people to the Covenant he made in Noahs floud and explains it thus as I have sworn that the flood shall return no more so that my Covenant concerning the waters cannot be reverst so neither shall the Covenant which I have made with thee be frustrate for it is a sealed Foundation the foundation of God stands sure and hath this Seal Tim. 2. 19. And concerning this know First That it is not built upon any contingent condition by us to be performed which man can defeat no more then there is required any such condition that the waters
a man that is sweetly the drawing is not against the will because it makes the will willing it doth not move the wheel against the wheel or the natural motion of it but with it and then the heavier the plummet the faster the clock goes If the power of God go with the willâ— of man it moves more freely as the stream doth with the wind and tide then the more power God puts forth the more willing you come Thy people shall be willing shall be voluntiers in the day of thy Power Psal 110. 3. as if the power of God in that day wherein it s put forth should make a man a voluntier in coming to Christ Jesus It 's true God moves contrary to the natural stream as the tide carries up the River but when the Lord puts a new Principle a new bias into the bowl and that natural heart of sin is taken away then this coming though it be with drawing is so sweet that the soul prays Lord draw me and I will run Cant. 1. 3. Thirdly It is wondred at that God should command what he works or gives for if he mean to give it why doth he command and if he command how doth he give if it be a duty how is it Gods work and if it be Gods work how can it be my duty I Answer That God gives the grace he commands the duty bidden is also given and except it be given it is not the bidding will serve the turn 1 Joh. 3. 23. This is his command that we should believe in his Son So then our believing in Christ is a commandment of God And in Acts 17 30. God commands all men every where to repent Here you see that faith and repentance both of them are commanded of God and it s the command that makes them to be your duty Well yet for all this both these are given by God Phil. 1. 29. To you li's given to believe 2 Tim. 2. 25. If God peradventure shall give them repentance to the acknowledgment of the truth here you find that both are given Again Circumcisc your selves to the Lord and be no more stifnecked Jer. 44. Oh Lord may some say doth God put this impossible work upon me Ezek. 18. 31. Make you a new heart and a new spirit here these two are commanded Make you and Circumcise you and yet both these are promised and given Deut. 36. 6. I the Lord thy God will Circumcise thy heart and Ezek. 36. 26. I will make you a new heart and a new spirit Can any thing be plainer then this he commands and works that which he doth command he commands to convince us of our debt what is due and of our impotency that we cannot pay that we may fall down at the feet of this God and yet he gives too for the magnifying and honouring of his free grace to unworthy man and his power to impotent man that is unable and therefore we distinguish between Legal commands and Evangelical those of the law require the dutie but afford no strength but the Gospel which commands faith and repentance that are Gospel-graces carry the grace and power with them not unto all that shall oppose and shut the door but unto the Elect of God and the people of his inward Covenant So that for a man to say it 's a Gospel command is to say that 't is possible through grace that is there goes grace and power with it which the Lord will convey by the command for the commands of the Gospel are vehicula spiritus carriers and conveyers that carry along the Spirit with them John 6. 36. The words that I speak they are spirit and life being like the commands given to the dead Arise come forth It is a vain thing to speak commandingly to the dead true had they not ministred that which was commanded it had not prevailed and such are the Gospel-commands of repentance faith and making the new-heart or else how should the Gospel-word be called as it is the ministry of the Spirit 2 Cor. 3. 8. The ministery of the Spirit is Glorious So much for the removing of these â—ubs out of the way of Reason Serm. 28 Obj. We shall propound a question for the further handling of this point why should these Gospel-graces and especially faith that bring us to Christ require super-natural strength and drawing for their production And truly there lies some emphasis in this word Gospel-grace for may some say what do you mean by that I mean that grace which serves to the recovery of man to the Image of God which he had and hath lost for in this state of the Image of God which we had before we fell there was life but in this Gospel grace by that there is a resurrection unto that or a better life then we lost before for God intended to restore his Image unto man in Christ who is his Image and this Image is restored by the begetting of this Gospel grace that brings us to close with Christ so that this faith or coming to Christ is a grace of recovery or resurrection through and by which the Image we lost is again repaired now for these graces they do require a supernatural strength Answ It seems to me that a man that is able out of his own experience to make this objection is on the borders of believing for when as the difficulty of faith once appeares and man comes to be sensible and distrusts his own opposition then he begins to draw near or to be on the threshold of faith he that is at a losse is near his way the water being troubled there is no question but there is cure I but saith the cripple the Angel moves the water but I have no bodie to put me in so the promise invites the Word calls but I cannot close with Christ there held forth I am a cripple and no need but of a hand to help me and whereas in Isa 53. 1. there seems to be a double expression concerning this point of faith Lord who hath believed our report and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed A man may say I heard the report and believe it to be true but the baring of the Lords arme must go to the making of man believe when we teach that men naturally cannot believe men wonder and say within themselves why should not I believe as well as another man I am as learned and knowing in the Scriptures and as pregnant as others and why should a man of a lesser measure and altitude of parts go before me in believing when we teach that men cannot keep the law of works there is never a one but will consent to it truly I cannot keep the Law I cannot love the Lord with all my heart and might and strength men yield they cannot but when we preach that faith is above your power you cannot believe and come to Christ though we report the report of Christ to you
which is said to contain better promises then the former hath this as the first I le write my law in their heart and put it in their mind that is in their inwards Hebr. 8. 9. 10. But instead of lighting a candle to the sunne I shall endeavor shortly to make a brief Anatomic of this Jew or Christian that is one inwardly and how he is distinguished from him that is so outwardly 1. There is in every true Christian an inward and spiritual man this is called The new man Ephes 4. 24. The inward Rom 7. 24. 2 Cor. 4. 16. A dead man may have inward parts but he hath not an inward man because there is no soul so an outward Christian may have inward parts a dead knowledge a dead heart dead affections but no inward man because there is no work of grace in him and this is called an inward man because as corruption spreading over the whole man is called the old man so this inward renewing grace spreading into and over the whole man the mind will affections is called an inner man and this inner man is that which knows God believes in Christ loves fears thirsts after grace delights in Gods Commandments and hath a continual opposition to the old man counter-lusting counter-desiring and counter-standing it Christ dwells in your hearts saith the Apostle The holy Spirit is within you saith Christ but as the soul never is in a dead body because where it dwells life is so Christ never is in a man that is dead where he is life is there is an inward man he that hath not in him this inward man cannot be a Christian inwardly Secondly There is an inward work of God that goes to the forming and begetting of this inward man Outward Ordinances may make a Christian in the Letter but an inward work makes a Christian in Spirit I will put my Law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts Jer 31. 33. A new heart will I give you and a new spirit 〈◊〉 put into you Ezek. 36. 26. I will put my Law into their minds and write it in their hearts Heb. 8. 10. These are Covenant-promises performed to all that are Covenant people In this inward work we have but the Ministry but the writing is by the Spirit as it 's said 2 Cor. 3. 3. Ministred by us but written by the Spirit of the living God Thirdly In this inward man wrought by an inward work consists the being of a true Christian for without this he that is called a Christian is no more a Christian than he that acts the part of a King is a King the name of a Christian is given or may follow from the outward profession but the nature is in this inward man He that begets communicates his Nature to the begotten he that paints a man imploys Art only but communicates no Nature God in a Christians new birth communicates holiness which is the Divine Nature but in an Hypocrite there is nothing but Art as I may say or some outward work for the outward forms may be painted yet inward forms cannot the lineaments of a Christian may be drawn to the life upon the white wall of an Hypocrite but the inward man which is that quod dat esse gives being to a Christian that cannot be but in a true Christian Fourthly He that is inwardly a Christian hath some marks of difference and distinction from the outward Christian forma dat distingui this inward work diffâ—renceth him from all sorts of them that are nominates and Christians outwardly First He is distinguished from the carnal Jew or Christian that professes Christ but lives in sin for though the outward Jew or Christian may hate some sins Thou abhorrest Idols thou hatest Popery and dost many good works yet that is out of some peculiar and particular indisposition to a particular sin and some particular approbation or liking of some good works but this hate of any sin or this inclination to a performance of any good works ariseth not from an inward nature or gracious principle as it doth in him that is a Christian inwardly and the reason is that contrariety to sin which is in a true Christian arising from this inward gracious Nature is to the whole species or kind of sin and is irreconcileable to any sin whatsoever as contrarieties of Nature are to the whole kind as light is contrary to all darkness and fire to all water so that this contrariety to sin arising from the inward man is universal to all sin though not an universal victory yet there is an universal contrariety victory argues strength contrariety argues nature hence it is that an outward Christian may hate one sin and love another becsuse there is not a gracious Nature in him which would be contrary to all And so also he may do good works but not out of a Nature that is in him for if it were from an inward Nature there would be an universal sympathy with and inclination towards God and all that is of God his Children his Commandments 1 Joh. 5. 12 3. Therefore saith the Apostle I delight in the Law of God according to the inner man Rom. 7. 22. not a particular good inclination but the Law in the whole of it It 's the victory of a Christian over corruption may not be full the performance of good may not be perfect but the inward Nature of a Christian is to be judged by the universal contrariety of his inward man to all sin and his universal inclination to God and holiness and that universal contrariety will beget a combate against all sin and that universall inclination to God an endeavour to all good but whether that combat be victorious or that performance be perfect though it may be much to shew the strength of a Christian yet it shewes not his inward nature but the other this universal contrariety to sin can be in no man but him that hath an universal sympathy with God and his whole law and image in his children they are both in him that is a Christian inwardly and they argue an inward nature of grace in him in which nature he differs from the carnal Christian who may oppose some sins and do some good works out of other principles and reasons Secondly This inward Christian is distinguished from a moral man that to his dogmatical faith and profession of Christ addeth moral vertue for there is as great difference between grace and virtue as between the sweet flowers spread upon a dead carkass and inward life a man be full of virtue 〈◊〉 and emptie of grace as a room exquisitely painted without light moral virtue is like flowers of needle work that are made by art but never grow from any living root natural temper disposition education produce moral virtues but now this inward man of a Christian is as I may say made up of Christ the knowledge faith love the tastes and rellish of Christ are
without life Now that it may be judged you are without and deprived of these there is no better argument to prove it then by that whereinto we are redintegrate by Christ this proves your lapse your loss your ruine for by that which is restored unto you you may know what loss you were at before but so as which is worthy observation at the first the Image of God was planted in man by creation for God created man after his own image The first man did not work the image of God in himself but it was planted in him by that creation by which he was made a man So this conversion comes not by any work of man this new Image of God is replanted by a second creation And therefore it s said in Ephes 4. 24. The new man is created after God in righteousness and holiness This I speak to shew that this flower needs not a watering only but a new plantation in our Garden that I might bring you to pray and give God no rest till you find this work wrought in you Secondly Consider man Positively and in him you shall find a world of lusts that byass him another way Lusts that fight against your conversion lusts that fight both against God and your souls so that no man can any more move and free himself from this lapsed state wherein he is then a bondman can free himself from his Master That 's a Scripture-comparison for there is not one lust you are under but you serve Serving divers lusts and pleasures Tit. 3. 3. one haling this way and another pulling that way and under the name of this bondage doth the Scripture often set forth mans impotent and indeed obstinate condition being as that servant in the Law that said I like my Master and will not go out free I will be a servant for ever There are many that say I will not leave my covetousness I like my sin bore my ear for perpetual servitude let sin be my Master for evermore Thus you see man is not only under privation but under the power of positive lusts Secondly From the work of Conversion it self that gives us very good reason no Philosophy in the world will deny this to be reason First this conversion to God is not wrought as habits that are generated produced and begotten in man by acts as a man writes often before he learns to write that is a moral way But this grace is planted in man first as potentia naturalis it produceth the acts and must first be The eye is a natural power 〈◊〉 a habit I do not by seeing learn to see as I do by writing learn to write but first I must have sight in my eye before I can make any act produce any fruit Grace is like sight in the eye we do not get grace by the several acts by us performed but first God plants it in our souls and then as with the eye we see Our Saviour Christ gives me the form of this reason First make the tree good and then the fruit will be good This must first be a man must first be endued with a divine and saving principle there must be a new man a new self a new creature before there can be any new acts How often have I told you that before this great work of God that plants a principle in me before this be wrought nothing at all can be expected from me Now Conversion is such a thing as this it makes the tree good and that cannot be by mans power because Conversion makes a new self in man I say it is impossible to reason and nature that this should be he that cannot do a good act can much less make himself a good tree Who ever heard of a thing in the world making it self Is any thing both a creature and a Creator I think there is no such thing in the world for if there were it would be something above a miracle A dead man raising himself its miracle great enough if another hand do it I say t is above a miracle and impossible in reason And truly if this Scripture-truth were brought to the ponderation of reason reason it self would not refragate and oppose the thing And secondly Conversion is a work supernatural and brings forth supernatural grace as to believe in Christ Jesus the Lord and to love God above self For that which is said in Scripture in the Law Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and all thy mind and thy neighbour as thy self If thy neighbour be to be loved as thy self then that which went before is the loving God above self And if this be true as it is that God is to be loved above self it s an impossibility till there be a principle put into the mind and heart whereby to do it for self cannot work above self nothing can act above its sphere of activity my reason is as the Schoolmen observe if a thing act and bring forth any thing without it self there would be some effect without a cause and the cause cannot reach it which is clearly in reason impossible and a contradiction Darkness indeed was and light was called out it God commanded light to shine out of darkness in our new creation 2 Cor. 4. 6. but that darkness should produce light I say that light is without a cause for there is no causality in darkness and to make an effect without a cause is a thing contrary to nature and reason and therefore there must be a power to command it out otherwise you put nature to work above it self Thirdly If you consider the Gospel-reasons which that most of all insists on and these are the simplest they have no Philosophy in them Why no man hath power to convert himself there are two reasons the Gospel gives and there are no more that I can give in this point I am sure Bellarmine acknowledges it First it layes in caution against boasting and takes that for reason enough Why not If man were able to believe and convert himself then there is foundation laid for boasting and pride that man reflecting on himself might say I believed and for that reason the Apostle doth deny in Ephes 2. 9. Salvation saith he is by grace not of works lest any man should boast not so lest that should be It s contrary to the scope of the Gospel and also to the Gospel-design that is to unhinge the power of man and to draw all the water to Gods own mill the free grace of God And oh that we were in love with this free grace of God! that whereby when we were involved in sin we were brought out The second Reason the Gospel gives and it needs no more is it gives all the honour to Gods grace throughout assigning all the difference of one man from another to that fountain If a man converts himself then he differences himself from another man but the Scripture assigns
may be secundum quid or respectively impossible that is not simply so It s not simply impossible to rise from the dead for then it could never be but its impossible for a dead man to raise himself So to believe in Christ it s not impossible through grace the divine traction but to a man as he is in himself and in sin it is impossible Faith in Christ is not an impossible act but it is not possible by mans own power and therefore if Reason quarrel at God for laying the conditions of the Covenant of life upon impossibilities for not laying the condition of the Covenant in mans own power yet that Reason is without reason in it for the condition was once in mans power and the forfeiture of the Covenant the event may teach us to bless God that it is so no more that the condition of the Covenant lies no more in the power of man to forfeit it or in man only to accomplish it God hath given I do believe and doth give so much power unto man as may justifie his commanding man and condemning in case they do not observe his commands there is so much power given as may justifie God in both and so much knowledge as God doth give to any man in the world so much knowledge as any man hath or might have so much he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 without excuse I think that 's a Principle and Maxime that will go far in all Divinity So much power as you have so much your excuse is taken from you so much you may believe and therefore are left inexcusable even those that have knowledge of God but by the light of Nature so much as they did know him are without excuse But certainly as it s said the purpose of Gods election stands not by our works but ex vocante of him that calleth Rom. 9. 11. so is his Covenant made good not by mans putting the condition but Gods giving of it else the covenant that he hath made with us should be a covenant of works or merits and not of grace if it did not stand upon Gods performance as it doth And therefore it s not laid upon an an impossible condition but a condition performed and made good by God himself I will put my law into their hearts and I will write it in their minds and they shall all know me that is shall believe in and love me and accept me for their God as the tenour of the covenant runs Heb. 8. 10. And the very reason why this covenant of life should not be defeated frustrated and made void therefore it s not committed to your power but reserved to the hands of the grace of God to make it good Rom. 4. 16. Therefore it is of faith that it might be of grace to the end that the Covenant might be sure to all the seed otherwise it had been as unsure as the Covenant that he made with Adam or as that which he made with Israel that God said was broken Heb. 8. 9. For in every Covenant that with Adam the promise was sure enough to the condition life was sure enough to the condition Do this if that condition had been performed it had been a sure covenant none surer What failed then the condition failed 〈◊〉 because it leaned on man and for that reason only it failed and therefore the covenant was not sure and this I have spoken all along to answer that objection that the covenant might be sure the condition doth not rest barely on the power of man But God performs the condition of the covenant that he makes with his people and I think he that gives the object of faith gives also the act of faith He that gave the serpent on the pole gives also the eye to look upon it that so Christ the object of your faith and faith that you might believe in him might be the gift of God For what avails Christ set forth to a people and no faith to lay hold on him Of what avail is the setting forth of an object where there is no eye to see it Grace I believe saving grace though I confess it is not so resented by many learned men comes from the purchase and merit of Christ as well as benefits of pardon The conditions and graces of the covenant come from the merit of Christ also without which there is no pardon since Christ is called Heb. 7. 12. the surety of a better Covenant an undertaker of the best Covenant Now all the question of the Text will be whose surety is Christ Is he Gods surety that makes it or mans surety with whom it is made Gods surety saith a learned man of latter times God and mans sure I think mans surety he is by giving satisfaction to the justice of God for the sins of man Gods surety he is by sending forth his Spirit to certifie and seal us Or thus he is surety for God that he will pardon us and sponsor or undertaker for us that we shall know God and believe in Christ and receive him for a Saviour therefore also called a Mediator of the same Covenant Now a Mediator is is not of one but of two parts in Zach. 13. 9. I will say You are my people they shall say The Lord is my God If Christ then be the surety of the Covenant Gods surety and ours for God and for us it will follow that Christ undertakes for us and that we have grace our believing our faith from his merit and his purchase Well then First I say all men are naturally unable to believe in Christ or to come unto him for though he be a fountain opened that was once a fountain sealed comparatively Zach. 13. 1. In that day a fountain shall be opened for sin and for uncleanness speaking in the dialect of the Jewes that is as in the Law there were sins and uncleanness sin to be purged by blood and uncleanness to be purified by water and there were expiations of sin and purgations of uncleanness represented in several Types So the Prophet shews that Christ shall answer them all 〈◊〉 Christ all these Types yet though he be a fountain opened as the impotent man said I have none to put me in Ioh. 5. 7. I lie lame and decrepid at the pool-side and when the water is moved have none to put me in So it may be said in this point there is a fountain opened in Christ Jesus for sin and uncleanness but none is able to come to it without a supernatural help and a divine hand go along with him The Gospel-preaching opens this fountain to you and this grace Pelagius rested upon and held that the grace of God was the preaching of the Word and opening the fountain to men For Orthodoxis verbis non abstinuit He as other Erronists that live in our times did not abstain from Orthodox words But what said Austin to them Nolumus istam gratiam
he forbids it A horse or stomackful colt put the bridle on him and he is mad let him run in the field and he is quiet Let the Sun shine on a stinking dunghill and it stinks the worse not because the Sun gives pollution by its heat but by accident makes the stink break forth so much the more Alas when the Lord comes to put the bridle of restraint on man he is filld with more stomack and rage and when the sweet Sun shines on him to invite him to God he is still the worse and the rather evil so little compliance is there of mans heart with God And as we may truly say that Antipathies and Sympathies do shew us very far into nature where they are found as the Schools do well observe for a lamb to hate and fly from not this and that wolf but every one though it never saw it before which shews a general antipathy to all wolves So it is in this case if there were a Law of God made known to any natural man such a Law as he never saw nor heard of before he would hate it and never comply with it which shews the stone that is in his heart and manifests a rebellion in it against God As on the contrary a Sympathy an agreement A soul that loves and delights in the Law of God though most cross to private interests is a very excellent proof of grace that hath reconciled the enmity of the heart to God Rom. 7. 22. I delight in the Law of God concerning the inner man Fifthly and lastly the pleasingness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the heart with any lust to which its taken by peculiar agreement of nature which is peccatum in deliciis doth shew this contrariety unto God so long as this sin of delight continues his master-sin he will walk contrary to God say what you will I confess every man cannot practice every gross sin as to be a drunkard a whore-monger covetous no more then one man at one time can possibly be sick of all diseases but that sin which takes him up by natural propension inclination or custome or whatever it be that either takes acquaintance with or possession of him no such man can come to Christ He himself tells them How can ye believe that are taken up with worldly credit and ambition John 5. 4. Let it be any sin Covetousness Drunkenness or Lust which he feeds by other sins and serves as a master to which he is tyed as fast as by a Cable which he cannot break until divine grace appear to him and cannot get off by any power of his own but Gods no afflictions though they bray him as a fool in a morter pound him to pieces yet his folly shall not depart from him no vowes though he seem to bind himself never so firmly nothing while the lust remains will alter or change him nay set the judgement of God and death eternal before his eyes ye do nothing the pleasure of his sin remains Rom. 1. ult Who knowing the judgement of God that they that commit such things are worthy of death yet not only do the same but have pleasure in them that do them Nay would you think that any mans sin should be so fast rivetted in him as that it should cause him to love death He doth so interpretativè by Gods construction and interpretation Prov. 8. ult He that sinneth against me hurteth his soul and they that hate me love death Now how filthy and abominable is man saith God that drinks in iniquity like water comparing a natural man to a fish in the water in its own Element from which you know he cannot be willingly pulled to the dry bank and therefore I conclude that man is not willingly of himself brought into that estate though it be far better yea a thousand times better then his own until his nature be changed and then he is brought And so much for the first branch the Contrariety of corrupt nature to God to his Law and to his Grace But whereas an Objection might be made that man is not so contrary to grace because that shews him life Certainly there is a greater opposition in the heart of man to the grace of the Gospel then to the Law of Duty to humble man and shew him that the work of Conversion is from contrary to contrary And therefore let me make use of that which some say that God in creating the world drew the creatures out of nothing but in this new Creation Conversion he finds opposition and contrariety in the subject that he works upon that bids him battel and sets him at defiance The Minister converts by new objects and God by new natures until which there is little done The second Branch of this opposition of corrupt nature to God we call enmity unto or hatred of God himself self which I instance in to shew that poison venom that is in man in every one of your best hearts in your natural condition unto the Lord God you will not be known of it in your selves Hate God may some say there is not one of us that take our selves to be haters of God but seem to defie all that hate God But the Scripture speaks much of it Them that hate me saith God Exo. 20. 5. And he calls them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 1. 30. Haters of God And in handling of this point I shall enter upon that sin which is diabolical First Hatred is a part of that diabolical malignity which makes man like the Devil for when he overthrew man at the first he spawned into man a certain diabolical seed not sins of sensuality and the flesh but malignity and opposition and spight against God this man is of a serpentine nature One man may be angry with another man but a Serpent hates the very nature of man Anger is in particulars hate in generals say the Schools so that this arises higher then the other doth into a hatred of God himself And then Secondly Hatred differs from Contrariety in this It rises from the consideration of such effects of justice which are threatned or executed upon man against his will punishing him for sin and so causes hatred but Contrariety is to the holiness of God and his Law and so is an opposite to Gods justice and the effects of it for corruption is so desperately carried against God that like the Devil it hates God punishing and inflicting not peradventure as God is a benefactor and sustainer of nature but he will not abide Gods vengeance on him Insomuch that a man in his private retired thoughts hath secret wishings in himself sometimes that God were not looking upon the effects of the Justice of God And this I will shew you in three Particulars And oh that this might rifle your hearts to go away from this self-love of yours whereby the great God is so opposed First all the hate that is in man aganst the Law
and Christ they will hold you where you are and make you lose Christ Jesus and so it is in mercy to us that we are stript of all other things which might have diverted us from Christ that not a hoof is left in Egypt to put us in mind of returning nor any bunch on the Camels back that may hinder his going through a strait as our Saviour hints the comparison And these hard conditions are reasonably required of us because he hath for us overgone and overdone all the world nay if there were a thousand worlds he hath overdone them all and therefore if he requires conditions that are hard to flesh and blood they are but reasonably required and the Apostle insists upon this reason in Rom. 5. 8. Peradventure one would dye for a good man that is a Benefactor one that is good to him some such may be found but for a righteous man one will scarcely dye that hath not been to him a Benefactor But the Lord Christ hath overdone all in that when we were sinners and enemies and no man will dye for an enemy he dyed for us and thereby hath obliged us to take such conditions from him as he will propound the Lord settle it in all our hearts Reas 4 Fourthly Men are unwilling to come to Christ Jesus because of those prejudices that are found against him for as I said before I think you will bate me that expression the Lord Jesus was the most scandalous person that ever lived on earth that is he afforded more scandals and offences unto the reason of man then ever man did not justly but by the mistake and misapprehension of mans reason how often doth he say Blessed are they that are not prejudiced at me his person his parentage his mean life his death on the Cross between two thieves and therefore the Apostle calls it the scandal of the Cross Gal. 5. 11. His appearance life death and doctrine all to carnal reason so unlikely and unsuitable to such a person and officer as indeed he was nay the Apostle Peter makes it general to all that believe not in him 1 Pet. 2. 7 8. He is a pretious stone to them that believe and a stone of stumbling and rock of offence to them that stumble at the Word c. whereat men dash first their reason and then themselves to pieces According as the light is wherein men see him so he is either a pretious stone or a rock of offence and let me say it again the sweetest promises in Christ Jesus have no more shew to a natural light then a Pearl or Diamond have to a swine or as a delicate colour seen by the light of a rush candle and on the contrary the hardest conditions seen by the light of faith the attractive light whereby God irradiates the mind in order to Christ these are desireable and have an admirable lustre in them above all the beauties in the world as an Egyptian for I would reason this point out of Scripture thought the glory of Pharoahs Court admirable as may be you might do but as for Moses that lookt upon it with another eye he esteemed the reproach of Christ greater riches Heb. 11. 26. shewing that as the eye is that looks on these things so is the will captivated And this weight of glory as it is called that is in Christ Jesus is made more weighty for that is but a Scripture allusion Glory is weighty in the Scripture the weight of Glory that is in Christ may be made greater to our eye two wayes either by conviction of Christ his excellency seeing seeing more of him or by humiliation of man under his misery by laying lower the price of this dung and dross undervaluing the lusts of this world as the light is by which he sees sin or Christ so the weight in the scales appears more either if we add to the one end or take out that which is in the other end of the scale for so much is this more weight as that is less that is put against it Oh that we had hearts to make abatements of the weights of this world and the things of this life that so the glory of Christ may be more weighty in our eyes and this is done by conviction I say the will is regulated by knowledge men will not chuse Christ because they know not his worth you would not sayes Christ to Jerusalem Mat. 23. 37. And thou knewest not the time of thy visitation Luke 19. 44. where there is no knowledge or not such a knowledge as is convincing there thou wouldst not Obj. True may some say the prejudices that men had against Christ in those dayes of his appearance to the world were many And if we had lived in those times and been left to our selves we had had as many as they but now they are ceast And therefore of all other this is no reason why men should yet alwayes be unwilling to receive Christ Answ I answer there are perpetual prejudices agaist Christianity through the mistakes and misapprehensions of men why they will not come to him or have him I cannot name them they are as the Devil or their own fancy do suggest to them for every one makes Christ a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence to them that are thereunto appointed as the Apostle Peter speaks 1. Pet. 2. 8. When a man being enlightned and a little convinc'd begins to be disquieted and finds trouble brought upon him by this there is wrought in this mans breast a prejudice against converting Grace that it takes away his sleep and appetite shakes him troubles him disquiets him that he cannot enjoy himself and the things of this world this is a prejudice and a mistake the truth is you must look for disquietness and broken bones when this is made known unto you But yet take it for granted you are now entring into a comfortable estate I will make the valley of Achor a door of hope the skirts of the land of Canaan Hos 2. 15. I will make that to be a door of hope what is that that a man or this people when I bring them to tribulations and disquiet them it shall be the beginning and commencement of hope comfort and delight wherein I will visit them in mercy Again When a man comes to be a professor of Christ and Religion he hath more enemies more temptations Satan molesteth him more he is more troubled then ever he was before and he takes prejudice at this not knowing that as Pharoah will make out with his Chariots and horse-men when Israel is a going so will Satan pursue those who are going out of his power There is also this prejudice against the wayes of God the wayes of God are holy I am unsuitable unholy he that hath gone so long loose as I have done shall never bear such strictness as is required this is a mistake he measures himself by
Grace put forth in the act of Conversion And for our clearer proceeding therein you must remember That Conversion doth either denote the work of God Converting man and this is Gods drawing or It denotes the action of man thereupon turning and coming in to Christ being thus moved and this is called mans coming in the text both of them make up compleat Conversion the one whereby God turns man and by the other man being wrought upon turns himself to Christ These two are inseparable in time but in order of causality Gods work is first the traction of God is before the coming of man the coming in of the light into a room we use to say expels darkness and plants in light though it be but one motion and one act so there must be the work of God enlightning the mind softning the heart drawing the will before there be a coming of man to God the act of drawing is Gods the act of Conversion or turning is mans God in his act of putting in and drawing forth faith doth not hinder but rather is the cause that the heart of man performs his own act and therefore the act of believing howsoever it be given by God yet being exercised and acted by us is our act for with the heart man believes Rom. 10. 10. as we use to say he that throws the bowl doth nor rowl or turn but the bowl by motion from the hand So when God puts forth this act to convert man the act is mans the act of Faith and Repentance and Conversion but the power and hand whereby the heart is turned that only is the act of God Well then First If we consider conversion as Gods drawing work converting the heart we may safely say The heart in that act doth not make actual resistance much less overcome and defeat the power of Grace which is put forth in believers with exceeding greatness of power according to the working of his mighty power which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead there you see the work described in Ephes 1. 19 20. It s true there may at that time and doth lurk a bitter root of proneness in the corrupt heart mark here is the knot and great point to resist the motions of the Spirit for the flesh lusteth against the Spirit and this root of habitual perverseness is not wholly and presently eradicate and rooted out by Converting Grace But this we say that Grace doth so powerfully work in the work or act of Conversion it so sweetly plyes the affections the understanding and the will with such drawings and carries the work on with that actual strength that the actual resistance of the heart is tyed up bridled and suspended for that time that it doth not overcome the Grace of God but the Grace of God overcomes the heart by a victorious delight to yeild up it self to God though there be corruption in it it is so suspended as it doth not act I will give it you by this comparison The tyde doth not take from the river an aptness to run downwards to the Sea but so powerfully when it comes in bears the stream back that it cannot take his natural course I need not make application And this may teach all Converts with what measure of admiration and thankfulness to come to God for overcoming bridling and suspending these resistances of your froward hearts for having lived twenty or thirty years in resistance of Grace and keeping it at the staves end and after Conversion resisting Grace and quenching the Spirit so often as you do if God had left you in that act to these resistances you had been lost and undone and therefore that God at such a time should forbid still and quiet these rebellions and resistencies of your heart till he had turned the stream and taken away the stone this is an admirable demonstration of the mercy love and power of his grace to you Of all things wherein God is to be praised this is one that a rebellious man that had so often before time and since resisted grace that at that time when God Converted him he did not leave him to the resistencies of his heart And how would that child had he wit thank his Father for tying him hand and foot that he should not struggle and otherwise he could not do while he was cutting for the stone for the strugling might have prevented the cure When God comes to work upon the heart and man cannot but strive and resist and rebell against grace that God should take away at that time this resistance and bind a man hand and foot and so to overcome him with grace that he cannot resist it Oh the admirable wonderful mercy whereby the Lord makes a difference between his elect and others whom he leaves with the bridle on their necks to run away whether they will for it must be put among Gods promises and mercies when though with some sharpness he hinders us of the use of our liberty in hindring us from finding contentment in our walking contrary to our departure from him as you observe Hos 2. 6. I will hedge up thy way with thorns that thou shalt not find or enjoy thy paths this hedge of thorns is an admirable mercy for which the people of God have cause to bless God all their dayes that keeps them from finding that content in the way of their sins which otherwise they would have done this Converting grace doth so put forth it self in the act of Conversion of every sinner I know not your experiences of it that it subdues the actual resistance of mans heart at that time as the effect of it cannot be frustrated or defeated which teaches us with importunity of Prayer to beg this grace which comes with so much strength as that it bears down the wickedness of our hearts and irresistibly works a saving work Turn thou me and I shall be turned Jer. 31. 18. and draw me and we will run after thee Cant. 1. 3. And that you that have received such grace may magnifie the goodness and power of God towards you in that dispensations The Reasons why Converting Grace doth take away and overcome the resistance of mans heart at the act of Conversion which with great content and profit to the Reader may be given of the point are four Reas 1 First The Grace of Conversion doth not only move the heart to believe but it makes it to believe I speak of the act of Conversion it doth not only suadere but persuadere I cannot distinguish these words in English or this it doth not only stand at the door and knock and call as you would do to awaken them that are asleep within Rev. 3. 20. as exciting grace doth which is indeed a great favour which is resisted by man for to this Grace that knocks and is only pulsant calling and awakening the heart of man we may Ponere obicem put a bar bar the
door the faster as against a thief and invader that would come in by force but the Grace of Conversion opens the door and if there be no body within but those that bar the door it comes with such power as opens the door the heart and comes in and takes possession for of the two though corruption be strong yet grace especially when it comes in strength is the stronger Our Saviour in Luke 11. 21. tells us while the strong man possesses his goods all is well but when a stronger then he and that is the divine hand of God comes to take possession he binds the strong man what that binds up the resistance of the heart that when God comes to cut him of this stone and he would struggle and could not do otherwise Grace overcomes it finds a man in unbelief and doth not only command him to believe but gives faith therefore faith is not only the command but the gift of God it finds a man unwilling but it makes him willing it not only stirs up by way of exciting the will and the deed but it works to will and to do saith the Apostle Phil. 2. 13. how long may one cry and call aloud at a dead mans grave Arise come forth but if with the call there go forth a power as there did when Christ called Lazarus out of the grave then he rises and starts up This Converting grace is called by Divines Creatrix gratia a creating grace we are his workmanship created in Jesus Christ Ephes 2. 10. This raises the dead this gives Spirituale esse a spiritual being unto the soul it puts in a formal principle of eliciting holy acts this puts in new strength and heals the vicious inclinations this grace doth not only call and say Obey my voyce but it puts in the very grace of obedience I will put my law unto the heart and write it in the mind that they shall all know me Heb. 10. 16. this drawing is the teaching of God and Gods teaching is alway followed or accompanyed with success with the work it self viz. mans coming for every man that hath heard and learned thus comes to me every man John 6. 45. and in a word such is the power of this Converting grace that saith the Apostle it is mighty to cast down strong holds reasonings to bring down every high thing that exalts it self and to lead every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ 2 Cor. 10. 4 5. and what 's that but it takes away the actual resistance of the heart at that present time Reas 2 Secondly If this Converting grace should not carry on the work with so efficacious and most sweet a hand as to overcome all our opposition one of these two things would follow First That our Conversion should be defeated and Gods intention towards his Elect should be frustrated for this grace of Conversion comes from the purpose of God which is infallible It is a calling according to his purpose Rom. 8. 29. what purpose why the purpose of his Election which must stand Rom. 9. 11. the purpose of God must stand that is not defeated frustrated and finally opposed for then it stands not And how doth it stand not of works and the compliance of the will of man but of Gods call now shall that grace that comes from a meaning and purpose of God be defeated by mans opposition and resistance no for then that could not be true that he hath mercy on whom he will and whom he will he hardens God would have mercy on such a man but by his opposition made against that work he is defeated which would be a sad assertion Secondly Or else this must follow that the will of man casts the scales of his Conversion and so the chief part belongs to man which is to decide the determine the work for grace doth not then determine the will to a choice but the will determines grace to an effect oâ— event whereby man may stand out and say I made my self to differ from another for another man had as much grace as I but he repulsed and opposed it he shut the door against it but I let it in and therefore the act of difference between my self and other men is my own act the act of my own will but this I should by no means admit of for to me it seems incredible that God that made my will and gave it that liberty that it hath should not if he will so work on it or in it as he will to his own glory without any detriment to the nature or liberty of it having a most omnipotent power to incline the heart of man like a river of water whether he will De ipsis hominum volunt atibus facit quod vult God doth with the very will of man what he will as if he that makes a lock and knows all the springs of it should not be able to make a key to it without breaking it all to pieces and it is also a thing incredible to me that God that hath determined of some persons to grace and glory let me suppose that for I think it must be supposed should leave it to the will of man that knows not the purpose of God to him either to determine himself to grace or to defeat it at his pleasure this makes very ill musick in an humble and rational ear that God that determines a man to salvation should leave it to the pleasure of blind will to defeat the purpose of his grace for if he should stumble as I may say on the resistance of it he himself is gone for ever which leaves not unto God so much above the Publican or they that are past over as the Pharisee his God I thank thee Reas 3 Thirdly There is a good rule to be observed laid down by our Divines viz. To put difference between some principal acts of grace without which the salvation of Gods Elect consists not and those subsequent and following acts of grace or the motions thereof in the regenerate which though they were very good and godly acts yet a believer may be saved without them And upon the first sort viz. to believe in Christ to Convert to God to be made new creatures to persevere unto the end for the performance of these God in his time gives to his people such a grace as shall not be frustrate or defeated they shall be performed in thee But for other acts that God calls for of thee as to omit such a â—in or to do such and such a duty which being considered single and particular thou mayst be saved without in these he gives thee his Spirit whose conduct is to be followed but as experience shews the Elect and regenerate may deessegratiae may be wanting to this grace and repulse the motions and as it s said grieve the Spirit Ephes 4. 30. if in one sort of acts he should resist he is lost and therefore
God puts in a mighty hand and an absolute will I will put my Law c. in the other he guides by his Spirit and a grace is given not so infallibly to bring the effect which is good not simply necessary to salvation because if you sin by not doing your duty yet your estate is not in danger and here let me suggest a meditation or two to such as are fit to make use of them First Let the regenerate consider that whereas they have resisted grace and the motions of it a thousand tmes and since their Conversion have grieved the Spirit by indulgence of their lusts against the motions of the Spirit and the dictates of their own consciences if God had permitted them unto themselves and let them have done so in the act of Conversion they had for ever perisht and their resistance at other times shews they might or would have done so then if God that may let his child slip and take a knock did not yet keep a hand upon them that they fall not into the fire Secondly Let them learn to understand God a right and to take comfort that though in other acts he please to suffer them often and very grievously to fall shewing thereby the perverseness of their spirits yet remaining so as that they may fear they may lose all and fall so as never to arise more yet be comforted that in such things as salvation lyes in he will be sure and an infallible God to his Elect to support and raise them up again and let them also remember that God so makes good the condition of his Covenant in things essential unto salvation to work them infallibly I will put my fear into their hearts that they shall not depart from me Jer. 32. 40. or as it is said Psal 37. 23 24. The Lord or dereth a good mans steps and he delighteth in his way though he fall he shall not be utterly cast down for the Lord upholdeth him with his hand though he fall in the Covenant he shall not fall from it Reas 4 Fourthly and lastly Converting grace in the act of it cannot be resisted and defeated because it is given to that end to subdue and overcome the resistance of flesh and blood now that which is given to take away resistance no resistance can stand against it therefore in the work of Conversion it will leave in the heart no actual rebellion that shall perk up to defeat the work A nullo duro corde râ—spuitur it is not resisted by the heart that 's hard because it takes away the hardness and gives a heart of flesh Ezek. 36. 27. I will take away the heart of stone and give a heart of flesh take away the heart untractable and give a heart that 's tractable I will take away the heart that 's hard as stone to resist and give them a tender heart to feel their own misery I may give it by this comparison In a room if the windows be not shut the darkness cannot resist the light because it s given to that purpose to expell the darkness And when God gives any thing to take away an opposition that opposite cannot stand in its place so this Divine grace is refused by no hard heart of man when it comes with the meaning and purpose of God to carry it on because then it comes with commission and authority to remove obstacles and pull away bars that it may overcome And this much be spoken of Conversion as it denotes the act of God drawing or Converting and the deportment of mans heart under it The second consideration is as Conversion denotes the action of man Converting to God upon and by vertue of this drawing of God And what is the deportment of the heart when it is toucht by this loadstone and drawn by this grace freedome say I and willingness there follows thereupon a coming nay a running after God in Cant. 1. 4. For the power of God and willingness of man do consist together thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power Psal 110. 3. Now therefore I will say that man cannot be supposed in this act of Conversion as it is his to resist or be unwilling because he is made willing and the resistance for this act is overcome and subdued And therefore it is said as God draws so man comes and his coming is an act not of force but of freedom being both powerfully and sweetly drawn by the cords of man by the bonds of love Hos 11. 3. And therefore as mans resistance of Gods work and his free coming in to God cannot stand together in the same act there is reason in nature for that a man may as well move East and West at the same time as resist and be willing to come all at one time for there is a contradiction in the terms to say though a man doth believe yet he will not believe for man will not resist being made willing to comply with God and this is the miracle of Gods power and grace in mans Conversion that the heart so prone and apt to run into sin so headlong and uncontrouled should upon the touch of this loadstone of grace be made so free and delightful to come to God and by this marriage consent to joyn hands with God loathing in comparison of God the thoughts of those lusts and pleasures which he so doated on in the dayes of his captivity to sin and saying as they said to their Idols Fie upon you get you hence and therefore there can be no resistance remaining in this coming so that its clear that neither in the act of Gods drawing or in mans act of turning will there be found a victorious resistance an habitual corruption there will remain but that it is bridled at any time let it magnifie for ever Gods mercy and grace we can do nothing against the truth but for the truth saith the Apostle But though this may well be spoken to magnifie the grace of Conversion to set you to pray for it and to teach that God is able to carry man out of himself in despight of his teeth as I may say as Iron toucht with the loadftone cannot but move to the North yet withall to let you see to humble you the abomination that is in your hearts what enemies you are to Conversion and faith in Christ and consequently to your own salvation Serm. 11 NOw having said this concerning the grace put forth and exercised in the act of Conversion and shewn thaâ— Converting grace flowing from the purpose of God is in the act of Conversion victorious over the resistance of the corrupt heart and though it do not suddenly extirpate all the degrees of habitual perverseness and rebellion yet it binds up the actual resistance at that time as that it is imprevalent to divert the work of so powerful grace I come to the point wherein the resistance offered to the grace of God doth lie and
grace published in the Word and left to the management of man convictively shews what even his Elect are that without his powerful hand to strike the stroke the work will not be done for the Elect of God as well as others being only morally moved and perswaded to Conversion do use the same shifts and Tergiversations make as much resistance and shew the same unwillingness as other men do and therefore take this for a rule and find it in your selves that God commonly convinces a man before he converts convinces man of his own impotency and opposition before he put forth his own arm and therefore leaves him to his own recusancy and resistance to â—ry his own strength and a long time lets him alone to his own purposes which will savour of pride enough untill God shew him the difference between the report of the word and the arm of the Lord revealed for although the word of God the Gospel that we preach unto you is the fittest means in the world of an external instrument to convert the heart of man and is furnisht with all requisites to work on the heart yet it s but like a key very suitable to the springs of a lock and put into it that will not shut the bolt and open the door without a hand to turn the key as well as put it in so if the Word preacht be never so fit to meet with the springs in mans heart yet if there be not a strong hand to turn the key the heart will not be opened so that when God convinces by the offer of grace and leaves you to your own acceptance little good will be done without the putting forth of his own arm to the work Secondly With these offers made in the Word God in Conversion goes out with his arm and so Conversion is wrought in those he purposes to call by the instrument morally by perswasion by Gods hand supernaturally so with the word that faith Lazarus come forth there goes a work of power to effect it this power goes forth with the Word as the hand with the ax with the instrument with the key for the honour of the ordinance And therefore it s told you while Peter spoke Acts 10. 44. the Holy Ghost fell upon the hearers meaning that there went out with the Word the power of the Holy Ghost to convert them that God calls according to his purpose he takes hold of their hearts with his powerful arm and brings them in yet not without means as if they were converted by Enthusiasms but in an ordinary way as I may clear it by a comparison frictions rubbings used sometimes to a people in a swound are very profitable to recall life where there was life before but if used to a dead carkass out of which life is gone doth nothing to beget or recall life so are the tenders of grace offered with exhortations and counsels motions and knocking 's if there be life of grace in the heart they are profitable to revive to call in to refresh grace but if used to a natural man to a man dead in sins of themselves they work nothing they leave him as dead as they found him untill there be a new life of grace put into him which is the work that I contend for to be of God Thirdly By these offers of grace and exhortations God takes from man all excuse all the light that God gives to man doth tend to render man unexcusable though it be but natural light for so far as it directs Rom. 1. 20. that they might be without excuse for what for not believing in Christ no that light went not so far no light leaves a man without excuse farther then it goes Gospel-light goes farther then natural light and convinces in a farther degree and proportion as the light is greater and as far as it convinces so far it will leave without excuse and therefore there is no man that hath Christ offered that is enlightned convinc't hath tenders made unto him but is left without excuse and though men in wantonness of disputes may weave a web of excuses and muster them up against God yet no man in agony of conscience upon his death-bed or at Gods Tribunal shall- be able to make any excuse for the neglect and resistance of the grace of God but shall be like him in Mat. 22. speechless he might have said somewhat for himself as to them that called him to the feast but there was no excuse to be made to the King There are two cases wherein all excuses are taken from man First In case of voluntary impotency by a mans own default as if he imbezel the stock committed to his hand and would make an excuse for non-payment of a debt though he may say he have it not that serves not his turn for you had it and the stock by you is imbezelled Or secondly if he be opposite and resist as if a man that will not or cannot see because he shuts the window and will not let the light in it s no excuse for him to say I do not see because its a voluntary act of his own to shut out the light in both cases he is without excuse But especially I lay weight on the latter the resistance of man and his opposition for there is no man living that rests in a simple impotency but resists and shuts his eyes and makes opposition to the grace of God tendred to him light is come into the world and men love darkness rather then light this is the condemnation Fourthly God in the Gospel seldom or never offers grace to a man but he affords and furnishes him with some degree of light and power to do more then he doth to go farther then he doth for in Rom. 1. 17. the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against those that hold the truth of God in unrighteousness that is for not living up to their light nor doing so much as they may or can no man in the world untill God work upon his heart savingly liveâ— up to his own rule neither doth facere quod in se est do so much as he might and hath power to do and therefore God is no way bound to give converting grace if a man will not imploy one talent so far as he may go with one what reason hath God to give that man five or ten talents None at all when the power and grace of God given is resisted and opposed and neglected What reason is there that men should cavil against the Lord and say I had not so many talents whereas he did not use the one he had no man is without a talent every man hath somewhat whereby he may trade for God and because he doth not do it certainly the Lord is free and clear if he do not give him more if he do not give him converting grace God will I say be clear when he is quarrelled at by man Answ 2.
Secondly Converting grace is Gods own not dispensed to any in a way of Justice but as a giâ—t of Gods meer will and pleasure and who shall call any maâ— to account for the gifts he gives if it were in justice there a man might demand account in Mat. 20. 15. is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own grace is Gods own and therefore is not tyed to accounts so it s argued Job 33. 15. why dost thou strive against the Lord he giveth no account of any of his matters and in respect of this soveraignty of God he hath no other rule to guide his gift of grace but his own will for he hath mercy on whom he will for who hath enjoyned him his way or who can say thou hast wrought iniquity Job 26. 23. therefore let those that from Converting grace do but seek an argument of excusing themselves and disputing with God in silence first ask themselves that question in Rom. 11. 35. who hath given to him first and it shall be given or rendred to him again first let him stand out and say this I have done for God and have given to him and therefore let him be just to render to me again or cease to quarrel Answ 3. Thirdly God doth not give Converting grace to all that have the offer to the end that he may make his grace the more glorious and admirable and his Elect the more thankful and obliged who when they see what the Lord hath done what scandal as it were he hath run himself into in the eyes of the world to greaten his mercy in their eyes how this is denyed to many better then themselves may stand admiring at that whereof no reason out of God and the cabinet of his will can be given If this grace which God hath given and will give to his Elect had been universal I do think I may very well say it must needs have fallen in price because reason teaches us that full markets make cheap commodities and therefore the wrath of God on vessels of wrath doth serve to shew forth his mercy on vessels of mercy Rom. 9. 22. to whom it appears to be riches of glory even by the consideration of Gods wrath upon others let Gods people look themselves in this glass and let them know that grace hath more glory by the property of discriminancy then it could have by universality for if diamonds were as common as Flints and Pebles I think people would not so much wear them on their fingers and so much of the first Premise I come to the second which is what entertainment the offers of grace do find with a natural man and that is opposition and resistance that look as the hard wall reverberates and beats back the ball that 's thrown against it and the harder you throw it the farther it recoils upon you so the hard heart of man by its renitency reacts and repulses the tenders of grace and because this is a point that no man will easily believe that he is a resister of grace therefore I mean to handle it only by opening some placâ—s of Scripture wherein you shall see that God charges this on you and then I shall sum them up into a total First there are two denominations of men that are said to hate the light and to hate Christ John 3. 20. every one that doth evil hates the light and John 15. 18. the world hates me the highest degree of malignity is exprest by hate the two highest and most pretious things Christ and light are hated by men that love their lust by the world that is in the dialect of Christ the not called the unregenerate which shews us the general state of men that are not brought into Christ they hate the light and they hate Christ but yet men will not own it they think not so so Hazael when he was accused by the Prophet that he should rip up women with child and other villanies when he came to be King What saith he am I a dog to do such great wickedness no more do men think this of themselves that they hate Christ or the light It s true the general and toothless light the shining and glistering light of speculation is pleasant that 's not the light which is hated but as the light that comes on sore eyes and causes them to smart is tedious so that light that discovers and convinces of sin and misery by reason thereof and threatens vengance from God for it that you cannot abide for mark the Word they hate the light lest their deeds should be reproved the reproving light is taken very ill they cannot bear that Secondly Those that are in impenitency drunk and asleep in the devils snare do oppose themselves or as the Word signifies are contrarily disposed and affected 2 Tim. 2. 25. Let the Minister instruct in meekness them that oppose themselves And who are these the secure wretched man who being drunk is fallen asleep in the snare of the devil for it is that he may awaken out of drunken sleep unto a sober mind those that lie cross in the way if God peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledgement of the truth which they disown and disavow and this is their resistance Thirdly The Gospel invitations are slighted by men of worldly spirits and employments whose very callings do call them from the Gospel feast Mat. 22. 1. For till a man be brought to God his imployment his lawful calling in the world makes him to slight the grace of God they were called to the Supper and the farm the oxen the merchandise and the marryed wife hinders their coming this and that other vanity are preferred for though heaven be never so great a thing as indeed it is yet to a man that hath a closer though a petty thing in his heart that hinders his choise of heaven as though the firmament be a great thing yet let a man put a six pence or three pence on his eye and it hinders his sight of heaven because a closer thing lies on his eye so when this world and the things thereof lie close to the heart though petty and mean they bring a contempt and slighting of this converting grace offered in the Word of the Gospel and therefore ver 5. they made light of it and ver 3. they would not come and this is their resistance Fourthly The patient expectation and loving call of God is gain said even by Israel that had the Ordinances of God what good did they they were resisted how is that proved in Rom. 9. ult all the day long the day of that Nation while it was a Nation till it grew night with them have I stretched out my hands to a gainsaying and contradicting people that believe not all day long there is patience have I stretched out my hands a Metaphor taken from a Mother calling her child there is a shew of calling with
affection and yet the proud and self-righteous people were gainsaying and contradicting thi◠was their resistance as long as Gods patience and do not you find this in your own hearts how often have you gainsaid and contradicted the God of heaven Fifthly The counsels invitations and reproofs of Wisdom i.e. of Christ are not regarded in Prov. 1. 24. a terrible place I have called and ye refused stretched out my hands and no man regarded ye have despised all my counsel and set at nought all my reproof or hated my reproof and the◠he proceeds to tell them how bitterly he will go out against them here is calling stretching out of hands counsel reproof and they all refused not regarded despised hated I think this amounts to the point of resistance Sixthly The Holy Ghost is resisted in Acts 7. 51. ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised ye do alwayes resist the Holy Ghost but how doth this stand with the former point that the Spirit of God in the point of Conversion cannot be resisted I answer The clear meaning of this phrase is the Holy Ghost speaking in the Prophets you have resisted the Holy Ghost speaking and testifying to you in the Prophets as if he had said the Holy Ghost speaking in the ministry and calling by the Word of the Gospel that 's it you have resisted for it s not meant of the renewing Spirit in the heart but of the Spirit testifying in the Prophets ye uncircumcised and stiff-necked like a Bullock of a hard neck that will take no yoke and uncircumcised that is hard and obstinate against God you do alway resist the Holy Ghost this was their resistance from whence you learn that there is a natural hardness of heart an obstinate neck that is the cause of mans resistance of the Holy Ghost both speaking in the Word and knocking at the door and exciting with motions the heart to believe all is in vain for it is but as knocking at a dead mans door or at a guilty persons door that will put more bars when one knocks so when God knocks and layes siege to mans heart there is made the greater opposition Seventhly Men that refuse to submit to the way of Salvation by God appointed are said to reject the counsel of God against themselves 〈◊〉 7. 30. speaking of some that came not in to the Baptism of John some read it Towards themselves the counsel of God towards them for their good or the counsel of God against themselves that is to their own hurt and prejudice in that they would not be baptized by Johns Ministry to the profession of the Lord Jesus people that will not come in to the Ordinances of God they reject the counsel of God against themselves to their own hurt this is through resistance Lastly Take a full measure of the height or this opposition there can be no higher expressions then those in Heb. 10. 29. to tread under foot the Son of God to account the blood of the Covenant an unholy or common thing and do despight to the Spirit of grace but who doth this are there such monsters in the world such miscreants as do this yes saith he that there is and who are they such as have been sanctified that is called into Christianity that 's the plain meaning and the word in the text reaches no farther separate from heathenish Idolatry and pollution to come to and profess the name of Christ and so have been sanctified and I take those in Heb. 6. 4. 5. to be the same men with these there it s said they were enlightned and tasted they were made partakers of the Holy Ghost and yet they fell here you find men sanctified to tread under foot the Son of God there is a double apostacy a simple apostacy called a stealing or a shrinking away from the profession of Religion And 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a venome apostacy falling away with despight against Religion or Christ that in Heb. 6. speaks of the former this in Heb. 10. of the latter and what doth God construe their action to be a treading of the Son of God under foot and offering despight to the Spirit In all these particulars I have held my self to the New Testament and the words of Christ in it and now as I said that we have particularly pondred the words of Scripture in this point let us sum them up together here is hating opposing ones self slighting refusing resisting the holy Spirit rejecting the counsel of God and treding under foot the Son of God which fully amount to a resistance of the offers of grace Serm. 13 I Know it is a hard thing to convince any man of this therefore I have used Scripture words Gods language that we may not flatter our selves and that men may see there is more poyson in their hearts then they are aware of or will own I know what it is that usually blinds men that they will not own these expressions of Scripture to belong to them for who will call himself an opposer of grace offered a resister of the Holy Ghost and that is because you confess your selves to be glad of the tydings of the Gospel of remission of sin and deliverance from hell and you delight to hear of Salvation as it is generally conceived to be a state of happiness not as it is a state of holiness and communion with God and in any extremity agony and death into which you fall you pretend to have some desires of grace as a bridge unto Salvation or at least seem to magnifie it much in words these things seem to be an argument to you that you are not resisters and neglecters of this saving grace but you may well remember that the foolish Virgins knocked at the door and cryed Lord Lord open unto us and the stony ground heard and believed the Word of the Gospel with a kind of joy And there is not the veryest coward in the world but will take hold of a swords point to save his life and to pluck him out of the water the Gospel as it is interpreted and looked upon by the eye of self-love seems very attractive of the desire of man towards it so long as he may serve himself and his own advantage upon it namely to live in sin and to his sin and yet be saved at last when he can sin no more so long there is no carnal heart will resist and make opposition but all this may stand with hate of Christ and Grace for till a mans heart be thus moulded and tempered by God as to affect Grace for reconciliation and for conversion that so you may be Gods as well as have him yours so as to live to him as well as have Christ dye for you till then there is little but fallacy and falshood in you the man that thrust in at the marriage feast who came to fill his belly with good chear not for the honour of the bridegroom was cast out speechless
man that hath life and sense in him should tremble Heb. 3. 11. So I sware in my wrath that they should not enter into my rest that as there is an oath of God made to the heirs of promise to shew the immutability of his counsel Heb. 6. 17. marke it so this Oath is made a Barr against the Salvation of the resisters of his Grace as it is applyed and doth also signifie the immutability of his wrath that its like the law of the Medes and Persians that alters not and therefore fear to outstand the day of grace For be you assured that as sun-set to one may be and is sun-rise to another so the day of grace may arise to another and yet set to thee Oh that you would know and tremble at it fearing lest you should be at or past the sun-set of this day of grace and so I have finisht the three premises First That God offers Gospel Grace to men seriously and in good earnest Secondly It is natural to corrupt man to entertain this Grace offered with neglect and resistance Thirdly That therefore he is plunged into a sad and miserable Condition The second of which that its natural to man to entertain this grace offered with resistance is that which I am to shew the reason of The First and the Third that God offers that Grace which being resisted plunges men into worse condition then ever affords matter of use to us But for the reasons of this resistance though all reason is for mans acceptance thereof yet such is the frame of the heart that it opposeth it self against it and therefore cannot come to Jesus Christ the Reasons though they are manifold I need not long insist of having said so much on the point already I shall therefore only name a sixfold reason Reas 1 First from the natural temper of the heart of every man which is hard and impenitent and therefore called a heart that cannot Repent Rom. 2. 7. a heart of stone Ezekiel 36. 27. that is untractable to God and resisting as an adamant that resists and dulls the tool that should cut it the very sun that softens wax hardens clay the means of Grace harden therefore pray Oh Lord take away this heart of stone according to thy Covenant for a Broken and a tender heart is the Gift of God Reas 2 Secondly The contrariety of the disposition and inclination of the heart of man to Grace shews it for Grace offered and the heart to which its offered are as Contrary as light and darkness flesh and spirit and we know in nature that contraries cannot be reconciled overcome they they may be and many times one is by the victorious opposite fire may be extinguished by water but to make fire and water agree cannot be so may Grace overcome But the filth of the heart is unreconcileable having a contrary center to move unto and rest in Reas 3 Thirdly Grace disturbs the peace of a Corrupt heart and therefore is resisted It takes away the contentment which it finds in lusts and fins as the stronger man coming in Breaks the peace of the strong man armed and spoils his goods Matth. 12. 29. when the strong man the Devil keeps the house lust is in peace But when Christ comes he disturbs the peace and spoils the goods and that must needs cause dislike in the heart of man For men would not be awakened and disturbed Let me alone let me enjoy my peace you shall seldom see any conversion wrought without a great breach of peace when a mans peace is broken in which he slept upon the Cushion of the devil all his days it s a great sign that there is power of grace gone forth to make offers to convince and bring that sinner in this is the cause that in defence of its own peace the heart makes such resistance A Reas 4 Fourth cause of this resistance is the servitude of the will in Bondage unto sin which is not like other Bondages A Bondman is not content in his condition he would quit himself if he could and would be glad to hear news of his redemption But this is a voluntary Bondage and pleases better then a gracious freedom it s the bondage of the will and nothing can be more free and willing then that Titus 3. 3. serving divers lusts and pleasures is the character that the Apostles gives of a natural state the man is in bondage under servitude to lusts and pleasures and though a bondman usually desires freedom yet this bondage hath no such desires because it is not a painful irksome bondage It s like that of a fish that struggles against being pulled out of the water because it is his Element A bondage whereby the will of man whatever the School-men say is like a Roman Prisoner tied by both arms to two of his fellow prisoners so is the will bound by a corrupt Understanding on one hand and corrupt affections on the other so that alas how should this man willingly come to Christ no more then a prisoner in bondage can possibly break from his keepers and come to you Reas 5 Fifthly The heart is filled with Ignorant prejudices against Religion and Grace which it looks upon as an enemy that comes to strip it of all contentment and to bring it into captivity he thinks of Religion and all the pâ—rts of it otherwise then indeed it is that it is a morose way and will take away his delight or one thing or other he casts in his mind through the foulness of his fancy all the imaginations of the heart being evil only evil and that continually Gen. 6. 5. Reas 6 Lastly A prepossession or a further possession For corruption is the first inhabitant Every mans head is first taken up with ignorance and hate of God and as the first man that is possessour of a Castle will keep it against every Invader so man being first engaged in a party by the king of this world and put into the command of the Castle of his heart when Grace comes and in the name of God demands a surrendry into the right owners hands it s lookt upon as an invader And therefore he sets himself to keep it out because he will hold to his party so that grace cannot get admittance till it bring an ejectionem firmam to throw out the enemy in possession For these and such like Reasons man strives with God and by the withdrawment of grace God seems to be out-striven with by man Oh Jerusalem wilt thou not be made clean when will it once be Jer. 13. ult A phrase of speech that testifies there is a long patience in it The uses of the serious offers of Grace and the misery of those that resist those offers are these two Use 1 First in General England London thou hast had a long day of Grace where the Lord hath visited thee by tendring the things that belong unto thy peace Christ Jesus to be
always as the day of your lives Understand me right It may be but is not necessarily so Its true he that is joyned to the living of him there is hope we that know not Gods dispensations may hope the Best and its probable that where God continues his Gospel there is something yet to do there all are not come in while he sends his servant to Bid his guests yet your hearts may be hardened through unbelief and thy eyes may be sealed And though men may hope till the eleventh hour yet thou maist be under the irreversible oath of God and though he may send his servants to invite others yet those that were invited and did not come he will invite them no more Matth. 22. this many times comes to pass To make a general rule is hard and I will not venture on that but this I say it may be sun-rise with others when sun-set with thee and therefore I pray embrace the day of your visitation least it prove not so long as you expect Mot. 2 Secondly When thou wouldest after this day of grace is past thou shalt not God will laugh at your calamity they shall cry and I will not hear them Prov. 1. 26. when Esau would have inherited the Blessing he did it not Heb. 12. when the master hath shut the door if thou knock it is in vain No man can come to me except drawn what do you think these things to be only skar-crows they will be found one day to have some meaning in them therefore take the wind while it blows say Lord I bless thee yet I feel sense and have thirst hear thee knock yet I have taste and appetite Oh let not these sparks die in me let me take thy offer before thou past in thy hand and hold it out no more It s true while there remains these knocking 's God is not gone from the door But alas it s a very sad thing to think that men should conceive they have power to come and take the offer when they please Why may some say Object Will not God be found always when man seeks Answ Yes verily for so Hezekiah speaking to as lost a people as could be 2 Chron. 30. 9. God is gracieus and â—â—rciful and will not turn his face from you if you return to him But qui dat poenitenti veniam non dat peccanti poenitentiam he that gives pardon to the penitent when he doth repent he doth not always give repentance to the sinner And there if you well observe it lies the knot Heb. 6. 4. It s impossible saith he to renew such a man again by repentance he speaks nothings of pardon that will follow but speaks to the grace of repentance and have you power in your own hands It s impossible to renew them again such men may knock at the door may seek the Blessing may cry in calamity for every man may desire to be out of hell and to be happy when alas he hath not so much grace as sincâ—â—ly to desire Grace But then may some say to me Object Help us to some means to retrive the day of grace I have lost it I have outstood my time the day of grace is shut against me Answ There are means for a man that hath some spiritual life in him that is fallen into desertion to recal the spirit and blow up the motions to recover him as it were out of a swound to life again for rubbing of a man that hath life in him wil recall life to the outward parts But if you rub a dead man all day long you find no life a poor dejected soul that hath some sparks of grace in him may have life blown out of the embers but if it be dead at heart quite gone and extinct that 's another case If a man have through the natural resistency of his heart stood against Grace forty years together for they have grieved me saith God Forty years yet notwithstanding there may be possibility of the conversion and life of this man else Gods Elect should not be saved who frequently resist which is but a resistance natural that 's made by the obdurate hardness of their own hearts and they are not under the seal of the Irreversible oath of God But after that the oath of God is gone out against a man and the deadly seal is stamped on a soul that hath so often and so long and with such provocations resisted the arm the woâ—k and offer of grace to prescribe means to help up such a man again is to presâ—â—be Physick for a dead man or to call back the day after sun-set wihch I cannot do and they say how properly they speak I will not inquire that Christ himself did not die for the sin of final Impenitency for that sounds like a contradiction And therefore Beloved in the Lord carry but this from this sermon a preventive fear and trembling thats a preservative from the danger from which there appears to me no restorative If you look for restoratives after God hath sealed up the eyes for grieving of his patience it is in vain But if you will have a preventive or preservative from the danger why then to day while it is called to day come in lest you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin and so I have handled the three things Premised Serm. 15 BEing desirous to raise the thoughts of man concerning Gods free grace as high as may be and to lay his thoughts concerning himself as low I will therefore proceed one step further upon these words No man can And that shall be for the inquiry Whether the Elect of God whom he hath appointed and purposed to bring to Salvation be naturally of the same disposition and have in them the same spirit of opposition to grace offered as others have In handling of which I shall briefly lay down five Propositions as that which shall make an end of this point Prop. 1 First The motions incitements the knocking 's at the door afforded by God in the ministry of the word are neglected and resisted for the present by the elect of God as well as others I mean the elect in their present natural estate for their hearts are as hard and stony even digd out of the same quarry as any others And God we know doth not chuse any because they were but that they might or should be holy In Ephes 1. 4. which shews that holiness is not the cause but the fruit of Gods election Neither doth the purpose of God though it be for everlasting salvation while it is in his own breast make any change in the Elect as saith the rule of School Praedestinatio nihil ponit in Praedestinato Gods ordaining for life makes no alteration for present in those that are ordained until it come to calling according to purpose as notwithstanding our Saviours purpose to raise Lazarus unto life yet Lazarus for the present lay as dead as other
men not raised untill the time and that power that quickned him was put forth Israel in Aegypt was never more free notwithstanding Gods purpose of an afterwards deliverance which he did intend unto them till Moses the deliverer came Paul while he was an elect vessel not called was never the more holy for that untill the time of his conversion came For Election is unto the means as well as to the end which it could not be if holiness should precede For though there be a holiness before the End in regard of execution you have your fruit unto holiness and the end Eternal life Rom. 6. 22. yet there is no such thing before purpose and decree Elect through the sanctification of the spirit unto obedience 1 Pet. 1. 2. And therefore the Scripture constantly gives the natural character of the Elect of God the same as non-elect there is a double Character given of them a personal and a natural the personal Character is many times worse then that of others they confess that I was a Persecutor a Blaspheamer chief of sinners 1 Tim. 1 13 14. In their natural character they are described as of the same temper lump and mould with other men Among whom we also had our conversation in times past and were by nature Children of wrath as well as others Ephes 2. 3. And we our selves were also sometimes foolish disobedient serving divers lusts and pleasures Tit. 3. 3. For otherwise these three things would follow thereupon First The mystery of comparative Election why Jacob and not Esau would cease for the reason being open and known voideth the mysterie Secondly The distinction and difference of one man from another would be of man himself Thirdly The production of Grace would not be de novo by Creation You are his workmanship Created in Christ Jesus but would rather be as the Bellows that begers fire where there were sparks before then the putting in new sire where there was none before Prop. 2 Secondly The deserters of grace by them received and the resisters of Grace by God offered are Justly deserted by God and the offers in time taken from them The deserters of Grace received I mean that which they call common grace are such as either do put out the sparks or let them dye and go out Such as the Foolish Virgins whose lamps went out or as the two Grounds the stony and thornie whose green blade was blasted or choaked And such we have many amongst us that for a time and season do put forth blossoms they have Enlightnings Convictions and do pretend great affections some sence of sin at some time especially some desires of Deliverance and are like flowers in a waterpot that will keep fresh and maintain a greeness for a time but as the Scripture saith they have no root and so they wither and are extinguished Object But you will ask me What order or tendency have these workings unto regeneration Answ These are common to the Elect and non-Elect and they are Precedaneous and Previous works of grace towards regeneration being initial things that by the management of God do come to some effect in Gods elect but yet in themselves are such as may be suffocated and choaked for God doth not usually convert any of his people by way of sudden Ethusiasms as if one should think of life put into a stone or stock as if in an instant a stone should change into a man a heart of stone immediately change to a heart of flesh But God moulds prepares the heart by the ministry of the word and excitations of the spirit as it is said of Peters hearers in Acts 2. 37. they were pricked in their hearts and made to enquire what they should do to be saved For as it is in natural Generation there are many previous dispositions that go before the induction of the forme which gives it the specifical Being so are men brought to a spiritual nativity unto regeneration not by a sudden strait God doth work by these previous workings and in the way of his administrations he doth impart certain Initials or beginings of grace unto men Object 2. If this be that the men in whom these are wrought may desert extinguish and fall off why then will some say is this so culpable a thing to quench these that have no regenerating life in them Answ These are they against which the Scripture pours out so much wrath and declares so great danger in this case to such as shall desert forsake or extinguish these workings of initial beginnings as in that phrase Heb. 10. ult my soul shall have no pleasure in them that withdraw to perdition not because these have any root at the present for so our Saviour describes them in Matth. 13. 21. but because the things in themselves have a tendency to further ripening and perfection as the egg to the Chicken the Bud to the fruit and the embryo to the Child not yet actually perfect Gal 4. 19. I travel in pain till Christ be formed in you In which respect they are said to know the way of Righteousness 2 Pet 2. 20 21. And for this reason it is so culpable because they do destroy the fruit in the bud But then may some say Object 3. This renewing and converting grace comes immediately from God and doth not require any previous or precedaneous workings Answ The comparison of natural generation will give some light what to say of this for suppose the rational soul be infused not meerly traduced poured in from heaven by the hand of God yet notwithstanding there is use of marriage and many preparatory dispositions are required tending to the generation of a man so that you may rightly conceive here if grace be which yet I dispute not the begetting of a man to God there may notwithstanding be required many previous dispositions tending thereunto which that it is so may be evident to you by the means and instruments that God uses in Conversion the instruments are men the means are the ministry of the word I have begotten you by the Gospel saith the Apostle in 1 Cor. 4. 15. And if God was pleased immediately which I know not that any of you Expect and should be sorry you should be deluded so I say immediately to convert and suddenly to snatch a man out of his unregeneracy without conviction foregoing without knowledge and sorrow for sin desire of pardon and deliverance then neither would there be need of the ministry of men nor word preached neither need the Minister rightly divide the word as the Apostles phrase is that is plowing down the ridges of the law or laying up the furrows by the Gospel preaching this grace therefore is that which may be deserted and these offers of grace are many a time resisted and are by many finally resisted to the great danger of their souls and the loss of them And therefore it is just with God to desert these and
I Confess Justification is like quitting of a Prisoner at the Goal delivery the sentence quits him in an instant and frees him But sanctification is like the healing of a wound by a Surgeon which is a progressive work a work of time the power of man is nothing in the one as well as the other without me you can do nothing both are from Christ that comes by water and blood 1 Joh. 5. 6. for the remission of sin and also for cleansing purging and purifying of the heart who is made both righteousness and sanctification to us 1 Cor. 1. 30. for else a man may be reformed by vertue not sanctified which is by grace or faith Thirdly That which though it denyes not grace to be of God no Pelagian would ever do that yet affirms the use of grace to be of man it is in man to receive it or not receive it to believe by it or no that is that God may give the power but not the act God gives the power whereby I may believe in Christ if I will But he gives not the act of believing And this is the great question which methinks is thus determined in the Scripture God saith the Apostle works both to will and to do and every man that hath learned of the Father comes to me Joh. 6. 45. for though your reason tells you that in many cases a man hath power to do that he doth not as to see when he shuts his eyes you must make a difference for when God works faith he frames the heart to use his grace and to believe as when the hand doth turn the wheel the wheel always tnrns for if it did not turn it takes away the subject of the question when there is a power put forth from God to work upon my heart to lead me to Christ he doth not therein only give a power that I shall use it as I list that 's clean contrary for if he turn me I am turned and if I am not turned he doth not turn me Fourthly that which teaches That Good works acceptable to God may be performed without a new nature and by this point I thrust every man to seek a new nature and a new being and not only to do good works for that contradicts the point of our Saviour Make the tree good and his fruit good There must first be Regeneration Renovation in the spirit of man whereby he must be implanted into Christ Jesus or there will never grow good fruit thereon Lastly that it is true God sends Christ as the text saith But there are so many attractives in him to draw a sinner that there needs no drawing of God there needs no drawing of a lost man to a Saviour no more then a poor man is drawn to a loaf of bread But sinners lost and undone stand in need of drawing And therefore I shall shew that as God gives Christ so he must give faith in Christ or I cannot be saved As God gives Christ and sends him to me so he must draw me and bring me to Christ or else no saving effect will follow And that shall be the second Use or Inference Serm. 18 Use 2 THat as God sends Christ to us so he must draw us also to him or else there can be no salvation and this may be thus proved Those that come not to Christ cannot be saved by him those of the world that are not drawn by this drawing of the Father do not come to Christ therefore they are not saved The service that this Inference doth is this will beat down the thoughts of many thousands that rest in this empty plea God hath sent Christ to die and to redeem mankind it is well and the plea is good for encouragement to believe but if this be all the consolation if this be all you rest upon Gods acts in sending Christ you are much mistaken for the great question is Hath God drawn thee to Christ Thou pleadest Christs mission but Canst thou make Gods traction of thee to appear This is the great point that this doctrine preaches as if Christ should say It is true My Father hath sent me and I am come to you by his appointment to shed my blood for you but you must come to me if you will have life and come to me you cannot except you be drawn by the power of him that sent me for no man can come to me except the Father draw him Whether of the two be most necessary to salvation Gods mission of Christ or Gods traction of man to Christ is as I conceive a trivial question hardly coming into the Schools which will tye a knot in any rush for they are both equally necessary as the Serpent on the pole in view to be lookt upon and the eye to see it were both necessary for the recovery of them that were bitten by fiery Serpents except God send Christ there is no object of Faith except God draw you to Christ there is no act of Faith And the necessity of the object and of the act cannot without fondness be compared together for both are in their kind necessary in the highest degree the mercy and the grace of God are eminent in both the Father his sending Christ and the Fathers drawing of sinners unto Christ they are both necessary But yet this sending and this drawing are of distinct consideration in divers respects First Gods sending Christ sets up to sinful man the object of his faith For though all the Scripture be the object of that they call the Catholick faith yet peculiarly Christ in the Scripture is the kernel and marrow of all the types in the Old Testament Christ is the object of Faith whereby it justifies For though the eye that lookt to the brazen Serpent could see many things besides yet they could have no cure by the sight of any thing but that this sets up to man the object of his Faith Gods drawing works in man the act of Faith If Christ had not been sent there had been no object to be believed on If God should not draw sinners to him there would be no faith to believe by So that it would be as with Israel if there were either no Serpent on the pole to be lookt unto or no eye to look up to it the recovery of those bitten with the fiery Serpents would fail Secondly Gods sending of Christ was in pursuance of his Covenant made with our Mediaeter Gods drawing unto Christ is in pursuance of his Covenant made with sinners in the Mediator That there is a Covenant of God the Father with Christ Jesus seems very probable because there was a Covenant made with the first Adam therefore also with the second And this is intimated by Christ himself in these words John 17. 4. I have finished the work that thou gavest me to do And in those Heb. 10. 9. Lo I come to do thy will O God For there is that we call the
that 's put forth in thy heart to draw and bring thee to Christ Jesus by faith and the reason of this thankfulness is three-fold Reas 1 First Faith is a discriminating grace it makes a difference between man and man to you it is given to them it is not given And if the Philosopher thought himself bound to be thankful to his gods for that he was a Grecian an Athenian a Philosopher this is worth all the bundle of such differences between man and man that God hath drawn thee to Christ savingly to take hold of him by Faith Reas 2 Secondly This Grace of faith is the main condition of the Covenant of life that whereas no man is saved but by being in the Covenant the condition is performed by God as well as the benefit promised faith is the very hinge on which the promise of Salvation turns the center on which it rests Rom. 10. 9. if thou confess with thy mouth and believe with thy heart thou shalt be saved where the Apostle brings in one in perplexity Who shall ascend up to heaven or go down to the deep who shall bring Christ to me why saith he the word is nigh if thou confess c. God might have given thee some other gift and made thee to excel and differ from another 1 Cor. 4. 7. but this makes heaven sure he hath given thee to Christ and Christ to thee Both of these are the gift of God and worthy to be praised Reas 3 Thirdly This faith is a mark and evidence that thou art one chosen of God and ordained to eternal life if there be any this must be chief so that from his faith whereby he is drawn to Christ he may draw an argument of life eternal As many as were ordained to life eternal did believe if from our love to God it may appear that we are called according to purpose Rom. 8. 29. then also from our faith For all that thou hast given to me shall come unto me saith our Saviour Use 3 Thirdly Then let an unbeliever pray for faith But to what purpose may some say let a believer pray in faith let an unbeliever pray for faith I dare not deterr an unregenerate man from the use of prayer happily no promise is made to such prayer nor no acceptance of the prayer as a savoury meat to God our Father but let not foolish disputers dispute you out of prayer for it is a worship of God and we are bound to worship him God calls upon us to make us a new heart that we may call upon him to do it for us the poor infirm and diseased cryed unto Christ for healing in the Gospel and when they came to him certainly they were not all believers and Simon Magus was sent to pray by Peter for forgiveness Acts 8. when you come to hear it is for faith and you then pâ—ay for the work of faith by the word you shew that you are convinc't of sin and that you do acknowledge God to be the Creator of faith And wicked men have greater mercies from God if not by way of Covenant and Promise yet in the way of free bounty and beneficence and therefore let them wait on him that hears the cry of young ravens Bow your knees pour out your prayers that you may come to Christ that he would not leave you to your selves your own emnity and opposition Use 4 Fourthly There appears by comparing things together that there is some admirable secret in this work of believing in and coming to Christ for if you observe there is all the reason in the world why a man should believe there being all arguments and motives of faith in Christ himself there are all manner of invitements and provocations in the word of God and there being some that do believe by such a faith as is under the rate of saving faith what may be the reason that our Saviour yet saith No man can come to me without a divine traction if I should handle these largely perhaps I should not be impertinent but I will be brief First there is all reason that man should come in to Christ Jesus for unless he do so and that sincerely the wrath of God abides on him It comes upon us for any sin but abides upon us for unbelief not that unbelief is the only sin that damns as some do teach in these days If a man be indicted of Felony and found guilty he is condemned for that but the reason why he is sent to execution is because that having the Book he cannot read so is unbelief the great Reason that all other sins are bound upon your backs none of them are pardoned Even as a woman in debt assoon as she takes a husband is no longer to be accounted in debt because all her debts involve him to whom she hath given her self So that very hour assoon as ever you believe you have your sins pardoned as the Israelite stung with a fiery Serpent assoon as ever he lookt up to the Serpent on the pole he recovered or as the Text saith he lived so he that believes is healed of all diseases restored into a state of favour made a Son and Heir of God for present title and all his mortal sins become venial yea not pardonable but pardoned Therefore there is all reason for it Secondly there are all Motives and Arguments for faith in Christ himself There is many a man would be glad of the benefits of Christ that doth not receive Union with Christ himself but marriage you know is not between a man and the dowry but between person and person Men obstruct their own Faith by looking to take rise for it in themselves but there is all in Christ he is the sinners Saviour not sinful Angels but sinful mans therefore no argument lies in sin to discourage thee because thy sin makes thee a due object as the biting of the fiery Serpent made a fit Patient for the Serpent on the Pole and as he is the sinners Saviour so he is the sent and sealed of God commissioned and authorized by him unto this saving work so that God cannot retract his act the promise of salvation to any that believes in him as he is the sent of God we need not doubt him whose anger it was that terrified us so he is freely offered and given to the sinner as a plaister wide enough for every sore being able to save to the uttermost all that come to God by him Therefore all Motives are in him Thirdly God invites us by all manner of invitations and provocations to receive Christ And I have shewed and proved to you that he doth call you seriously and not tantalize us with the promise of faith for then he could not say How often would I but you would not The Call whereby God invites men to faith and repentance is serious Fourthly there are many that do believe and that with joy by a faith that is
channel It was the saying of Austin long agoe De ipsis hominum voluntatibus facit quod vult God works upon the will of man what he will doth not the Workman that makes the watch know all the springs and can set the watch going and doth not God that made the heart know how to move and determine it to himself did not God make the day without the Sun at first and cannot he move nature by his omnipotency without ordinary course It s true I know men acute men of the Schools do hold it hard if not impossible to reconcile Gods working with mans freedome and think it not feasible but rather that the one crosses and thwarts the other but I say there is a harmony and sweet agreement between Gods drawing and mans coming when he will convert and bring in the Soul to close with Jesus Christ as there is between a weight or plummet of a Clock that accelerates the motion and a natural propension towards the Center which both joyâ— and interâ—â—â—r noâ— so t is here the will of man moves freely and God by his drawing doth give to it a greater weight that accelerates the motion of the will and by how much the more the Lord drawes by so much the freer is the will made Oh! that men would consider this and if they do not understand this let them believe that God doth the I pray what may be the meaning of that place Phil. 2. 12. Work out your Salvation here is mans working for Gods works in you to Will and to Do a Text that plainly shewes that the work of God and the work of man may very well stand together and the truth is there are four things that I think according to the principles of learning of Scripture I am sure that may make Gods drawing man to Christ and mans free coming very reconcilable so as the more man is drawn the freer he shall be he shall come as the Text Nay he shall runne Cant. 1. 4. as the more weight the freelier moves the plummet downwards First I hold it to be a great truth that was espied by learned Naturalists Philosophers that that which is a mans chief good and so apprehended to be is pursued with infinite desire and the will is necessarily carried towards it there is no shiness no indifferency of a man to this for Appetit us summi boni 〈…〉 the desire of my Chief good is an infinite desire Why because the highest good must needs have the highest appetite there being nothing that may put measure or limitation to that desire and therefore in the desire thereof the heart is necessarily carried and not indifferently contingently remisly Secondly The chiefest good of man consists in this the having and enjoying of God foâ— this is the highest and most satisfactory good that fills the appetite whereby the heart of man can be taken up and that fully and there is but one medium to the attainment of this chiefest good there is but one line leads unto it and being so the chief good and the line are equally desired the meanes is knowing of Christ coming unto or coming in by Christ so that when the chief good is but one and the meanes but one to it there can be no dissent of mans heart to either of these when they are known and apprehended and that this is the chief good and the onely meanes to it you are taught in one text of Scripture as I conceive John 17. 3. This is life eternal that they know thee and him whom thou hast sent Jesuâ— Christ if the knowing of God life eternal be the 〈◊〉 bonum and knowing Christ the only means that leads to that end then without all question the will of man once apprehending this to be so is carried without indifferency necessarily in the pursuit of both Thirdly Now when enlightens convinces and convictively teaches the mind to know and see this chiefest good this God and to know the only mean to this happinesse the having of Christ Jesus then is the heart forcibly and freely drawn and cannot be other it cannot but pursue and follow after for the light of Gods teaching carries it and the bias of the will naturally followes the dictate of that light of God and so you have both in one Gods drawing and mans coming and the greater the drawing is the more light the mind hath the freer is the coming with greater propension and it is this teaching of God by which our Saviour explaines this word drawing in the next verse 45. It s written in the Prophets they shall be all taught of God every man that hath heard and learned of the Father comes to me So that hence I prove that the will naturally followes this voice of God and if this be Gods drawing Gods teaching what contradiction can there be between these two Gods drawing and Mans coming every one that is thus taught is a Comer a Believer in and a Closer with the Lord Jesus and doth as freely come as a man in the dark doth follow a Lanthorn or light set up Fourthly The great satisfaction which the heart of man finds in Christ Jesus thus taught and revealed to it in the light of the Spirit doth fully bind up and suspend the resistance or actual opposition of the heart at that time I confesse while corruption is in the heart of man there will be potentially some backwardness sluggishnesse and indisposition to walk with God as alwaies in the bottom of a vessel there will some dreggs remain but this the heart puts not out at the time of this satisfaction felt though at other times and in other matters it may like a bitter root vent out some gall that remaines yet when the Lord is working thus warmly and convictively upon the heart to turne it at that time this resistance is bound up and lies close and doth not break out but lies as if the hands were tied the resistance tamed and the opposition taken off as the exhalations drawn up by heavenly bodies do during the influence mount upwards on high and yet there is a power in the matter at some other time to move downwards again but that power is suspended for that time or as the fresh water-stream will runne amain being carried back with the tide And yet when 't is going back there is a propensness in it to run down the stream which to me seems lively to set out this point to you while the heart of man that is rebellious and reluctant hath this conviction on it and is taught to know God himself to be the chief good and Christ the only means leading thereunto For this time this resistance is bound up and opposition is not made though there be a power of resisting remaining that will sometimes put out it self though not now That 's the third Observation Observ 4 The fourth Observation is from these words Except my Father that hath sent me draw him
from Christ for there nothing could be done nor could conversion be wrought at all If the stream be equal with the Tide then it would be standing water the tide could not run up nor the stream run down so if these two the things that draw me to and that withdraw me from the Lord Jesus were of equal power it would be standing water there could be no conversion but now the work is wrought because the strength is too hard for the opposite withdrawment You have overcome them little children 1 Joh. 4. 3 4. because greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world For reason teaches that the greater power is the overcoming power God doth otherwise move the heart of man to believe in Christ than these withdâ—awers can remove for the devil or world can but move by suitable objects that are suitable to present temper and therefore they move by forreign motives for you must needs confess I think that the devil frights or draws men by objects that is all he can do but how doth God move he moves by principle there 's the clear difference putting another principle into the heart of man which shall wholly attend desire and thirst after the gaining of the Lord Jesus you may see the difference in this instance if you throw a stone upwards it 's moved by a forreign motive a strength without it but see what becomes of it see how the Principle within overcomes the forreign power for it abates by degrees till it comes to turn and down it comes again without throwing by virtue of the principle whereby it is moved to its own center So it shall be and is when God plants a principle in his people that shall propend to Christ as the chief good these forreign motives though they may prevail to make agitation and shake the man yet it overcomes and God by giving a new heart and bidding the soul with power to come to Christ it shall come and overcome all objective suggestions otherwise I say again the power of God in the conversion of a sinner would be less than the concurrent power that withdraws and there could be nothing wrought but now there is somewhat wrought and therefore the power of God is greater This victorious drawing of God is seen in two things First in overcoming that which doth resist and would hinder Secondly Inclining or enabling the heart to chuse or close with Christ to whom God would have it come Both these are in one Text I will take away the heart of stone Ezek. 36. 26. there is the overcoming of that which lies in the way resisting And I will give a heart of flesh that is I will turn the heart into a temper contrary to what it was that it shall rellish what it distasted and love what it hated because there is a new appetite and inclination moving the other way that he can with as much ease and propension move and come to Christ Jesus the Lord as before he did from him For whether God come in with greater strength as the tide into a River or also that the principle within be changed as the bias on the other side the Bowl the heart will â—un contrary to what it did before The power of God in the conversion of a sinner must be victorious over all contrary power Thus I have shewn that 't is a victorious drawing Serm. 29 2. The second property of this drawing of God is that it makes the heart-more willing for the drawing All that ever come to Christ they come as Voluntiers they come willingly they do not come as forcibly constrained for constraint is for slaves Lactantius hath a saying and 't is true If Religion be constrained jam nulla est then it is none Religion cannot be compelled there is nothing more voluntary than that which we call Religion So I say of the heart of man in this point that a forced will if any such could be is rather noluntas a nilling than voluntas a willing And therefore though man at first motion when God by his Grace revealed doth come to make seizure and take hold of mans heart do resist and say as he in Mat. 21. 29. I will not Yet afterwards faith the Text he repented and went So when this drawing comes then the heart of nilling is made willing The Scripture compounds in one mans will and Gods power Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power Psal 110. 3. The exerting of Gods power makes a people Voluntiers And therefore though at first Israel be unwilling to be delivered when Moses first delivered his Commission to them they did not relish the motion they found fault Exod. 5. 21. Thou hast made our favour to stink before Pharaoh we shall be the worse for thee And Exod. 6. 9. They hearkened not unto Moses voice because of their affliction and cruel bondage Yet this Israel after they had seen the hand of God with Moses and the miracles that he wrought and those impediments were confuted they were willing to go out in post haste they went out in the night and there was not a dog that barked or moved his tongue to give interruption to their clear passage Exod. 11. 7. So I may allude in this point very properly man filled with prejudice and enmity at first when the Lord begins to call dislikes the motion fights all he can to maintain self but then the Lord repeats his drawings and his knocking 's over and over again till his arm becomes victorious in mans conversion and then being made willing and tasting a sweetness in God and the motion made he is drawn and comes he is drawn and runs The reason of this second point is because there is loving kindness in Gods drawing he constrains by love Hos 11 4. I will draw them with the cords of a man with loving kindness will I draw them this latter is an exegesâ—â— of the former what is meant by that phrase the cords of a man 't is a metaphor or figurative speech borrowed as learned men say from a man that brings a sturdy or untamed bullock to the yoak with stroaking and gentle usage I will bring them saith the Lord so as they shall be willing so that I will make them delight in my yoak God knows all manner of ways saith one whereby the heart of man can be wrought upon and must he not needs know As a workman that knows all the springs of a Watch or Lock that he hath made knows every way to open it can make a key to hit every ward which when he hath fitted to all the springs doth easily open it without breaking it open by meer strength Such is the merciful way of God in conversion sometimes he breaks hard knots indeed with hard wedges he brings in stomackful sinners with hard usage but many times sweetly and strangely now there are two things that go to the making of
the heart of man a voluntier or the will of man is freed by these two acts of God First he takes off and cuts in pieces the fetters of bondage wherein it s bound under sin concluded and shut up under sin and in captivity thereunto dead and bound too so man is said to be in bondage because until he be freed and plucked from his predominant pleasing lusts which are the strongest fetters of all he cannot stir a foot or move a step toward God till these fetters be taken off every natural man is under a necessity of sinning joyned with freedom of sinning he acts freely but yet necessarily sins against God as a bondman freely doth service to his Master but yet necessarily man is free to that particular whatever it be but yet he is necessarily under sin if he go even to perform holy duties he is under sin in regard of the manner of the performance of them or to give you a more lively comparison the fish is free to swim on this or that side of the prison in the Pond but yet cannot get out of the Pond so is man free enough to evil yet necessary is his bondage to it that he cannot stir he can do nothing but sin against God a miserable bondage and necessity of sinning Joh. 8. 34 36. He that committeth sin is the servant of sin But if the Son make you free ye shall be free indeed where you are taught this lesson they that live in sin are in bondage to it that this freedom from sin is the work of Christ Jesus and therefore till these fetters this bondage be taken off from the will of man man is necessarily under the power of it and cannot come to Christ But you may say The taking off the fetters from a dead man makes him no more free than before for still he is dead and stirs not I grant that and therefore Secondly God takes away the innate antipathy of the will and heart to God the enmity that you will not be perswaded is in you and creates a sympathy in the heart to cleave and come to Christ and this is by planting of another principle than was in it before And this shews this drawing of God to be of God when it is so powerful as it takes off those bitter strong resistances that are in the heart of man as it shewed the fire that Elias called for to come from God in that it swallowed up and lickt up the water So when the power of God thus drawing shall so overmaster the rebellion and opposition on the will of man which it makes and whereby it made head against God before this shews that it is the power of God But he sides there is also a sympathy put into the heart inclining it as iron toucht with the Load-stone hath a property of moving and sticking to the Load-stone These are natural comparisons If you see such thingsin nature will you not believe as Christ saith when they teach you heavenly things Will you not believe that God is able by this sympathy in the will to make the heart by power willing to come to Christ Jesus by virtue of which if the option was given to man what would he chuse what Lord would he serve what of all things in the world would he pitch his choyce upon if he might have it for wishing Why nothing but Christ saith the heart But what say you to victory over enemies to worldly greatness pleasures prosits of this or that kind No nothing but Christ the heart is toucht with this Load-stone and drawn to it from its proper center and so willing is this man to be drawn that all his prayers as at conversion every heart is prayer-ful and every corner serves for a Chappel wherein to vent his desires to God are for drawing Cant. 1. 4. Draw me and we will run after thee that God would work a further taste and a further inclination in him Therefore I may well say that this drawing and this free coming may well be compounded and stand together And yet man thus drawn as he comes freely so he comes certainly as it 's said Turn me and I shall be turned save me and I shall be saved Jer. 31. 18. speaking of the certainty that follows this power of God in turning or in saving man That is the second property The Third property of this drawing is this That it is a drawing teaching or a teaching drawing such a drawing as is by teaching and this appears if you compare the Text with the verse following where our Saviour produces a proof out of Isa 54. 13. to prove this drawing to him Is it not said in the Prophets All thy children shall be taught of God as all the children of the visible Church are taught by men so all thy children shall be taught of God and he proves they are drawn because they are thus taught For the opening of which point in a word or two You must know that the knowledg of God is put for all religion all acts of grace are denominated by this word knowing God this is the phrase of the Covenant in Jer. 31. 34. they shall all know me And that these are a peculiar and select people that do know him see how it followes in the same place for I will forgive their iniquities and their sins will I remember no more There is none to whom this knowledg is given but those whose sins are also pardoned who are taken into favour they that are thus forgiven do all know God for that which you call superficial knowledg I speak not of that now This knowing refers to teaching and learning not unto mans teaching but to Gods of whom this covenant people do learn and are taught and therefore instead of what is said John 6. 45. Every one that hath learned of the father It is said Hebr 8. 10. they shall all know me little and great one and other that have learned that is that have been taught And we are said in Eph. 4. 1â— to learn Christ and God is said as the Geneva Translation renders it Gen. 9. 27. to perswade Japhet into the Tents of Sem and all this I say about Gods teaching mans learning God's perswading and mans knowing of God to signifie that this work of God upon the mind of man enlightning and convincing it doth express this drawing of God not but that the will of man in his conversion is moved too for the illumination of the mind and the made motion of the will are two beginnings of Faith in man but if the corrupt will be only excited and awakened and not healed or changed that doth not do the work when the word of God excites and calls upon you if the will be not renewed the work is not done it would be but as the pounding of spice it sweet it will be more sweet if stink it will stink the more the Pestil doth not change the savour of
afforded that they may come but no marks that they shall be drawn Serm. 31 Use 3 Thirdly Consider what may be deduced from this point for the advancement of practical Godliness there is no point more copious in its use for the advancement of free grace then this doctrine of Gods powerful working and drawing men to Christ Jesus First It suggests matter of Humility grace is not loose though it be free there is no glorying at all left to us in the matter of our salvation all boasting is taken away by Gods drawing every point that 's profitable is so so far as it advances practical Religion and much of that consists in an humble frame of spirits for as lower grounds are richer and more fruitful then hill tops that see further but are more barren so a man that hath tasted of the tree of knowledge of good and evil may see further and discern more in matters of notion and speculation but the humble soul that hath seen the hand of God working its works in it is more fertile and fruitful to God Secondly It suggests matter of thankfulness for where humility goes before there thankfulness followes after and according to the proportion of the one is the other in 1 Pet. 2. 9. That you should shew forth the praise of him that hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light who were before no people when we come to consider and have these impressions set on our souls that he calls us out of our darkness for darkness is ours into his marvellous light thankfulness arises from this And as light came out of darkness so God hath shined into our hearts the light of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ Whence came the first light out of darkness where no man could have imagined the light to be so God hath called us out of darkness And Thirdly It calls for fruitfulness in requital of sogreat a grace fruitfulness is as we may say of varnish no colour of it self but sets off and puts a beauty upon other colours Fertillity is the nature of good soyl and men look for fruit from land or tree proportionable to the cost and labour bestowed so doth God expect fruitfulness according to the proportion of his goodness the meditation of this grace quickens the ingenuous heart to obedience when a man hath the sence of his justification that he is reconciled to God by the blood of Christ and that being reconciled we shall be saved by his life as 't is Rom. 5. 9. 10. this puts him on to a high degree of fruitfulness this manures the Tree and therefore in 1 John 4. 19. We love him because he first loved us and 5. chap. 3 vers It 's love that makes the Commandements not grievous Thus you see how it advances practical godliness And as it advances practick godliness so likewise it heightens all the obligations whereby a man can be obliged to God either to be humble thankful or fruitful they are advanced by the sence of the free grace of God Now for the advancement of obligations they are two-fold Such as have strength of Authority in them Or Such as have sweetness and constraint of love in them First obligations of authority are by the law of God For that doth not cease to oblige a believer being a perpetual law that God hath set on man in all states and conditions And then the Free grace of God is an obligation by a constraint of love the love of Christ constrains us in 2 Cor. 5. 14. Because we thus judg or have this sence that if one died for all then all are dead so that the obligation it puts upon you is of love and service above other men God may well expect some singular thing of you as namely first Because he hath drawn thee not others yea haply hath left many for one taken thou art one taken drawn out of the herd marked out for God as I said made to passe under the rod Vobis datum est non illis to you it is given c. not to others Secondly Because he hath drawn us when we withdrew for every man by nature doth withdraw even as a heifer withdrawes and will not be yoked so man withdrawes from the yoak of God from the doctrine from the faith the love and from the acquaintance of Christ Jesus and therefore it s said in Rom. 10. last vers I have stretched out my hands all the day long to a contradicting or withdrawing people Nay he not only draws us out of darkness and nothing but pursues and followes us when we run from him if the Lord should let men alone yea if the elect of God were let alone at first when God begins to draw they would be deserters forsakers and relinquish God you stiff necked people you do alwaies resist the Holy-Ghost but now God still knocks and if man comes not at first God knocks again and this bends mans heart to God that the Lord pursues him with mercy and followes him with loving kindness if God had let him alone he had perish'd but God would not let him have his will to perish Thirdly Because he hath drawn thee no better then others of the same clay saith the text the potter makes the difference not the clay are we better then they the Jew then the Gentile Romans 3. 9. No in no wise and therefore God to shew that there is no difference in man instances in twins that tumbled in a belly Rom. 9 10. Rebecca conceived by one even Isaac c. Nay it may be thou wast one of lower and meaner rank from whom God could not expect so much service so babes have it revealed not the wise Base things of the world are chosen not many noble and great Naaman the Syrian is cleansed and not many lepers in Israel who would think that Rahab the harlot should be named with Abraham in James 2. 25 Fourthly The Lord found thee when thou did'st not seek him he overcame thy opposition and resistance waiting that he might be gracious Isaiah 30. 18. if he had taken thy denyal and let thee alone if he had not overcome the evasions and Tergiversations of thy sturdy spirit by pursuing thee with fresh forces till he had brought every thought within thee into captivity unto the obedience of Christ 2 Cor. 10. 5. had he not stricken thee down as Paul was until he made thee say Lord what wilt thou have me to do what might have become of thee had he not hedged thee in with thorns and laid mustard on the breast to wean thee from thy sweet sins Lastly When God hath taken this course and won over and made the heart willing then a man accompts his own gain his arguments of confidence his own righteousness all dross and dung for the excellent knowledg of Christ Jesus in Phil. 3. 7 8. when the Lord hath given such a tast and sweetness then a man desires
it himself and is pleased with that with which he was displeased before when the heart is thus overcome then it submits he stands faire in his own eyes no more his own face pleases him no longer he rebels no more but submits to the righteousness of God Ro. 10. 3. and so receives Christ as the greatest treasure in the world therefore free grace is a great obligation it binds strongly by the constraint of love Fourthly I close all with a motive to examination whether you be partakers of this drawing now before the Sacrament you are called the Lord invites you to his table he invites his friends his children these he calls by the word every ordinance breathes unto you little else but Christ Jesus for all sanctifying strengthning and corroborating grace from whence come they surely in Hosea 14 8. from me is thy fruit found all your strength arises from the greater and further reception of Christ Jesus therefore examine whether this work of God hath been on you to draw you to Christ Jesus faith is not a vulgar grace it is not an easie thing it comes from divine omnipotency and power as we say of the resurrection whereby a dead man rises from the grave it is a work of the power of God and therefore Christ confuting the Sadduces that denied it said you erre not knowing the Scriptures and the power of God I am saith Christ the resurrection and the life No man is alive till he take hold of and believe in the Lord Jesus now can a dead man be raised from the dead and not be sensible do you think faith is not a sensible work yes as 't is a powerful work so 't is sensible to man yet I confess men may be deceived as women are by false tumors and swellings so there are many delusions whereby a man may take himself to be in a state of grace when he is not because there is a false faith as well as a true it is the point of examination pressed by St Paul in 2 Cor. 13. 5. because of such moment examine your selves whether you be in the faith whether Christ be in you many think of a Christ without them you are all glad to know that Christ gave himself for you that he gave himself to be the blood of atonement but is he yours by the blood of sprinkling the Scripture puts this to the trial by words that intimate Christ within men Galath 4. 19. my little children of whom I travel in pain till Christ be formed in you and Ephes 3. 17. Christ dwels in our hearts by faith Gal. 2. 20 Christ liveth in me these phrases do difference the Jew outwardly from the Jew inwardly and teach in like proportion that he is not a Jew that hath the outward character and not the circumcision of the Spirit Ro 2 28. and let that obligation sit on you in the 2 Tim. 2. 19. Let every one that names the name of Christ depart from iniquity for else it s not the sacraments will serve turne in 1 Cor. 10. 4 5. they eat of the same spiritual meat with us But God was not well pleased with them they were wicked and therefore examine your selves what work of God you have found upon your hearts whether you are renewed by the Holy-Ghost in Tit. 3. 5. God is said to save man by the washing of regeneration v. 6. that being justified by his grace you might be made heirs of eternal life To move you consider Motive 2 First The graces that have connexion with or do accompany salvation are inward things there is an inward seal a white stone with a name in it known to them that have it Sacraments seal the outward part the conditional compact that whosoever believes shall not perish but it is the Spirit that witnesses to ours that we are sons of God Motive 2 Secondly That unto and by those inward graces God drawes his people thus he undertakes to create a new heart to put his law into their mind this is that which is called the teaching of God Gods drawing so that its the inward work that gives thee comfort of this business But Object Doth not the manducation of Christs body and blood in the Sacrament tend unto this inward and spiritual inhabitation of Christ in us Answer Yes And so did the outward ordinances of the Jewes they tended to spiritual things there circumcision signified an inward circumcision as our baptisme an inward washing and our eating and drinking sets forth our communion of his body and blood our union and communion which are spiritual are here exhibited unto us as meat and drink of life as John 6. 37. He that eats me shall live by me this in this chapter so much spoken of is not sacramental but it is spiritual eating for it was spoken before the institution of the supper but it speaks of the kernel of it the eating of Christ his body by faith And so much for this text THE DIFFERENCE Between a True Inward Christian And the Outward Formalist DISCOVERED In three Sermons on Rom. 2. 28 29. By M r RICHARD VINES Late Preacher of Gods Word at S t Laurence Jury LONDON LONDON Printed for Abel Roper 1662. THE DIFFERENCE Between a True Inward Christian And the Outward Formalist Rom. 2. 28 29. For he is not a Jew that is one outwardly neither is that Circumcision which is outward in the flesh But he is a Jew that is one inwardly and Circumcision is that of the heart in the Spirit and not in the Letter whose praise is not of men but of God THe Apostle before he makes entrance upon the Doctrine of Justification which is one of the Cardinal Points of the Christian Religion doth convince and conclude that both Jews and Gentiles and so consequently all mankind are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 under sin Rom. 3. 9. draws up the conclusion 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we have shewn cause before or charged all men to be under sin teaching all Masters of conviction the necessity of that method to cut off the branch which is to be ingraffed from the tree where it had its first birth before it can be fit for coalition with a new stock and for participation of the root and fatness of the Olive Tree first make a man a sinner my meaning is make him miserable and when the strugling fish that is stricken with the hook is tired or choaked you may more easily draw him to the shore The great Rule to be observed in the conviction of gainsayers is to disarm them of their Armour those inward reasonings and strong holds wherein they trust then it is an eaâ—ier thing to bring them in when that wherein they trusted is 〈◊〉 down about their ears Think not saith S. John to say within your selves We have Abraham to our Father think it not speaking to the inward reasonings of the Jews at that 〈◊〉 The Apostle imitating this course â—oth as concerning the heathen
Gentile grant in Chap 1. that they did or possibly might know God by the foot-steps that he had left of himself in the Creation and the government of the world but that knowledg amounted to no more than of his Being or Properties not of his Worship especially that which you call positive and so they neither glorified him as God nor shewed that wisedom which as Philosophers they professed for professing themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they became foolish ver 22. As for them that assert the Sun and Moon to be Preachers of Christ the Mediator to the Heathen I think I may joyn them together with that Philosopher who had a conceit that the heavens do make an harmony by their motion which Musick I dare say he never heard As concerning the Jew the Apostle brings him in cap. 2. ver 11. pleading his difference from the Gentile and it is granted cap. 3. ver 1. that much every way is the advantage of the Jew and the profit of Circumcision For Circumcision verily profits if thou keep the Law cap. 2. ver 25. but if as we say of some Planets their great light be joyned with ill Aspects and irregular motion so if you that have a form of knowledge and truth in the Law if thou be a breaker of the Law and live contrary to thy own Principles then thy circumcision is made uncircumcision for an honest heathen that is uncircumcised is better than thou and shall condemn a dishonest though circumcised Jew ver 26 27. and the reason is because God measures not men by their external accomplishments which they have by being Churches and the priviledges of them but by the inward power of godliness accompanying their outward profession For he is not a Jew that is one outwardly c. In which words there is First A distinction Secondly A description or definition Thirdly An estimate or valuation First The distinction is not between divers persons as of a Jew and no Jew Circumcision and no Circumcision for that sounds as a distinction of Christian and Heathen but it is of one that it a Jew and no Jew of Circumcision that is and yet is not Ciâ—cumcision as of Christians that are and yet are not Christians for so it is always when you speak of equivocals So the Pouâ—â—raiâ—re of Caesar pictured in the Table is not Caesar so he is not a Jew that is one outwardly Secondly The description of both is the Jew that is no Jew is one that is so by 〈…〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or visible profession or if you will oâ—tenâ—â—tion oâ— Religion but he is nothing 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in secret or inwardly if he have not that which in our Covenant is exprest in these words the law written in his heart and put into his mind the circumcision that is not circumcision is the visible mark they carry in the flesh but no inward purity of heart and mortification of lust the one of these is in the letter the other in the spirit What is the meaning of this phrase How comes this word not in the letter to signifie outwardness in opposition to Spirit or inward grace so it signifies in the new testament or in Scripture and I think peculiarly 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies a line made by a pencil as well as a letter made by pen and so may signifie a meer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a portraiture or mathematical body that consist of lines of no depth and substance an outward form and nothing else or a writing with Ink as the Epistle 2 Cor. 3. 3. the Epistle of Christ not written with Ink but by or with the Spirit and so the Scripture that knowes another writing viz. by the Spirit in the heart doth fitly oppose thereunto that other manner of delineation which is outward by pen or pencil and so circumcision by a mark in the flesh is said to be in the letter not that the Apostle decries the ordinances of the Jewes or their profession in sensu composite but only in sensu diviso when the form goes without the power for even Christianity which is not so outward in all respects as Judaisme was hath a form of doctrine a form of worship or else no sacraments and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a form of godly conversation so it s called whatsoever they that call themselves Antiformalists but are indeed Formalists do quibble to the contrary Thirdly The valuation that is made of both these the Jew or the circumcision outwardly that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may have the praise of men The Apostle before his knowledg of Christ valued himself at a great rate by those things that were but outwardly as a visible Church-member past all contradiction but the Jew 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the circumcision of the heart the power and purity of Godliness within hath the commendation of and acceptance with God I shall need say no more for the general opening of these words only before you go any further change the scene and lay the measure to your silves he is not a Christian that is one outwardly in form whose baptisme is the sprinkling of his face with water but he that is a Christian indeed reputatively and as to Church-membership thou maist have praise of men for thy profession for man sees 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the outside but God measures the real members of his covenant by their faith for it s his peculiar 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Father that sees in secret Math. 64. The observations to be made upon the words shall be short and plain and the Uses we will take altogether at the close Observ 1 First Here we have an excellent example for preaching of distinguishing doctrine especially to such professors whose pride and outwardness in the true Religion makes them seem to themselves to be some body when they are indeed nothing distinguish a Christian professor from the Heathen a Protestant from a Papist and you shall say too little to them that are Christians inwardly and too much sometimes to feed the pride of them that are so outwardly they that know no more of Christianity but that which is outward will be ready to object when you beâ— them down so flat that which the Apostle inferrs as the Jewes objection against his distinguishing doctrine Rom. 3. 1. what advantage then hath the Jew or what is the profit of circumcision I Answer as the Apostle doth much every way but when I have said all all saving grace is discriminant and differencing and so should all saving doctrine be sharp but wholsome cutting but convincing teaching others what they should be by shewing what manner of men they are that have the praise of God As to a visible station in Church order the Apostle distinguishes 1 Cor. 5. 12. between 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those that are without those that are within that is within the pale of the Church both the
not we lovers of our selves covetous proud boasters c. having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof 2 Tim. 3. 2. c. I might go on and rather make a parallel than a difference between these two and therefore as the Apostle concludes this Jew to be no Jew so we may of this Christian and if those that preach the Gospel will do any good among a formal people they must take their Christianity from them you have a ground for it the Apostle took away Judaism from the Jews you must tell them that 't is not Christianity will profit and bring them to heaven if they be saved they must be convinc'd of this and then that Rule will follow He that thinks himself somewhâ—t when he is nothing deceives himself Gal. 6. 3. and many thousands are so deceived amongst you Use 2 Secondly If this be true Doctrine then rest not till you find in your selves some proof of an inward work some brokenness and softness of heart the heart of stone taken away some newness of spirit something of Christ Jesus Had the Jew found out the entrails of his Religion he had found Christ there over and over but he dreamed of a National salvation as I may almost say by virtue of a Covenant that had Inwards in it but he saw little Let me say to you You have spiritual Ordinances look for Christ in them he is the kernel of all Ordinances Go to God and pray Lord it is thy Covenant-promise to put thy Law into the Inwards of thy people Jer. 31. 33. and that there called Inwards the Apostle calls the writing of the Law in the heart and mind Heb. 8. 10. There are some that are otherways great men that when they come to die whither do they fly Bear me witness I die in the Protestant Faith I die in the Faith and Confession of the Church of England which I have pitied them in for that shews the rightness of the Faith which they profess but not the savingness of their Faith and profession as to them except they look as the Jews did for a National salvation because they are all of the true profession Others there are that when they have incorporated themselves into such a Body whereof the Characteristical mark is a separate opinion from other men then they think they are come into a state of salvation that they have been in Egypt all this while now they are come to Canaan Alas poor souls you will find something else wanting as the Apostle saith Others there are that depend much upon a holiness of their own making Pharisaically Papistically I never like this frame let the holiness that God hath appointed stand and let us stand to that and when all is said that I can say unto you here must be the great work to find an inward work of holiness in your souls though the Ordinances or form be of God as the Jews were much more when the holiness is of your stamping and therefore look for this inward work that ye be not only the Epistle of Christ written with ink in Letter but in the Spirit of the living God 2 Cor. 3. 2. There are two places that I will give you to set home this Exhortation from the most glorious Church that we read of in all the New Testament of highest elevation for variety of spiritual giâ—ts and abilities and they had greatest blots too which was the Church of Corinth to them the Apostle gives this Item in 1 Cor. 10. 5. Brethren I would not have you ignorant that our Fathers speaking in an Ecclesiastical sence did all eat of the same spiritual meat honoured with Sacraments extraordinary the Rock the Manna and both were Christ Yet with many of them God was not wel pleased and he gives the reason of it for they were tempters of Christ they had such sins upon them which you may charge upon your selves mutatis mutandis and yet this Church though they were so high he humbles them with such an exhortation as might shame them that is to a strange thing Examine whether ye be in the Faith and had Christ within them 2 Cor. 13. 5. We are I know not how many forms above that question and yet be sure though profession be never so high that 's the main thing to be inquired for Iâ— Christ in you you can talk of Christ without you but as gallant as you are you must prove your selves if Christ be in you and know that he is in you except you be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Reprobates you are saved by a Christ in you The third Use of this Point is for reproof and I will willingly though I do it sorrowfully put my self into the number of the reproved Let every man therefore reprove himself for the exceeding great outwardness in Religion that abounds amongst us there is fire wanting in us time was and it was indeed the worst of times when Christians the professors of Christian Religion in England were practical and exceedingly addicted to practical holiness keeping a sweet inward communion with God and among themselves their conferences were savoury and their inward experiences communicated were excellent edifying and building up and Christ was 〈◊〉 set out to sale in all markets he was the penniworth held out in all Christian meetings but in these daies I may not wish for persecution I may say that the stomach they say makes better digestion in cold than in hot weather so when times are troublesome and unsafe the heat goes inward to make good digestion now there is necessity to call men to inwardness this and that opinion this and that conceit such a controversie blowing of a feather up and down between man and man matters of no concernment as he said and he was a very observing man do so take us up that the tree of knowledg is in greater request then the tree of life exceptis paucissimis omnis câ—tus Christianorum sentina vitiorum We may see our outwardness easilie and for it tax our selves our sabbath discourses what are they but tales or news We preachers preach our parts and you pray your gifts Nay St James saith sometimes you pray your lusts we studie our religion that we may conform to rising times parties customes we set our dials by the countenances of mortal men and which way that looks we set our profession our worship is but a carcass because we are but carkasses in it not answerable to that God who is a spirit whom we should serve in spirit and truth we conferre our notions or some lighter ware when we meet together we are seldome or rare in the duties of self-examination run over the daily circuit of our devotion that we have chosen to perform in our families as a post-horse runs his stage our fastings are but disguised self-seeking and our Religion it self a kind of Policie What need I go on to instance in those things that you take to