Servants as Superiors in Gifts or Places or Inferiors or equals as Neighbors and companions In our Teaching and learning ruling and obeying buying and selling Be conscionable in all these which are your own Relations if you will live as Christians and be acceptable unto God An ungodly or oppressing Magistrate a murmuring rebellious Subject an ungodly negligent or factious Pastor an unteachable refractory ungodly Flock a Husband Parent or Master without Religion Love or Justice a Wife or Child or Servant without Love and dutiful obedience and faithful diligence a proud contemptuous Superior a malicious censorious inferiour an unjust uncharitable Neighbor a deceitful buyer or seller borrower or lender and a self-seeking friend and seducing unprofitable companion are all as far from pleasing God by the rest of their works or profession of Religion as they are from being obedient to his will They provoke him to abhor their Prayers and Profession and to tell them that he will rather have Obedience than Sacrifice If you are false to men you are not true to God It is he that feareth God and worketh Righteousness that is accepted of him and the unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of God DIRECT XVI Live as those that have all their powers receivings and opportunities to do Good with in the World and must be answerable how they have improved all And as those that believe that the more Good they do the more they do receive and the greater is the honour the profit and the pleasure of their lives TO do no harm is an honour which is common to a stone or a clod of Clay with the most innocent man If this were all the excellency that you aim at it were better that you had never been born for then you would certainly have done no harm Remember that to do good is the highest imitation of God supposing that it proceed from Holy Love and be done to the Pleasing and Glorifying of God that the Principle and the End be sutable to the work Remember who hath told you that it is more blessed to give than to receive Acts 20.35 And hath promised that He that receiveth a Prophet in the name of a Prophet shall receive a Prophets reward and he that receiveth a Righteous man in the name of a Righteous man shall receive a Righteous mans reward and whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a Cap of cold water only in the name of a Disciple verily I say unto you he shall in no wise lose his reward supposing that he have no better to give Matth. 10.41 42. Give to every man that asketh of thee according to thy ability Give and it shall be given to you Luke 6.30 38. and 12.33 Take that day or hour as lost in which you do no good directly or preparatorily And take that part of your estate as lost with which directly or remotely you do no good Remember how the Judgment must pass on you at last according to the improvement of your several Talents Matth. 25. When your time is past and your estates are gone or your understandings or your strength decayed and your power and greatness is levelled with the poorest it will be an unspeakable comfort to you if you are able to say We laid them out sincerely to our Masters use and an unspeakable terror to you to say They were lost and cast away on the service of the Flesh. If therefore you are Rulers and are entrusted with Power study how to do all the good with your Power that possibly you can If you are Ministers of Christ lay out your time and strength and parts in doing good to the Souls of all about you study how you may be most serviceable to the Church and Cause of Christ. If you are rich men study how to do all the good with your Riches that possibly you can do not violating the order appointed you by God In your Neighbourhoods and in all your Families and Relations study to do the greatest good you can Take it thankfully as a great mercy to your selves when opportunity to do good is offered you And content not your selves to do a little while you are able to do more Gal. 6.7 8 9 10. Be not deceived God is not mocked for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap For he that soweth to his Flesh shall of the Flesh reap corruption but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap everlasting Life And let us not be weary in well-doing for in due season we shall reap if we faint not As we have therefore opportunity let us do good to all men especially unto them who are of the houshold of Faith 2 Cor. 9.6 He which soweth sparingly shall reap sparingly and he which soweth bountifully shall reap bountifully Every man according as he purposeth in his heart so let him give not grudgingly or of necessity for God loveth a chearful giver Heb. 13.16 To do good and to communicate forget not for with such Sacrifices God is well pleased Ephes. 3.10 For we are his Workmanship created in Christ Jesus to good works which God hath ordained that we should walk in them Let doing good be the business and imployment of your lives Preferring still the publick good before the private good of any and the good of mens Souls before that of the body But yet neglecting none but doing the lesser in order to the greater Object But I am a poor obscure person that have neither abilities of mind or body or estate and what good can I do Answ. There is no rational person that is not entrusted with One Talent at the least Matth. 25. and that is not in a capacity of doing good in the World if they have but hearts and be but willing If you had neither money to give nor tongues to speak for God and to provoke others to do good yet a Holy humble heavenly patient blameless life is a powerful means of doing good by shewing the excellency of Grace and convincing the Ungodly and stopping the mouths of the enemies of Piety and honouring the waies of God in the World Such a holy harmless exemplary life is a continual and a powerful Sermon And for giving if there be first a willing mind it is accepted according to that a man hath and not according to that he hath not 2 Cor. 8.12 If you are unseignedly willing to give if you had it God taketh it as done What you would have given is set down on your account as given indeed The Widdows two mites were praised by Christ as a bountiful gift and a Cup of cold water is not unrewarded to the willing Soul No one therefore is excusable that liveth unprofitably in the World But yet men of Power and Parts and Wealth have the greatest reckoning to make Their ten Talents must have a proportionable improvement It is a great deal of good that they must do For to whomsoever much is given
Physical passive Reception as Wood receiveth the Fire and as our Souls receive the Graces of the Spirit but it is a Moral Reception or Reputative which is Active and Metaphorical This will be better understood when the object is considered which is Christ Jesus the Lord To receive Christ as Christ or the Anointed Messias and as the Saviour and our Lord is to believe that he is such and to consent that he be such to us and to trust in him and resign our selves to him as such The Relation we do indeed Receive by a proper passive Reception I mean our Relation of being the Redeemed Members Subjects Disciples of this Christ. But the person of Christ we only Receive by such an active moral reputative Reception as a Servant by consent Receives a Master a Patient by Consent receives a Physitian a Wife by consent receives a Husband and a Schollar or Pupil by Consent receives a Teacher or Tutor or the Subjects by Consent receive a Sovereign So that it is the same thing that is called Receiving Jesus the Lord and believing in him as it is expounded Joh. 1.12 There are three great observable acts of Faith essential to it the first is Assent to the truth of the Gospel the second is Consent or Acceptance of Christ and Life as the offered good the third is Affiance in Christ for the accomplishing of the ends of his Office Now the word Faith doth most properly express the first act and the last and the word Receiving doth most properly express the middlemost but which ever term is used when it is Justifying Faith that is spoken of all three are intended or included By what hath been said you may discern whether you have Received Christ or not For your Faith may be known by these acts which are its parts 1. If you sincerely believe the Gospel to be true which must be with a belief so strong at least as that you are resolved to venture your happiness upon this belief and let go all for the hope that is set before you 2. If an offered Christ in his Relation as a full and perfect Saviour be heartily welcom to you If you consent to the Gospel offer and are but truly willing to be his and that he be yours in that Relation Faith is not only called a Receiving of Christ but is oft exprest by this term of Willing him And therefore the Promise is to Whosoever will Rev. 22.17 and the wicked are denyed a part in Christ because they will not have him reign over them Luke 19.27 or Will not come to him that they may have life Joh. 6.40 even because they would none of him Psal. 81.11 12. which is because they are not true Believers or Disciples of Christ. 3. If you thus by consent take Christ for your Saviour Teacher and Lord it must needs follow that you fiducially rely upon him or trust him to accomplish the ends of his Relations that you trust to him for deliverance from the guilt and power and punishment of sin and for quickning strengthening and preserving Grace and for everlasting life that you resign your selves up to him as his Disciples to learn of him with a confidence or trust that he will infallibly teach you the way to happiness And that you also give up your selves to him as his Subjects with a Trust that he will govern you in truth and Righteousness in order to your Salvation and will defend you from destroying enemies This much is of the very Being of Faith or the Receiving Christ Jesus the Lord And these parts are inseparable he that hath one in truth hath all Whenever we find in Scripture the Promise of Justification or Salvation made to us if we believe it is this believing and none but this that is intended It is not only believing in Christ as a Sacrifice or Priest that is the Faith which Justifyeth and believing in him as a Teacher or Lord that sanctifyeth the effects are not thus parcelled out to several essential parts of this same Faith but it is this one entire Faith in all these essential parts that is the undivided condition of all these benefits and in that way of a Condition of the free Promise it doth procure them So much for the meaning of the first words Receiving Christ Jesus the Lord I will be briefer about the next The second is walking in him which is no more but the living as Christians when once we are become Christians and using that Christ to the ends which we received him for when once we have received him Two things are necessary to such as we that have lost our way the first is to get into the right way and that is to get into Christ who is the way the other is to travel on when we are in it For it is not enough to bring us to our Journeyes end that we have found out the right way The next word to be explained is rooted Which doth not intimate that any are really planted into Christ without any rooting in him at all but by rooted is meant deeply rooted For the Roots increase under ground as well as the Tree above ground Rooting hath two ends and both are here implyed The first is for the Firmness of the Tree that blustring winds may not overturn it The second is for nutriment that it may receive that nourishment from the earth which may cause its preservation growth and fruitfulness This is the Rootedness of Christians in Christ that they may be confirmed in him against all assaults and may draw from him that nutriment that is necessary to their growth and fruit The next term is built up in him No house consisteth of a bare Foundation Five things are expresly contained in our being built up in him The first is that we are united or conjoyned to him as the building is on the Foundation The second is that we rest wholly on him as our support as the building doth on the Foundation The third is that we are also conjoyned one unto another and are become one spiritual building in the Lord. The fourth is that the Fabrick doth increase in bigness as the house doth by being built up so that it importeth our increase in Grace and the increase of the Church by us The fifth is the fitness of the building to its intended ends and use Till it be built up it is not fit for habitation And till Christians are built up God hath not that use of them to which he doth intend them The next term is stablished or confirmed in the Faith which signifyeth but that strengthening and fixing of us that may prevent our fall or shaking And it compriseth these two things First that we be soundly bottomed on Christ who is our Foundation And secondly that we be cemented and firmly joyned to each other And this comprehendeth their stability in the doctrine of Faith And therefore he addeth as ye have been taught to fortify
way and went far and by going further might have attained to Salvation The heart of many a Minister hath been glad to see their Hearers humbled and bewailing sin and changing their minds and lives and becoming forward Professors of Godliness when a few years time hath turned all this joy into sorrow and one of our hopeful seeming Converts doth grow cold and lose his former forwardness another falls to desperate sensuality and turns Drunkard or Fornicator or Gamester another turns worldling and drowneth all his seeming zeal in the love of Riches and the cares of this life and another if not many to one is deluded by some deceiver and infected with some deadly errors and casts off duty and sets himself like a hired instrument of Hell to divide the Church oppose the Gospel and reproach and slander and rail at the Ministers and Professors of it and to weaken the hands of the Builders and strengthen the ungodly and serve the secret enemies of the truth Those that once comforted our hearts in the hopes of their Conversion do break our hearts by their Apostacy and subversion and become greater hinderances to the work of Christ and greater Plagues to the Church of God that those that never professed to be Religious Those that were wont to joyn with us in holy worship and went up with us to the house of God as our companions do afterwards despise both Worshippers and Worship Whereas if these men had been rooted and confirmed you should never have seen them fall into this misery O how many Prayers and Confessions and Duties do these men lose How many years have some of them seemed to be Religious and after all have proved Apostate miscreants and the World and the Flesh and Pride and Error swallow up all See then what need you have to be rooted confirmed and built up in Christ. 4. Consider also How much of the Work of your Salvation is yet to do when you are Converted You have happily begun but you have not finished You have hit of the right way but you have your Journey yet to go you have chosen the best Commander and fellow Souldiers but you have many a Battle yet to fight If you are Christians indeed you know your selves that you have many a corruption to resist and conquer and many a temptation yet to overcome and many a necessary work to do And there is a necessity of these after-works as well as of the first For these are the use and end of your conversion that you may live soberly righteously and godly in this present World denying ungodliness and wordly lusts Tit. 2.11 12. For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works which God hath ordained that we should walk in them Eph. 2.10 And how can Infants go through all these works Which of you would desire an Infant or Criple to be your servant But though God be in this more merciful than man yet he may well expect that you should not be still Infants What work are you like to make him in this decrepit and weak condition O pittiful blindness that any man that knows that he hath a Soul to save should think an Infant-strength proportionable to those works and difficulties that stand between him and everlasting Life In the matters of this Life you feel the need and worth of strength you will not think an Infant fit to Plow or Sow or Reap or Mow or Travel or play the Souldier and yet will you rest satisfied with an Infant-strength to do those great and matchless works which your Salvation lyeth on 5. Moreover the weak unconfirmed Souls are usually full of trouble and live without that assurance of Gods love and that spiritual peace and comfort which others do possess One would think no other Argument should be necessary to make men weary of their spiritual weaknesses and Diseases than the pain and trouble that alwayes attendeth them It s more pain to a sick man to travel a mile than to a sound man to go ten To the lame or feeble every step hath pain and all that they do is grievous to them when far more would be a recreation to one that is in health O therefore delight not in your own languishings Choose not to live in pain and sorrow But strive after Confirmation and growth in Grace that overgrowing your infirmities you may overcome your sad complaints and groans and may be acquainted with the comfortable life of the Confirmed O how roundly and cheerfully would you go through your work how easy and sweet and profitable would it prove to you if once you were strong confirmed Christians Alas the Souls of those that are not confirmed lye open to every temptation of the malicious enemy of their peace and how small a matter will disquiet and unsettle them every passage in Scripture which they understand not and which seems to make against them will disturb them A Minister cannot Preach so plainly or so cautelously but somewhat which they understand not will be matter of their disquiet Providences will trouble them because they understand them not Afflictions will be bitter to the mind as well as the body and will immoderately perplex them because they understand them not or have not strength to bear them and improve them The sweeter mercies of prosperity will much lose their sweetness for want of holy Wisdom and strength to digest them And what man would choose such a weak and languishing state as this before a confirmed healthful state Will you run up and down for Physick when you are sick and will you no more regard the health and stability and spiritual peace and vigour of your souls 6. Moreover it is the strong confirmed Christian that hath the true use and benefit of all Gods ordinances Meat is digested by the healthful stomack and it s seen upon them and we use to say It is not lost It is sweet to them and doth them good and they are strengthened more by it And so is the confirmed Christian by Gods Ordinances But to the weak unconfirmed Soul how much of the means of Grace is even as lost How little sweetness do they find in means and how little good can they say they get by them I deny not but some good they get and that they must use them still for though the sick have little relish of his meat yet he cannot long live without it and though it breed not strength or health yet it maintaineth that languishing life but this is all or almost all What a sad thing is this to your selves and unto us when Ministers that are as the Nurses of the Church or Stewards of the Houshold to give them all their meat in due season must see that all that ever they can do for you will do no more than keep you alive Yea how often are you quarrelling with your food and you do not like it or you cannot get it down somthing still ails
believe that God the Father is the First in the holy Trinity of persons that the whole Godhead is perfect and infinite in Being and Power and Wisdom and Goodness in which all his Attributes are comprehended but yet a distinct understanding of them all is not of absolute necessity to Salvation That this God is the Creator Preserver and Disposer of all things and the Owner and Ruler of Mankind most just and merciful that as he is the Beginning of all so he is the Ultimate end and the Chief Good of man which before all things else must be loved and sought This is to be believed concerning the Godhead and the Father in person Concerning the Son we must moreover believe that he is the same God with the Father the second person in Trinity in carnate and so become man by a personal union of the Godhead and Manhood That he was without Original or actual sin having a sinless nature and a sinless life that he fulfilled all Righteousness and was put to death as a Sacrifice for our sins and gave himself a Ransome for us and being buried he rose again from the dead and afterward ascended into Heaven where he is Lord of all and intercedeth for Believers that he will come again and raise the dead and judg the World the Righteous to everlasting Life and the Wicked to everlasting punishment that this is the only Redeemer the Way the Truth and the Life neither is their access to the Father but by him nor Salvation in any other Concerning the Holy Ghost we must believe that he is the same One God the third person in Trinity sent by the Father and the Son to inspire the Prophets and Apostles and that the Doctrine inspired and miraculously attested by him is true that he is the sanctifier of those that shall be saved renewing them after the Image of God in Holiness and Righteousness giving them true Repentance Faith Hope Love and sincere Obedience causing them to overcome the Flesh the World and the Devil thus gathering a Holy Church on earth to Christ who have by his Bloud the pardon of all their sins and shall have everlasting blessedness with God This is the Essence of the Christian Faith as to the Matter of it As to the Manner of Receiving it by the understanding 1. It must be received as Certain truth of Gods Revelation upon the credit of his Word by a lively effectual belief pierceing so deep as is necessary for its prevalency with the Will 2. And it must be Entirely received and not only a part of it Though all men have not so exactly formed distinct apprehensions of every member of this belief as some have yet all true Christians have a true apprehension of them We feel by daily experience that with the wisest some matters are truly understood by us which yet are not so distinctly and clearly understood as to be ready for an expression I have oft in matters that I am but studying a light that gives me a general imperfect but true conception which I cannot yet express but when another hath helped me to form my conception I can quickly and truly say that was it that I had an unformed apprehension of before and it that I meant but could not utter not so much for want of words as for want of a full and distinct conception 2. The Matter of our Christianity to be Received by the Will is as followeth As we must consent to all the forementioned truths by the Belief of the understanding so the pure Godhead must be Received as the Fountain and our End the Father as our Owner Ruler and Benefactor on the title of Creation and Redemption and as our everlasting happiness The Son as our only Saviour by Redemption bringing us pardon reconciliation holiness and glory and delivering us from sin and Satan and the wrath and Curse of God and from Hell The Holy Ghost as our Guide and Sanctifier All which containeth our Renouncing the Flesh the World and the Devil and carnal Self that is the point of their Unity and heart of the old Man This is the Good that must be embraced or accepted by the will And secondly as to the Manner of Receiving it it must be done Vnfeignedly Resolvedly unreservedly or absolutely and habitually by an inward Covenanting of the heart as I have formerly explained it And this is the Essence of Christianity This is true Believing in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost This is the Foundation and this is the right laying of it And now the thing that I am perswading you to is to see that this Foundation be surely laid in Head and Heart And 1. That it may be surely laid in the Head you must labour 1. To understand these Articles And 2. to see the Evidence of their verity that you may firmly believe them And 3. To Consider of the worth and necessity of the matter revealed in them that your Judgments may most highly esteem it This is the sure laying the Foundation in the Head To these ends you should first learn some Catechism and be well acquainted with the Principles of Religion and also be much in reading or hearing the holy Scripture and enquiring of your Teachers and others that can help you and see that you take your work before you and step not higher till this be done And then all other following truths and Duties and promised benefits must all be so learnt as to be built upon this foundation and joyned to it as receiving their life and strength from hence and never lookt upon as separated from this nor as more excellent and necessary For want of learning well and believing soundly these Principles Essentials or Fundamentals of Christianity some of our people can go no further but stand all their dayes in their ignorance at a non-plus Some of them go on in a blind Profession deceiving themselves by building upon the Sand and hold true Doctrine by a false unsound belief of it And when the Flouds and storms do beat upon their building it falls and great is the fall thereof With some of them it falls upon the first assault of any Seducer that hath interest in them or advantage on them and abundance swallow up Errors because they never well understood or Firmly believ'd Fundamental Truths With others of them the building falls not until death because they lived not under any shaking temptations But it being but a perseverance in an unfound Profession will nevertheless be ineffectual to their Salvation 2. When you have thus laid the Foundation in your understanding be sure above all that it be firmly laid in your Heart or Will Take heed lest you should prove false and unstedfast in the holy Covenant and lest you should take in the Word but into the furnace of the Soul and not give it depth of earth and rooting and lest you should come to Christ but as a servant upon tryall and make an absolute
to God He hath respect to the humble contrite soul. Isa. 57.15 and 66.2 Psal. 51.17 The hungry he filleth with good but the rich he sendeth empty away Luk. 1.53 He giveth more grace to the humble when the proud are abhorred by him 1 Pet. 5.5 The Church of Laodicea that said I am rich and increased with goods and have need of nothing was miserable and poor and blinde and naked Rev. 3.17 As many that are proud of their honour and birth run out of all by living above their estates when meaner persons grow rich because they are still gathering and make much of every little So proud Professors of Religion are in a Consumption of the Grace they have while the humble increase by making much of every little help which is sleighted and neglected by the proud and by shunning all those spending courses which the proud are plunged in Be sure to keep mean thoughts of your selves of your knowledg and parts and grace and duties and be content to be mean in the esteem of others if you would not be worse than mean in the esteem of God DIRECT V. Exercise your selves daily in a life of Faith upon Jesus Christ as your Saviour your Teacher your Mediator and your King as your Example your Wisdom your Righteousness and your Hope ALL other studies and knowledg must be meerly subservient to the study and knowledg of Christ 1 Cor. 2.2 That vain kind of Philosophy which St. Paul so much cautioneth Christians against is so far yet from being accounted vain that by many called Christians it is preferred before Christianity it self and to shew that it is Vain while they overvalue it they can shew no solid worth or vertue which they have got by it but only a tumified mind and an idle tongue like a tinkling Cymbal 1 Cor. 13.1 and 12.31 and 2.4.14 15 16. and 1.18 19 20 21 23 24 27. Col. 2.8 9. We are compleat in Christ in whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily ver 10. No study in the World will so much lead you up to God and acquaint you with him especially in his Love and Goodness as the study of Christ his Person his Office his Doctrine his Example his Kingdom and his benefits As the Deity is your ultimate end to which all things else are but helps and means so Christ is that great and principal means by whom all other means are animated Remember that you are in continual need of him for direction intercession pardon sanctification for support and comfort and for peace with God Let no thoughts therefore be so sweet and frequent in your hearts nor any discourse so ready in your mouths next to the excellencies of the eternal Godhead as this of the design of mans Redemption Let Christ be to your Souls as the Air the Earth the Sun and your Food are to your bodies without which your life would presently fail As you had never come home to the Father but by him so without him you cannot a moment continue in the Fathers love nor be accepted in one duty nor be protected from one danger nor be supplyed in any want For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell Col. 1.18 19. And by him it is that being justified by Faith we have peace with God and have access by Faith unto this Grace wherein we stand and rejoyce in hope of the Glory of God Rom. â— 1 2. And it is in him the Head that we must grow up in all things from whom the whole body doth receive it's increase Ephes. 4.15 16. You grow no more in Grace than you grow in the true knowledg and daily use of Jesus Christ. But of this I will say no more because I have said so much in my Directions for a sound Conversion DIRECT VI. Let the Knowledg and Love of God and your obedience to him be the Works of your Religion and the everlasting fruition of him in Heaven be the continual end and ruling Motive of your Hearts and Lives that your very Conversation may be with God in Heaven YOu are so far HOLY as you are DIVINE and HEAVENLY A Christian indeed in casting up his accounts being certain that this World doth make no man happy hath been led up by Christ to seek a Happiness with God above If you live not for this everlasting happiness if you trade not for this if this be not your treasure your hope and home the chief matter of your desires love and joy and if all things be not prest to serve it and despised when they stand against it you live not indeed a Christian life GOD and HEAVEN or GOD in HEAVEN is the Life and Soul the beginning and the end the Sum the All of true Religion And therefore it is that we are directed to lift up our Heads and Hearts and begin our Prayers with Our Father which art in Heaven and end them with ascribing to Him the Kingdom the Power and the Glory for ever It is not the Creatures but God the Creator that is the Father the Guide and the felicity of Souls and therefore the ultimate end and object of all Religious actions and affections Dwell still upon God and dwell in Heaven if you would understand the nature and design of Christianity Take God for all that is for God Study after the knowledg of him in all his Works Study him in his Word Study him in Christ And never study him barely to know him but to know him that you may love him Take your selves as dead when you live not in the Love of God Keep still upon your hearts a lively sense of the infinite difference between him and the Creature Look on all the World as a shadow and on God as the substance Take the very worst that man can do to be in comparison of the punishments of God but as a Flea-biting to the sorest death And take all the dreaming pleasures of the World to be less in comparison with the joyes of Heaven than one lick of honey is to a thousand years possession of all the felicities on earth Think not all the pleasures honours or riches of the world to be worthy to be named in comparison of Heaven nor the Greatest of Men to be worthy to be once thought on in comparison of God As one straw or feather won or lost would neither much rejoyce or trouble you if all the City or land were yours So live as men whose eyes are open and who discern a greater disproportion between the portion of a worldling and a Saint Let God be your King your Father your master your friend your wealth your joy your All. Let not a day go over your heads in which your hearts have no converse with God in Heaven when any trouble overtaketh you on Earth look up to Heaven and remember that it is there that Rest and Joy are prepared for believers When you are under any want or cross or
or remembrance or a look Phil. 3.13 14. If you feel this poison seise upon your hearts and your condition in the world or at least your Hopes begin to grow too sweet and pleasing to you presently make hast to Christ your Physician and take his antidote and cast up the poyson as you love your Souls You must know no other pleasure in your outward mercies but as God appeareth in and by them and as they tend to profit you and further you in Gods Service or to promote your own or others good but not as they are provision for the flesh Rom. 13.13 14. See my Book of Crucifying the World DIRECT X. Cast not your selves wilfully upon temptations but avoid them as far as lawfully you can And if you are cast upon them unwillingly resist them resolutely as knowing that they come to entice you into Sin and Hell from God and your everlasting happiness And therefore be well acquainted with the particular Temptations of every company calling relation business time place and condition of life and go alwayes furnished with particular Antidotes against them all STrong Grace will do no more against strong Temptations than weak Grace against weak ones Temptation is the way to sin and sin is the way to Hell If you saw the dangerousness of your station when you cast your self upon temptations you would tremble and fly as for your lives I take that man as almost gone already who chooseth temptations or avoideth them not when he may Especially be acquainted with the diseases and greatest dangers of your Soul and there keep up a constant watch Are you lyable to a gluttonous pleasing of your appetite Avoid the temptation set not that before you which may be your snare Let a little and that of the least tempting kind of food be your ordinary provision Sit not at the Gluttons Table who fareth deliciously every day if you would escape the gluttons sin and misery Or if the provision be of other mens disposal at least rise quickly and be gone Are you inclined to please your appetite in drinking Avoid such strong drink as may tempt your appetite and avoid the place and company that draweth you to it Are you inclined to fleshly lust Avoid the presence of such of the other Sex as are a temptation to you Look not on them nor talk not of them but above all take heed of nearness and familiarity and privacy with them and of all opportunity of sin When the Devil hath brought the bait to your hand and telleth you now you may sin without any molestation or discovery you are then in a very dangerous case Some that think they would not be guilty of the sin will yet tempt themselves and delight to have it in their power and to have the opportunity of sining and to come as near it as they dare And these are gone before they well perceive their danger So if you are inclined to Pride and Ambition avoid the society of those that tempt you to it Come not among Superiors and Gallants or such as kindle your ambition A retired life in company of mean and humble persons is fitest for one that hath your disease Mind not high things but condescend to men of low estate Rom. 1â— 16 But if you cannot avoid the Temptation be sure yet to avoid the sin Take it as if you saw and heard the Devil himself perswading you to sin and damn your Souls Abhor the motion and give not the Devil a patient hearing when you know what he cometh about Resolution scapeth many a danger which those are ruined by who stand disputing and dallying with the Tempter Especially look about you when the Tempter employeth Great men or Learned men or Godly men or nearest friends to be his instruments And if their subtilty puzzle you go to the stronger and more experienced Christians for advice and help VVatch and pray that you enter not into temptation Matth. 6.13 and 26.41 It is a dreadful thing to think what persons temptations have overthrown Luke 18.13 Heb. 6.6 7. How Wise and Learned and excellent men have been over-witted by Satan and sinned like fools when they have let go their watch If we be as resolved as Peter temptations may quickly change our resolutions if God leave us to our selves and we grow presumptuous or secure And then our very Reason will lose its power and false representations will make things appear to us quite contrary to what indeed they are and those reasonings will seem probable to us which at another time we could easily see through as meer deceit Temptation as it prevaileth doth damp and cast asleep our Graces and charm and bewitch all the faculties of the Soul 1 Tim. 6.9 DIRECT XI If it be possible make choice of such a Pastor for the help and guidance of your Souls as is judicious experienced humble holy heavenly faithful diligent lively and peaceable that liveth not in separation from the generality of the sober Godly Ministers and Christians where he liveth 1. THink not of being sufficient for your selves without the help of those whom Christ hath appointed to be watchmen for your Souls Heb. 13.7.17.24 As you cannot live without the teaching and the Grace of Christ so Christ doth vouchsafe you his teaching and his grace by the Ministry of his own Officers whom he hath appointed to that end and use It is marvellous to observe how Christ chose rather to convert men by the Preaching and Miracles of his Apostles than by his own And how he would not fully Convert Paul without the Ministry of Ananias though he spoke to him from Heaven himself and reasoned the case with him against his Persecution And how he would not fully Convert Cornelius and his Houshold without the Ministry of Peter though he sent an Angel to direct him to a Teacher Nor would he convert the Ethiopian Eunuch without the Ministry of Philip nor the Jaylor without the Ministry of Paul and Silas though he wrought a Miracle to prepare for his Conversion Acts 16. and 10. And Paul must plant and Apollo must water before God will give the increase 1 Cor. 3.6 And though all true Christians are taught of God and must call no man on earth the Master of their Faith but Christ 1 Thess. 4.9 John 6.45 Mat. 23.8 9. Yet have they their Teachers Fathers and instructers under Christ who are helpers of their joy though they have not dominion over their Faith and are Overseers though not Lords and Owners of the Flock and are Ministers of Christ by whom he teacheth and stewards of the Mysteries of God and Ambassadors by whom he beseecheth sinners to be reconciled to God having committed to them the word of reconciliation Eph. 4.11 12 13 14. 1 Cor. 4.1 15. Acts 20.28 2 Cor. 1.24 1 Pet. 5.1 2 3 4. 2 Cor. 5.18 19 20. These are Labourers together with God upon his husbandry and building some being Master-builders and others Superstructors
his hand or the Fornicator to cure his lust than to put out his eyes it were a cheap remedy A cheap and easy superficial Repentance may skin over the sore and deceive an Hypocrite but he that would be sure of pardon and free from fear must go to the bottom DIRECT XX. Live as with Death continually in your eye and spend every day in serious preparation for it that when it cometh you may find your work dispatcht and may not then cry out in vain to God to try you once again PRomise not your selves long life Think not of death as at many years distance but as hard at hand Think what will then be needful to your peace and comfort and order all your life accordingly and prepare that now which will be needful then Live now while you have time as you will resolve and promise God to live when on your death-bed you are praying for a little time of tryal more It is a great work to die in a joyful assurance and hope of everlasting life and with a longing desire to depart and be with Christ as best of all Phil. 1.21 23. O then what a burden and terror it will be to have an unbelieving or a worldly heart or a guilty Conscience Now therefore use all possible diligence to strengthen Faith to increase love to be acquit from guilt to be above the World to have the mind set free from the Captivity of the flesh to walk with God and to obtain the deepest most delectable apprehensions of his love in Christ and of the heavenly blessedness which you expect Do you feel any doubts of the state of immortality or staggering at the Promise of God through unbelief Presently do all you can to conquer them and get a clear resolution to your souls and leave it not all to do at the time of sickness Are the thoughts or God and Heaven unpleasant or terrible to you Presently search out the cause of all and labour in the cure of it as for your lives Is there any former or present sin which is a burden or terror to your Consciences Presently seek out to Christ for a Cure by Faith and true Repentance and do that to disburden your Consciences now which you would do on a sick-bed and leave not so great and necessary a 〈◊〉 to so uncertain and short and unfit a time Is there any thing in this World that is swâ—â—tâ—r tâ— your thoughts than God and Heaven 〈◊〉 which you cannot willingly let go Mâ—rtiâ—iâ— it without delay consider of its vanity compare it with Heaven Crucifie it by the Cross of Christ cease not till you account it loss and â—â—ung for the excellent knowledg of Christ and life eternal Phil. 3.7 8 9. Let not death surprize you as a thing that you never seriously expected Can you do no more in preparation for it than you do If no why do you wish a death to be tryed once again and why are you troubled that you lived no better But if you can when think you should it be done Is the time of uncertain painful sickness better than this O how doth sensuality besot the World and inconsiderateness deprive them of the benefit of their reason O Sirs if you know indeed that you must shortly die live then as dying men should live Choose your condition in the World and manage it as men that must shortly dye Use your Power and Command and Honour and use all your Neighbours and especially use the Cause and Servants of Christ as men should do that must shortly die Build and plant and buy and sell and use your Riches as those that must die remembring that the fashion of all these things is passing away 1 Cor. 7.29 30. Yea pray and read and hear and meditate as those that must die Seeing you are as sure of it as if it were this hour in the name of God delay not your preparations It is a terrible thing for an immortal Soul to pass out of the body in a carnal unregenerate unprepared state and to leave a World which they loved and were familiar with and go to a World which they neither know nor love and where they have neither heart nor treasure Matth. 6.19 20 31. The measure of Faith which may help you to bear an easie cross is not sufficient to fortifie and encourage your souls to enter upon so great a change So also bear all your wants and crosses as men that must shortly die Fear the cruelties of men but as beseemeth those that are ready to die He that can die well can do any thing or suffer any thing And he that is unready to die is unfit for a fruitful and comfortable life What can rationally rejoyce that man who is sure to die and unready to dye and is yet unfurnished of dying comforts Let nothing be now sweet to you which will be bitter to your dying thoughts Let nothing be much desired now which will be unprofitable and uncomfortable then Let nothing seem very heavy or grievous now which will be light and easy then Let nothing now seem honourable which will then seem despicable and vile Consider of every thing as it will look at death that when the day shall come which endeth all the joyes of the ungodly you may look up with joy and say Welcome Heaven This is tho day which I so long expected which all my dayes were spent in preparation for which shall end my fears and begin my felicity and put me into possession of all that I desired and prayed and laboured for when my Soul shall see its glorified Lord For he hath said John 12.26 If any man serve me let him follow me and where I am there shall also my servant be If any man serve me him will my Father honour Even so Lord Jesus remember me now thou art in thy Kingdom and let me be with thee in Paradise Luke 23.42 43. O thou that spakest those words so full of unexpressible comfort to a sinful woman in the first speech after thy blessed Resurrection Joh. 20.17 GO TO MY BRETHREN AND SAY VNTO THEM I ASCEND UNTO MY FATHER AND YOUR FATHER AND TO MY GOD AND YOVR GOD. Take up now this Soul that is thine own that it may see the Glory given thee with the Father Joh. 17.24 and instead of this life of temptation trouble darkness distance and sinful imperfection I may delightfully Behold and Love and Praise thy Father and my Father and thy God and my God Lord now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace Lord Jesus receive my Spirit Luke 2.29 Acts 7.59 And now I have given you all these Directions I shall only request you in the close that you will set your very hearts to the daily serious practise of them For there is no other way for a ripe confirmed state of Grace And as ever you regard the glory of God the honour of your Religion the welfare of the Church and those
grounds of comfort and when they cannot raise their souls to any high and passionate joys they yet walk in a settled peace of soul and in such competent comforts as make their lives to be easie and delightful being well pleased and contented with the happy condition that Christ hath brought them to and thankful that he left them not in those foolish vain pernicious pleasures which were the way to endless sorrows 3. But the seeming Christian seeketh and taketh up his chief contentment in some carnal thing If he be so poor and miserable as to have nothing in possession that can much delight him he will hope for better dayes hereafter and that hope shall be his chief delight or if he have no such hope he will be without delight and shew his love to the world and flesh by mourning for that which he cannot have as others do in rejoycing in what they do possess and he will in such a desperate case of misery be such to the world as the weak Christian is to God who hath a mourning and desiring love when he cannot reach to an enjoying and delighting Love His carnal mind most savoureth the things of the flesh and therefore in them he findeth or seeketh his chief delights Though yet he may have also a delight in his superficiall kind of Religion his hearing and reading praying in his ill-grounded hopes of life eternal But all this is but subordinate to his chiefest earthly pleasure Isai. 58.2 Yet they seek me daily and delight to know my waies as a nation that did righteousness and forsook not the ordinances of their God they ask of me the ordinances of justice they take delight in approaching unto God And yet all this was subjected to a covetous oppressing mind Mat. 13.20 He that received the seed into stony places the same is he that heareth the word and anon with joy receiveth it yet hath he not root in himself but dureth for a while for when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of the word by and by he is offended Whereby it appeareth that his love to the word was subjected to his love to the world Obj. But there are two sorts of people that seem to have no fleshly delights at all and yet are not in the way to salvation viz. the Quakers and Behmenists that live in great austerity and some of the Religious orders of the Papists who afflict their flesh Answ. Some of them undergo their fastings and pennance for a day that they may sin the more quietly all the week after And some of them proudly comfort themselves with the fancies and conceit of being and appearing more excellent in austerity than others And all these take up with a carnal sort of pleasure As proud persons are pleased with their own or others conceits of their beauty or witt or worldly greatness so prouder persons are pleased with their own and others conceits of their holiness And verily they have their reward Mat. 6.2 But those of them that place their chiefest happiness in the love of God and the eternal fruition of him in heaven and seek this sincerely according to their helps and power though they are mislead into some superstitious errors I hope I may number with those that are sincere for all their errors and the ill effects of them XXIV 1. A confirmed Christian doth ordinarily discern the sincerity of his own heart and consequently hath some well grounded assurance of the pardon of his sins and of the favour of God and of his everlasting happiness And therefore no wonder if he live a peaceable and joyfull life For his grace is not so small as to be undiscernable nor is it as a sleepy buried seed or principle but it is almost in continual act And they that have a great degree of grace and also keep it in lively exercise do seldom doubt of it Besides that they blot not their Evidence by so many infirmities and falls They are more in the light and have more acquaintance with themselves and more sense of the abundant love of God and of his exceeding mercies than weak Christians have and therefore must needs have more assurance They have boldness of access to the throne of grace without unreverent contempt Eph. 3.12 2.18 They have more of the spirit of Adoption and therefore more child-like confidence in God and can call him Father with greater freedom and comfort than any others can Rom. 8.15 16. Gal. 4.6 Eph. 1.6 1 Joh. 5.19 20. And we know that we are of God and that the whole world lyeth in wickedness c. 2. But the weak Christian hath so small a degree of grace and so much corruption and his grace is so little in act and his sin so much that he seldom if ever attaineth to any well-grounded assurance till he attain to a greater measure of grace He differeth so little from the seeming Christian that neither himself nor others do certainly discern the difference When he searcheth after the truth of his faith and love and heavenly mindedness he findeth so much unbelief and aversness from God and earthly mindedness that he cannot be certain which of them is predominant and whether the interest of this world or that to come do bear the sway So that he is often in perplexities and fears and more often in a dull uncertainty And if he seem at any time to have assurance it is usually but an ill-grounded perswasion of the truth though it be true which he apprehendeth when he taketh himself to be the child of God yet it is upon unfound reasons that he judgeth so or else upon sound reasons weakly and uncertainly discerned so that there is commonly much of security presumption fancie or mistake in his greatest comforts He is not yet in a condition fit for full assurance till his love and obedience be more full 3. But the seeming Christian cannot possibly in that estate have either certainty or good probability that he is a child of God because it is not true His seeming certainty is meerly self-deceit and his greatest confidence is but presumption because the spirit of Christ is not within him and therefore he is certainly none of his Rom. 8.9 XXV 1. The Assurance of a confirmed Christian doth increase his alacrity and diligence in duty and is alwayes seen in his more obedient holy fruitful life The sense of the love and mercy of God is as the rain upon the tender grass He is never so fruitful so thankful so heavenly as when he hath the greatest certainty that he shall be saved The Love of God is then shed abroad upon his heart by the Holy Ghost which maketh him abound in love to God Rom. 5.1 2 3 4. He is the more stedfast unmoveable and alwaies abounding in the work of the Lord when he is most certain that his labour shall not be in vain in the Lord 1 Cor. 15.58 2. But the weak Christian is unfit
fear the Lord and that he keepeth all the tears of his servants till the reckoning day And if judgement begin at the house of God and the righteous be saved through so much suffering and labour what then shall be their end that obey not the Gospel and where shall the ungodly and sinner appear 1 Pet. 4.17 18. Eccl. 8.12 Prov. 11.31 13.6 Psal. 56.8 Deut. 32.35 Jam. 5.9 2. And the weak Christian is one that will forsake all for the sake of Christ and suffer with him that he may be glorified with him and will take his treasure in heaven for all Luk. 14.26 33. Luk. 18.22 But he doth it not with that easiness and alacrity and joy as the confirmed Christian doth He hearkens more to the flesh which saith favour thy self suffering is much more grievous to him And sometimes he is wavering before he can bring himself fully to resolve and let go all Mat. 16.22 3. But the seeming Christian looketh not for much suffering He reads of it in the Gospel but he saw no probability of it and never believed that he should be called to it in any notable degree He thought it probable that he might well escape it And therefore though he agreed verbally to take Christ for better and worse and to follow him through sufferings he thought he would never put him to it And indeed his heart is secretly resolved that he will never be undone in the world for Christ Some reparable loss he may undergo but he will not let go life and all He will still be religious and hope for heaven But he will make himself believe and others if he can that the Truth lieth on the safer side and not on the suffering side and that it is but for their own conceits and scrupulosity that other men suffer who go beyond him and that many good men are of his opinion and therefore he may be good also in the same opinion though he would never have been of that opinion if it had not been necessary to his escaping of sufferings what flourish soever he maketh for a time when persecution ariseth he is offended and withereth Mat. 13.21 6. Unless he be so deeply engaged among the suffering party that he cannot come off without perpetual reproach and then perhaps Pride will make him suffer more than the belief of heaven oâ— the love of Christ could do And all this is because his very belief is unrooted and unsound and he hath secretly at the heart a fear that if he should suffer death for Christ he should be a loser by him and he would not reward him according to his promise with everlasting life Heb. 3.12 XXIX 1. A Christian indeed is one that followeth not Christ for company nor holdeth his belief in trust upon the credit of any in the world and therefore he would stick to Christ if all that he knoweth or converseth with should forsake him If the Rulers of the Earth should change their religion and turn against Christ he would not forsake him If the multitude of the people turn against him nay if the professors of Godliness should fall off yet would he stand his ground and be still the same If the learnedest men and the Pastors of the Church should turn from Christ he would not forsake him Yea if his nearest relations and friends or even that Minister that was the means of his conversion should change their minds and forsake the truth and turn from Christ or a holy life he would yet be constant and be still the same And what Peter resolved on he would truly practise Mat. 26 33 35. Though all men should be offended because of thee yet would not I be offended Though I should die with thee yet will I not deny thee And if he thought himself as Elias did left alone yet would he not how the knee to Baal Rom. 11.3 If he hear that this eminent Minister falleth off one day and the other another day till all be gone yet still the foundation of God standeth sure he falleth not because he is built upon the rock Mat. 7.22 23. His heart saith Alas whither shall I go if I go from Christ Is there any other that hath the word and spirit of eternal life Can I be a gainer if I lose my soul Joh. 6.67 68. Mat. 16.26 He useth his Teachers to bring him that light and evidence of truth which dwelleth in him when they are gone And therefore though they fall away he falleth not with them 2. And the weakest Christian believeth with a Divine faith of his own and dependeth more on God than man But yet if he should be put to so great a tryal as to see all the Pastors and Christians that he knoweth change their minds I know not what he would do For though God will uphold all his own whom he will save yet he doth it by means and outward helps together with his internal grace and keepeth them from temptations when he will deliver them from the evil And therefore it is a doubt whether there be not degrees of grace so weak as would fail in case the strongest temptations were permitted to assault them A strong man can stand and go of himself but an infant must be carried and the same and sick must have others to support them The weak Christian falleth if his Teacher or most esteemed company fall If they run into an error sect or schisme he keeps them company He groweth cold if he have not warming company He forgeteth himself and letteth loose his sense and passion if he have not some to watch over him and warn him No man should refuse the help of others that can have it and the best have need of all Gods means But the weak Christian needeth them much more than the strong and is much less able to stand without them Luk. 22.32 Gal. 2.11 12 13 14. 3. But the seeming Christian is built upon the sand and therefore cannot stand a storm He is a Christian more for company or he credit of man or the interest that others have in him or the encouragement of the times than from a firm Belief and love of Christ and therefore falleth when his props are gone Mat. 7.24 XXX 1. A strong Christian can digest the hardest Truths and the hardest works of Providence He seeth more of the reason and evidence of truths than others And he hath usually a more comprehensive knowledge and can reconcile those truths which short sighted persons suspect to be inconsistent and contradictory And when he cannot reconcile them he knoweth they are reconcileable For he hath laid his foundation well and then he reduceth other truths to that and buildeth them on it And so he doth by the hardest Providences Whoever is high or low whoever prospereth or is afflicted however humane affairs are carried and all things seem to go against the Church and cause of Christ he knoweth yet that God is good to Israel Psal.