were liable to be broken off again and those also that are after the spirit true heirs according to the promise who are in like manner under this dispensation and teaching til the seed himself come and take them from this Schoolmaster in order to bring them under the most lively effectual teaching and instruction of his owne mouth and by his owne personal appearance in spirit to them either as the day-star arising in their hearts and giving forth the glory of his first appearance in his owne face as he is the Son of man in the form of a servant and fashion of the first Adam made immutable or 2dly as the sun in its strength breaking forth in their soules that are gathered to him appointed and qualified to be with him in the Kingdom of his father and admitted to the peculiar priviledge of beholding his glory in the face of his most exalted and heavenly manhood as he is the only begotten lying in the fathers bosome he that is above all What he hath seen and heard in the beholding of the fathers shape and very similitude that he testifieth but no man receaveth this his testimony that is but a meer man and no more For it is not it cannot be conveyed or communicated unto any but with unspeakable words which it is not possible for man in the single capacity of his first nature and make though become immutable to receave or utter so much doe they surpasse all the knowledg as wel as expression of meer man Under the voice of this threefold ministry God the mediatour who is the possessour of heaven and earth the maker of them and all therein hath made of one blood al nations of men for to dwel on the face of the earth hath distributed to al of them and determined the bounds of their habitations as also the different and proper means to bring them back to himself by repentance from dead works and faith towards the living God He hath awakened that light in every one that comes into the world that shal move and cal upon them at some time or other upon occasion of sundry concurring providences to seek the Lord if haply they may feel after him and find him who is not far from every one of us It ought not then to be a thing incredible with us but that by these means provision is made by God in Christ and care taken not only for the restoring of man againe unto that righteousnes and purity of nature which he lost and to the exercise of that kind of freewil which he enjoyed at creation but yet farther to regenerate and beget him into a more excellent fashion of being and heavenly frame of Spirit in and by which the end of his first creation is fully answered and the law of it accomplished Of this we shal now in the third place proceed to treat by way of answer to 3. The third generall Query which is this In what sence is it possible for man in his mutable state considered either before or after his fall according to the degree of restoring healing grace which he does or may arrive unto to hear and obey the things of Gods law without turning from it finally and in so doing to grow up out of his mutable into his immutable state and be made heir and possessour of life eternal To understand this the more plainly and distinctly and to prevent prejudices and mistakes we shal discusse this subject under these 4 particular enquiries following as branches of this 3d maine point and general query 1. Whether was man at first created in a capacity of being and aptitude of mind possible to obey and fulfill the law of nature so to as answer the end of his creation til brought under a second work of Gods hand call'd the new creation and thereby cast into a new mould and frame of being Secondly whether man by sin be so unmade againe and corrupted so disorder'd and disabled that by the blessing and vertue of Christs blood and the proper and fit means that by the father are put into the hands of the Mediatour he is not in a capacity and possibility notwithstanding his losse by the fall to be restored and made able againe to obey Gods law with the same kind of ability God gave him at first And upon such restoration is he not obliged to set about it at least to shew his good will and syncere inclination of mind there unto according to the measure of the ability he receaves 3. How was man to employ and make use of his naturall ability and strength given for the performance of Gods law and according to what rule might or ought he to have walked with God either before or after the fall which would infallibly guide and unmoveably keepe him in the way to eternall life a way which is called the way of holines such as the uncleane passe not over and the wayfaring men though fooles cannot or shall not erre therein and at the end whereof is immortality and eternall blessednes 4. How comes man in a judiciall manner to be hardned by God and made a vessell of wrath fitted and appointed to everlasting destruction And when is it that he shal be denied any farther benefit by the Sacrifice or Christs death and no more permitted to change his mind and turne from his evill wayes though he should seek it with teares but be in a certaine expectation of the unquenchable flames of Gods wrath ordeined for the punishing and devouring of all fixed and impenitent sinners To the first of these enquiries The creatour did at the beginning put a created ability and principle of motiō into the creature But the strength and power of this first impression is not sufficient for the continued motion of every respective creature in its kind but a perpetuall concourse and cooperation of the creatour is needfull thereunto Then doubtlesse man who was made in Gods image a rationall and free agent the masterpiece of the visible creation ought not to thinke himself exempt from such a dependance nor to covet or desire to be made perpetuall upō such tearms as would in effect dethrone his creatour and make more Gods then one The end for which man was at all created was to be perpetually moving in love and service to his creatour as a vessel prepared with meetnes for the use of his Lord in whatever he should be commāded by him for the advancement of his prayse and glory Now as loue is the end and perfection of the commādemēt so is it the first and cheife principle out of which all true obedience to the commād must proceed and a duration and perpetuity in this loue and duty is absolutely necessary to mans hapines and continuance in Gods favour and good liking For untill a man keep Gods commandements out of this principle and be sure of its unchangeablenes he neither can be sayd to walke in that Covenāt or agreement with God
nor ever be sure of keeping the condition of that Covenant upon which God promises to be his God and to be and abide in loue and communion with him for ever And it is most unquestionable that the Lord will faithfully performe his promise and his oath the two immutable things wherein he cannot lie The only doubt is whether man in this first make and frame of mind be able to performe the duty required of him Every benefit requires answerable duty Gods bounty then to man in giving him his being creating him in his owne image and likenes must needs lay a strong obligation upon him to loue God with the love that he requires And if this love be made by God a necessary condition of mans obteining eternall life it is certainly possible for man to performe this condition even to loue the Lord his God with all his heart soule mind and strength either in the power of what he hath or of what by the same gracious and liberall hand of God he may be made to have For an impossible condition is all one with a negative as if God should say that eternall life and blessednes is utterly impossible and altogether vnatteinable for man The nature of man is most drawne and commanded by love This is that which swayes and carries it in its motions after the object which it pursues Now the appearance which God gives of himself in his Son the image of the invisible God the brightnes of his glory and expresse character of his person is the most beautifull and desireable object that can come into the mind of man for his fruition and inheritance And he is not only lovely in himself but full of love to man He hath such love in him to mans nature as he hath not to any besides no not to the angels For he took not on him the nature of angels but the seed of Abraham which thereby came to be knit in personall union with the only begotten Son of God And yet farther the love of God in Christ towards men is most largly and liberally diffusive to the filling all those that doe become willing receavers and enterteiners of it with its owne fulnes and unsearchable riches of divine treasure shewing itself not in word only but in deed and in truth to all those that are taken into cohabitation with it as the habitable part of its earth The cords of this love are the cords of a man attracting by arguments exceedingly adaequate and suited to the reason and understanding of man Where lies then this great mystery that it should be impossible for man to continue in the love which God commands and declares as the law he is to observe and performe upon the severest penalties of his displeasure Is it not rather indeed a grosse mistake for any to thinke or say so And are we not rather to conclude and affirme that it was not only possible for man to have performed this great and comprehensive duty of continuing in the love of God which is the fulfilling of all law before his fall but is so still by such restoration of strength and ability as men doe receave by the vertue of Christs death and resurrection Man in his first creation was furnished with an ability to be his owne keeper in that righteous and good frame wherein he came fresh and lively out of Gods hands with which he girds himself and goes whithersoever he will He was created unto good workes that he should walke in them he had the enlightning and quickning influence of Gods spirit to assist and direct him therein Yea he was so intimately ioyn'd with the Lord the spirit in love likenes and agreement that it may truly be sayd his soule was as it were a part of his joyned and continued to him as the habitable part of his earth the temple which he built for himselfe to dwell in And must it not needs be very irksome and painfull to depart be cut of disioynted and separated by our iniquity from him that is our life But as man hath thus a righteous and reasonable soule which ought to be guided by the mind and law of his God so hath he also a power of girding and turning himself according to the free motion of his owne will He hath in his soule a changable principle which can move and conclude either way to good or evil according to the differing report and representation that is made to him by the one or other part of his mind that is his intellectuall or sensuall nature of both which he is composed as hath bin shewed So then according to the arguments given by these different parts of his composition on the one hand or on the other being furnished with a competent measure of divine light to discerne and conclude aright as to the way he should goe God leavs him so far forth in the hand of his owne counsell as to be at liberty to chuse and determine within himself as it shall seem best to him In this vnconstant and moveable estate of man this dividednes and wavering of mind inclinable to good and also to evill under the shew of good man being left free and without constraint what is it possible for him to doe can he love the Lord his God with all his heart soule mind and strength and his neighbour as himself and can he continue so to doe unchangably and perpetually The answer very breifly may be 1. That it is possible for man to be perpetually moved in and by that love to God which is required by the law 2. It is possible for man considered either as before or since the fall to move himselfe in the performance of this his duty for a much longer continuance then he shews himself willing and inclinable to do it in his mutable state 3. It must reasonably be supposed that while man reteins such a changable principle and fountaine of action in him as the freedom of his owne will and to be in his owne keeping and at his owne dispose his obedience to Gods law and his walking with him must needs be as God him self complains at an all-adventures and without any stedfastnes in his Covenant But he that as single and at his owne dispose in the freedom of his owne will cannot keep himself firme and stedfast in the performance of his duty may so yeild himselfe to be bound up in the will and motion of another who is unchangable that he may be kept in the power thereof unmoveable and free from all danger of departing or turning aside to the right hand or to the left from the holy and streight way of Gods Commandements And this seeming bondage to the will of another is the truest greatest and most absolute freedome being that which falls to mans share as he comes to be actually united with Christ in the band of the choicest and most excellent marriage union We may then safely conclude that it was possible
A pilgrimage into the land of promise By the light of the vision OF Jacobs ladder and faith OR A serious search and prospect into life eternal pointing out the way and discovering the passage out of mans mutable state of life into a state of immutable righteousnes and glory through the knowledg of Christ in Spirit Written in the year 1662 by HENRY VANE Knight towards the latter end of his prison-state by himself fully reviewed and perfected some few dayes before his suffering and left as his last Testimony and service to this present generation according to the wil of God before he fell asleep HOSEA 12.3.4 and 6. verses He took his brother by the heel in the womb and by his strength behaved himself princely with God Yea he had power over the angel and prevailed he wept and made supplication unto him he found him in Beth-El and there he spake with us Therefore turn thou to thy God keep mercy and judgment and wait on thy God continually Printed in the yeare 1664. A TREATISE CONCERNING ETERNAL LIFE THe purposes and counsells of Gods mind are first taken within himself before they are or can be knowne to any other They are therefore called the deepe and hidden things of God For God is his owne counsellour There is none that can instruct him His mind is not only comprehensive of all that can be knowne and consulted upon but hath those eternall springs of light and power by which he is the supreame cause and orderer of all things And these as to their manner and kind of operation are three These first and great powers are they who in their name and manifestation are the Father Son and Holy Ghost by whom the same God doth forme and take all his counsells within himself and put them in execution according to the purpose of his owne mind These are the severall distinct powers of discerning and will in the same divine essence With the first of them God minds things after his owne incomprehensibile manner of being knowing and willing them as God Of this patern there is no imitation I am says God and there is none besides me With the second God minds things on earth or in the world condescending to proportion himself in his knowledg and will to the creature in order to be found in the likenes and fashion of created nature and so to act over the law first in himself that the creature may be capable to imitate and fulfill it after him With the third he does so admirably joyne and put both these minds into one and fix them in such most perfect harmony and love that they are not to be divided yet keeps and upholds in each their proper and distinct operations By this threefold operation God sets up the eternall law and causes the manifestation of that which is the very wisedome and reason of God himself the head of Christ the person of the blessed mediatour For he who thus is three in counsell wherein he decrees and orders all things giving the law in one and the same eternall mind does not execute by himselfe immediatly but by the Mediatour his representative or image the Angel of his presēce in whom his name or likenes is placed in order to beare it and bring it forth into the sight and participation of others By the immediate operation of the Trinity he is made and constituted the Lords Christ and true Messiah the secondary and executing power ordeined by God as the breath and voyce of his mouth to fulfill all his wills and all the counsells of his heart This is he who was from the beginning the breath of God the inspiration of the Almighty the face and image of the invisible God First by eternall generation within the mind of God 2. By everlasting emanation as the outshining light and express character of he divine essence 3. By temporall incarnation and inseparable personal union whith the seed of David According to his eternal generation he is without Father without Mother without descent coeternally and coessentially God with the Father or first cause of all no lesse truly and properly God then God himselfe But that which he is by everlasting emanation is the first born of every creature he that was before all things and by whom all things consist And according to his temporall incarnation he was made man like unto us in all things sin only excepted He is the inward writing of the eternal law that is written and lies within the bosome of the father None can read or unloose the seales on the backside of this writing but the lion of the tribe of Judah he that from eternity hath knowne Gods mind and bin his counsellour as the almighty breath of his month inspiring and giving life and being to all things which when put forth doth execute most exactly all that the dictates of Gods mind require to be done Without him is not any thing made that is made Nay admit the creature could receave being without him which it cannot yet the eternal law and will of God could never be knowne to angels or men unlesse revealed to them by this lively oracle and voyce of his month For all things are delivered to him of the father and none knows who the Son is but the Father nor who the Father is but the Son and he to whom the Son will reveale him No man hath seen God at any time The only begotten Son which is in the bosome of the Father he hath declared him even he that was in the beginning was found in the forme of God and thought it not robbery to be equall with God the WORD in whom is life and that life the light of men By him comes all hearing understanding and obedience to be wrought in the creature The first creature in which it is wrought is the building not made with hands eternal in the heavens made part of himself who as Mediatour is a mixed seed of both natures in one person and Spirit In this Spirit he comes in the dispensation of the fulnes of time to be made flesh and so hath in him the voice of God the voice of the head and cheif of angels and of the head and cheife of men by meanes whereof he speakes and converses with all created understandings in their owne likenes and language Thus comes he to be that spirituall ladder and way of graduall entercourse by means whereof the angels that are ascending and descending upon him doe keepe the doore open betweene heaven and earth and he fils al things This is Gods first best and most perfect worke finished from the beginning the works that are so much the object of Gods knowledg and delight that he therein rests subjecting them no more to change This is the building not made with hands eternal in the heavens the invisible and exemplary paterne unto both creations the rock whence they flow Deut. 32.4 He is the rock his work is
one of one immortall seed and he not ashamed to call us and owne us for his brethren As he is so are they that are borne of one and the same immortal seed each one resembling the children of the great King They become one with him through this birth as he is one with the father They are fixed and rendred unmoveable in his love as he is in his fathers love This they arrive at by his declaring to them the fathers name or giving the manifestation of the fathers love as he and the father are one that the love wherewith the father hath loved these his children may be in them and that the Spirit of the Son that lives in the fathers love may also be in them even the spirit of adoption whereby we cry Abba father From thence-forward are they evidently no more servants but true heaven-born Sons and heirs of God through Christ being taught to know God after the same manner as they are knowne of him and to apprehend that for which also they are apprehended of Christ Jesus It is Christ in the spirit of this love that apprehends the soule layes hold on the heart and cleaves to it as he is the sealed one of the father till he change it into the same love and image from glory to glory working us into such a conjunction in spirit with him and likenes in operation to him that not we in the exercise of our former and naturall free will but Christ in this his love and glorious liberty of the Son of God lives in us and we in him as in a Kingdom that cannot be shaken This love does not only cast out fear but frees from all danger of any more breach of Covenant with God whence his finall departure from us should follow or our separation from him This way of giving himself to us is love indeed in a much more excellent way then appeared in such gift as he made of himself to us in our first creation or in his restoration-work upon us since singly considered as that whereby he makes a new proof and triall of us In both those two former sorts of restoration-work above mentioned God is indeed pleased to make us his people manifesting himself and his will to us and making knowne to us good and evill experimentally so that we have tasted of the evil and of the good when the Lord hath restored our first fredom and put it in our power againe to cleave to him and love him or else to leave and forsake him In this state he set Adam under the counsell rebukes and threatnings declared in his law with a liberty to stand or fall Whoever then stands upon these tearms with God is alwayes in the same danger can never be out of the fear of a breach that may happen between God and him through his owne default The comming of that love and the spirit of it above-mentioned into the soule does perfectly secure from and cast out all such feare And this it doth perform by its attracting prevailing power in and over the will whereby man is brought to give up the absolute Rule and power of keeping himself into the will of him that is this love and is made fully content to be in his hands and under his wormanship as a little child created a new unto the good works before ordeined that we should walk in them The soule is hereby fitted and prepared with a meeknes and lowlines of mind to draw together in one yoke with the spirit of this love whose command is easy and burden light requiring no more nor other thing to be done then what by faith we se our head the second Adam in our very nature to have done before us And as many as are taught and enabled by Christ to walk with him according to this rule that is as a race set before them in his cross they are the true Israel of God and mercy and peace shall for ever rest upon them Conformity to this rule of the crosse is the high way the way of holines which all the ransomed of the Lord are appointed to passe and wherein the waifairing men the true pilgrims on earth though become as fools and little children cannot erre but will infallibly come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads But this way of holines appears to flesh and blood so strait a gate to enter in at so fiery a baptisme to passe through so bitter a cup to drink up that none whoever that are left to the freedom of their owne wills or naturall liberty restored will ever be inclined to drink it off or conforme to Christs example and command therein They looke upon ir as a rock of offence a stone of stumbling which they know not how to get over nor have any mind to it This bitter cup and hard saying is provided by God as the bitter waters were of old to try the adultresse or false hearted wife to her husband It hath the like operation both wayes as the antitype and mystery of the bitter water in the Mosaical ministration It hurts not those that are chast in whose spirit there is no guile but makes them more fruitfull in good works such good works as proceed from a lively operative saving faith which those that truly and savingly beleeve in Christ wil be carefull to maintein But it corrupts and rotts others ripening them faster on to their owne destruction It is to this sacrifice of the first freedom of our wills or free wil offring that the Apostle exhorts us Rom. 12.1 2. I beseech you brethren by the mercies of God that ye present your bodies or living soules a living sacrifice holy and acceptable to God your reasonable service or the service which your reason owes unto God in seing and accounting yourselvs fools under his teachings and weak and insufficient under his ruling power in you Obj But it will be objected If I suffer the freedom of my owne will to be taken from me I either become a perfect slave or am reduced into that necessity of action with which all creatures work by a Kind of instinct so shall I come to be unmanned and made a very beast Answer In such suggestions and groundlesse surmises we erre not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God If we did both these consequences of mans being reduced to slavery or bestiality through such resignation of his freedom and rational powers that make up his reasonable sacrifice into the hands of God who will returne all back againe with usury would appear exceeding far from truth as is possible For so far is that frō a bestiall state of life and will that succeeds in the room of our rightly resigned freedom to the will of God by the crosse of Christ and fellowship with him in his death that it highly advances man into a more glorious liberty evē the liberty of the sons of God a freedom to good only a liberty
the law of God and hath given up itself to the rule of the declared enemy of God the spirit of darknes that rules in the children of disobedience but it is also that by which the outward man of the heart called Coll. 3. the members of the mind that are upon the earth withdraws itself from its due subjection and conformity to the dictates of right reason that are suggested to it from time to time by the enlightned spirit of the mind and gives up itself to vile sensuall lusts and affections that carry the whole man captive to sin and death to commit all iniquity with greedines and run into all manner of unrighteousnes The mind which in both these respects is dead is a downright servant of sin and is free from righteousnes or hath freed itself intirely from under its command and Rule as it is written know ye not that to whom ye yeild yourselvs Servants to obey his Servants ye are to whom ye obey whether of sin unto death or of obedience unto righteousnes The freedom wherein man was at first created was such as whereby he might freely and voluntarily fix himself or rather be fixed in the service of righteousnes through beleeving or in the service of sin by unbeleif By the one he might have bin for ever free from all danger or possibility of serving sin or turning from the service of righteousnes By the other he might in such manner free and discharg himself from the service of righteousnes as never to be receaved into it againe but be for ever condemned to the unchangeable servitude of sin as his punishment The first use man made of this primitive freedom was to free and turn himself out of the service of righteousnes and yeild up himself in subjection to sin And the work of Christ the redeemer is to turn him back againe from the service of sin and power of Satan unto God setting him in as good a condition as at first yea farther to free him for ever from any possibility of becoming a servant to sin any more if the fault be not in himself This restoring renewing and regenerating of man by the power and workmanship of the redeemer in whom we are anew created unto good works is frequently tearmed in scripture a resurrection or quickning from the dead But now this renewing work flowing from the spirit of Christ into fallen man admits of severall measures and degrees which are accompanied with answerable operations and effects upon the mind 1. It turns man back againe from sin to righteousnes conferring upon him the use and exercise of his free will in Gods service upon the like tearms of mutability as he had it at the first creation thereof And to be thus anew created in and by Christ Jesus unto good works is in a degree and measure to be quickned with Christ and raised by him from the death of sin as sin is the transgression of the law They that are under this worke and chang wrought by Christ upon their hearts are yet but under the law or under the rule and command given by God in the first Covenant This ministry of the spirit of Christ doth in Scripture passe under the name of Moses John Baptist and Eliah as the voice of the messenger going before but not the voice of the Son of God himself in his owne person 2dly Therefore there is a farther and an additionall work to this which supposes this chang first to be wrought the operation whereof is to make this a repentance never to be repented of this chang unchangable by bringing the mind into that better state of fredom which is for ever exclusive of sin or of any possibility to chang and return to the service of sin againe This second work enlarges the first making it more entire within itself then ever it was in yeilding subjection to righteousnes as transform'd into the whole will of God with an impossibility to chang or turn in affection from it This is properly the workmanship of the Son himself called Regeneration which carries in it the fredom with which the Son makes all those free indeed whom he causes to receave him in this gift of himself to them likening them unto himself in that lowly meek and subjected frame of spirit wherein as the Son of man he is prepared to se God and to do alwayes that which is welpleasing in his sight Those that are under this second work are properly beleevers having faith of the right kind saving faith And they are therein created by Christ Jesus unto good works with another manner of will and spirit then those are of that are but restored only unto the service of righteousnes and chuse there to be left to work out their owne salvation in the single principles of their rectified nature and free will For in them that freewil offering Rom. 12.1 is made the life of that flesh is offered up in sacrifice which the law of faith commands as the only way to exclude boasting or a being puffed up in the service of righteousnes and indeed to exclude all possibility of finall relapse from God or returne to the service of sin This flesh that would live in us is the power we have to lust and desire move and act of ourselvs in the use and exercise of our primitive free will either to good or evill as likes us best This freedom may either be taken away from us by force or we may be brought through a principle of love begotten in us of our owne choice to resigne it up into the hands of another ordeined of God thereunto to keep and manage for us This is that Christ tells us John 6 37 40. All that the father giveth me shall come to me and it is his will that of all that he hath given me I should lose none but raise them up againe at the last day For I came downe from heaven not to do my owne will but the will of him that sent me And this is his will that he that seeth the Son as he lives not in his owne will but in the will of the father and beleeveth on him living in the will of the Son and not in his owne will should have everlasting life and be raised up at the last day To be taken off then by this gift and drawing of the father from all desire to live in our owne will or be at our owne arbitrary single choise and dispose and to be made willing and contented to live in the will of Christ to be built up in a conjunction of spirit a unity and simplicity in the motion of our will with his will enable us truly to say with the Apostle that now not we live but Christ liveth in us and the life that we now live in the flesh or as yet in the mortal body we live by the faith of the Son of God who loved us and gave himself up to death for us that he
the dying of the Lord Jesus whilst he is in his far countrey He hath appointed them a warfare to manage with the ruling powers of this world in a way of Testimony or witness-bearing and therein not to love their lives unto death but in faith and patience to possesse their soules Neverthelesse least they might imagine thereupon as they are too apt to do that their faith if it were of the right kind and unfamed would presētly come forth into its powerfull operation he warily cautions them therein and corrects that mistake by intimating that this was a thing they were not to expect till they had shared with him in his sufferings continued with him in his temptations and given proof of their service and obedience to him in and under the crosse For sayes he which of you having a servant plowing or feeding cattel will say to him by and by when he is come from the feild goe sit downe to meat will he not rather say to him make ready wherewith I may sup gird thyself and serve me till I have eaten and drunken Wait but till such time as that which is yet behind of my afflictions in my members by them to be borne shal be filled up and afterwards ye shall eat and drink The season for your eating and drinking with me at my table in my fathers Kingdom will then come when the work of faith in you shal be fulfilled with power and I shal be admired in all that do beleeve This is that which is properly to be wrought and effected by Christ at his second comming upon the sounding of the seventh trumpet and at the preaching of the everlasting gospel which is not another but the same gospel of Jesus Christ the son of God that the ministry of John Baptist was sayd to be the beginning of But it is called everlasting from the differing kind of effect and operation it will have especially upon the outward man and sensuall part of the mind from what the dispensation of it under Christs first appearance had For that which was then sowne in weakenes and left the possessors of it exposed to various sufferings from the powers of this world shall now be raised in power at this last day to the clothing and furnishing their very outward man with an ability to handle the powers of this world and all adversaries whatsoever as they shal se good That which for the most part is atteined unto under the dispensation of the gospel in the day of Christs first appearance in spirit is but a restitution to that which yet is mutable a repentance and a reformation that in time of triall failes being repented of and turned from upon which such persons sinke downe into a dreadfull apostacy from God and from the holy commandement delivered to them But at the day of Christs second appearance the works of righteousnes shall come forth with power and prevalency triumphing over sin in all for a season as well as in true beleevers but in these it shal be permanent and abiding The life of the immortall seed shall make them perfect in love and shall by the ministry of glory in Christs second comming be made manifest and visible to every eye The sun of it shall never set more This is that which we are commanded to wait for because it will surely come and not tary He that beleevs will not make hast but is taught with the hasband man to wait for this precious fruit of the earth and to have long patience till the latter rain be receaved as well as the former Now the receaving of the latter rain is not to be looked for in the course of good husbandry till the seed be in the earth and hath had its season there to corrupt chang its forme die and spring up with a new eare against the harvest Happy shall they be who endure to the end taking the prophets and other holy men that have gone before them for an example of long-suffering and patience having heard also of the exemplary patience of Job and seen the end of our Lord himself who passed this way to the crowne and warns all his true followers to expect the like The work of Eliah as hath bin shewed is to turne men from sin by repentance and to cause them to returne by faith to the living God enabling thē to performe their whole duty to him as by his law we are commanded Our blessed saviour Mat. 17.11 12. mentions two distinct commings of Eliah or two Eliahs One Eliah says he meaning Iohn Baptist is already come the other meaning that foreruning dispensation that is the beginning of the everlasting Gospel is that which commeth or shall come and it is to be waited for at the sounding of the seventh Trumpet The latter Elias is first mention'd by our saviour v. 11. that is to come and restore all things or be the preparatory messenger to that appearance and comming of our Lord that shall compleat the restitution of all things Act. 3.21 as he hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy Prophets since the world began Enoch before the flood Prophesied of this latter comming and appearance of Christ saying behold the Lord commeth with ten thousands of his Saincts Jude v. 14. So then these two commings of Eliah answer to the two commings of Christ the two dayes of the Son of man the early and later rain of his first and second appearance both of which make up that one third day above-mention'd that Hosea speaks of John Baptist in his ministry which was the first comming of Eliah was coursely enterteind by Herod who did to him what he would But there is another Elias to come though very much opposed by many who endeavour to confound Christs words in the fore-mentioned Scripture as if they were all to be understood of John Baptists Ministry only and did not assert or declare Eliahs second comming But the context makes it plain Eliah commeth or shall come and restore all things This our Lord said after they had done what they would to the first Eliah which he acknowledged was come already And both jews and Christians do understand Mal. 4 5 6. of Eliahs second comming in the end of the world immediatly before the great and dreadfull day of the Lords second comming For then the like universall corruption apostacy and violence yea greater and of a deeper die and malignity because contracted in times of greater light then that of the old world in Noahs dayes will certainly appear and stand in need of such a refining fire as the ministry of Eliahs second comming will be found to be in order to restore all things out of that desperate evill and forlorne estate And then shall those that fear the Lord tread downe the wicked as ashes under the soles of their feet Mal. 4.2 3. This is to be the work of Eliahs second comming but how and by what ministry shall it be wrought It will
the purity of his Ordinances amongst us a very small remnant a seed of hidden ones we had bin as Sodom in the height of sinning and bin made like unto Gomorrha in the extraordinarines of our punishment These are they that God accounts his jewels the people that are of price and value with him whatever reproach and disesteeme they are in from the world in all times These have that faith in the seed of it by which they are possest with an ability to do all things for the truth and nothing against it and this through Christ the power of God inwardly strengthening and bringing them forth into a likenes of ability with himself to do all things by his quickning of them as he himself hath done by the fathers quickning of him that they may live by him as he himself according to his manhood lives by the father who does in him all the works God hath now for neer these six thousand years kept these his jewels by him as a reserved hidden treasure that he resolvs in a fit season to bring to light and make a shew of openly in the sight of the whole world In the mean time he calls them into the secret chambers of his love and is encreasing their faith and patience under the great and various trialls wherein they are with God strangers and soiourners in and to the world and to the delights and comforts of it as all their fathers were This time of hardship and suffring from the world must not alwayes be their lot There is a day approaching wherein the time of their ill usage from the world shal be no longer God will have his season to shew kindnes and love to them and to do them honour in the sight of the whole creation a day in which his purpose and determined resolution is to make up his jewels and bring them all together from all parts where he hath kept them hid and concealed In this day he will spare them and shew favour to them as the father spares his owne son that serveth him and in serving pleaseth him And so visible a distinction in this day will God put in the way of the dispensations of his providences even to the eye of the world between them that serve him and them that serve him not between the righteous and the wicked that every eye shall take notice of it And it shall have such a powerfull effect upon the beholders that there shall come people the inhabitants of many cities yea the inhabitants of one city shall goe to another saying let us goe speedily and continually to pray before the Lord of hosts I will goe also Yea many people and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem and to pray before the Lord. Ten man shall take hold out of all languages of the nations on the skirt of him that is a jew saying we will goe with you for we have heard that God is with you The jews that they will thus take hold of wil be such as are so indeed having the faith that failes not but makes them the receavers of that anointing which teacheth all things and is truth and no lie By this heavenly anointing they are in their very principles distinguished I. From those whose faith is so far from being of the same precious kind with theirs that it is sure to faile in the most needfull time in the day of temptation and triall when the winds blow and the rain deseends and the floods come and beat upon them Such faith is of little or no price Secondly The true Jew by his faith and anointing wil be likewise distinguish'd from those that have no faith but are unreasonable persecutours of those that have being void of all right discerning in matters of faith These true Jews and Israelits indeed are as we have shewed the two families in Jacobs house children of the same Jacob but not by the same Rachel of whom were only Joseph and Benjamin This distinction in Jacobs family seems to be taken notice of by the holy Ghost Ezek. 37.16 where the twelve Tribes are compared to two sticks or stems springing out of the same root as two houses nations or families of the same Israel Upon the one stick the Prophet was commanded to write for Judah and for the children of Israel his companions to whom as we know the Kingdom and scepter was assigned and out of whom Christ according to the flesh came Upon the other stick there was to be written for Joseph the stick of Ephraim and for all the house of Israel his companions For the seperated one from his brethren the exalted one above his brethren the dreamer to whose sheafe all the other sheaves yea the sun moon and stars were to do obeysance To him in a word was assigned the first birthright in the double portion of it the upper and the nether springs the blessings of heaven above of the deep that lieth under of the breasts and of the womb the blessings of the father that have prevailed above the blessings of his progenitours in an extent to the utmost bounds of the everlasting hills that are appointed to be on the head of Ioseph and on the crowne of the head of him that was separate from his brethren These are the blessings written for Ioseph and for all the house of Israel his companiōs or of his faith spirit and principles Both these sticks the two houses or churches of beleevers and Israelits in deed are to be made up into one new Ierusalem in Christs hand Both flocks are to be gathered into one sheepfold and visible universall church-state of the revealed sons of God distinguished from all people on the face of the earth besides And they shal be gathered into one universall Kingdom and civil state that shall beare rule over the whole world For thus saith the Lord behold I will take the children of Israel the scattered sheep belonging to this fold from among the heathen whither they be gone and will gather them on every side and will bring them into their owne land even into the promised new Ierusalem state the new heavens and new earth wherein dwells righteousnes figured out by the land of Canaan And I will make them one nation or seed of my blessing in the land upon the mountains of Israel and one King shal be King to them all And though Iudah shall be there with his companions and Ioseph with his under distinct writings and enrollings assigning unto each their lot yet both shall make but one church and Kingdom one spirituall seed or nation of Abraham They shall no more be two so as to be divided into two Kingdoms either in church or state They shall neither envy nor vex one another any more They shall be fully agreed and live in peace as inhabitants of the same city the new Ierusalem uppet and lower as the hebrew word imports Ps 51. or heavenly and earthly consisting