impossible to him or had power above him And hence the Lord delights to set forth the praise of his Mercy and therefore when sin is most vile and hainous and hellish then doth he express his compassion in a most glorious manner it 's the glory of the Physitian when the Disease is most deadly then to do the Cure Isa. 43. 24 25. You have wearied 〈◊〉 with your iniquities and made me to serve with your sins behold I even I am be that blotteth out thy transgressions for my name sake q. d. None but a God of endless Mercy could do it therefore behold it acknowledg it I will blot out your iniquities and remember your sins no more This is the dispute of the Apostle Rom. 5. last having said that our Justification Reconciliation and Life comes by Grace he ads why then serves the Law he answers That sin might abound that sin might be encreased and become more and more hainous because against an express Law but where sin abounded grace abounded much more the Lord gave as it were sin all advantages to do its utmost and yet then Grace would abound so much the more in conquering and raigning over sin And therefore it 's certain if all sins in the world that against the Holy Ghost excepted should meet in one Soul as Waters in the Sea the Mercy of the Lord would abound much more 〈◊〉 those sins did abound The Merits of our Savior Christ are of an 〈◊〉 satisfying vertue and exceed the venom of the guilt of all sins Rom 5. 18. So Paul constantly disputes If by the offence of one sin entred unto 〈◊〉 much more by the death and obedience of our Savior Righteousness entred unto eternal Life And therefore it was that our Savior was pleased to receive our Nature even from the vilest of sinners that he might shew himself a Savior from all sins Matth. 1. Hence also his blood is called a fountain set open for Judah and Israel to wash in for sin and for uncleanness Zach. 13. 1. i. e. For all kind of sinners and all sorts of sins So that were thy heart a Sink a Sodom a Hell of wickedness if the water of this Fountain might pass through and be applied it would clense all For our Savior 〈◊〉 the infinite wrath of his Father which was due for our sins more he needed not nay should not nay could not have suffered if he died for a thousand worlds of his Elect if they had come from the Loyns of our first Parents And I do beleeve there is vertue enough there to pardon the sin against the Holy Ghost if it were applied but because it was committed against the work of the Spirit so directly it is not just he should and there is no other that will for the Spirit works from the Father to the Son and therefore last of all so that they both have put forth their works before and if therefore his be wronged he will not apply and there is none else that can if the Work of the Father be wronged Christ may intercede if he be blasphemed the Spirit may apply but if he be despighted there is none left that will or can Because the power of the 〈◊〉 is such that he can conquer and overcome all which with his own Honor he can attempt to remove as all but that which is committed immediately against his Operation he wil and doth this is the ground of overcoming which the Apostle gives 1 John 4. 4. You have over come the world because greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world That also which Paul propounds for the clensing of the most loathsom puddles 1 Cor. 6. 11. But ye are washed but ye are sanctified in the Name of Jesus and by the Spirit of our God for that Spirit is above all unclean Spirits and therefore when he will come and work upon the soul and clense it from all its corruptions Sin and the World and the Devil and all give way they cannot hinder his work So that if the Mercy of God be infinite able to forgive all the Merits of Christ of infinite Vertue able to satisfie for all and the Spirit of infinite power to conquer all then the worst of sinners may become broken hearted sinners when the Lord will please to look upon them We have here matter of Admiration to see and stand amazed at the riches of Gods mercy and grace which succors the most desperate sinners relieves at the hardest streights saves even from the nethermost Hell It 's the Collection the Prophet makes from the ground formerly mentioned Mich. 7. 18. Who is a God like unto thee that par donest iniquity and passest by the transgression of the remnant of thine heritage because mercy pleaseth him He intends pardon to such who have nothing that can purchase it do nothing that can deserve it nay practice nothing which is in any manner pleasing which might perswade him to it yea when he is displeased with all things but his own mercy and indeed can be pleased with nothing else when they dishonor his Name wrong his Justice reject his Commands and grieve his Spirit every thing provoketh him yet because his mercy pleaseth him therefore he doth good against evil therefore he overcomes all their evil in goodness Yea When sinners out of their impenitency and malignant enmity of their Spirits would destroy themselves and his mercy also and cast away his compassions his mercy is pleased to honor it self and to save them who is a God like this God and what mercy like this mercy He is not like the Idols of the Heathens even themselvs being witnesses for the followers favorites of Idol Gods who 〈◊〉 upon them in time of prosperity and devote themselves to their Worship yet in the day of distresse their Idols leave them in the lirch and they are forced to look to the Lord for relief Jer. 2. 27. In the time of their trouble they will say Arise and save us But the hope of Israel is not like them when the Disease is most deadly he then cures the condition of the sinner most desperate he then delivers out of the jaws of Satan and botom of Hell he then rescues It s the Prerogative he takes to himself Thy destruction O Israel is of thy self but in me is thy help Hos. 13. 9. It 's that praise which the Saints give as the proper due of the Lord Psal. 103. Praise the Lord O my soul who forgiveth all thy sins and healeth all thy diseases and Jonah leaves this Cure upon Record after he was landed by the 〈◊〉 Jonah 2. 6. Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption O Lord my God and verse 9. Salvation is of the Lord. Here is a ground of Encouragement to sustain the hearts of such forlorn Creatures as are sunk down in desperate discouragement as past help and hope to provoke them yet to seek out
will 92 It discovers two dangerous mistakes about the work of Application  1 When a man catcheth at the general offer of mercy and Christ without getting a special title thereunto  2 When a man takes hold of Christ from self-love for self-ends 93 See the folly and madness of men who are unwilling to be made happy  See the Justice of God in the destruction of such as will not have Christ.  〈◊〉 The manner and Order how this 〈◊〉 good made ours  The soul for whom Christ hath purchased  1 Is made capable of it  2 Hath a right unto it 〈◊〉 3 Is estated in it 〈◊〉 4 Hath liberty to use all as it 's own  Uses five hence  Admiration at the riches and freeness of Gods grace in Christ. 95 He works that in all his which he requires of them  2 Humiliation in the sight of our own vileness 〈◊〉 unworthiness 〈◊〉 3 Encouragement 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the hearts of the 〈◊〉 sinners sinking under 〈◊〉 apprehension of their own  1 〈◊〉 not able to reach this work  2 Crossness to it and 〈◊〉 against it  4 Direction shewing the 〈◊〉 way how to set 〈◊〉 the work of Application  1 Look at Christ first all our good being laid up 〈◊〉 him  2 Look at all Graces either as leading to Christ 〈◊〉 coming from him  3 When we would have our Graces acted 〈◊〉 to them but to Christ as the Author and 〈◊〉 of all 〈◊〉 5 Exhortation to the Faithful  1 Make sure keep sure your Evidences for Christ.  2 Challenge and make use of all the good things 〈◊〉 Christ.  3 Grow rich upon the revenues of the Gospel  III. The Causes of Application 〈◊〉 1 The Principal Cause is 〈◊〉 himself  1 The 〈◊〉 is satisfied by Christ.  2 Christ as Mediator and Head of the 〈◊〉 Where that of Christ from whence 〈◊〉 issues is the Resurrection of Christ 〈◊〉 Use Hence distressed sinners should look to the 〈◊〉 surrection of Christ.  3. The Spirit sent from the Father and the 〈◊〉 make this Application  2 That Power by which the Spirit works in 〈◊〉 tion is an Almighty power 〈◊〉  Rea on s two 〈◊〉 Because  1 Of that Hellish opposition in us against it  2 That good that is to be communicated is a 〈◊〉 natural good  The Instrumental Causes are those means which the Lord is pleased to appoint and 〈◊〉 viz. The Word in the Ministry of it 133 1 The Power resideth in Christ and his 〈◊〉  2 From thence it is in the Word  3 From thence to the Administration thereof by the 〈◊〉  〈◊〉 four hence  Information  1 The Work of Application is not wrought by moral 〈◊〉  2 It is 〈◊〉 136 Tryal whether we have found the impression of Gods Power by the means  Support unto sinners sinking in the thoughts of  1 The 〈◊〉 between this work and them  2 Their opposition against it  Exhortation to attend upon God in his own means 138 1 Slight not any but try every Ordinance  2 Fear 〈◊〉 we should fall short of Gods Power in an 〈◊〉  3 When the Lord works by an Ordinance take heed of withdrawing our 〈◊〉 from under his working power  BOOK III. On Luke 1. 17. To make ready a People 〈◊〉 for the Lord. DOCT. 1. The soul must be fitted for Christ before 〈◊〉 can receive him 144 1 What this Preparation is in four things  1 Arenouncing the Authority of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2 Of our own abilities 〈◊〉 3 Of our own worthiness 〈◊〉 4 A readiness to side with Christ 〈◊〉 2 The manner of this 〈◊〉  1 The soul is passive herein  2 It 's an act of the Spirit dispossessing sin  3 This being done Faith certainly follows  4 The soul prepared yields wholly to Christ 〈◊〉 Reasons why there must be such a Preparation 〈◊〉 taken from  1 The testimony of several Scriptures  2 Else the soul should be implanted into Christ 〈◊〉 it is in a state of Nature  3 The soul must be cut off from the root of old Adam before it can be 〈◊〉 into Christ the 〈◊〉 Adam  Uses five hence 〈◊〉 1 Instruction Christ cannot be united to the soul 〈◊〉 in its 〈◊〉 For  1 Such a one cannot receive the Spirit  2 He is in the state of Cendemnation  3 He doth oppose Christ.  4 He is under the Covenant of Works  5 He is under the Power of Sin  2 It discovers the folly of carnal men who conceit they may have Christ without any preparation for him 3 Tryal whether we have come to Christ in the right way 166 The difference between restraining and preparing Grace 166 Gods ends in restraining men  1 To shew his Dominion over the worst of men  2 To provide for the Societies of men  3 That he may put his Servants to a narrower search  Gods end in preparing Grace is That he may implant the soul into Christ.  This 〈◊〉 Evidence against four sorts  1 Such as 〈◊〉 this Work as 170 1 〈◊〉 secure sinners  2 Presumptuous Atheists  2 Such as come to Christ and yet renounce 〈◊〉 their corruptions  3 Such as come to Christ and renounce not their own abilities  4 Such as renounce not their own worthiness  4 Encouragement to distressed 〈◊〉 such are in way of preparation therefore in way to Christ.  5 Exhortation to prepare for Christ  1 Consider how sinful and miserable we are 〈◊〉 must prepare 200 2 Who it is we must prepare for  Here consider  1 The worthiness of Christs person  2 The good he brings with him  3 He beseeches you to receive him  DOCT. 2. A plain and powerful Ministry is the ordinary means to prepare the heart for Christ. 20 1 Plain in  Words Matter 2 Powerful as delivered with  1 Evidence of Reason 212 2 Zealous 〈◊〉 213 Reasons two 〈◊〉  1 Such a Ministry discovers the secrets of sin  2 It over-powers Corruption and sets an awe upon the spirits of men  Uses three hence 216 1 〈◊〉 may see the reason of the little success they find viz. Want of plain and powerful preaching  2 See the fearful estate of such as have lived long under such a Ministry and yet not prepared for Christ.  3 Exhortation Attend upon the Word that the end of it may be attained viz. Preparation for Christ.  BOOK IV. On 2 Cor. 6. 2. In an acceptable time have I heard thee in the day of Salvation have I succored thee 221 DOCT. 1. The VVork of God is altogether free  1 In appointing  2 In revealing  3 In blessing the Means 229 Reasons three Because  1 〈◊〉 we have can purchase it  2 Nothing we can do can
will a Spiritual good without a spiritual power  3 The corruption of the will utterly indisposeth it to receive a spiritual power  4 Though no force is offered to the faculty of the will yet the corruption of the will must be removed by a holy violence that so it may 〈◊〉 a spiritual power and so put forth a spiritual act 377 Reasons of this are four Because  1 The corruption of the will will not go away of it self  2 The Spirit of Grace that works upon the soul drives out corruption as its contrary  3 By Converting Grace the Dominion of sin is subdued The unwilling will is made a willing will The true meaning of that 388 4 By it also Satan is cast out of the soul he will not go away by intreaty  5 How the plucking of the soul from sin and drawing it to Christ is accomplished 〈◊〉 1 Satans Commission is now called in by Christ.  2 Satans right and claim to the soul is taken from him  3 He is also put out of that possession he had in the soul.  4 The soul is now acted no longer by sin and Satan as formerly but the bent of the heart is under the hand of the Spirit  6 Why this work of Attraction is ascribed to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 1 This work is common to all the three Persons  2 Yet it 's chiefly attributed to the Father  Reasons two Because  1 The manifestation of his displeasure is most suitable here to drive the sinner from his sins to Christ.  2 The Father hath sent Christ that is  1 He hath appointed him to  2 Fitted him for And  3 Accepted him in the work of Redemption  Uses three hence  1 Instruction in six Particulars 408 1 Conversion proceeds from God as the alone cause of it For  1 It is not in him that wills or runs but in God that shews mercy  2 Grace gives power to act 〈◊〉 must 〈◊〉 before any concurring act  3 As in Natural Generation and Corruption of the soul from Adam it 's wholly passive so in Regeneration  2 Conversion depends not upon is not resolved into the Liberty of mans Will  For if it did then 412 1 A man made himself to differ  2 The will of man is 〈◊〉 above the Grace of God  3 God should be deprived of the praise of his mercy  3 Conversion depends not upon nor issues not from the congruity of means  For  1 Then it might lastly be resolved into a Natural cause  2 Some that have been suited with most means have continued most opposite  3 All means in themselves are unable to draw the sinner to Christ.  4 The power of Grace in Conversion is irresistable i. e. it takes away the power of 〈◊〉 so as it shall 〈◊〉 frustrate the Grace of God  5 When there is 〈◊〉 there is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Grace Because 427  1 When there is sufficiency of Grace there are all the Causes working  2 There also the power of resistance is removed  6 All men have not sufficient help of preventing Grace 〈◊〉 1 Sense and Experience give evidence of it  2 None come to Christ but whom the 〈◊〉 draws  3 All are not given to Christ.  2 Consolation 435 1 To support the hearts of unconverted 〈◊〉 against the  1 Temptations of Satan  2 Snares of the world  3 Corruptions of their hearts  2 To the Faithful who have found this 〈◊〉 God will go on in it  3 Exhortation 〈◊〉 1 To the Converted Labor to draw others from their sins to Christ.  1 Do what you can your self  2 Bring them to Christ in the use of means  2 To the 〈◊〉 Come and lie under 〈◊〉 drawing hand  1 Present thy self before God in the use of means  2 Leave not the Ordinances till you find 〈◊〉 Power of God therein  The Names of several Books Printed by Peter Cole in 〈◊〉 London and are to be sold at his Shop at the sign of the Printing-press in Cornhil neer the Exchange Eight several Books by Nich. Culpeper Gent. 〈◊〉 in Physick and Astrologie 1 The Practice of 〈◊〉 containing seventeen several Books Wherein is plainly set forth The Nature Cause 〈◊〉 and Several Sorts of Signs Together with the Cure of all Diseases in the Body of Man Being chiefly a 〈◊〉 of The works of that Learned and Renowned Doctor Lazarus Riverius Now living 〈◊〉 and Physitian to the 〈◊〉 King of France Above sifteen 〈◊〉 of the said Books in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 been Sold in a very 〈◊〉 Yeers 〈◊〉 been eight times printed though all 〈◊〉 former Impressions wanted the 〈◊〉 Causes Signs and Differences of 〈◊〉 Diseases and had only the 〈◊〉 for the Cure of them as plainly 〈◊〉 by the Authors Epistle 2 The Anatomy of the Body 〈◊〉 Man 〈◊〉 is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the several 〈◊〉 of the Body of Man 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 very many 〈◊〉 Brass Plates than 〈◊〉 was in English before 3 A 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by the 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 of London Whereunto is 〈◊〉 The Key to Galen's Method of 〈◊〉 4 The English 〈◊〉 Enlarged 〈◊〉 an 〈◊〉 Discourse 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 Herbs of this Nation herein is 〈◊〉 how to 〈◊〉 a mans 〈◊〉 of most Diseases 〈◊〉 to Mans 〈◊〉 with such things as grow in 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 three 〈◊〉 charge 〈◊〉 in the 〈◊〉 Book is 〈◊〉 1 The 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 all Herbs 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The 〈◊〉 of drying and 〈◊〉 them and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 3 The way of making 〈◊〉 keeping 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of useful 〈◊〉 made of those Herbs The way 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 according 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 and Mixture of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the part of the Body 〈◊〉 5 A Directory for Midwives or a Guide for 〈◊〉 Newly enlarged by 〈◊〉 Author in every sheet and 〈◊〉 with divers 〈◊〉 Plates 6 Galen's Art of Physick with a large Comment 7 A New 〈◊〉 both of studying 〈◊〉 practising Physick 8 A Treatise of the Rickets being a 〈◊〉 common to Children 〈◊〉 is 〈◊〉 1 The Essence 2 The 〈◊〉 3 The Signs 4 The 〈◊〉 of the 〈◊〉 Published in Latin by Dr. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Bate and Dr. 〈◊〉 translated into English And 〈◊〉 by N. Culpeper A Godly and Fruitful Exposition on the first Epistle of Peter By Mr. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Minister of the Word of God at Dedham in Essex The Wonders of the Load-stone 〈◊〉 Samuel 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 An Exposition on the Gospel of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 St. 〈◊〉 By 〈◊〉 Ward Clows Chyrurgery 〈◊〉 of Salvation 〈◊〉 Engagement for the 〈◊〉 by John Goodwin Great Church Ordinance of 〈◊〉 Mr. Love's Case 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Petitions Narrative and Speech 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a perswasive to peace 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Saints submission and Satans Overthrow 〈◊〉 Mans Practice in 〈◊〉 Time Mr. Symsons Sermon at Westminster Mr. Feaks Sermon before the Lord Major Mr. 〈◊〉 Treatise of Hell of Christs Genealogy Eaton
so catcheth at it meerly out of their own 〈◊〉 This 〈◊〉 false Application and this I take to be the cause of the blind presumption of the unwelcome guest Mat. 22. 12. Friend how camest thou in hither not 〈◊〉 thy Wedding Garment He heard of the 〈◊〉 provided and that the Lord kept open doors and therefore he adventured to croud in amongst the company therefore our Savior challengeth him How camest thou in If Coming here was 〈◊〉 why should he be blamed whether was not the wound therefore in a disorderly manner of beleeving and coming He came in his own strength and did not look to Christ to give him a heart to beleeve it answers not the guise and wear at this Wedding which is that the Lord must as well guide us in our coming and order that as well as order the dainties he prepares and 〈◊〉 us unto The Second Ground of mistake in our Application When out of common illumination set up in the mind terror and astonishment let in upon the 〈◊〉 together with notice and conviction it 's only in Christ that must and can do us good Out of these common insightnings and legal terrors the soul is stirred out of a natural 〈◊〉 to procure it's own safety to catch at that comfort and supply whereby it may succor and releeve it self out of these pressures which are too heavy for it Now as long as those fears and the noyse of those direful threatnings of the Lord continue in the view of the soul and as long as it doth not discern its own falsness in this imagined and self-deceiving application out of self love to self ends all that while in a blind kind of boldness it may pretend to hang upon Christ and free mercy But when either the legal stroke ceaseth that he feels not a need of the balsom or that he fails of his end and this groundles application which is nothing els but a presumption fails then al this work falls to the ground and his hopes and heart fails him and all he will then say I applyed mercy to my 〈◊〉 but God never did I catcht at a promise and Christ but God never gave him to me And this is the cause why thousands 〈◊〉 short when it comes to a dead lift their conversion the promises and mercy they have laid hold upon come to nothing the truth is they took a Christ but God never applyed him to them O Application is a wonderful work Thus Esau who despised the birthright and blessing indeed yet out of self love for self ends he seeks the blessing with tears but not with a faith of Application a faith of Gods operation For the root of faith is in the Lord Christ issuing from the work of his spirit and therefore he must apply himself to us before we can apply him to our own hearts As the beams of the Sun must come down to the waters before it can draw up the water in clouds and vapors So here The Root of this Application being in Christ when we cannot keep our selves yet he keeps us by the power of God through Faith unto Salvation he keeps us and keeps our faith I have prayed said Christ to Peter that thy faith fail not he keeps us to a Kingdom and keeps a Kingdom for us he puts us into possession and none can put us out Hence we may observe the madness of the 〈◊〉 hearts of men which transports them beyond all the bounds of reason carries them against the Principles of Nature and common Sense which makes them not only miserable but unwilling to be made happy Was there ever any sick man that was not content to be healed and any in prison and pressures that was not willing to be delivered any helpless that was not desirous to be eased and succored by another yet this is the hellish and unreasonable venom of a distempered and sinful heart that loves its poyson delights in its bolts and prison destitute of all Spiritual good hath neither hope nor help in its self to get or receive any can do no good for it self and yet is unwilling that God should do any good fot it or make it capable of receiving any famish they do and would not have meat provided that might sustein them perish they do and yet would not have the power of the Word work kindly and effectually upon them for their safety and deliverance it 's not a sickness only but a Spiritual madness if men carry themselves so when they are sick we say it is a Frenzy thus Isay 30. 10 11. They say to the Seers see not to the Prophets prophesie not 〈◊〉 not counsel not but cause the holy one of Israel to cease from us This is the temper of every Natural man in this world This serves to justifie the equal and righteous proceedings of the Lord in the utter 〈◊〉 and destruction of the ungodly and the Enemies of his Grace at the great day of Judgment when they shall be full of their 〈◊〉 and full of their plagues cast out of the presence of the Lord or the least expression of any gracious 〈◊〉 attribute of God nor bounty to pity them nor patience to bear with them but they lie under the power of their sins and the infinite displeasure of the Almighty This is that will stop all mouths and answer all cavils they have no more but what they would have they want nothing but what they were weary of You would be proud and stubborn and rebellious and you shall be so you shall have your belly full of your abominations and now you have your wills you were weary of the Word that would reveal your sins convince your consciences subdue your corruptions the truth was your only trouble you were troubled with Counsels Reproofs 〈◊〉 Ministers that you could not have your full swing in your sins God will ease you of that trouble you shall never see the face of a Saint that may counsel you never hear the voyce of a Minister to reprove you never have the Word to work upon you you have said to the Almighty 〈◊〉 away from us we desire not the knowledg of thy 〈◊〉 now you have your desires They that 〈◊〉 me love death Prov. 8. last you have what you loved you could not help your selves you say but you would not have the Lord make you capable of any help Thus every mouth is stopped and the Lord justified out of the Consciences and Confessions of the wicked themselves 2 How this good is made ours For the manner and order of putting us into 〈◊〉 of all this good it will appear in Four Particulars The Soul is made capable of all that Spiritual good and those Precious blessings which 〈◊〉 to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is and must be first room made for the 〈◊〉 of these or els there is no Possibilitie to 〈◊〉 of these a man cannot be in heaven and hell at 〈◊〉 happy and miserable at
〈◊〉 Power of God in the conversion of a 〈◊〉 is far more secret and Spiritual such as we are 〈◊〉 able to reach It is the prayer of the Apostle for the Ephesians Chap. 1. 17 18. that they might know the working of his mighty Power in working Faith it is the most mysterious of all the works of God it shakes the 〈◊〉 of the ablest Divines upon Earth Comfort to releeve the hearts of sinners against desperate discouragements when the floods of iniquity 〈◊〉 in amain upon the soul the sinner looks to his 〈◊〉 to Gods Ordinances and Providences and 〈◊〉 the Work of God that should be wrought in him and 〈◊〉 what ods and disproportion there is between his Soul and that blessed Work that should be in him why truly this is the only help to a soul in such a case with man it is impossible but not with God for with him all things are possible Matth. 19. 26. Though there be such a vast disproportion between thy own ability and this Work that thou shouldest never attain 〈◊〉 if thou wert left to thy self yet know that Christ by the Almighty Power of his Spirit is able to do it for thee But the soul will say the truth is there is not so much disproportion but there is as much opposition in my soul to the work of Grace why should God ever give me that mercy which I would not have and that Grace which my soul hath so much opposed this is another depth Why yet know thou that Gol can overwork all these and will do so for thee if thou seek unto him But know this to thy ever lasting terror That if thou do 〈◊〉 thus in the hardness and opposition of thy heart against Christ and his Grace that this Power of the Lord that would convert thee will put forth it self to confound thee to thine eternal ruine Exhortation Not to defer the time 〈◊〉 Grace but every soul of us with trembling hearts to attend upon the Lord in the use of means that he may be pleased to work his own good Work in us It 's that the Apostle exhorts unto Phil. 2. 12. Workout your 〈◊〉 with fear and trembling and he gives the reason of it For saies he it's God that worketh in you to 〈◊〉 and to do of his own good pleasure that is it is in Gods hand to help us or to forsake us either 〈◊〉 make the means effectual for our saving good or else to withdraw his presence and blessing from them while we do enjoy them 〈◊〉 Be 〈◊〉 fearful not to slight any Ordinance God hath appointed as Naamans 〈◊〉 said to him Go and try it he that now counsels you to it may bless it and work by it if it please him Secondly Tremblingly fear to fall short of Gods Power in an Ordinance for a man may fall short of God and Christ and Grace and all good even while he doth enjoy the Ordinances of God and live under them therefore say as Elisha did Where is the Lord God of Eliah Here is the Word and here is the Ordinance but where is the Lord God of this Word the God of Preaching and Praying It is not in the Minister or the means to do good to my soul but Lord speak thou the word and it shall work upon my soul as he said 2 Kings 4. 29 30. As the Lord lives 〈◊〉 will not leave thee till thou go with me do thou so when the Lord gives thee means say I will not leave the Lord until he make this Counsel this Word this Ordinance effectual for my saving good Be also tremblingly fearful when the Lord works by any Ordinance lest you should go out from or with draw your self from the power of it when you find and feel somthing more than Man and Means and Ordinances Oh let it not slip away the Lord was in that word do not suffer that stroke to go away because God is there now the Lord is working be you sure to follow the blow and give not over wrastiing 〈◊〉 striving with the Lord until he bless you with the 〈◊〉 working of his Word and Spirit and so apply unto thy soul all Spiritual Good in Jesus Christ. BOOK III. LUK. 1. 17. To make ready a People prepared for the Lord. HAving dispatched the Nature of Application in the General The Parts thereof come to be Considered in the next place These are Two 1 A Preparation of the Soul for Christ. 2 An Implantation of the Soul into Christ. That so having the Son we may be sure to have life 1 Joh. 5. 12. possessing him who is the heir of all we may be possessed of all both Temporal and Spiritual Blessings with him But before the Soul can be engrafted into the true Vine Christ Jesus it must be prepared and fitted thereunto by the powerful work of the Spirit of God upon it being not fit to receive a Christ by Nature and unable to fit its self thereunto by any liberty of Will or any sufficiency natural it hath When then these Two Works are imprinted upon the Soul the Sinner comes to take full possession of a Savior and to have all those Spiritual good things which Christ hath Purchased applyed unto him And thus these Two taking up the whole Nature of Application it 's manifest they must be the Parts of Application as reason inforceth The First is thus Described Preparation is a fitting of a sinner for his Being in Christ. The words of the Text will afford us full ground for the Handling and Discovering of this Truth To prepare a People fitted for the Lord Which words make known the main Task that was imposed upon John the Baptist and that great Work of his Ministery being the Forerunner of our Savior Christ wherewith he was betrusted and for which he was every way fitted with Gifts and Graces proportionable Therefore it s said in the beginning of the Verse He shall come in the Spirit and Power of Elias i. e. He shall have that large measure of gracious and Ministerial Gifts that special presence and assistance of the Spirit of the Lord accompanying of him as somtimes Elias had that so in the corrupt and declining state of the Church which was now exceeding great he might set things in a better frame build up the Breaches made taking off those Dissentions Errors and Divisions which had spread over the Body and eaten into the Bowels of the Church of the Jews like a Gangrene or Cancer And therefore as it was foretold of him so it was performed by him Matth. 17. 11. He did restore all things Namely such was the lively and over-ruling power of his Ministery that he wrought the Hearts of the Children otherwise 〈◊〉 and rebellious to the wisdom of the just men that laying aside all carnal wisdom of the 〈◊〉 which was enmity against God and caused 〈◊〉 and strifes among men they came to judge 〈◊〉 of things that were excellent to
painfully in doing our Duty and let the Lord do what is Good in his own eyes Evident therefore it is That the Aim of the words carries us directly unto the first work of God upon the Soul 〈◊〉 the Prophet Isaiah expresseth in Isaiah 49. 5. 6. 8. That is the acceptable time wherein Jacob must be brought back again to God Undeniable also it is That this work of Preparation as the out-Porch and Entrance which makes way to all the rest is here pointed out Particularly by the Apostle when he entreats them to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 VVord 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifying the entrance and admittance 〈◊〉 the Lord when in the power of his Ordinances he stands and knocks at the door of the heart which is then done when the Lord begins to lay hold upon the soul and to grapple witn the sinner in awakening and wounding his 〈◊〉 for his 〈◊〉 And lastly beyond all Question 〈◊〉 49 9. 〈◊〉 thou maiest 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Go forth The Scope then of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our intended 〈◊〉 Search we then in the Second Place the Sense of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so those divine Truths which are there contained may be Collected by us Time The word in the Original imports Season or Opportunity which is not so much the continuance of days or months or yeers as the Concurrence and meeting together of 〈◊〉 conveniences which may be 〈◊〉 to any work whereof more anon when we handle the Point hence Collected 〈◊〉 Some Difference there is between the Apostle and the Prophet Isaiah from whom this Testimony 〈◊〉 taken but all return to one Sense The 〈◊〉 in the Old Testament refers it to the VVork 〈◊〉 God the time of his acceptation or good VVill The Apostle in the New Testament applys it to the Time A Time accepted Yet so as the work of God is 〈◊〉 and comprehended under it In the 〈◊〉 then it intimates Three Things 1 The time that is appointed 2 The VVork of Grace put 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for the Conversion of any soul 3 The 〈◊〉 of all it depends upon Gods pleasure when he sees fit to accomplish the Decree of his Election to Convert a sinner effectually to himself and out of his free good will to take him into his 〈◊〉 by calling him out of the world to the knowledge of 〈◊〉 and his saving Grace in Christ. Day of Salvation For the more full understanding of the Reason of the first word Day we may enquire the nature and rise of it In the beginning when the Lord made All and amongst the rest the living Creatures he furnished them with powers and abilities for the performance of their work he seated and set every one of them in his proper place as upon a stage for the acting of his part He set also bounds and laid forth several periods and distances of time for each purpose Now the Distinctions of time i. e. the separation of Light and Darkness made so many stops as it were in some or which there must be stayed Thus in Creating every Particular that is added The Evening and the Morning were the first and second Day c. They had their Day of Creation and their Day of Operation so long as they continue that is their Day for the Day and Night are the Distinction of all this Time here below and serve as so many stops and stayes in which each thing is stinted for its being and VVorking And hence it may be it is There is no Day nor Night in Heaven Rev. 10. 6. neither shall there be any more Time there that is Distinction or Measure of Time by Day or Night after the last Judgement for that must needs be the meaning of the Text because in Heaven and Hell the state of things and so their times are unchangable Hence to man His day is his life 〈◊〉 long as he breaths in the 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 this Sun that 's the Time allotted to him to act his part in to trade for his everlasting State and Condition Hence again to descend yet lower there is a special period a stinted time for every part of this life and so many courses as I may term them and srames of occasions which belong to any so many seasons and several limits of time hath he allotted to each particular Thus the wise man There is a time to gather and a time to scatter a time to plant and a time to pluck up Eccles. 3. 1. And these 〈◊〉 are called Days in Scripture Thus there are Troubles and Tryals Visitation and Grace which the Lord in the dispensation of his Providence allots to men and there is a day for each of these A day of trouble Psal. 50. 15. A day of Tryal Heb. 3. 8. A day of Visitation Luke 19. 42. and a day of Salvation in this sense as here in the Text. Salvation Presumes alwayes danger and evil and according to the quality and nature of the one the other is to be considered and conceived here it is spiritually to be understood in the sul sense of it to wit from the danger of sin here begun in Preparation perfected in Glorification after this life And that Speech by way of Similitude seems well to interpret this manner of Speech Heb. 3. 9. The day of temptation when your Fathers tempted me i. e. that moment of time when that rebellion was expressed so here That moment or instant wherein the Lord begins to put forth the work of his special Grace about the Salvation of a sinner by the means he hath in mercy appointed And thus the Apostle expounds the word in the Verse following Behold now is the day of Salvation he saw it they could not but perceive it and all might acknowledg 〈◊〉 much because the Word of Salvation Acts 36. 26. viz. The Grace of God that is The Gospel given by grace 〈◊〉 bringeth salvation did now appear tit 2. 〈◊〉 So that it may be truly affirmed in a savory sense This day is Salvation coming to such to whom the word of the Gospel is come in the Ministery therof The Words thus Opened The Collections which are of special weight and Consideration are Four Faithful Ministers ought to be earnest in calling upon God and faithful 〈◊〉 the improvement of means for the spiritual good of such to whom they are sent This is taken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Text How shall God 〈◊〉 unless they Call How shall God Help unless they Endeavor They who are thus 〈◊〉 according to Gods Command they may expect a 〈◊〉 success according to Gods Promise He 〈◊〉 I will Hear I will Help Therefore their Prayers shall be Answered their Labors Blessed for God will not falsifie his Word nor 〈◊〉 of his 〈◊〉 It s in the meer good pleasure of the Lord to work upon the heart in the Ministery of the Word when he sees fit It 's in the day of Gods acceptation and good Will that the Prayers of Faithful Ministers are heard and their Pains made 〈◊〉 for the Spiritual
Matth. 11. 25 26. The issue then is If it proceed from Gods free pleasure that Means are 〈◊〉 revealed blessed then is there a full freedom 〈◊〉 all and it must be so for these Reasons There is nothing man hath that can Purchase this Simon Magus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and its probable enough 〈◊〉 would nor have stuck at the price had the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 never so great Acts 8. 18 19. And when 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that the Holy Ghost was given through 〈◊〉 on of hands be offered them ' Money to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that 〈◊〉 But the Apostle Peter 〈◊〉 with 〈◊〉 Thy Money 〈◊〉 with thee 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 thou hast thought that the Gift of God may 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Money 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 think such a thing impossible 〈◊〉 for ever 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it Purchases are made by such things as carry some kind of proportionable worth to that which is to be Purchased But there is nothing that can be compared with wisdom and the Spirituall Grace in Christ Prov 3. 15. Much less can be accounted of an answerable Rate and value thereunto There is nothing a man can do of himself whereby he may procure and obtain this spiritual good Rom. 9. 16. It is not in him that Wills nor in him that Runs It is not said in him that goes carelesly about the work but it is not in him that improves the best of his abilitie and that with speed though he 〈◊〉 in this race but it is in God only that shews 〈◊〉 If thou shouldest mark O Lord what is done a miss who should abide it Psal. 103. 3. The best are so far from obtaining favor by any desert of their doings that it is well with them they are not consumed by his displeasure for the failing of their best actions There is no Promise made to any Natural man whereby he can challenge this at the hands of the Lord All men by nature are children of 〈◊〉 Eph. 2. 3. Heirs of perdition if they have their own place its Hell if they have no more but their own Portion Confusion and eternal 〈◊〉 is that they must look for if they have the fruit of their own tree the wayes of their own work it s nothing but wo and misery 〈◊〉 3. 11. All Promises are Yea and Amen in Christ 2 Cor. 1. 20. made and performed in him alone they that are out of Christ therefore what they have besides Hell is 〈◊〉 Mercy The Sum then is It man by nature have nothing to Purchase any Spiritual good can do nothing to deserve it have no Promise to challenge it it is freely out of Gods good pleasure that any 〈◊〉 of any share therein Here then is matter of Thanksgiving to all the 〈◊〉 of God who have been made partakers of so 〈◊〉 favor to wit Their 〈◊〉 should be filled with his praise and their 〈◊〉 with a 〈◊〉 admiration of this so 〈◊〉 a mercy so much undeserved and so 〈◊〉 bestowed notwithstanding The greater and more free the goodness of the Lord is the greater should our 〈◊〉 be in the receiving of it This made the Prophet stand amazed Who is a God like unto thee Micah 7. 18. Men will see somthing in us to move them and expect some good from us to perswade them to shew favor but who is like unto our God who shews mercy not because we can deserve it or have any right to challenge it not because we can please him but because mercy pleaseth him and he doth it only because he VVill now his VVill be done and blessed he his glorious Name for ever Go thy way then in secret thou that hast found this acceptation from the Lord in sincerity of Soul present thy self as in his presence and say Good Lord Why is it How comes it That since many that have lived 〈◊〉 the same Place dwelt in the same Family sare in the same Seat and heard the same Word are yet in the Gall of Bitterness in the Bonds of Iniquity yet in the Kingdom of Darkness under the Power of their Sins and like to perish for them for ever Lord Lord VVhy are mine eyes enlightned to know the things belonging to my peace VVhy my heart touched with any saving remorse for my Sins That I should have any desires after thee any longings for thee Oh its Grace it s thy Free Grace Otherwise I had never been made partaker of any Spiritual good nay I had never known it Father VVhat am I that thou shouldest be thus mindful of me that thou shouldest thus remember me yea mindful of me when I was not mindful of my self remembrest me when I had forgotten thy glory my own soul and mine own everlasting good Was not I as blind as ever any and knew not as careless as ever any and respected not yea stubborn and stout hearted gainsaid I not yea rejected thy compassions so often tendered in the Ministery of the Word and forced upon me by those heart-breaking Exhortations of thy faithful Ministers to reveal these Spiritual good things when out of negligence I did not know them yea then to press them upon my Conscience and by the effectual work of thy Spirit then to prevail with my heart when at first I did oppose and cast them behind my back let me for ever return all praise to thy Majesty out of whose free mercy it is that I have been made partaker of any saving work for the good of my Soul Yea I thank thee Father Lord of Heaven and Earth that thou hast revealed these things to babes and sucklings and bid them from the wise and prudent That the Learned of the world are befooled and thou hast taught me a poor ignorant silly wretch That many noble and honorable are cashiered and thou hast accepted of a base worm plucked me out of a smoaky Cottage out of a Corner of Hell to receive me into the Kingdom of thy Christ to bear me in thy own bosom here wildering up and down in this valley of tears that thou maiest glorifie me with thy self when all tears shal be wiped away from mine eyes Oh! it is thy Free thy Free Mercy let my Soul for ever bless thee and walk worthy of thee and it that I may serve thee with a good and a glad and a free heart as I have received freely from thine own Hand whatsoever either I have or Hope for Here is also ground of great Encouragement to all distressed and disconsolate 〈◊〉 who labor under the weight of the guilt of their many sins and sight of their own unworthiness The right Consideration of the former truths may be as a spiritual Cordial whereby their hearts may be quickned to seek unto the Lord as their hopes sustained to expect that succour and supply which may be most seasonable for their Relief Because as there is no worth on our parts that can move the Lord so there is no vileness so great that can hinder him from doing what good he
his fury was at the height when breathing out threatnings against the Church he came armed with authority and hellish resolution to carry all to Prison Acts 9. In a word while Paul proceeds furiously with a 〈◊〉 intention to oppose Christ to persecute his Members and in the issue to procure and hasten his own everlasting ruine then our Savior prevents him and pitties him and doth him most good while he strives to do most harm and to make havock of the Church the truth and his soul also yea then works his conversion when he most seriously endeavors to work his own Confusion of himself and such as professed the Faith in sincerity the aim of God in all the Apostle directed by the Spirit expresseth to be this 1 Tim. 1. 16. I was a Persecutor but I obtained Mercy to the end that the Lord in me might shew all long-suffering to the example of those that should beleeve on his Name Such a forlorn Sinner at that time was the fittest subject to receive the full print of Gods love and compassion in great Letters as it were that he might be a pattern to all 〈◊〉 of the boundless compassions of the Lord. That as Seamen after a dangerous wrack and miraculous deliverance set up a Monument of their Preservation to all that pass that way to work fear in them to prevent shipwrack and yet hope of Recovery if they do To the like purpose is the Conversion of the Apostle in this heat of his Rebellion set upon Record in publick view As though the Lord should say Look here you forlorn sinners see a desparate Rebel running post-haste to his everlasting ruine and behold withal the hand of Mercy then stopping of him in his way Paul persecuting Christ in his Members Christ then pittying and preserving Paul the one most kind when the other is most vile and 〈◊〉 Oh the madness of a deluded Soul 〈◊〉 reason But Oh the Compassions of a Savior beyond all compare Be afraid you never proceed to such hellish folly and yet bless God That there is such a Savior if you do These be the Seasons of Gods acceptation the first here principally intended the rest not excluded and in these opportunities thus appointed by God in his Wisdom according to his good will he doth put forth the work of his Grace to bring home the Souls of his unto himself Hence we learn That a long life is a great blessing in it self a great temporal blessing as it comes from the Lord. Why Because all that while a man is in the way Mercy may meet with him and he may meet with it While there is life there is hope unless a man have sinned against the holy Ghost Physitians observe all the while there is strength in Nature there is hope the Physick may prove profitable It is much more for the comfort of the Soul while there is life there is yet a possibility Thy heart is stubborn and rebellious and proud but thou yet livest and the Lord lives and his Mercy lives therefore it may be he may shew mercy to thee But when a man is dropped down into the grave and the pit hath shut its mouth upon him then all his thoughts perish then with a sad heart he may remember all the helps he had the opportunities he had but never had a heart to get any good by them Then he reads over all the Sermons he heard by the flames of Hell and remembers all the kindnesses of the Lord and then there is no hope You therefore that know your bosom abominations you have your back doors and your base haunts you know your sins are not pardoned you have not repented of them when you are gone home go your waies and bless God that you live For let me tell you This is all the hope in the world that yet you are alive and therefore the Lord may shew Mercy to you if your dayes were ended and you gone down to Hell then not all the world nay not Christ nor the Mercy of God it self could not save you then therefore look as it was with a Child which was followed by a Bear into a pond the Child cryed out to the people that were running and came to the ponds sides Oh help help and still as the Bear 〈◊〉 him first his Arms than his Legs and still he cryed out Oh help help yet I am alive yet I am alive this is your condition beleeve it Not Bears but Sins and Devils are upon you they have you in their clutches tearing and devouring your Souls Oh look to Heaven and cry out unto the Lord and say Lord a proud stubborn Creature but yet I am alive the Devil is Devouring my soul but Lord help me and deliver me yet I am alive bless God you are so and know its all you have to shew for your everlasting welfare For while there is Life there is Hope Matter of Caution and Advice to fence our souls and fortifie our selves against that hellish distemper of self-Murther that our hearts may be carried with hatred of it and our souls preserved from the commission of it when partly from discontentments and partly from terrors of Conscience men are not able to bear with themselves but they will run to a Halter or a Knife they will put an end to their lives that they may put an end to their sorrows they wil not live that they may not live thus and thus Why Consider Art thou sure of a better life They will Answer No that 's my misery I see all my sins before me and Hell gaping for me and the Devils attending to seize upon my Soul and it makes me weary of my life Weary of your life Take heed of that bless God for your life and pray for life and seek to preserve your life what you may for while your life lasts you are in the way to Mercy Dives had so much experience of the torments of Hell that he sends to those that were alive Oh take heed of coming hither you are in a better condition than I what ever your case be Learn therefore for ever to fear and flie from temptations to self Murther as that which would put an end to your life and to put an end to all hopes and possibilities of Mercy from the Lord. But the main Fruit of the Point which properly belongs to this Place is a Use of Instruction which ought to be observed and settled upon the Consciences of us all Doth the Lord then usually accept of the Soul and do good to it while he provides and continues the means of Grace What then remains but we should give all dilligence to attend upon his times take his means and improve all to the 〈◊〉 for our Spiritual good Suffer me here to stay a while and urge the Collection with an Argument or Two and yet go no further than the Words nor take other Reasons than the Text will
gather the 〈◊〉 whilest it is fresh while time and strength 〈◊〉 take the pleasures of the world and enjoy the 〈◊〉 of my heart not now to sit moping in a 〈◊〉 go drooping and sorrowing for my sins when 〈◊〉 hair grows gray and decrepit age comes on 〈◊〉 yeers hence when my Sun grows neer the setting 〈◊〉 Life begins to decline and my strength to decay 〈◊〉 shall than have leisure to talk of holiness to turn 〈◊〉 a new leaf and betake my self to my Beads and 〈◊〉 of Grace in the mean time these jolly 〈◊〉 speak unto Preparation and Humiliation as 〈◊〉 somtimes to Paul Go your way for this 〈◊〉 and when we have a convenient time we will 〈◊〉 for you Answ. Thou fool this night may thy soul be 〈◊〉 from thee Luke 12. 20. How knowest thou but the Lord may pluck thee out of the land of the living and send thee packing down to thy own place give thee thy Portion with Unbeleevers and Despisers of his Grace and then all thy thoughts perish thy time is past and Repentance too late when the Pit hath shut her mouth upon thee how fond to think to have leisure to Repent when thou wilt not have time to Live 2 Be it the day of thy Life continue yet the day of Salvation may be ended for this is but a minute or moment of that span of time a point or 〈◊〉 of that opportunity If the Lord remove his 〈◊〉 take away the light of his Word dam up the fountain of Grace and stop the well-springs of Salvation thou mayest perish for thirst and live to 〈◊〉 the folly of the neglect of Means when happily thou shalt not know where they be nor yet have liberty and ability to enjoy them if thou knewest while therefore the day of our life and the day 〈◊〉 Salvation the Mart of Mercy lasts both which are but short and uncertain let us be watchful to observe and careful to take all advantages to buy the chiefest and best Commodities Humiliation and Faith Especially considering it may be any 〈◊〉 particular day as our Savior to Jerusalem Oh that thou hadst known at least in this thy day Luke 19. 42. When the Word is mighty and the Spirit speaks powerfully unto thy soul when the undeniable evidence of the Truth convicteth thy judgement and the keen threatnings thereof cuts and lanceth thy corrupt Conscience to the Core and the Lord raps at the door of thy heart by the hammer of the law Oh now follow those motions and cherish them make much of a little and suffer the blessed Ordinance of God to have its full blow upon thy Soul go aside and consider seriously with thy self Certainly the Lord came home this day unto my heart touched me to the quick and met with my particular Corruptions withstood me to my face and by the authority of his Truth like the naked Sword in the hand of the Angel stopped me in my Course and bad me back again assuredly this is my part a Portion carved out in special 〈◊〉 my Soul this 〈◊〉 is my day of Salvation in which the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to work the good work of his grace 〈◊〉 me True it may be so and for ought that thou 〈◊〉 I or any under heaven know it is so Remember 〈◊〉 thou hadst a fair offer and take heed how 〈◊〉 dost refuse it lest thou never have the like 〈◊〉 Break therefore through all Oppositions cast 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 listen to no alurements to the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 while 〈◊〉 is called to day harden not thy 〈◊〉 And as Paul to his Company Acts 〈◊〉 thou never to see their faces more I know as one of the 〈◊〉 brings in his sins our old 〈◊〉 like old 〈◊〉 will threap kindness from 〈◊〉 plead prescription and continuance we have 〈◊〉 long taken much sweet Counsel together 〈◊〉 much delight and content Give us warning 〈◊〉 before you give us a discharge let us 〈◊〉 our 〈◊〉 of 〈◊〉 for the while and hereafter let 〈◊〉 think of amendment Thus the same Father when 〈◊〉 had often resolved to renounce his bosom 〈◊〉 and the beloved lusts of the flesh still that sounded in his ears To morrow to morrow as the burden of Satans song To morrow soon enough hereafter time enough thus while he was startling and 〈◊〉 by the terrors of his Conscience he lulled him and rocked him a sleep again by delayes 〈◊〉 at last in a holy kind of violence and indignation of heart breaks through all demurs nomore delayes no longer but cryes out Why not to day why not to day Lord and from that day following God gave him victory Go thy wayes and do thou likewise stand not haggeling and dallying with the Almighty set down a resolution like the Laws of the Meads and Persians never to be revoked that thou wilt from this 〈◊〉 and ever hereafter wait upon the 〈◊〉 of grace and give way to the work therof Dispute no more but determine thus with thy self Why yet am I here in the land of the Living yet 〈◊〉 this side the bottomless pit the Lord still tenders the offers of Salvation strives still with this sturdy heart of mine I know not how soon I may be taken from the Means or the Means from me or the Blessing of the Lord from us both while therefore the spirit speaks to my Soul Seek thou my face give me a heart to eccho back again Thy face Lord will I seek this day After all this the heart still sings loath to depart and the deluded finner lingers after his lust as Lot after Sodom and therefore puts in a new Plea on this manner Imagine the worst should I put off this fair and kind Call of the Lord Yet since it is in my power to entertain it hereafter there is not so much danger though I now refuse it Answ. Be it granted Thy life might be prolonged the words of the text do most apparantly dash this presumptuous conceit It s the Season of Gods acceptation It s not in thy power but depends meerly upon his good Will We are not the Patrons of the means of Grace much less of their work it is not in our Gift the Sending and Blessing of both issues only from the good pleasure of the Almighty prolong not then put not off the time deny not Gods gracious offer lest thou never have offer again he that now holds out the golden Scepter of Mercy to receive thee hath an Iron rod wherwith he can 〈◊〉 thee to nothing and break thee in pieces like a Potters vessel He that hath the Keyes of David and now sets open the gate of Salvation he can shut it and no man shall open it any more and when thou hast stayed too long and comest too late thou mayest knock hard with the foolish Virgin and cry aloud with Esau and yet receive neither Blessing nor Birthright and its just with God it should be 〈◊〉 that the Word which thou hast dispised should
must be a stranger from the life of Christ Rom. 8. 1. hath not yet his Spirit is in the state of Condemnation and that if he so continue he shall perish but whether he shall be converted and brought home at last by the Almighty Power of the Lord it rests only in his own bosom depends alone upon his good pleasure leave we then the Sentence with the Lord who will either recover him out of his sin or most righteously judg him for it Of Consolation Here 's also a Cordial to keep up the fainting hearts of decrepit and aged sinners whose noysom lusts plead prescription of continuance as though they were beyond the Authority of any Law to cast them out I confess it indeed Oh that ancient men would consider it the case is very desperate and brought to the last cast Is it not a marvelous streight that the great work of Everlasting Life lies upon the moment of an hour as it 〈◊〉 to follow the words of the Parable 〈◊〉 considering it is not usual for men then to be 〈◊〉 The little twig such may take hold on is this hath been done and therefore there is hope it may done again and this hope it is which keeps the 〈◊〉 above water never too late to forsake our 〈◊〉 the Lord accepts at the Eleventh hour 〈◊〉 must not then suffer our own fears or Satans 〈◊〉 to pluck up our resolutions and 〈◊〉 by the roots with any false shews of hopeless possibilities When a decrepit sinner hath tired 〈◊〉 in his ungodly courses grows weary with 〈◊〉 burden of an accusing conscience and 〈◊〉 of an ill led life and begins to bethink himself is not in a right way suddenly the Enemy 〈◊〉 to his view the number and nature of his many 〈◊〉 and withal suggests the way so long 〈◊〉 the time to return so short better not set out 〈◊〉 not to be able to get home In vain now saies 〈◊〉 to begin so great a work of Preparation when 〈◊〉 have so little opportunity and so great an 〈◊〉 thereunto To what purpose is it to strive 〈◊〉 we cannot overcome to enter upon the 〈◊〉 when in all likely hood we shall be benighted see 〈◊〉 Sun is but an hour high and never come to the 〈◊〉 of it Oh shake off those sluggish discouragements sit 〈◊〉 down and perish there is yet hope in Israel 〈◊〉 this thing 't is true the work is hard yet God 〈◊〉 done as much for others and therefore can do much for thee also Thy time is short thou hast 〈◊〉 foot in the grave but the Arm of the Lord is 〈◊〉 shortened that he cannot help thou hast ancient 〈◊〉 he hath ancient mercies his loving kindness 〈◊〉 been ever of old When thou hast neither time 〈◊〉 strength to relieve thy self the Lord notwithstanding at the last hour and when thou doest least expect it and hast least deserved it who knows but yet he may call thee into his Vineyard listen therefore unto his voyce make hast to answer his call and leave the success with him Lastly If the Lord put forth this work of Preparation most ordinarily in our middle age all those whom more especially it concerns who are yet in the flower of their years whose Breasts run full of Milk and their Bones full of Marrow as Job speaks they are to be exhorted in the Lord to take the safest and the easiest course for themselves even the counsel of the wise man Eccles. 12. 1. Remember now thy Creator in the daies of thy youth before thy evil daies come the time that God useth to bless most let us be wary to improve most for our good A wise Traveller useth to take the day before him and 〈◊〉 accounts the middle of the day most safe for his passage the Rule is most true and useful also for us while we are wildring onward towards the end 〈◊〉 our hopes rise we early prevent the morning watch to make speed to run the waies of Gods Cammandements while the best of our Natural abilities are about us the middle of our age like the middle 〈◊〉 the day will be most safe for our spiritual Travel and endeavor considering we carry such a charge about us even our souls and the care of their Salvation and happiness lest deferring till our old age and our evening shut in upon us we be wholly spoyled of both for Preparation put off untill our crazy time is like never to be or very uncomfortable if 〈◊〉 be attained It 's not likely we shall ever share in so glorious a work they who are setled so long upon their 〈◊〉 are hardly ever removed considering the company 〈◊〉 common infirmities troops and multitudes of sicknesses and sorrows which seize upon old age and surprize it as 〈◊〉 prey decay the Sences enfeeble the Judgment weaken the Memory as though all the passages were now stopped and gates shut whereby Grace should have any entrance How shall Faith come to him by hearing whose Ears are become deaf that he cannot hear How shall he search the Scriptures in which Grace and Life are to be found who hath not an eye able to see much less to read them How shall he be able to fatham the depths and mysteries of Salvation who is become a child in understanding not sufficient to conceive of the most common things Hence it is the Prophet gives such a man for gone past recovery as it were Isa. 65. 20. The sinner of an hundred years old shall be accursed a Curse is the Portion that is carved out unto him he must look for nothing else that 's his allowance an old rotten post is only fit to be chipped out for the fire no waies prositable to be laid in the Building no not to make pins for it He that hath seen an hundred yeers and yet never came to the sight and rellish of the saving work of Grace farewell he as we use to speak I will not say it is impossible for him to avoid the Curse I must say it is unusual For how justly may God deny to entertain him who would not so many years give way and entertainment to his Word and Spirit What Captain will entertain a Soldier that is not able to fight What Master will hire a Servant that is not able to work in his Vineyard Why should the Lord 〈◊〉 wise chuse such weaklings aged and decrepit who shall not be able to strike one stroke for him in the defence of his Truth or set one foot forward in 〈◊〉 waies of his Statutes As Achish spake of David when he came to the 〈◊〉 and seigned himself mad 1 Sam. 21. 15. What 〈◊〉 I need of mad men that you have brought this man to me shall he enter into my house So the Lord may say Have I any need of dead men that you have brought these aged 〈◊〉 ruinous carkasses before me shall they ever find acceptance or entrance into the Kingdom of Grace or Glory Hath
sent him for this end would drive me out of my sins and send me to him for succour and relief that I may be sure to speed And I may be sure the Father who is so deeply offended wil never refuse him 〈◊〉 me if I come to him through his Christ. So we have done with the Explication of the Point Instruction We may hence by way of Collection inferr several things which are of much Consequence in our daily Course and yet al appertain to this place as to their proper residence where they have their first rife and therefore may most cleerly and rightly be here discussed and so discerned by those who will encline their ear and apply their heart unto wisdom Hence it follows by force of undeniable Consequence that this work of Attraction and so of preventing Grace proceeds from God as the only Cause thereof and depends wholly upon his 〈◊〉 pleasure and that he works in us without us We being destitute of al Ability which might help thereunto That which is done by a Holy kind of Violence against the natural inclination of the heart that must needs be done upon us but not by us we have no hand in that work and so it is here as hath been proved Let me ad Two or Three Reasons more besides the Evidence of the Rule from whence it is immediately deduced Here that Weapon comes first to hand which some of the Ancients have so often used in this Cause and its the Canon of the Apostle and that Staple Principle that cannot be gain-said Rom. 9. 16. It is not in him that willeth or in him that runneth but in God that shews Mercy Where al other helping Causes that may share in the Conversion and bringing home of the sinner are wholly denied cast out though they were Means of special improvment that if any thing might seem to further it they might have been of peculiar use and of a speeding nature It was not a sleepy careless slighting of the attainment of any spiritual good or a sloathful attendance upon it nor is it a kind of heartless and spiritless Affection to it that are here rejected nay though his will was there and the strength of endeavor yet both miss the mark The Apostle is Plain and peremptory Let him set Heart and Feet and Hand and Head on work he shal never do no good on it it is not there It s meerly only in him that shews Mercy It was wont to be Answered by the Pelagians that it is so said That it s not in him that Runs or Wills without Mercy pittying of him and Grace assisting of him he cannot do it without these let him do what he can yet he can do it with these The vanity of which Answer hath been long since discovered as that it crosseth and corrupteth the very meaning of the Apostle For then the meaning upon the self same grounds would here be thus As it is not in him that Wills and Runs without God assisting co-working so you might turn the tables It s not in God that shewes Mercy without him that Wills and Runs For if the words be not a plain peremptory denial but only comparatively to be taken It s not so much or not in his willing and running without Mercy prevailing and helping yet they concur as Causes in this work then may they as 〈◊〉 be taken the other way It s not in God that shews Mercy only and wholly but in him that wills and runs in part which is to destroy the text and to cross the intendment of the Spirit That Dispensation of God which gives ability and a Principle to the will for to work that act and dispensation must be before the ability of the will and act of it and so cannot be caused by it As if God put a soul into those dead dry bones in Ezek. 37. that they might live this putting in of the 〈◊〉 whence comes life is before and so without the work of the soul or life also and not at al caused by either But this Preparation and pulling away from sin is to make way for a spiritual ability to be given to the will for to work and therefore it is before the will and work and either of them as any cause So the Apostle John 1 Joh. 5. 20. He hath given us a mind to know him and his Christ. Not only drawn out this act of Knowledge but given a mind also to enable us hereunto 2 Cor. 3. 5. We 〈◊〉 no sufficiency as of our selves to think a good thought but all our sufficiency is of God Not only the thinking but the 〈◊〉 thereunto It s he that gives a 〈◊〉 of flesh and then causeth us to walk in his wayes Ezek. 36. 26 27. This is to be Observed against a wretched Shift and cursed Cavil of the Jesuits when they would pretended to give way to the Grace of God and yet in truth take away what they give And therefore they yeild freely and fully That it is God who gives both the will and the deed And Grace is required of necessity unto both and neither can be without it nor will nor deed But in truth this is nothing but a colour of words when the sense which they follow sounds quite contrary For ask but their meaning and when they have opened themselves al comes to thus much That the Lord hath a Concourse and a co-working in the Will and Deed and sends forth an influence into the act of the Will and of the work done and leads forth and guides both unto their end And this is no more than he doth with the act of any Creature the first cause concurring with the second For in him it is that we live and move and have our being As it is with Two men that draw a Boat or a Ship together each man hath a principle and power of his own whereby he draws but both these meet and concur and co-work together in the drawing So that al this that is said is but indeed to darken and delude the Truth yea and to destroy the work of Gods Grace and deceive the Reader For this gives no more to the work of Gods Grace in Conversion than it doth to the Act of Providence upon and with the act of any Creature reasonable Whereas this must be observed carefully and for ever maintained as the everlasting Truth of God That the Lord gives a power spiritual to the work which it had not before he Concurs with the act of that power when it is put forth he gives him a being in the 〈◊〉 of Grace before he leads out the act of that being He first lets in an influence of a powerful impression upon the Faculty of the Will before he Concurs with the Act 〈◊〉 Deed. He gives a heart of flesh and then causeth them to walk in his wayes As if one could put a Principle of life and motion into another and then
heart is the alone work of God It is not in him that Wills nor in him that Runs 〈◊〉 in God that shews Mercy You know many of you hundreds for ought I know that you never knew what Christ and his Grace meant and you know your hearts close with your sins though you dare not give way to them Now mark when you come and hear the mind of God and the Ministers speak unto you and the Will of God is published Oh! Go your wayes home and say As the Lord lives I will not leave thee until the Lord hath spoken to my soul till I find the effectual work of the Word and Spirit of God drawing my soul from my sins to Jesus Christ. Therefore call for that same shewing Mercy which the Apostle speaks of Rom. 9. 16. So then it is not of him that wills nor of him that runs but of God that sheweth mercy When you have run what you can and willed what you are able then look up to the Lord to shew you Mercy the Minister hath spoken what he can and I have heard what I can but Lord shew Mercy and never leave until you have found that the Lord hath shewed you Mercy in this work of drawing your Soul from Sin to Christ. FINIS THE Application OF Redemption By the Effectual Work of the Word and Spirt of Christ for the bringing home of lost Sinners to God The Ninth and Tenth Books Beside many other seasonable and Soul-searching Truths there is also largely shewed â—â—The heart must be humble and contrite before the Lord will dwell in it â—â—Stubborn and bloody Sinners may be made broken-hearted â—â—There must be true sight of sin before the heart can be broken for it â—â—Application of special sins by the Ministry is a means to bring men to sight of and sorrow for them â—â—Meditation of sin a special means to break the heart â—â—The same word is profitable to some not to others â—â—The Lord somtimes makes the word prevail most when its most opposed â—â—Sins unrepented of makes way for piercing Terrors â—â—The Truth terrible to a guilty conscience â—â—â—Gross and scandalous sinners God usually exerciseth with heavy breakings of heart before they be brought to Christ. 11. Sorrow for sin rightly set on pierceth the heart of the sinner throughly 12. They whose hearts are pierced by the word are carried with love and respect to the Ministers of it And are busie to enquire and ready to submit to the mind of God 13. Sinners in distress of conscience are ignorant what they should do 14. A contrite sinner sees a necessity of coming out of his sinful condition 15. There is a secret hope wherewith the Lord supports the hearts of contrite sinners 16. They who are truly pierced for their sins do prize and covet deliverance from their sins 17. True contrition is accompanied with confession of sin when God calls thereunto 18. The Soul that is pierced for sin is carried with a restless dislike against it By that Faithful and known Servant of Christ Mr. THOMAS HOOKER late Pastor of the Church at Hartford in New-England somtimes Preacher of the Word at Chelmsford in Essex and Fellow of Emmanuel Colledg in Cambridg Printed from the Authors Papers written with his own Hand And attested to be such in an Epistle By Thomas Goodwin And Philip Nye London Printed by Peter Cole at the sign of the Printing-Press in Cornhil neer the Royal Exchange 1657. READER IT hath been one of the Glories of the Protestant Religion that it revived the Doctrine of Saving Conversion And of the new creature brought forth thereby Concerning which and the necessity thereof we find so much indigitated by Christ and the Apostles in their Epistles in those times But in a more eminent manner God hath cast the honor hereof upon the Ministers and Preachers of this Nation who are renowned abroad for their more accurate search into and discoveries hereof First For the Popish Religion that much pretend to Piety and Devotion and doth dress forth a Religion to a great outward Gaudiness and shew of 〈◊〉 and wil-worship which we confess is entermingled with many spiritual strains of self-denial Submission to Gods wil Love to God and Christ especially in the writings of those that are called Mistical 〈◊〉 But that first great and saving Work of Conversion which is the foundation of al true piety the great and numerous volumns of their most devout writers are usually silent therein Yea they eminently appropriate the word Conversion and thing it self unto 〈◊〉 man that renounceth a Secular life and entereth into Religious orders as they cal them and that Doctrine they have in their discourses of Grace and free wil about it is of no higher elevation than what as worthy Mr. Perkins long since may be common to a Reprobate though we judg not al amongst them God having continued in the midst of Popish Darkness many to this day and at this day with more Contention than ever that plead for the Prerogative of Gods Grace in mans Conversion And for the Arminian Doctrine how low doth that run in this great Article this we may without breach of Charity say of it That if they or their followers have no further or deeper work upon their hearts than what their Doctrine in that point calls for they would fal short of Heaven though those other great truths they together therewith teach God may and doth savingly bless unto true Conversion he breaking through those Errors into some of their hearts And how much our reformed Writers abroad living in continual wranglings and Disputes with the Adversaries of Grace have omitted in a Practical and Experimental way to lay open and anatomize the inwards of this great work for the Comfort and settlement of poor souls many of themselves do greatly bewayl And to find them work and divert them from this it hath been the Devils great Policy who is at the head of all those Controversies as also ever since Pelagius time to this very day to make that dry and barren plot of Ground namely the naked dispute of the freedom of mans wil to be the great seat of this War as the Pope did the Conquest of the Holy Land in the darker times to find al Christian Princes work and thither to draw al the forces and intentions of mens minds jejunely in a great part Phylosophically to debate what power mans wil for-sooth hath in the Summity and Apex of Conversion to resist or to accept the Grace of God and so whether Moral perswasions only be not Sufficient or that Physical Pre-determinations be not also requisite to Conversion whilest in the mean time al those intimate actings of a soul in turning to God The secret particular passages both on Gods part and on the souls part which are many and various by which the soul is won over unto God and Christ those treaties the souls of men hold with God and Christ for justifying and
many prayers promises resolutions continues still yet it may be otherwise saies Hope this holds up the head from sinking the heart from failing But despair takes away this you have tried used the means expected help but you see it comes to nothing nay there is no hope it will ever be set your heart at rest it will never be This stops all the passages that there is no hope for any good or comfort to accrue to the soul. This is the Instrument of death whereby the Enemy at once makes an end of the very life of our comfort The hope of Salvation is made the Helmet of a Christian so the Apostle 1 Thes. 5. 8. Put on the Breast-plate of Faith and Love and for an Helmet the Hope of Salvation Well-grounded evidence and assurance of Gods Love in Christ is as it were the head and the highest top of a Christians comfort hope is the Helmet for when our sence and feeling experiences and performances yea our hearts fail in regard of any present sweet or refreshing we have yet hope saies it may be it will be better hereafter and this holds the aking head of a Christian The Devil who ever fights at the head labors to shake our assurance and comfort and if he can dash a mans hopes by despair he kils him dead in the head there is no help nor recovery to be looked for know this and be wary and wise for after times 2. As it dams up the way and stops the passage that there is no possibility of any good to come so it deads all a mans endeavors takes off the edg of a mans abilities puts all out of joynt and off the hooks that there is no striving after a good when there is no hope to attain it All men that are carried by counsel if not fools or mad-men they ever have an end in their eye at which they look and for which they labor this is the white they shoot at the price they run for for this they devise and contrive means and use what they have attained improve what they take in hand in hope the end they have attended may be brought about Now where there is no hope which 〈◊〉 casts off there is no good to be expected therefore no possibility to attain our end therefore no reason to attend our labor in that behalf Why should I se k saies the despairing man when I have no hope to find Why should I spend my labor in praying hearing reading improving any Ordinance when there is no possibility I should speed that ever God should help or hear or bless as good sit still as rise and fall So Cain when he had laid that desperate conclusion My sin is greater than can be forgiven he flies into the Land of Nod drowns himself in sensual delights but forsakes the Lord. The Hope of Good is the Load-stone of a mans labor it carries on our course with speed and resolution So they in Jonah 3. 9. Who can tell if God will turn and repent and turn away from his fierce anger that we perish not Therefore do these two things Let not Satan make conclusions from our weaknesses nor do thou listen to them nor beleeve them if he should make them We should be wary not to suffer our selves to be deluded by his false collections Thy Conscience saies thy corruptions are strong and many and of long continuance therefore there is no hopes saies Satan Temptations are violent and subtil saies thy experience thou feelest them so therefore there is no expectation of relief or abatement saies Satan the inference is unreasonable and grosly false the sins of Manassah Paul these Converts in the Text were such and yet such received the work of Grace and Mercy also therefore listen not to him who is the father of lyes Look not to the power of means we do enjoy the abilities we have the performances we take up for we shall find them all broken staves and bruised 〈◊〉 they will not only break under us but pierce us 〈◊〉 they will fail us and our hearts also there is no sufficiency for our succors and therefore no sound ground of Hope But we should keep our eye constantly and continually upon the sufficiency of Gods saving health and incomprehensible power Who is able to do abundantly above all that we can ask or think Eph. 3. 20. Do you not see saies the Enemy the means do not work your prayers do not profit the abilities you have and the endeavors you take up serve rather to encrease your sin than to help you they nor you are able to subdue the least sin to gain the least assurance not able to procure the least peace True be it so Yet God is able Thus our Savior to his Disciples dismayed with the difficulty of the work Lord say they who then can be saved he answers With man it is impossible but not with God for with God all things are possible Matth. 19. 26. It 's not possible saies Satan so many waies have been tryed so many means used and yet all is in vain Ay but saies Christ though with man and means it is impossible yet with God it is possible Psal. 73. 26. My 〈◊〉 fails and my heart fails but God is the strength of my heart and my portion for ever So much for that Point We are come now to enquire the Particulars expressed in the Description and here also presented to our view And first touching the sight of sin whereby the sinner is made rightly apprehensive of his own corruption and his condition by reason thereof The Point thence is this There must be a true sight of sin before the heart can be truly broken for it A right apprehension goes before through Contrition The Judgment must be rightly enlightened to see the nature of our sins before the heart can be pierced with that sence and sorrow that is meet This is Gods way which he takes in whose hand it is only to do this work Job 36. 8. to 11. When sinners come to be bound in fetters and holden in cords of affliction then he sheweth them their work and their transgressions wherein they have exceeded and then bows their ear to Discipline and commands them to turn from iniquity So repenting Ephraim prosesseth it was the course the Lord took with him After I was instructed I repented Jer. 31. 19. That which the eye sees not the heart rues not that which is not apprehended by the understanding is not affected by the will so in 1 Cor. 14. 24 25. when 〈◊〉 word comes home in power and plainness so that the thoughts of his heart come to be discovered he falls down and saies God is in you of a Truth The want of this was the reason why the Woman of Samaria manifested such sawcy impudency and peremptory boldness in her conference with our Savior though she could not be ignorant that those abominable loose haunts of hers would call to
to dawn and the hour yet to come that ever he was touched with any sence of sinful rebellions never yet Godly sorrow came into my soul nor remorse into my Conscience for al my many 〈◊〉 before God and men wounds of Conscience burdens of spirit and brokenness of heart for our daily departures and provocations they are wonders and riddles I have heard of such dispositions but am a stranger to the having of the least work that way I appeal to thy own Conscience what wouldest thou think of such a party who thus confesseth and is as he confesseth me thinks I hear thee answering and thy heart shaking before thou givest it What! senceless of his sin how fearful is his estate Where there is no sence there can be no sorrow no repentance therefore no Christ nor pardon nor Salvation for unless ye repent ye shall all likewise perish Never broken God will never bind so far from being good that he is not yet in the way to receive any good Wo unto him that hath thus sinned and thus continues Oh poor ignorant Creature thine own mouth hath condemned thee thou hast past 〈◊〉 against thine own soul thou never hadst a true sight of thy sins therefore thou couldest never have a true sence of them or sorrow for them thou never hadest a sound apprehension thou canst not have a through contrition for them It came not near thy heart to break it when it never touched it in Truth nay it never was within thy ken to see it in aright manner See yet thy misery further in enlarged these several Degrees following There is no evil thou canst prevent no good thoucanst receive no mercy thou canst expect and when thou hast looked sadly upon these thou wilt have thy load Liable thou art to all the hazards that Devils can devise or intend men endeavor or thy self deserve A blind man is subject to all kind of injurious dealings from the feeblest persons yea from Children plot they may he cannot perceive do they may he cannot avoid It is so with an ignorant person in his Spiritual condition he is a prey to his sins and a spoyl in the hands of Satan that catcheth him at his pleasure and carrieth him headlong and hood-winked to everlasting destruction every snare entraps him allurement intangles him temptation foils him he can see nothing prevent nothing but goes like an Ox to the slaughter and a Fool to the stocks and knows nothing Nay were there no Devils to tempt thee thou wouldest run into all evils of thine own accord An ignorant heart like a blind man stumbles at every block fals into every ditch yea rusheth with greediness to the practice of the most hellish evils It was the Jews case out of ignorance they chose Barabbas a Murderer and rejected the Lord of Life they were violent to take away his blood that came to take away their sins and this out of ignorance for so our Savior in his prayer Father forgive them they know not what they do Luke 23. 34. He that walks in darkness knows not whither be goes though he go to Hell 1 John 2. 11. There is no good he can receive from any means remaining in this blindness Counsels do not take place 〈◊〉 cannot perswade Judgments Threatnings do no awaken Admonitions Exhortation are of no force they are beyond the reach of all these they cannot come at them therefore cannot work upon them But as in some desperate diseases when they are come to the greatest extremity as in a Quinsie when it hath swelled beyond measure that speaking and swallowing are wholly hindred each man that sees will easily conceive and conclude Alas he is but a dead man he can take nothing therefore it 's not possible he can continue The Disease indeed is curable but how should his Physick cure him or his Diet nourish him if he can take neither there is no good to be expected to be done when he can take nothing that can do him good So it is in the soul ignorance stops the passage of the power and work of al Gods Ordinances There is no corruption but the means are mighty through God to relieve if they could be taken were the heart proud if the Word were received and welcomed it would humble it if stubborn it would meeken and calm it if unclean it would purge it But ignorance stops al the passages intercepts the work of the Word the understanding conceives it not and the heart cannot profit by it nor be bettered therewith There is no Mercy thou canst expect And this is able to 〈◊〉 a mans heart and hopes in irrecoverable discouragements for though our endeavors prevail not means prosper not yet mercy can outbid both and relieve beyond both but if mercy suffer thee to be blinded mercy wil suffer thee to be damned It 's Gods own resolution expressed Isai. 27. 11. They are a people that have no understanding therefore he that made them will not save them nay he will shew no mercy to them It 's the determination he hath 〈◊〉 as a conclusion beyond controul Hos. 4. 14. The people that do not understand shall perish It 's the last execution he will put forth 2 Thes. 1. 8. He will come in flaming fire rendring vengeance to them that know him not They are the mark in the first place against which the fiercest of his fury expresseth it self They that wil not now see their sins by the word they shall be forced to see them and to look them over by the flames of 〈◊〉 at the day of Judgment Hence again it follows To be hard to be convicted is a dangerous sin and a dreadful curse to the party that is tainted with such a disposition of spirit We wil go no further than the Doctrine delivered and that will give in undeniable evidence to both parts of the collection 1 To be hard to be convinced is a dangerous sin and that more waies than one He sins against his own soul the happiness and peace of it as being accessary and that in a special manner to his own everlasting ruine and imbrewed his hands in his own blood as it were when the helps that God hath appointed provided and now also presents before him and puts into his hands he willingly yea wilfully rejects refuseth the use of them and opposeth the work of them and so consequently his spiritual good that might come thereby When the Patient out of sullenness and waywardness of spirit refuseth the Physick or Diet provided for his good at last Nature becomes so low that he is utterly disenabled to take it and so is starved and 〈◊〉 each man concludes he was accessary to his own death So when God hath sent his faithful Servants to admonish thee his Ministers to convince that gainsaying Spirit of thine to ransack the corruption of thy cankered Conscience so that the core might have been searched and thy distempers 〈◊〉 Who knows what good might
and do more cheer and quicken and comfort in a cordial manner So it is in the soul by the dayly musing and acting of our thoughts upon the occasion of any corruption presented our Meditation is the distillation which draws out the Spirits of pride or passion or lusts and becomes marvelously confirmed in these and transported by these to our spiritual prejudice they grow strong in us and we under the power of them thus Jonah while he sits down in a muddy distemper and attends the vanity of his own thoughts he rows drunk with his passion so that he neither knows God nor himself not only doing that which is naught but he wil 〈◊〉 that which he doth I do well to be angry unto the death saies he Hence it is the Apostle suggests that Caution Rom. 13. last Make no provision for the flesh the Meditation and musing of our minds is the plentiful provision we make for the welcoming and maintaining of any distemper when we let our thoughts loose to view the compass 〈◊〉 any harsh carriage and injurious dealing we make provision for anger and revenge and the heart comes to be carried with violence of wrath and rage Thus and thus he dealt with me so unkindly so injuriously and that to my disparagement in the presence of such and this sets him al on a flame when we pore upon our infirmities and weaknesses we provide for discouragements and we sit and sink down under them and so strengthen those corruptions that otherwise have received their deaths wounds and would be weakened and wast away As it is with old decayed Bodies which are subject to fainting fits and are ever and anon swooning away the powring in of some Cordial Water wil fetch them up again and ad new strength and cheer The Flesh here is original corruption the old Man which in the Saints is dying away and decaying dayly but our Meditation puts as it were Aqua vitae into the old mans mouth adds vigor afresh and somtimes makes it with violence to prevail Lastly while the swarmes of vain imaginations keep through-fare in our minds and the noysom steems of sinful affections are rising boyling and bubling in our bosomes there is little expectation that the power of any meanes should come in upon the soul or prevayl with it for good the croud of imaginations stop the passage so that there is no comming to speech with the soul the hurries of 〈◊〉 to transport it and take up the whol strength of it that it can neither attend nor stay upon any thing besides 2 Cor. 10. 4. therefore called the strong hould where Satan intrencheth and fortifyeth himself against al the means of Grace 〈◊〉 may cast him out for while the stream of the thoughts are turned another way the ear hears nothing the understanding minds nothing the heart embraceth nothing there is no place or room there and thence it is as our Saviour speaks the word cannot take place in them John 8. 37. therefore the prophets advice to Jerusalem when he would have her clensed and saved he directs her to dislodge her vain thoughts wash thy heart O thou Jerusalem that mayest be saved how 〈◊〉 shal vain thoughts lodg within thee Jer. 4. 14. those vain thoughts are those carnal reasonings whereby the sinner would put bye the authority of the truth that so the sinner might neither see the loathsomness of his sin nor the danger of his estate or the necessity to recover himself out of it and if these thoughts lodg in him there wil be no entertainment for the power of any ordinance or counsel that wil take place with him nor reproof awe nor exhortation perswade he casts out and keeps off any thoughts of any necessity to be washed and so to be saved If then by those vain thoughts thy heart is estranged from God and carryed in 〈◊〉 against him If they be the cause of al sins committed and continued in if the hindrance of al means that might procure our God then is their evil exceeding 〈◊〉 and therefore we should so judg it and so be effected with it Wee come now to speak of a third 〈◊〉 alleadged to excuse sin and to shew the slight 〈◊〉 the soul 〈◊〉 of it viz. suppose the failing was in practice yet because the matter or thing wherin the offence was committed was but SMALL men look at it as a petty business a very trifle not worthy 〈◊〉 taking notice of and therefore account it as an 〈◊〉 of folly and childish weakness to be troubled with so 〈◊〉 a thing or to have the heart deeply affected with it more than the matter deserves and a man in reason should It was but taking of a penny or shilling too much putting off a cracked Commodity without suspicion by slight of hand lazying out a mans time ever seem to be doing and yet do little out-bid a man in a bargain by a wile and he never the wiser these are but tricks of wit matters of no consequence and what needs Conscience be troubled for these a man is 〈◊〉 the worse for them why should he judg the worse of himself or his condition such 〈◊〉 in a mans coat make it never a whit the more unseemly such poore petty things in a mans carriage makes it never a whit the more uncomfortable As the eye of man happily discerns not these things the Law cannot reach them nor the magistrate punish them why should any man punish himself or 〈◊〉 a torment and rack to his Conscience for them The things are little and petty The less the things are more hainous thy fault is and the greater thy guilt as it thus appears The less LOVE thou shewest to the Lord if thou wilt BREAK with him for a trifle Sets the honour of his great name Obedience to his holy Law contentment to his good spirit at so low a rate as that thou wilt dare to justle injuriously against al these for a very shadow which in thine own account is as much as just nothing where there is truth and strength of Love the hardest things seem light and things of the greatest worth little As Jacob served seven years for Rachel and it seemed short and time little because he loved her Gen. 29. 20. Ask me what thou wilt for dowry sayd Shecher Hamors son and I will give it only give me the mayd Gen. 34. 12. Amongst men in ordinary converse which lyes within the compass of humanity he never prizeth a mans friendship or fayor who fayles him in common curtesies and deny their desires or refuse to gratify them in things of no great worth I thought I might have commanded a greater matter at your hands than so but when I see you stick with me for such a trifle there is little love when so little a matter can hinder the work of it A gracious heart wil part with all for Christ and thou wilt part with Christ and his mercy rather than part
the Lord may dwell among them also Psal. 68. 18. Eph. 4. 8. This may suffice for the Proof of the Point See the 〈◊〉 of it laid open in 〈◊〉 Particulars He presseth in upon men by the prevailing work of his Grace in his Ordinances before they look after him or their own welfare prevents their imaginations and desires When 〈◊〉 snorting in their sins sit down securely wel apay'd with their careless and corrupt condition the things of Grace and Christ and Mercy are not so much as in their thoughts or dream the Lord beyond their expectation le ts in the discovery of himself and 〈◊〉 manifestation of the work of his Spirit before they be aware of it Jos. 24. 2. compared with Acts 7. 2. Thus it was in the calling of Abraham when the Lord brought him to himself and made him the Father of the Faithful when Terah and he were drowned in Idolatry without God without Christ and without Hope never heard of any such thing as life in a Savior by Faith never hearkened after it but worshiping the Idols of the Heathen The God of Glory saies Stephen appeared to our Father Abraham when he 〈◊〉 in Mesopotamia before he dwelt in Charran when he dwelt in the mid'st of Idolaters and never had the least thought or apprehension of the Covenant of Grace the Lord then appeared to him and bad him come out from thy country and kindred and from thy fathers 〈◊〉 and so from their Idolatrous Practices God finds men before they seek him he makes known himself before they enquire after him Isai. 〈◊〉 1. I am 〈◊〉 of them that asked not after me I am found of them that sought me not I said behold me behold me to a Nation that was 〈◊〉 called by my Name How often have we heard it and known it in our own Country the Lord hath sent a Minister to see the Country and visit his friends and it hath been the day wherein he hath been pleased to visit the heart of many a careless ignorant Creature who came idling as to a May-game or Morrisdauncing and dropped into the Assembly and the Word hath laid hold on him before he hath been aware of it how often hath the loose Prodigal come to riot it at the Fair and Market and hath been drawn in to hear beyond his purpose cross to his desire and wished himself out of the place and yet hath heard that before he departed which hath been a word of life and peace unto his soul for which he saw cause to bless God to all Eternity Matthew he is sitting at the receit of Custom minds how to take money Peter and James are casting a Net into the Sea to see how to make provision for themselves Christ cals them to himself and so to an Interest in Grace and Glory when they had not so much as a thought that way It 's that of the Apostle Rom. 9. 30. The Gentiles who sought not after righteousness they have attained unto righteousness and yet the Jews who pretended great pains and search that way they fel short of it As the Lord presseth in upon men before they be aware and beyond their purposes So many times he takes the worst of men whose hearts and lives are at the greatest distance from the holiness of his word and waies Thus our Savior posesseth that the Publicans and Harlots such as were in the rank of the most notorious wretches Go before the Scribes and Pharisees into the Kingdom of Heaven Luke 3. 9 10. Luke 7. 29. Which carried a form and appearance of Godliness in the view of the World And you shall observe the Lord to gather the most glorious Churches in the places and amongst the people where there have been the puddles and sinks of all wickedness 〈◊〉 Corinth Creet notorious and 〈◊〉 in all 〈◊〉 for hideous and hellish abominations and yet there the Lord 〈◊〉 Churches of the greatest beauty Saints of most glorious excellency of Grace such as were destitute of no Grace and yet the place destitute of no villany 2. Cor. 6. 7. When he had reckoned up a catalogue of most accursed Villanies yet professed God brought precious Gold out of dirt and 〈◊〉 Know ye not that no 〈◊〉 Idolaters Effoeminate abusers of themselves with man-kind nor Theeves nor Extortioners shall inherit the Kingdom of God and such were 〈◊〉 of you Ver. 10. 11. But ye are washed but ye are sanctified but ye are justified by the Name of Jesus and by the Spirit of our God The Lord Jesus prevails with these that are the most reffuse persons even when they are in the ruff and height of all their wretchedness when they are in the extreamest out-rage and running riot in the waies of wickedness beyond the bounds of modesty and moderation Our Savior Christ stops not Paul in his proceeding when his injurious and blasphemous carriage was in the bud beginning while his Spirit was stirring with the pangs 〈◊〉 pride and 〈◊〉 that he stood as a Spectator and 〈◊〉 and kept the Garments of those that stoned Stephen Acts 22. 20. not yet attaining that impudency and violence to lay hands on the Saints and to fly upon the prey But when he became more mad in malice and cruelty and became a principal in such out-rages a leader in bloody persecutions Acts 26. 11. that he goes armed with Authority breathing out threatnings and slaughter Acts 9. 1. resolves to attach and imprison all sorts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sexes men and women that prosess the Name of Jesus When he is running full carreer in such 〈◊〉 and cruelty the Lord then meets him unhorseth him takes his weapons out of his hand 〈◊〉 his Commission and causeth him to bear his Name who had before blasphemed it to care sor all the Churches who before destroyed them he makes him fall at his foot and follow his 〈◊〉 and colors Lord what wilt thou have me to do The 〈◊〉 beyond his place commission and allowance he scourges and cruelly handles Paul and Barnabas and when he prides and pleaseth himself in his cruelty and 〈◊〉 behaviour towards the poor servants of the Lord he then takes him to task Acts. 16. 30. puls him down upon his knees and forceth him to seek for mercy and direction from those to whom he shewed no mercy nor humanity before he trembling fel down saying Sirs what must I do to be saved The Lord stops not Manassehs out-rage when he enters first upon his kingdome as he easily could have done but suffers him to fil up the measure of his iniquity so that the bottom of Hel could not afford abominations more or worse than were practised by him he filled Jerusalem with blood shut up the dores of the sanctuary gave himself to witch-craft and conjuring The Lord now grapples with him by the power of his grace and after his mighty provocations persevering also in those desperate courses the Lord humbles him mightily under his almighty hand and brings him
to our works but according to his own purpose and grace so the resolution is into the free grace of God the soveraignty of his purpose issues not from any work of ours hangs not upon that hinge hence it is the Lord denyes the communication of means to some whom he foresees would use and husband them to beter advantages and bestowes them upon such who neither prize nor profit by al they have nay are open contemners and opposers of the truth Wo be to thee Chorazin wo beto thee Bethsaida for if the great workes that have beendone in thee had been done in Tyre and Sidon they would long before this day have repented in sackcloath and ashes Math. 11. 21. yea he professeth Ezek. 4. 6. If he had sent Ezekiel to a strange people and of hard language such as had never heard of the things of God and grace they would have hearkned to him when the Jewes rejected his counsel and the commands of God dispensed by his means Hence it is the Lord to shew the soveraign freedom of his pleasure that he may do with his own what he wil and yet do wrong to none he denyes pardon and acceptance to those who seek it with some importunity and earnestness Prov. 1. 28. they shal seek me early and shal not find me and yet bestowes mercy and 〈◊〉 known himself unto some who never sought him Isai. 65. 1. That we may 〈◊〉 from hence for ever to fear and avoyd that haeretical doctrine of the Arminians so deeply dangerous to the salvation of mens souls and so exceedingly derogatory to the glory of Gods free grace in Christ who maintayn that if we do what we can and improve the natural abilities we have and the means we do enjoy God wil not deny to give us the grace supernatural we want An opinion so gross that the Popish school wil not abide by it and the most ingenuous of the Jesuits themselves do professedly oppose and condemn For besides that it destroyes the comfort of a sinner dasheth the hopes of al the sons of men for if none should be saved but those that do what they can its certayn never any man either in nature or grace did what he 〈◊〉 either emproveing his natural abilities as he might according to special opportunites and liberties put into his hand nor 〈◊〉 faithful ever tohusband their grace according to what they received and was expected and might also be justly challenged at their hands If therefore their hopes had their support here their hearts and hopes and comforts and happiness and al would fayl them and they must needs have their lives and their everlasting condition ever in doubt and suspence and in issue sink down in everlasting discouragment but I say besides this it destroyes the whol frame of grace in the carriage of it First it undermines the very foundation of the dispensation of grace which proceeds as we have heard from the purpose and Good pleasure of the Almighty thither our Saviour looks as at the fountain from whence al spiritual favours proceed Math 11. 26. I thank thee Father c. Even the Father because it pleaseth thee 2 Tim. 1. 9. called not according to our works and free wil but according to his purpose and free mercy Rom. 11. 19. Whom he will he hardens and whom he wil he shews mercy to soften and converts he doth not expect how we improve the freedom of our wils and perform our works but he gives both wil and deed whereas this opinion resolves the issue of my conversion and so of salvation into my own purpose and as he said makes Gods free grace lackey after mans free wil. For it is in a mans power and pleasure to do what God hath put into his own power according to his own wil if I wil do but what I can if I wil and improve abilities and advantages afforded but as I may according to this conceit God wil never deny me the Grace I want the mercy and Salvation I do endeavor after So that the last resolution in this way is left upon a mans own free wil if he will not do what he may he misseth his good if he do what he can he shal not fail to receive it It cuts the very 〈◊〉 of the Covenant of 〈◊〉 and the freedom thereof For upon this ground and grant it 's not in Gods hand to dispose of his own mercy but it is in my hand and left in my choyce If I wil improve liberties and advantages I may have the Grace I want if I wil reject both then it 's my folly and negligence I must bear the blame and endure the misery and thank my self when it was in mine own power to provide for mine own comfort This course issues and returns into the Covenant of Works these Paul sets in such a direct opposition as that they cannot stand the one with the other Rom. 11. 6. If of Grace it is no more of Works for then Grace was no more grace if of Works then not of Grace for then Works were no more Works what then Israel hath not obtained q. d. It was not the bulk and body of the people nor in the power ability or performance of any person but the Election hath obtained Not because Israelites not because they had such Priviledges not because they used such Ordinances and took up the performance of Duties required but because elected therefore called therefore justified The contrary course which issues the obtaining of Grace into the improvement of abilities and advantages returns as I said into a 〈◊〉 of Works for the Condition in the ultimate resolution stil remains in my power the staff is left in my hand It 's al one upon point to have 〈◊〉 enough in my hand to pay and to have it in my power to command if at my pleasure in another hand and so I dispose of Gods mercy and my own good in the issues Whereas in the Covenant of Grace all is firstly freely wholly and only in the hand of the Lord to dispose to whom he wil what when and after what manner he wil. In this Covenant he doth not require the condition only but the Lord Christ as the Second Adam he performs the Condition also not only requires new hearts but puts new spirits into us not only commands us to beleeve but enables us and as he himself speaks Gives us to beleeve Matth. 13. 11. This crosseth the end of the Covenant and the scope of the whol course and administration of the means of life and Salvation which is to set forth the glory of the Riches of Gods Grace in the Eyes of all and to the Consciences and acknowledgments of all hearts a return of al 〈◊〉 to him and a total dependance upon him for ever Therefore the Lord chose the base and despicable things that are not to confound things that are 1 Cor. 1. last that no flesh should glory in
honor of his justice and to save thy soul thou sinful rebel Nay he can tel how best to provide most for his own glory when he pardons most sins I beseech thee pardon my sins for they are many Psal. 25. 11. He lets the power of darkness proceed to its ful strength that the power of his exceeding mercy might shew it self in delivering from the nethermost hell He gives sin advantage that it might do its worst and raign unto death that so his grace might raign over sin death unto eternal life According to the soveraignty of his wil whereby he subdues al things to himself Eph. 3. last and here thou mayest yet feel firm bottom to bear up thy fainting heart from sinking down into everlasting discouragement Thus you see the compass of this encouragement which issues from Gods free grace But least some proud flesh should arise by this healing preservative if it should heal too fast to keep thee under this encouragement and yet to keep thee from presumption take these Cautions It 's possible God may do thee good notwithstanding all indispositions and oppositions But know 〈◊〉 for certain he never will do it but in his own way If he save thee he wil humble thee if he pardon that guilty soul and Conscience of thine he wil pierce both to the quick there is not a possibility he should save thy soul 〈◊〉 thy sin also set it down for an undenyable conclusion I cannot have my stubborn and rebellious heart and have any hope that ever I shal have either Grace or Mercy If thou wilt sin that mercy may abound as the Apostle brings in the sons of Belial speaking Rom. 6. 1. thou mayest have thy sin but upon these terms thou shalt never have mercy Either expect that God should take away thy sin or else never expect he should prevent thy ruin When the Lord lets in some light to discover the loathsomness of thy corrupt Nature and begins to grapple with thy Conscience so that thou stand'st convinced of the vileness of thine own waies the worth and excellency of his Grace when God hath thee upon the Anvil and under the Hammer to break thee in the fire to melt thee 〈◊〉 fear fear lest thou should'st make an escape from under the hand of the Lord and fall back again to the old base course it 's a dreadful suspicion of Gods direful displeasure lest either the Lord wil cease to do thee any further good or give thee up to those hellish departures that thou shouldest make thy self everlastingly uncapable of mercy 1. It 's a sore suspicion that the Lord purposeth to leave striving and to meddle with thee no more when the Lord suffers thee to wind away from under the power of the means which formerly thou wert subject to It 's Gods usual manner to make such unexcusable and never make them good that they might go self-condemned and so go to Hell It 's that of the Prophet 〈◊〉 which he makes a Symptom of the out-cast condition of the Jews that they were dross Jer. 〈◊〉 30. Reprobate Silver shall men call them because the Lord hath rejected them How proves he that Verse 29. The Bellows are burnt the Lead is consumed in the fire the Founder melteth in vain for the wicked are not plucked away To this purpose is that of our Savior when he had long striven with the rebellious Jews clocked to them as a Hen to her Chickens and would have gathered them under the wing of his saving Providence by the preaching of the Gospel and ye nothing would prevayl they would drive Christ out of their sight and he smites them with a plague answerable Math 23. 2 last ver ye shal see me no more until ye shal say blessed is he that comes in the name of the Lord. And this his word hath taken hold upon them unto 〈◊〉 day the poor forlorn Jewes have not had a sight of Christ this sixteen hundred yeers scriptures they have prophecyes promises yea they have the Gospel while they 〈◊〉 the Gospel for so the Apostle Gal. 3. The Gospel was preached to Abriaham saying in thy seed shal al the Nations of the earth be blessed they see al this but the vayl is over their eyes they see no Christ in promises ordinances and therefore no salvation leaving secret things to God So it befals many falshearted Apostates when God hath had them in the fire and they come out too hastily from horror and humiliations before half melted It s a great adventure they never come to Christ but wanse away in a powerless kinde of formality and content 〈◊〉 with the enjoyment of some outward priviledges and ordinances and names of profession they have the scriptures and ordinances but never see a Christ in any of them nor wil the Lord look upon them nor once speak to them when he passeth by but let them live and perish as heartless Christless men Thus our savior dealt with his people in former times when he had sent the spyes into the Land of Canaan Heb. 3. 18. Numb 14. 23. and they returned convinced by their own experience of the goodness of the land as flowing with milk and honey and out of a slothful cowardice because there were iron Charrets and walled cities and mighty Giants they withdrew the duty and Gods charge and disheartened also the people the text sayes the Lord sware in his wrath they should not enter into his rest When God swears it shewes his purpose is unchangable and his execution wil not be altered Canaan is a type of the Kingdom of grace and so of Glory when the Lord let in some evidence of the excellency thereof and the heart cannot but acknowledg it 〈◊〉 leaves off rather than it wil take the paynes to grapple with those Giant-like corruptions that iron and 〈◊〉 hardness of heart why shouldest not thou fear least God should swear thou shalt never enter into his rest thou shouldest never find the power of the death of Jesus in killing the body of death so that thou shouldest cease from thine own works and from the sinful distempers of thy corrupt heart Fear again lest the Lord give thee up to thy old distempers that thou should'st make thy self everlastingly uncapable of any good and sin that unpardonable sin against the holy Ghost When thou goest against those Convictions of thy Conscience those tasts of approbation which somtimes thy heart took in the good Word and waies of God for by this back-sliding thou art in the ready way to run upon that rock This was that which helped Paul the possibility of mercy 1 Tim. 1. 14. But I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly it was his zeal that he persecuted the Church i. e. his blind zeal but should he have done so against the Dictates of his Conscience and the evidence of Truth in his own heart he could hardly have seen a way for mercy So the Apostle to the
Hebrews 6. 8. The Earth that often drinketh in the rain and yet brings forth thorns and 〈◊〉 is nigh is nigh unto cursing whose end is to be burned The rain is the Word heard understood embraced acknowledged and yet have their malicious venemous conspiracies against the Gospel of God and Saints of Christ and that in 〈◊〉 like thorns under the leaves like bryars under pretence of moderation and humility can scratch bitterly it 's a heavy suspicion their end wil be burning Take heed thou content not thy self in thy rebellious condition for upon this supposition that thou wilt have this thou puttest thy self out of any possibility of good goest against Gods Order Course and Covenant and the whol Work of Redemption Christ comes to bless his by turning them away from their sins Acts 3. last and therefore when the Lord comes to hale thee out of thy sins take heed thou dost not go from under Gods strivings lest he strive with thee no more EXHORTATION We have hence special motives to quicken the desires and provoke the endeavors of the most carnal minded men in the world to attend with all the care and diligence they may upon the means of Grace But you wil tel us It is not in our Preparations Performances and Improvements that our Spiritual good depends there is nothing we can do can procure it it depends wholly upon the good pleasure of the Lord Why then should we trouble our selves to endeavor any thing I Answer The Inference is the quite contrary way All is in God and his good pleasure attend therefore upon him in his own means that thou mayest receive al from him If a man should reason thus I can do nothing for my self therefore I wil take a course that no man shall do any thing for me it were not a weakness but a kind of madness but rather in common sence a man would be provoked to press his own heart thus I can do nothing of my self therefore I must attend upon God in those means which he useth to do for all those he useth to do good unto So the Disciples to our Savior when he would arm them against his departure Will ye also go away John 6. 68. They answer Lord whither should we go thou only hast the words of eternal life Christ only can humble and convert Christ only hath peace and pardon therefore only go to him We are so wise for our bodies where one is most like to speed every man is most willing to go especially considering as nothing can purchase his favor 〈◊〉 nothing can 〈◊〉 the expression of his good pleasure when he wil go therefore what ever thy condition is When thou art at the weakest here is supply As he said Why stand you gazing fainting and famishing get ye into Egypt for Corn that we may live and not die though thou livest in the height of the perversness of thy heart in the out-rage of thy rebellion though thou carriest a scornful contemptuous spirit with thee yet go who knows when is Gods time what he may do bring your own souls your rebellious Servants and disobedient Children fall down at the foot of Christ in his Ordinances and say Here are a company of Hellish Traitrous hearts which bring proud stubborn scornful rebellious distempers like so many bloody weapons even to wound thy good Majesty withal Oh pluck these weapons out of our hands these treasons out of our hearts that would pluck us to thee and so to destruction As we cannot deserve any thing so our wretchedness cannot hinder thy Work And because thou knowest not the season of mercy take al seasons thou knowest not what time God may or wil work because it is in his own pleasure therefore attend upon him at al times 2. Tim. 2. 25. Proving if at any time God will give thee Repentance Attend upon him in all Ordinances because it is in his pleasure to breath in which he wil and to bless which he wil for thy Spiritual Comfort Sow thy Seed in the morning and in the evening because thou knowest not which may prosper this or that Eccles. 11. 6. Thou knowest not whether Prayer or Meditation or Reading wil prosper and which of these or any other Ordinance God wil bless for the saving good of thy soul. When thou findest the Lord stirring moving enabling and working in thee move thou and work thou also As the Marriner when he finds the gale coming any way he tacks about 〈◊〉 way to take the advantage God was tampering with the heart of Agrippa it was at a ha now a ha Thou hast almost perswaded me to become a Christian saies he to Paul Acts 26. 28. Ah what a pity was it he should fal back again It 's matter os wonderment able to swallow up the heart of a sinner with the everlasting admiration of this 〈◊〉 unmatchable kindness of the Lord. Micah 7. 18. Who is a God like unto thee that pardonest iniquity and passest by the transgression of the remnant of his Heritage He retaineth not his anger for ever because he 〈◊〉 in mercy he will turn again he will have compassion upon us he will subdue our iniquities and thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the Sea You that have tasted how good the Lord is and found this Truth made good in your own hearts by your own experience as Paul was wont to recount his course I was a persecuter blasphemous and injurious but I obtained mercy I doubt not but many of you may say if ever there was a Fiend in Hell or a Rebel upon Earth I was one an opposer of the Gospel a despiser of the means of Grace a hater of the holy waies of the Lord and his servants that walk therein yet then God did me good when I desired and 〈◊〉 my own hurt Get ye homeye blessed Saints and in the secret of your Closets cal Heaven and Earth together and leave these compassions upon Record Say the time was this carnal mind of mine plotted my wretched 〈◊〉 and mine own ruin but then the Lord prevented both I opposed 〈◊〉 entreaties and he yet pursued me and would take no 〈◊〉 he called after me wept over me Turn ye turn ye why will you die I provoked him he pitied me I resisted him he imbraced me I said I would have none of him nor his Grace he said he would have no denial I resolved to walk on in the frowardness of mine own 〈◊〉 and to perish in the despight of al means and he would and did shew me mercy in the despight of the pride and rebellion of this heart or else I had never seen this day nor never had hope to see his face in glory Be astonished and confounded at this O ye Devils and come down ye blessed Angels from Heaven and magnifie this mercy Leave this in your last will and testament to your little ones O ye Fathers leave
Rule by their means and the People love to have it so all wel met But what will you do in the end thereof They might have answered We do what we list Yes for the while but what wil be the end So Job 20. 12 13 14. Though wickedness be sweet in his mouth and though he hide it under his tongue though he spare it and forsake it not yet his meat is turned in his bowels it 's the gal of aspes within him Revel 18. 7. how much she hath glorifyed her self and lived deliciously so much torment and sorrow give her James 1. 12. When lust hath conceived it brings forth death when lust is conceiving then terror is hatching The reason is in a word The heart comes to be more estranged from God the God of peace and comfort and therefore terror and astonishment is now in the mint and preparation for them The heart grows more hard as it growes more secure in the continuance of evil so more unfit and uncapable either of mercy offered or of the benefit and saving good of any means that are provided by the Lord. And therefore the 〈◊〉 is more dreadful when it comes 〈◊〉 to be discovered and the plagues more unsufferable when they come indeed to be executed upon them or threatned against them A rankling sore is hardly cured and with much heart smart when it is Surfeit of long continuance is recovered with much difficulty 1 Sam 12. 19. that which they would not acknowledg and reform before is now most dreadful pray for us to the Lord that we dye not for we have added to al our sins this evil of as king a King Gen. 42. 21. The 〈◊〉 of Joseph when their cruel dealing came but into their remembrance how did it cut their hearts wee are verily guilty concerning our Brother his blood is required at our hands Learn we therefore not to judge the condition of a sinner or the content of a sinful course according to the present delights which they seem to take or the pleasing sweetness they pretend they sind in the wayes of wickedness With which they are so far deceived and their carnal and deluded hearts are so far taken aside and ravished as it were that they think it nay conclude it there is neither heaven nor happiness to be compared thereunto and such a suddain glitter dazles the eyes many times times of the Lords dear ones when they looke upon the painted appearance of things as at the present push they come presented and beautified with the trappings of pleasure and profit ease and honourable hearts contents Psal. 73. 2. This made Asaphs foot almost slip and turne aside from the righteous and good wayes of Gods grace while he was deceived with the present pomp of the proceedings of the wicked men Yea he professed that not only he stumbled but many were wholy taken aside with this delusion Psal. 73. 10. Many come hither i. e. side with the society of the wicked because ful cups of water are administred to them and a confluence of outward and present comsorts are cast in upon them The cure he himself found when he went into the Sanctuary and also prescribes it unto others namely when he beheld the end of those men vers 17. and those their wayes what wil be the end of cozening and reproching lying and dissembling that is the way to judg aright of sinful proceedings and the certain way not to be deceived by them Look not upon the rich man as he fares deliciously every day but look at him as he is frying and scorching in flames and herein crying Oh Father Abraham let Lazarus dip but the tip of his finger to cool my scorching tongue when he obtaynes not a drop of water whereas poor Lazarus is at a feast in Abrahams bosom Look not at Judas as plotting with the scribes and pharisees and prospering in his purpose as pleasing himself in his project and pocketting his thirty pieces This is but for a season but stay a while and turn aside a little and see how he is forced to vomit out his morsel and in hellish horror to roar out his wretchedness I have sinned in betraying innocent blood and follow yet further and see his end he ends his dayes and his comforts together his covetousness continued in so long before prepared a halter for his ruin Look not upon Corab Dathan and Abiram when they ruffle it out in the pride of their hearts and out-brave Moses and the authority of his place ye take too much upon you ye sons of 〈◊〉 but see the Earth open and swallow him and his company of rebells and al the people flying and crying least we perish also It is one and not the least part of the power of the redemption of our Saviour that he gave himself for us that he might deliver us from this present evil world Gal. 1. 4. not because world only or evil alone but from the presentness of it to deliver and free our hearts apprehensions from the two much attending and false conceiveings of those present appearances of these false lying vanities we cannot judg amiss if we look at the end of Godly men and a Godly life not at the present inconveniences that are light and momentary which do attend them Psal. 37. 37. Consider the upright and mark the end of that man is peace Perplexed he may be but his end is he wil be pardoned ful of doubts and distractions but his end is to be settled and quieted for ever you have heard of the patience of Job and of the end that the Lord made with him judg that wel and you wil not miss to judg aright James 5. 11. see what end sin and a sinful course make and then you wil not pass sentence amiss It wil be our greatest comfort and should be our greatest care to rise presently from our fals and recover our souls without delay from such failings with which we are many times overtaken our first care should be not to sin our next care not to continue in it if we be surprised therewith A green wound is easily and successefully cured in an ordinarie course when your old rankled sores hardly admit of any recovery When the member is sprayned or out of joynt to delay or neglect to set it and that with most speed its likely never to grow strong 〈◊〉 almost impossible it should be made streight deal so with thy heart in the work of seasonable and sound repentance for there is the like danger better we judg our sin than that we should be judged yea condemned for them better we begin with speed to see our evills and lye in the way to seek for mercy than that our careless security should make way and preparation to hasten piercing and overbearing plagues It were to be wished we should never be taken aside or plucked away with false fears to speak hastly and by unbeliof basely
poysoned with sin blessed 〈◊〉 ye when men persecute you and hate you and speak al manner of evil of you falsly Math. 5. 12. could men speak al evil and do al evil against us and let 〈◊〉 do that 〈◊〉 is sinful to deserve it these cannot hinder our blessedness but encrease it Matter of bitter COMPLAINT to see how few there be in the world who ever knew what this hatred of sin meant And therefore yet were never 〈◊〉 with any sound broken heartedness for it such as Job 〈◊〉 of who hide their corruptions under their tongues as 〈◊〉 pleasant morsel spare it and wil not forsake it Instead of hating their sin they hate the word that would discover it the Minister that preacheth against it the man the Magistrate the Law that would reform it Instead of loathing their sins they loath the 〈◊〉 of the lives the exactness of the wayes of such who indeed set themselves most against sinful carriages once cross them in their courses you have stirred a 〈◊〉 nest they ruin al on heaps This is a 〈◊〉 stone of the truth of 〈◊〉 work of contrition whether 〈◊〉 Lord have left the mighty impression of this preparative 〈◊〉 upon the soul of a sinner That the league betwixt the heart and 〈◊〉 lusts is 〈◊〉 not alone 〈◊〉 the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of evil nor yet to avoyd and go aside from the occasion that may lead to it under some present pang but thou hast put off the love of sining why blessed be God the combination is come to naught sorrow hath 〈◊〉 the knot and union betwixt thy soul and thy darling 〈◊〉 This hatred breaks the knot and union fully thou art now divorced from thy former lovers thou fearest the approach of them rather choosest to see the blood of them than to enjoy the presence of them Stay but Gods time and be perswaded in his best season he wil take thee into the bosom of his love which wil be better than life it self to thee Thou art in the hand of Jesus and under his charge he that hath rescued thee from the rage of the Devils and from the right that sin ever claymed in thee he wil never loose his labor nor shalt thou loose thy 〈◊〉 and happiness in the issue He hath bound the strong man the strongest of thy corruptions that heretofore have too much and too easily prevayled with thee had got thy affection and the strong holds of thy heart those strong temptations and 〈◊〉 by which Satan as by so many garrison souldiers maintayned possession in thy soul yet now this strong man is bound his holds battered and his garrison abandoned So that there is a spoyl made of al his goods the temptations that formerly found entertainment they are now abhorred his suggestions delusions that found easy entertance acceptance are now loathed and thy heart set against them the Lord Christ is now about to own thee as his proper possession and then he wil never part with thee more thy heart trembles at the least inkling of the return of thy distempers seeks the destruction and would see the not being art a weary of life meerly because they live and art resolved never to entertayn terms of peace with them though thou never seest quiet day in the world 〈◊〉 the work is the Lord Christs he wil own it it 's true and thorough he wil never leave it until he have brought it to perfection and thy soul to eternal happines but alas this truth as a touchstone shewes the contrition of most in the world to be counterfeit that many have been in the fire heated but never melted as with mettal the parts of it battered but never severed fully the dross from the oar and therefore there can never vessel be be made for any honorable use and service thereof In a word the doctrine passeth sentence of sad condemnation upon four sorts of persons as such who never 〈◊〉 in the work we shal point very briefly at the particulars that each man may take his portion First the CARELES and fearless Christian is cast out of the number of these contrite sinners whom God doth prepare for his Christ and mercy such as walk heedlesly up and down the world not awed with any watchful fear of the temptations and occasions and snares which are layd in their way to entrap them or with the treachery and deceivable lusts which suddenly draw them aside to common neglect of duties which they reform not or transport and carry them with pangs of passions and distempers and they amend not certainly either these know not these to be sins or else do not know them and hate them as direful and dreadful enemies to their souls It could not be but their hearts should shake at the sight of them and the dangerous assaults which they cannot but know if they know them to be 〈◊〉 but they wil hazard their everlasting happiness People who live without watch or fear they have no enemies or no war 〈◊〉 hand and if thou livest in this Laish-like fearless fashion thou never knewest the war of a Christian nor the enemies they have nor art in the condition of a Christian 〈◊〉 hast the heart of a Christian to this hour within thee And therefore Jude so 〈◊〉 those Atheists and sensual wretches who were 〈◊〉 of Gods spirit which are spots in your feasts feeding themselves without fear Jude 22 these are blaynes in the body of the Church spots in the Assemblies of Christians speak without fear in the companies where they converse walk without fear in families where they live walk without fear in the occasions with which they have to deal and the Apostle adds they are withered twice dead and plucked up by the roots far enough from having any spiritual life or any preparation therunto look as in nature reason 〈◊〉 and experience evidenceth if there were a malicious enemy with a puissant and mighty armie now making his approaches to the City and attempting the siege if the allarum should be given by the watch to the City a messenger dispatched to each mans dore if any were so careless that he would not attend or attending the 〈◊〉 stirred not or happily for fashion stirring if yet he labored not by a watchful fear to provide for the assault and attend the 〈◊〉 of command repayr to the place for defence of the City there is no man but would conclude certainly he is a party he is not an enemy to the army that doth besiedg every loyal and faithful subject shakes at the apprehension of the power and rage of the adversary who is now likely to make havock of al and that without mercy so it is here the violence of temptation from without and the strength of corruptions from within fight against the soul thou that are a disobedient child a rebellious self-willy servant a perverse and 〈◊〉 wife an ignorant 〈◊〉 hearer the allarum is given in publick