that of losing his rest of incurring his endless intolerable displeasure this is a wise and gracious fear not only the beginning of Wisdom and Grace but its safety and preservation its watchful Monitor Exciter and Furtherer all along for it makes us examine and prove our selves whether we are as yet in the faith well settled and grounded such a faith as works by love and sincere obedience not a groundless or fruitless credulity perswasion confidence of all being well on a bare profession and when we have found that we are sincere in faith repentance love obedience it awakes our care to continue so by growing in grace and persevering against whatever allurements or terrors lest we fall from our own steadfastness and hold not fast the ground of our confidence to the end It works on our memory and revives our humility for sins past it works on our reason and stirs up our care against sin for the future The fear of missing or falling short of Gods rest of incurring intolerable eternal trouble anguish and pain restrains us from running on in the ways of destruction In the restraint some hope of pardon shews it self in this hope we see the mercy and love of God and then at last perceive the horrour and ugliness of sin not onely in its punishment but in it self This last hath more of love than fear in it and the fear is now become filial for a good Son will fear the anger of his Father so much the more because he knows the greatness and sweetness of his love and by that fear preserves and increases his filial obedience Our Saviour commands his Apostles themselves who sure were Sons and had the Spirit of Adoption to fear him that can destroy both body and soul in hell fire that they might not fear but choose to suffer all that Man could inflict on their bodies rather than hazard the loss of his favour for what 's the fire of persecution to that of Gods wrath or the pains of a Rack for an hour or two to the torments of hell for evermore The Fathers call this fear 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the bridle of lusts or disorderly appetites and not onely the entrance to Piety but the Guardian of all Virtue S t Jerom confesses he owed the strictness of his life to this fear and S t Ambrose says Love it self is upheld by it Some would confine fear to Mount Sinai as if Mount Sion did exclude it whereas the Apostle having compared the Law on the one and the Gospel on the other Heb. 12.18 22. adds presently ver 25. See ye refuse not him that speaketh for if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth much more shall not we escape if we turn away from him that speaks from heaven And then concludes the whole Chapter with these words Wherefore let us have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear for our God is a consuming fire I know that of S t Aug. is true Brevis differentia legis Evangelij Timor Amor. But 't is the fear of temporal punishment which is proper to the Law wherewith as also with hope of temporal promises they were in that Nonage allured or terrified first to outward then to inward spiritual obedience We should indeed for the great kindness and enamouring amiableness of our Redeemer and Redemption be all on fire with thankful love but we must consider not onely what 's the height of our duty we owe to our Lord but what 's that which at first entrance into his School we can perform and what afterwards through the remainders of corruption we still need and what he will be pleased to accept Thus to be frighted and chased to happiness is an Argument indeed of our imperfection but since our state is as yet imperfect 't is our Wisdom to use all such helps as our Lord allows of And yet even in the state of innocency our first Parents needed this motive and had not fell if they had used it they fell with this thought that they should not fall They who in this lapsed imperfect estate require such Christians onely as are made up of all love do but Votum accomodare non Historiam nec qualis est sed qualis esse deberet describunt They tell us what their wish is and our duty but consider not the real History of what is and what is likely to be effected Thus Tully says of Cato that optimo animo summâ fide utens nocet interdum Reipublicae with an honest and good meaning he did sometimes much hurt to the Commonwealth by imposing that strictness of Laws and Manners which 't was not able to reach or keep Tanquam in Platonis Republicâ non tanquam in faece Romuli fitting his sentence rather to Plato's phansied Utopian Commonwealth than to the real state of Rome So I may say of these Perfectionists they do not remember that they have to do with Men in whom some remainders of the old Man will still be lusting against the Spirit and those lustings must be check'd and chil'd and supprest sometimes with this fear of falling short of God's Rest and falling into intolerable Troubles And yet suppose they were as St. Paul and feared Sin more than Hell yet the height of some Mens grace is no ground for a general Doctrine nor because Love is the best of all therefore may Fear be made unlawful as if that were a Sin which God propounds to keep us from Sin Hell I am sure is a part of our Creed as well as Heaven and God hath propounded both a Tribunal and a Mercy-seat and if we may serve God as Moses did with an eye of hope to the recompence of reward why not with an eye of fear towards him who though a Father will-judge every man according to his works Our Saviour indeed Luke 12.32 bids his flock how little soever not fear because it is their Fathers pleasure to give them the kingdom but the fear he forbids is the fear of distrustfulness in him or his promises or assistances as if he would not or could not defend his obedient Children against the numerous Herd of the wicked not the fear of incurring his holy and just displeasure in case they should do what must displease him We do not fear as the Jews did present punishment to restrain us from that lust which otherwise we love and would willingly follow Our greatest motives of obedience are not from that spirit of bondage which looks chiefly on temporal things and thinks it self rejected for ever if chastised here or tried with afflictions for the Gospel directs us to things invisible and eternal much more clearly than the Law and makes afflictions patiently endured the sign of Gods favour rather than hatred nor is it contrary to the Spirit of Adoption to fear offending him that adopted us lest thereby he disinherit us Though we are received into the family of
of God is eternal life Again the same Janfenius also observes That our Saviour in the sentence of condemnation doth not say depart ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for you but for the Devil and his Angels Whereas in the sentence of the righteous it runs thus Come ye blessed inherit the Kingdom prepared for you By this saith he it is implied That the Salvation of the righteous must be ascribed to the mercy of God who hath prepared the Kingdom and the damnation of the unrighteous not to God but to their own iniquity How this will consist with his and his Mother Romes proud Tenent of meriting Heaven I cannot see nor is it much material to see save only that this may be seen thereby That Wisdom and Truth is often justified not only by her Children but by her enemies forced by that light sometimes to own what by their prejudices they study and labour to deny Such was also that final extorted confession of Bellarmine himself after all his disputes against the truth Tutissimum est in solâ Dei misericordiâ totam fiduciam reponere but that more common and owned saying of all their Schools and Divines Fundamentum meriti non cadit sub merito The Foundation of merits or the first grace by which Man is first justified cannot be merited and although granting this yet they earnestly contend that by the good use of this first grace life eternal is properly merited but they say it without and against Scripture and reason For reason tells us whatsoever any Man hath interest in by mercy and grace and gracious promise it must be expected sued for and humbly accepted on the same terms that it is granted or else it is forfeited But not only the first grace but all increase of grace whatsoever must be grace and freely bestowed not merited The preparations of this heavenly Kingdom for us and us for it are the fruits of mercy No Man can do well unless he be first enabled by God to do so and the more he is enabled by Gods gifts and graces bestowed upon him the more obliged he is to God The least increase of grace given after the first use of grace exceeds the measure of our service and thankfulness and that which creates new title of debt unto God cannot possibly be any ground or title of merit from God to be adopted in Christ Jesus or made the Sons of God by grace who were by nature the Children of wrath strangers and enemies is a blessing for which we become so deeply indebted Servants to God our Creator Redeemer and Sanctifier that should we do abundantly more and better than we do we could not make the least recompence for that he hath done for us and yet we cannot continue to will or do well but by the free undeserved continuance and increase of that grace and holy Spirit which first prevented us Yet who is there that doth all that good so well and constantly as that Spirit did or would have enabled him The manner of the Apostles question Rom. 11.35 Who hath first given to him includes an universal denial no Man hath no Man can give any thing to him and therefore none can receive any thing from him none to be sure that are not only his meer creatures but sinful creatures can receive any thing from him by way of merit but of free mercy and bounty If we view and scan the Tenor of all Gods promises made in Scripture from the first grace to the increase and perseverance and final accomplishment of them in glory we shall find that he promiseth only this to be merciful and bountiful unto us and if mercy and bounty be the compleat object of all his promises then may we not expect their accomplishment as the merit of our service but as the fruit of his mercy and loving kindness If a loving earthly Father should give his Son a liberal pension before he could modesty ask or discretion expect it and promise him also that if he employed this present years allowance well he would allow him more liberally the next year in this case how well soever the Son used his present pension yet seeing the profit is wholly his own not his Fathers the more bountifully his Father useth him the next year the more still he is obliged and bound unto him Although this good use of his Fathers bountiful allowance were the condition and some kind of motive or reason why and on which he was treated A gracious and ingenious Son would not challenge the second or third years pension as due to him by right of merit more than the first although he had his Fathers promise for these two years which he had not for the first For his Fathers promise was only to be good and bountiful unto him so he would be dutifully thankful for his bounty Now to expect and challenge that by right of merit which was promised out of favour and loving kindness although a condition of dutiful demeanour and faithful diligence especially if that demeanour or diligence came after former misdemeanours and be not such in all respects as it should be neither is an high degree of unthankful undutiful pride especially from a Son to a Father a Son that was once a rebel and enemy On our Heavenly Fathers part no debt of doing us good can be laid It was his meer free goodness to give our first Parents such being as once they had having lost that goodness wherein we were made 't was more than meer goodness 't was abundance of mercy to make us any promise at all of restauration to our lost inheritance the eternal life of his favour and after this promise made it is the continuance and increase of the same mercy to adopt us and to increase his grace upon us daily and lastly to Crown all this with an exceeding great reward which is himself the endless vision of him from whom we have all we enjoy here or hereafter Non fuisti factus es Malus fuisti liberatus es quid Deo dedisti We may deserve the diminution or withdrawing of Gods mercy favours and blessings but we cannot merit or deserve their increase Merit supposeth such an inducement as may not only prevail but such as must oblige and tie in strict Justice whereas no such tie or obligation can be laid upon the fontal original goodness much less upon free mercy which yet multiplies it self to all that provoke not its withdrawing or abatement Methinks Men should be afraid of this proud opinion of their own merit because 't is so like that of the Pharisee's when even that Publican whom he condemned will rise up in judgment against them for he went away justified rather than the other Luke 18.4 The Pharisee absteined from many gross sins and wanted not many good works to alledge for himself He gave Tythes of all he had fasted and prayed and seemed also more humble than the Romanist for
of Rebels the riotous assemblies of gluttons and drunkards they must be ready and forward to go to the place where Gods honour dwelleth where his word and Sacraments are dispensed to the house where the Widow and Fatherless inhabit If the wicked perverse sinful foot be cut off and the holy charitable foot be left thee to carry thee to thy duty towards God and Man what hast thou lost but the disconsolate walk of a wilderness amongst briers and thorns and serpents the path of dismal darkness and death and error where no Rest is to be found For that of truth light and life and eternal happiness Last of all we must be sure to keep the heart for God that of all the rest he chiefly expects without which the putting out of the Eye the cutting off the hand and setting a watch over our Tongue and offering up our dearest and only Isaac in obedience to Christs Command will be thought but an Hypocritical mockery of God who knows the heart and cannot be mocked My Son give me thy heart Prov. 20.26 That he asks and that he will have and surely no Son will withhold that from his Father The heart is the Throne of the great King where he sits and rules the whole Man this is the most holy place of the Temple where the Spirit of truth and holiness inhabits and therefore he that gives him not this gives him nothing that he will accept or that will make for our everlasting Rest If the heart be first presented the rest will and must follow a wise and holy Tongue a diligent and liberal hand a watchful and attentive Ear a wary foot obedient sober chast flesh will not stay behind but will all conduce to the carrying us on in peace to this desired Rest Every part and member of the body looks to be at Rest and in perfect happiness in Heaven and therefore every part must look to praise and glorify him on Earth 't is not enough that the Tongue be holy and chast if the hand be covetous nor that the Ear be diligent and attentive at holy duties if the Tongue speak not and the hand act not according to what the Ear heard Every member must do its office the head was made to know God the heart to love him the Tongue to praise him the feet to follow him wherefore withhold no part from him remember he made the whole Man and redeemed the whole if any thing be withheld no Rest no happiness to be expected 't is in our choice whilst we are here what we will do and which we will chuse whether to take part with Satan whose work it is to destroy us or come when Christ calls us to him who will assuredly save us one of these we must do there 's no neutrality between both either we must be the Members of Christ the Children of God and Heirs of Heaven or else we must be the Children of Satan and Heirs of intolerable endless condemnation Remember the dreadful misery of their choice who take hell for their portion and remember that a short delight here unrepented will cost a lasting sorrow hereafter Shall the Son of God become the Son of Man to present us unto God his Father to give us eternal Rest and shall we refuse and flee from our own happiness and become profoundly miserable in despight of all his mercy and tender care over us If Christ say Come unto me all ye that are weary and heavy laden and I will give you Rest Shall we stop our Ears at this gracious call of Christ and continue in wilful sins What do we else then but knowingly prefer the whispers of Satan before the loud cries and calls of Christ We chuse hell and death and the company of infernal Spirits before Heaven and life and the Society of Saints and Angels If we refuse to come now when Christ calls us at the last day he will refuse to receive us If we appear with hearts filled with iniquity and hands full of blood with feet that walked in the counsel of the ungodly and stood in the way of sinners he will not know us for his Children having lost his Image in which we were made he will say unto us Depart from me ye cursed I know ye not But if we carry with us the resemblance of our Maker that Image and likeness of him which he once stamped upon us if we can present him with a wise and pure heart if we can lift up unto him holy hands if we can see him with chaste Eyes and if our feet have walked in his Commandements and trod his Courts if our feet have stood in thy Gates O Jerusalem then shall the Gates of Heaven open unto us then our Heavenly Father will take us for his obedient Sons such as heard his voice and such as shall hear it again when he will say Come ye blessed of my Father inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the begining of the World for I was hungry and ye fed me in Prison and ye visited me c. All the Sons of God from the first born to the last are all heirs to a Kingdom all his invitations are to a Crown his Sons are inheritors of those joys which fade not away and of that Rest which never shall have end Whereas the sinful Person 's immoderate desires of the things of this World are but his torment till he be satisfied and then his satisfaction is his torment because there 's no Rest nor quiet in it and proves so much less than his expectation Thus is the restless sinner always sick one while of too much another while of too little now of loving then of loathing now of want then of satiety for he never ceaseth to want till he cease to desire and Man is always desiring either the presence of somthing he cannot have or the absence of somthing he cannot remove or else the continuance of somthing he cannot keep Hence the sinner appears to be as the Prophet Esaiah speaks Isa 57.20 Like the troubled Sea when it cannot Rest whose waters cast up mire and durt The Winds within him and the Waves and Tide without him give him no Rest and when his delights are at the highest floud they do bring him the sad news of an approaching ebb Ask but the unclean Adulterer and let him tell you what Rest and Peace he finds in his vice compare but his short pleasure with the tormenting fire of his lusts joyn'd with the worm of his guilty conscience Have but patience to look upon him in his nasty diseases and rotten bones his wasted flesh as well as estate for that is often the event always the hazard and he will have little to boast of but will find himself really to endure more misery in the way to eternal death than many a holy chast Christian finds to eternal life Ask the Glutton or the Drunkard whose highest thoughts are for the cloying not satisfying
Gods children and must love God above all as our Father love our Redeemer so much more than all Relations than life it self and its dearest contentments as to forsake and renounce them for ever rather than him Yet we are still exhorted and enjoyned to pass the time of our sojourning here in fear not to fear what Man but God can do unto us To love him as a Father and fear to lose his love by offending him to love the Son and kiss him with reverence lest he be angry to love the Holy Spirit of God and fear to grieve resist and quench him lest we turn his grace into wantonness and make him withdraw his gracious presence that would enable us in holiness and righteousness to serve him without fear of any evil that can befall us so doing or of any enemy that can hurt us and yet to fear him whom we serve as our Lord and King A good Son may fear to incur his Father's wrath by ceasing to be so and yet cry Abba Father Tertullian interprets that of Saint John Perfect love casts out fear of lazy fear that will not go on in the way of grace for fear of a Lion in the way some hazard and difficulties likely to meet him not the fear of Gods wrath possible to be incurred by sin and backsliding but of temporal dangers and persecutions If our love be perfect though with the perfection of sincerity that is habitually prevailing over all other loves 't will cast out such fear and make us lay down our lives for the Brethren to glorifie God and encourage others by the evidence of our faith content to adventure any thing for Christs sake even death it self but sure not the displeasing of God and the torments of Hell that were too prodigal an alms too wild a valour directly contrary to the love as well as fear of God in Christ Charity again casteth out all fear but by degrees as that increaseth so fear abateth If our Sanctification were as perfect for degrees as universal for its parts were our obedience like that of Angels which cannot fail we should need neither hope to encourage our love nor fear to guard it but while it is only in part the best Christians in this state of imperfection may have use of a Deaths Head and make Gods threats as well as promises subordinate means to concur with the principal Buttresses to keep the Building from swerving while the foundation of Faith and Love keeps it from sinking Fides spes tuta si cauta secura si sollicita Tert. Fear makes our love reverent our hope wary our faith discreet If the Sails be too full they may endanger us as much as a Rock for Fear as a Rudder guides and steers our Faith and Hope between the gulph or sands of Despair and the rock of Presumption or proud Security Serve we the Lord then in love but in fear too and rejoyce unto him with trembling as David speaks fear him as Lord love and rejoyce in him as Jesus yea and fear him as Jesus too fear to offend so gracious a Saviour to vilifie and hazard such precious Salvation sit timor innocentiae Custos saith St. Cyp. ut Deus qui in mentes nostras clementer influxit in animi hospitio justâ operatione teneatur If God hath entered into our hearts through his Son by his Spirit let us be glad and rejoyce in his presence for thankful joy is his entertainment but let fear keep the door that nothing enter that may displease so holy a presence Aiunt quidam saith Tert. se salvo metu vel fide peccare some say they can venture on sin without any prejudice to faith or fear sic ergo ipsi salvâ veniâ detrudentur in Gehennam dum salvo metu peccant so shall such who say and do so be thrust into Hell without any prejudice to God's mercy or Christ's merit and intercession Whether we consider the infinite eternal worth and weight of this Rest the intolerable endless troubles of missing it or the absolute necessity of hating and shunning all evil of loving and following all duties and graces in order to attaining the one and escaping the other Whether we look upon the weakness inconstancy treachery of the flesh within us or upon the variety of temptations alluring and terrifying us from the world without set on by the Devil with all the vigilance of subtil malice or on the shortness or uncertainty of the time wherein this Rest must be secured or lost for ever Whether we look on the love and infinite mercy of God in offering purchasing inviting drawing us to this Rest at such a price by such powerful obliging variety of means or motives or on the deceitfulness of mans heart willing to think the conditions of it fewer and easier than they are and to satisfie it self in the hopes of it on an outward profession a speculative faith or a partial obedience Or lastly whether we consider the possibility of falling away through sloth or impatience from the sincere repentance and faith love and obedience which was begun All and every one of these call for an humble watchful fear and godly jealousie over our selves solicitous cautions and diligence lest we fall short of it Take heed then of thinking this fear of missing it either unnecessary or unbeseeming Christian Professors or true Believers since many Professors are no true Believers and they that are may cease to be so unless they watch and pray assiduously and work out their own salvation with fear and trembling Look not upon it as too slavish for Persons regenerate and Children of light since sure it is that the Spirit of God and the holy Apostles made choice of no Arguments but such as were fit to be made use of by Christians and the motives of fear are more than once the Arguments they chose even to those who had been made partakers of Christ and were of the House and Family of God such as had received the Kingdom that could not be moved Heb. 12.28 Who yet are there exhorted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to have Grace or to hold it fast by making an humble diligent use of that pretious Talent Or if you will 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be thankful to God the munificent donor of such a benefit and this duty raised to the height to the serving of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 whether that refer to the Persons and signifie serving with cheerful alacrity for fear and chearfulness are very consistent the former the Guardian the Conservator of the latter Or whether it refer to God as we render it serving him acceptably with reverence and godly fear you have still in this Apostle the motives of fear annexed to this duty for our God is a consuming fire 'T was wisdom then and sober piety in him that said He would not leave his part in Hell meaning the benefit he found in meditating on God's threats as well