their afflictions be not so much under them yet they are above their afflictions though they cannot go on their way with so much gallantry as others yet they are not turned out of their way So Job that pattern of patience was sometimes up and sometimes down but he had the Conquest It is with Christians as it is with the Ayr which is sometimes bright and sometimes cloudy sometimes stormy and sometimes calm A Ship at anchor rouls in the Sea but is safe So Christians have many tosses in this world but are secure Peter is an instance of this truth And some of our own Martyrs and others might be produced who have shewed a very trembling spirit a misgiving heart in the time of their tryals Some have begun to fret at their condition as that good man Asaph did in Psal 73. because he saw God did not do for him as for others was angry and disputed the matter Jeremiah did so in the 12 Chapter of his Book Jonah did so with a witness David sometimes Why hast thou forgotten me saith he Sometimes they are brought to use ill means to help themselves Asa did so in 2 Chron. 15. Because God did not help him he would see if he could help himself he struck a League with the King of Assyria and thereby provoked God The Reason of this Inequality that is between Christians compared one with another or that is to be found in themselves at one time compared with themselves at another time lies in such things as these 1. Some sufferings are more sweetened with the divine presence then others God attends some afflictions with more inward Consolations and manifestations of his Love then others Those sufferings that are for his Names sake are usually thus sweetened The Apostle Peter 1 Pet. 4.14 saith If you be reproached for the Name of Christ happy are ye What follows For the Spirit of Glory and of God rests upon you These two sufferings and rejoycings are mixed and put together In 1 Thes 1.6 You have received the Gospel in much affliction and joy of the Holy Ghost Much affliction much persecution and therefore joy in the Holy Ghost Sufferings for God and Christ are no bars to the sweetest serenity and most perfect calm of the Soul notwithstanding these joy oft rises to the highest even unto extasie as some have found God usually pours out himself very fully at such times Light though but a spark will appear against all the darkness of a whole spacious room The little light of a twinkling Star prevails against the darkness of the night How much more will the light of Gods face when that shines upon the Soul prevail against all the darkness of sufferings that are upon a man When Peter and Daniel were in great afflictions God sent his Angel to comfort them We have examples in our own stories that do sufficiently witness what the sight and taste of divine Love will do in sufferings Have not some called the flames beds of Roses not only things without pain but of pleasure Eusebius tells of one that writ to his friend from a stinking Dungeon and dated his Letter from my delicate Orchard God so sweetens every condition even the worst that they undergo for his sake that they have more contentment and satisfaction of Soul then a Prince on his Throne Therefore the Apostle 2 Cor. 7.4 hath these expressions Great is my boldness of speech toward you great is my glorying of you I am fill'd with comfort I am exceeding joyful in all our tribulations Strange matter of Joy He was very glad to hear that they were hunted and persecuted of this world for the Name of Christ as himself was because now he knew they should enjoy more of God and of that which the world knew not Therefore the Apostle James saith Account it all joy when you fall into such temptations when you suffer thus Other afflictions and tryals usually have less of sweetness in them Secondly True Interest in God is not always of equal strength and power with Christians Let a man be supposed to be of a vast estate such things have been found if he doth not keep an exact account of what he hath he may think himself worse then nothing and then will be as a Begger though he be rich So a Christian not keeping the account of his Interest clear may suffer in his Spirit as one that is without God when indeed he is in the bosom of God Oh how is our unhappy spirit subject to excursions and wanderings from God! and these are the destruction of our peace and bring our Souls into a night of sorrow Asah of whom I spake before was out upon this account because he had lost the sweetness of the enjoyment of God Thirdly God sometimes leaves his people not only to their sufferings but to grief yea and to faintings under their burdens When God comes in way of Correction he will have his Rod known to be a Rod it shall smart It is true the ultimate end of it is to make us more partakers of his holiness His end is cure but the way is by grief and we shall know the weight of his hand when he comes thus When God comes to visit us it will be a sharp season He will not always deny us some comfort from the manifestation of himself to us but he will so manage the matter that we shall know he is not pleased with us But however there is a vast difference between the people of God and others between their impatience under their burdens and that of the world for God doth maintain his presence in his people and they find it it 's attended with such a Spirit as this usually in the worst times they can still plead with God You have an example in Psal 44.17 All this is come upon us yet we have not forgot Thee nor dealt falsly in thy Covenant Our hearts have not turned back neither have our steps declined from thy Way And yet they had complained very much in the words before and shewed a deep sense of the burdens and troubles that lay upon their spirits yet for all this God was their God and they had not departed from him So in Isai 26.8 In the way of thy Judgments O Lord we have waited for Thee the desire of our Soul is to thy Name and to the remembrance of it This is the frame of the spirit of Gods people that although they complain and be full of sorrows yet still their affections are towards God they are unmoveable and unchangeable our desires are still towards Thee You know that famous speech of Job in Chap. 13.15 Though he kill me yet will I trust in him and yet Job spoke many hard things and was full of bitterness And the Church here in this Micah 7. saith She will wait and bear the indignation of the Lord which was heavy upon her till God came and shewed mercy to her Again Though
ask the possession of it You cannot ask more then he is intended to give you He takes more contentment in giving I do not say then you can take in asking though that be much but then you can have in enjoying The Propriety you have in God is by a Mediator so that he by whose means you come by this Propriety hath all things put into his hand and he is in stead of God to you as it is said of Joseph that he was in stead of God to his Brethren He that hath obliged us to be whatsoever we can to those that are ours hath much more obliged himself to be all that he can for us Christ was made so great not for his own sake but for our sakes if he be set on the Throne it is for our sakes What shall we need to fear when we come to ask any thing of him He stands more obliged to us then we can be to ours because it is easier for him to do what his place calls upon him for then it is for us for the engagement is strongest where the performance is easiest and because we are dearer to him then ours are to us the dearest child is not so dear to its mother as we are dear to him and the hurt that would come to those that are beloved of God if he should fail them is greater then can come to children by the neglect of their parents Again The honor that Christ hath engaged is of infinite more concernment If a father be unnatural that is a stain upon him but what is a spot of dishonor upon a piece of dirt But if the Prince of Glory should be unnatural this would highly reflect dishonor upon him How may we walk with confidence and security and account our selves richer then Princes and stronger then Armies Though all this nothing concerns those that stand out and are as strangers and aliens that will call God Father whether he will or no that are not taught it from above but have learned it of themselves If a man cannot call God his Father and his God upon good grounds what a miserable state is that man in He is nothing he hath nothing and there is nothing between him and everlasting misery but a moment of time He goes up and down pleasing himself with vain shews pleasing himself with painted Butterflies but hath nothing to live on he is utterly unprovided for Eternity CHAP. IV. Saints have not only the Portion but the Spirit of Children Ingenious walking greatly requisite in those who pretend Interest in God God more easily pleased with his people then with others Tastes of Gods sweetness are obligatory Careless walking weakens hope in prayer Vse 2d IF the sight of our Interest in God be the life of Saints then let those who plead an Interest in God walk worthy of it It is precious for it is their life it is worth all that is required of you That which God calls for at your hands takes nothing from your happiness but adds much to it It is the Apostle's exhortation Col. 1.10 Walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing Let me propound to your Considerations a few things to put you on to this First You are deeply obliged to please God and thereby to walk worthy of him for being in so near relation to him you have not only the portion but the spirit of children Because you are sons therefore he hath sent the Spirit of Adoption into your hearts Gal. 4. Other relations This was touched in the foregoing Sermon because they want strength are not always beautified and sweetened with a convenient spirit The relation of a husband cannot communicate a meek spirit to his wife nor the relation of a parent to the child because of their impotency their will is strong but their hand is short But God in that gracious relation wherin he stands unto his own gives them a Spirit like unto himself that so he may have Children answerable to himself and to his Will In Rom. 8.9 If any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his He that is joyned to the Lord saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 6.7 is one Spirit As persons conjoyned in marriage are one flesh so he that is married to the Lord that is brought into that near relation unto him is one Spirit they are one in their affections propensions dispositions and designs As we say of a multitude they are of one heart and of one spirit when they conspire in one so God and his people are one Spirit because they center in one he in governing them and they in subjection and subordination to him so one as things ruled and the Rule is one This argument the Apostle urgeth in 2 Tim. 1.7 God hath not given us the Spirit of Fear but of Power Love and of a Sound Mind He had in the words before exhorted to this Therefore saith he I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God that is in thee by the putting on of my hands But Timothy might say How can I do that Why saith the Apostle we have received not the spirit of fear but of power It is a time of danger indeed and a hard work to preach the Gospel in such days as these but he that is gifted and fitted by Christ to that work hath received a spirit of courage and power by which he is able to mannage the things that he hath received of God Then I say having received the Spirit of children the obligation lyes the stronger upon you to walk as children This is a Rule The more proportionably a man hath received strength and ability to his work the more he is bound to it therefore the more of the Spirit you have received the more you are obliged And this Spirit of Christ in his people acts according to its primitive original Pattern as it wrought in Christ so it will work in you according to your proportion This moving will be strong because it moves upon the highest grounds that which is most taking and prevailing it moves upon hopes and sense of eternal life If you walk not so as to please God you walk with much frowardness of heart and your sin is the greater It 's true though you have received this Spirit yet there is much of the spirit of this world in your hearts but this is our duty and our work not to suffer the better Spirit to be quel'd and damp'd by the other But yet again that you may see it more fully remember if you please not God you act against your own Interest and advantage for your life is bound up in the favor of God when you therefore act against God you act against your selves The Apostle useth such an argument in Ephes 5. where he exhorts husbands to love their wives for no man ever hated his own flesh He means this that they being one the husband cannot cease to love his wife
the house of Eli and he did it As a fundamental assistance to all this Look to the setling of your Souls in a firm belief of the Gospel for so far only as we beleeve the words of eternal life they are of power to us Remember that in Heb. 4.2 The Gospel came to the Jews but it did not profit them because it was not mixed with faith The weight of words lies in the truth of them and not only in the worth of them For if you speak of mountains of Gold of heaps of Pearls though these are rich words yet if there be not as much truth in them they are but an empty sound and take not the heart Converse much with all the witnesses of the Scriptures truth converse with and call to mind frequently that inward Seal which is upon your own spirits that living and effectual force and vertue which the Word of God hath had upon your hearts unto a thankful embracing of it to a holy subjection to it to a couragious and chearful dependance upon it to the melting of your hearts and the pouring out of your spirits unto God Remember these things for Gods appearances in his Word are as so many seals and witnesses from above Rest not till you can say with that Angel Rev. 19.19 These are the true sayings of God And with the Apostle in Joh. 21.2 We know that his testimony is true For while this is not done our comforts and rejoycings in God cannot be high they cannot exceed our faith Then let no dark clouds remain upon your spirits so far as you can if you have received a little light make it to encrease more and more to the perfect day Observe the language of the people of God I know that my Redeemer lives I know that thou art with me How often have you these expressions in the first Epistle of John 2.3.4 and 5. Chapters We know that we are of God We know that God dwells in us We know that we have passed from death to life We know that we are in the truth Endeavor to come to this Again Be frequent in drawing comfortable and reviving inferences from your Interest in God Mark what inference the Church makes I will wait upon God my God will hear me Faith and a lively enjoyment of God is full of argumentation and that is the life of the Soul It is not maintained by a speculation of God but by arguments reasonings and such conclusions as are meat and drink indeed to the Soul CHAP. XX. Our Apostacy hath made us unapt for divine Life and Converse with God through a Mediator and willing to conform to the lowest Patterns HAving said much to this Point I will shew now what great need there is that so much should have been said and much more also for the furtherance of this life in God take therefore into your hearts these few things First We are naturally in greater affinity and capacity as to the things of the creature then to the things of God It is was not so from the beginning but our Apostacy cast us into this unhappy state that whereas we were nearest unto God now all things are nearer unto us then God we are grown strangers to that life As the child of a Prince that goes away in his childhood and is trained up in a beggers house he contracts a beggers spirit and grows a stranger to a Princes life So it hath been with us As Nebuchadnezzar lived like a beast and forgot the life of a Prince yea of a man so we are strangers from the life of God What God saith in Hosea 8.10 is true of us all We account his things as strange things as things that we are not acquainted with we have neither a pleasing sight of them nor a pleasing taste of them but they are to us as meat that we cannot relish that suits not with us Nothing was more natural to man then to live in God as we came out of Gods hand It was not more natural for the fish to live in the water then for us to live in God and that was a blessed state The brest is not more natural to the child then that life was to us that was our first life and it was sweet though it was short It was a blessed life for God let out himself in so much fulness as took the heart up into intimate acquaintance We were made upright that is such as God delighted in such as we should be now we are altered our spirits are divided and scattered In as much then as we have not altogether cast off our depraved natures we have need to be thus called upon we being more enclined to the creature then unto God Secondly Naturally we have a greater propensity to observe the Law then the Gospel to do what we are bid then to take what is offered and given to us in the Gospel For the Law is natural to us it is written in our hearts the things that are revealed in the Gospel are above Nature This disposition the Apostle found in those Rō 9. latter end Israel which followed after the Law of Righteousness did not attain unto the Law of Righteousness Wherefore because they sought it not by Faith but as it were by the Works of the Law for they stumbled at that stumbling stone It was a stumbling stone indeed to them they rather chose to make their way to life by the Law then to accept of life according to the propositions of the Gospel because the Law was more near to them it was more natural to them but the Gospel is supernatural Children are nearer to and more apt to receive those things which are by Nature then those things which are by instruction and appointment It is natural for a child to eat he need not be taught it but for a child to learn that is hard he is at more distance from it So it is more easie for us to form our selves to the obedience of the Law then to the Gospel Thirdly We are naturally more apt to converse with God immediately then by a Mediator Because this is still according to the natural course and original appointment of God in the first Creation of Man Though then there was a very great disproportion an infinite disproportion between God and us yet because there was no Conscience of guilt no matter of offence this poor Creature though but dust and ashes could come to God and did converse with him immediately But now since his going away from God God hath declared that man should come no more immediately to him but by the Door which he hath appointed He hath made Jesus Christ that Door and whosoever entereth by him hath life and none else You may knock at the door of Mercy and spend your days in tears and prayers but not be heard unless your way be through Christ Therefore 1 Pet. 1.21 the Apostle speaks thus Through Him we beleeve in God And
THREE TREATISES Being the Substance of sundry DISCOURSES VIZ. I. The Fixed Eye or the Mindful Heart on Psal 25.15 II. The Principal Interest or the Propriety of the Saints in God on Micah 7.7 III. Gods Interest in Man Natural and Acquired on Psal 119.4 By that Judicious and Pious Preacher of the Gospel Mr JOSEPH SYMONDS M. A. late Vice-provost of Eaton Colledg LONDON Printed by J Macock for LUKE FAVVN and are to be sold at his Shop at the sign of the Parrot in Pauls Church-yard M.DC.LIII The Pourtraiture of Mr. Joseph Symonds Late Vice Prouost of Eaton Colledge Aetat Suae 50. To all that desire to live godly in CHRIST JESUS IT is not unknown to very many of Gods people in this Nation with what entire affection and happy success the pious Authour of these Meditations now asleep in Jesus laid out himself in the service of the Gospel Divers of you sate somtimes under the shadow of his Ministry with great delight And of those who had not the enjoyment of him but in more removed distances what serious eye ever read as it ought that truly incomparable piece The Deserted Souls Case and Cure and was not thereby enlightned startled humbled lifted up nearer to God Or what good heart for that end that it might be better duly perused his later piece Of Faith and Sight but it was by increased faith and its just appendages more fitted for sight The Holy Spirit was his spring and plentiful emanations from thence filled his Cistern and made him free to communication He dwelt in the presence of Christ d so was at home in Heavenly Negotiations and the content that he had there made him delight to stand still between Christ and his people to receive and give though he gave away his own life withall And when he perceived the shadow of the evening to be stretched forth upon him they did nothing to him but only provoke him to make more haste in the finishing of his work Those holy Tapers which receive their light from the golden Lamp of the Sanctuary shine and burn down to the socket and are burning and shining lights thereto In his wearinesses and weaknesses grown constant in his later time when the effects of his pains made strong sollicitations to desist it was an expression which he often used with pleasance to his friends Yet praying and preaching is too good work to be weary of In the continuance of it he poured forth himself as a drink-offering to Christ upon the service of his Saints and so passed to eternal life through the best forms of death And indeed that way as is roported of Moses God doth kiss away the souls of his Servants But that he might prevent death he took much pains with his own pen besides constant expence of mony for the assistance of another that his love in permanent testimonies might out-live his life and the first neglects of his hearers He knew well how precious discourses are lost to the inconsiderate part of men and women who either do not give due heed while a Sermon is preached and so take it not into their understandings and hearts or else cannot remember it having heard it but once Of his good will to such he hath left many evidences which will be produced if God pleases as soon as time health and other work will give leave to make up the Chasin's and mend other errours of the writer in those copies which were taken from the Pulpit and were not corrected by himselfe For the present it was judged meet to print these three small Tracts The first touching Spiritual remembrance of God as a most seasonable praelibation This being a time when a careless Devil hath after too eminent a manner possessed a multitude of Professours and many Christians have recklesly lost Jesus Christ in the crowd of worldly affections designes diversions The aim of this is to quicken all that have the root of eternal life in them to more frequent Addresses of Soul to God and to rivet them in contentful abode and holy reposes in him The Second is an excellent discovery of the Saints interest in God in which all holy souls may see how happy they are or may be in God their God The Third holds forth Gods interest in us by which as by a true glass we may learn to reflect upon God all his goodness and love contained in the former Treatise if it be also revealed in our hearts and so God will be to us as he is to all true Christians the beginning and end of our life All which Discourses the Godly Reader will find enrich'd with many clear descriptions of heavenly truths many rational considerations which in way of Exhortation do strike fitly and weightily upon those capable principles which God hath put into the soul as Ears for him to take hold of both with very lovely representations and right dreadful terrours and as he goes up and down he will meet methodicall and sure directions like benigne Guides telling the way of happy life to all the children of wisdom and truth So you have a short account of what you may find in these papers Be their Patronage the living influence of the all-quickning Spirit who only is able to make these and all other well-ordered tendencies effectual to their desirable ends and who can protect them from unprofitable reading and forgetful neglects which are the wrongful abuses and unjust imprisonment of the most useful truths I who in this matter do only carry the staff of Elisha which he hath left behind do and shall pray that it may not only be laid upon the child which is ready to dye but that this Spirit would joyn himself to it and make it the ministration of life even the beauty and bands of God upon the spirits of his own That the misplaced eye of some Reader may be set right and then fixed that some heart may be undeceived And Oh that the time were come when no Child of God would write his name in the earth which to do is to be cursed and to make the Divels sport Alas whil'st we through their false representations and cozening impulses sell our comfort our life our soul for cheap things at easie rates do they not laugh do they not insult Though it is a poor sport and proper only to Divels to rejoyce in the follies and sorrows of humanity The Lord Jesus who came to break the power of spiritual wickednesses drive them out of the souls of men and women and if they must have leave to enter any where let it be onely into swine The Lord appear more to the Inhabitants of this world that they may see the glory of truth and be transformed into its Image delivered into the spirit and life of truth and out of the power of detaining falshoods and seducing vanities the chains of evil spirits Then the capacity of the children of men so empty hungry and sore distressed though
command over his spirit which he should have so that his mind either stands still as a lake or if it move it runs at waste as indeed a mans mind doth if it be not toward God and for God A great fault it is when men take not pains with themselves as the Prophet complains Isai 64.7 No man stirs up himself to take hold on God It 's said in Exod. 35.28 They came every one whose heart stir'd him up Your hearts had need be stir'd up else they will not do their work Is it fit that so noble a faculty then which there is none under Heaven more glorious as that understanding which God hath entrusted you withall should be no more improved Was this golden Candlestick given you for any other light then that which is from above that may shew you the way to union with God and enjoyment of him Were these golden Cabinets given you and have you the keys of them that you should keep them empty when you might fill them with heavenly treasure which is invaluable David calls his Soul his glory you stain the crown of your glory when you make such glorious creatures to lacquey after every creature which should be in attendance upon God like Angels in the presence of their Father When the mind runs after vanity you become vain Jer. 2. What iniquity have your fathers found in me that they run far from me and walk after vanity and are become vain The vain out-goings of your minds and spirits will make you vain yea worse then nothing What injury do you do your selves that have such nimble winged messengers that can mount up to the highest Heavens can walk with Angels can lodg themselves in the bosom of the glorious God can present all your Cases to him can bring back again reports of mercy to you if you use them not Do you not see how God is sending out to you continually The thoughts of his heart are Love eternal Love and the fruits of his Love are always sent out like the beams of the Sun He hath sent out his own Son and will not you send out your thoughts towards him Will not you order your thoughts toward him who hath directed his greatest Love towards you What is your life but a continual emanation and emission of divine Love And is God thus flowing forth to you and will you stand still and not have your minds runing out to him 2. In the next place As this is a fault that there is not that sending out of the thoughts toward God and that setting of the mind to this work so this is another fault that there is not a bending of the mind in this work Oftentimes the mind looks up but it 's so feeble that a mans thoughts are like an arrow shot from a Bow weakly bent which reacheth not the mark It 's wise counsel that the Wise-man gives Whatsoever thine hand findeth to do do it with all thy might I am sure in nothing more it concerns us to act with all our might then when we act towards God in whom all our life is 1 Chron. 22.19 Now set your hearts and souls to seek the Lord your God This is our work 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 give your hearts to act with life and vigor when you go to take into your eyes the greatness of that glory which you hear of God The Apostle's phrase is Have the loyns of your mind girt when you are upon this work I ask you that question which Christ put to some in another case What went you out to see When you crawl and move as if you had no heart nor spirits whom go you forth to see What him that is the Lord of Glory the only Potentate What are such heavy and lazy aspects to take in such a Glory You see in what large streams your thoughts fly forth to other things and are you only languishing weak and feeble in things of so great concernment Mal. 1.14 Cursed be the deceiver that hath in his flock the sound and the strong but offers the blind and lame Certainly this is the way to procure a curse to be so exceeding remiss in your addresses to God hence it is you get no more Then God comes most to the heart when the eyes are most set upon him The child that draws with strength is soonest filled The Brests of Consolation are full but therefore you are empty and complain because you bend not your selves to draw from the Wells of Salvation You take not pains with your selves to make your way to God lively 3. As this is a fault not to send our your minds toward God and not to bend your minds to the work so this is another the not binding of your minds to it You should not only go to God but stay with him The right minding of God is not a transient glance and sudden cast of the eye that is presently wheel'd off from God again Psal 143.5 I remember the days of old I meditate on all thy works I remember them and not only bring them to remembrance but I meditate on them my mind talks of them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is the force of the word I muse and stand looking on the works of thy hands this is that which fires the heart when a mans eye is fixed on God Psal 39.4 5. My heart was hot within me while I was musing the fire kindled then spake I with my tongue c. Indeed that is a season of kindling when the mind is musing but when the mind is fleeting and floating little impression is made little good comes of it There are many days at Court wherein strangers come to see and are soon gone and what get they Nothing But they that abide in the presence of the Prince live by him It 's not a pointing and casting of your eye towards Heaven that makes God your portion If you do not dwell with him he useth you like strangers Think well of it Certainly where the Eye abides not it 's because either the thing displeaseth or there is some better thing that draws away your hearts What is there in Heaven or in Earth should draw away your minds from these Visions When you look upon him who is most glorious is he not worthy on whom your Souls should dwell and your minds rest themselves with all their might Certainly what we love that will hold us that will be in our thoughts we need not call out our minds and if once the eye be set upon it it holds as the Loadstone having drawn the Iron keeps it fast to it self Christ himself acknowledgeth such an operation of love upon himself Cant. 6.5 Turn away thine eyes Or taken away mine heart 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 excordiasti me for they have overcome me And in Cant. 4.9 Thou hast ravisht my heart my Sister my Spouse with one of thine eyes Christ was as one that had lost his heart
be sure you mind it and have this in your hearts to be ready to it Revel 12. They loved not their lives to the death Animarum suarum pro. digi Beza they did with their lives as with things they hate not at all regard them So when it 's said they liked not to retain the knowledg of God in their thoughts the meaning is they hated that God should have any room in them or that there should be any knowledg of God in their hearts Though the worst of men cannot but sometimes have God in their eyes yet because they like it not God counts it is not done and takes it as if they gave him no attendance or never lookt after him The Apostle Rom. 7.17 upon this account reckons It 's no more I but sin that dwelleth in me because the propention of my spirit my better part is all towards God it is no more I In this sence when a wicked man thinks of God it 's not the man that doth it but his conscience or the power of God upon him he doth what he would not do As in another case Quae quia non potuit non facit illa facit when a man would do a thing though he cannot do it it goes for done with God as it 's said of Abraham concerning his son and David concerning the temple So that whether it be good or evil it 's not reckoned if the will be not in it Let no man deceive himself though he cast his eyes toward Heaven all the day long if he love not this work he doth nothing 3. That which is not done according to the Rule God reckons it as not done If a Master set his servant about a work if he do it not according to the pattern and rule which is set him nothing is done it may be worse then nothing This is not to eat the Lords Supper 1 Cor. 11.20 Yet they did eat it but because it was not done after its due manner he saith this is not to eat it And mark it what God faith in this case Isai 43.22 Thou hast not called on me O Jacob but hast been weary of me O Israel Thou hast not brought me the small cattel of thy burnt-offerings neither hast thou honored me with thy sacrifices I have not caused thee to serve with an offering nor wearied thee with incense Thou hast bought me no sweet cane with money neither hast thou filled me with the fat of thy sacrifices c. Yet they did these things and God acknowledgeth it Jer. 6.20 To what purpose cometh there to me Incense from Sheba and the sweet Cane from a far Country Your burnt-offerings are not acceptable nor your sacrifices sweet to me He looks on the thing as not done because 't is not done as it should be Men think of God but their thoughts are not holy awful and subjecting the spirit they think of God but their thoughts are no way proportionable to the Majesty of God they look loosly carelesly and carnally upon God they peep upon that glory with an unholy and undaunted spirit and so it s against the Rule and God reckons it not done nay it will be worse to them God will recompence upon their heads even their thoughts of him this he will punish severely People think they do well when they have good thoughts and think well they are deceived for if their thoughts be not as they should be though they be for number as motes in the Sun they do no good but bring many sufferings and punishments upon them 4. That which is a mans course and trade denominates a man and not any particular action A man may come to a Carpenters house and take up his tools and do something at his work but this makes him not a Carpenter it doth not denominate him because that is not his trade The best Saints sin yet because it 's not their trade and course they are said not to sin and are called blameless and holy c. And David is said to be a man after Gods own heart notwithstanding his many failings because the habit of his spirit was so Now the course of the world is a course of habitual and voluntary forgetfulness of God endeavoring to shut God out of their thoughts and if their thoughts do run towards him it 's but as water out of its proper channel not in its place their way is altogether out of God that we may say of God in reference to these as Job of places not frequented They are forgotten of the foot Job 28.4 So the minds and spirits of these men converse not with God but he is forgotten of the foot of their Souls This is a dangerous state when they are not with God where are they In the night tares are sown and when is night but when God appears not as the non-appearance of the Sun makes darkness and then the night takes place and now all evil is to be found in that man Judg. 3.7 They did evil and forgot God Those two are joyned together as the cause and the effect they forgot God and therefore did evil Forgetfulness and unmindfulness of Gods is the womb of all sin where every unclean spirit nests A man that lives in forgetfulness of God is free to righteousness as the Apostle speaks Rom. 6.20 He is in no bonds to God he feels no obliging power in any thing upon his spirit toward God Non entis non appaâ—entis eadem est ratio As things that are not so things that are unknown and not minded are worth nothing It 's all one to me whether things be not or be forgotten The spirits of those men are in a woful case that live without God they are as Sheep without a Shepherd and like a Ship among Rocks nothing but a divine hand can rescue them from everlasting Shipwrack All affections of love joy fear and hope flow from sight of God therefore where there is no sight and knowledg of God men are free to all evil If thou forgettest God thou clearly pronouncest and the express language of thy course is that there is no God this very thing strips him of all loveliness and beauty one not worthy to be minded What is more contemptible then that which no man will look on Forgetfulness is the state of death Psal 31.12 That I be not as one forgotten among the dead When God is not remembered by thee he is to thee a dead thing And what is thy mind but as a grave a place of darkness and forgetfulness where is nothing but pollution and corruption and whatsoever is loathsom in it self and destructive to thee It 's the speech of Bildad in Job 8.11 12 13 14. Can the rush grow without mire or the flag without water Whilest it is yet in his greenness and not cut down it withereth before any other herb So are the paths of all that forget God and the hypocrites hope shall
place but the acts of the Soul may be done in any place at any time you may start into Heaven when no eye sees you you may be on the wing towards God though among a croud of men no business is such but you may be with God and yet your business not suffer Again It 's an eternal faculty and the work of it is everlasting A contemplative life is the life of Heaven it 's that which Angels do they ever behold the face of your Father in Heaven If you like not this work how will you live in Heaven The dislike of it is a bar against your entrance The life of blessedness is a life of Vision and seeing God which if you take no delight in Heaven is no place for you Again It 's a faculty very active your minds must be somewhere else if they be not with God and if they be not on God they are upon something of less concernment Why should you follow after drops and neglect the Fountain Why should you fly after shadows and neglect him who is the true Substance Truly if the mind have its current from God towards other things these things are not only of less concernment but destructive and from whence you will reap nothing but corruption and depravation and defilement of spirit you will grow worse and worse into the form of the Devil by how much your minds stray from God and pitch upon other things Jer. 2.5 They are gone far from me and have walked after vanity and are become vain Again It 's a faculty that hath received in the Saints a tendency towards God You do extreamly wrong your selves when you make not use of that propensity and put not forth your selves to have communion with God whereby you might bless your selves in the enjoyment of him See how David expresses the propensity of his spirit towards God Psal 63.1 O God thou art my God early will I seek thee my Soul thirsts for thee my flesh longeth for thee When shall I come and appear before thee to behold thy Glory as I have seen it in the Sanctuary This is the course of the spirits of the children of God in whom that propensity which was natural is now in part restored so that they are bent towards God they thirst after God as a man thirsts for water in a dry and thirsty Land Again There is a blessing in this work God blesseth what he likes as he curseth what he hateth He likes it well Mal. 3.16 Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord and thought on his Name He will be sure to mind those that mind him and be a friend to those that seek after him When you are bid to look upon him it is but to receive from him Is it any thing else but to call and invite you to look on the most pleasing and delightful Object that in the beholding of it it may convey it self unto you and you be delighted and filled with it It is all one as if he should bid you sit down by a Well of Life and drink and to be as Christ and the Angels are who are blessed in the beholding of him as if he should bid you come and pluck Apples off that Tree of Life that is in the midst of Paradise God loves this work Cant. 2.14 Let me see thy face my Beloved and hear thy voyce for thy voyce is sweet and thy countenance comely In one act you may do that which pleaseth God and makes you blessed Set your eye towards him and his eye will be more towards you and he will refresh you as with Manna there is enough in him come and take freely Reflect upon your own experience have you ever found this way like a wilderness If it be a blessed work why will you unbless your selves If the work will exalt you why will you debase your selves in not closing with it And if you might live above in Heaven why will you live below Let all the sweetness you have ever found in this work provoke you to enlarge your self toward it When thoughts of God are moving in you God himself is not far off he will come and enter too and how sweet is it for God to come and take up his habitation in the Soul CHAP. IX Jesus Christ a Pattern of Eying the Father Greatest mindfulness of God due God our best Friend All we have is in his hands and of his gift All Religion founded upon a due mindfulness of God Anguish awails wandering hearts ANother Argument is from the Example of our Lord Jesus whom we are to mind and imitate He is your Pattern What saith Christ Learn of Me And Be you perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect How can you follow Christ the Captain of your Salvation if you mind him not When the Apostle perswades them in Heb. 12. to run the race that is set before them he bids them look to Jesus the Author and Finisher of their Faith Mariners at Sea that they may run a right course keep an eye on that ship that bears the light Your course cannot be right when your eye is not upon Jesus Christ your Pattern Would it be with us as it is when the forgetfulness of God lodgeth in our hearts if we did more mind Christ We should say in our selves Is this the course that he steered David tells us of Christ Psal 16.8 that he set the Lord always before him or as Luke expounds it applying those words to Christ Acts 2.25 I foresaw the Lord always before my face The Father was Ever in his eye whatsoever came into his sight he ey'd him first and fix'd upon him Now Christ is not only appointed to be our Pattern in this thing but he takes notice of us whether we imitate or no His eye is upon us to see whether our eye be upon the Father as his was and is for ever It was the counsel of Seneca that when men are about to do evil they should think on Plato or some such eminent man as present to behold them Certainly if Christ were more minded as such a Pattern God would be more the object of our most affectionate thoughts Again If we consider the Object it is the greatest reason in the world that our eye should be upon God God is our friend he loves us he bears us in his heart and shall not he be in our thoughts This is ill requiting of him whose eye is always on us seldom or never to eye him This is a great contradiction to the Law of Friendship which consists in reciprocation of loves Jer. 29.11 I know my thoughts toward you saith the Lord thoughts of peace and not of evil to give you an expected end Oh that we could say so I know my thoughts towards God are thoughts of love and care to please him Job 19.14 See how hainously
Job took it that his friends had forgotten him My kinsfolk have failed and my familiar friends have forgotten me c. As God is your friend so all you have is in his hand My times saith David Psal 31. are in thy hands O God And can you forget him in whose hands are all your concernments If you had but a piece of your estate in a mans hand you could not but mind him God hath all that you have for Soul and body to Eternity in his hands and shall we forget him It was the aggravation of the sin of Belshazzar in Dan. 5.23 that he did not glorifie God in whose hands his life was Thy God in whose hands thy breath is thou hast not glorified Again You have all from him all the good of every kind that you receive is all from God and will you not mind him Deut. 32.18 God complains that the people were unmindful of the Rock that begot them and forgot God that formed them Shall we so dishonor our selves and live so cross to all principles of Reason and Justice as to be taken with the things we receive from God and forget him Shall we receive all that comes from him and shut him out of doors It was never Gods intent that when he had deckt our ways with all flowers of comfort we should sink into an ungrateful unmindfulness of him These are so many memento's to excite us to remember him It was the commendation of Abraham Heb. 11. that he sojourned in the Land of Promise as in a strange Country He did not sit down as at home and make glad his heart in the enjoyment of mercies but reckoned himself as in a strange Country that he might enjoy him that is better then all It is upon record that God had said often to his own people the Jews Beware lest you forget me when you come into that good Land It is spoken to you also Take heed you forget not me in your habitations in your relations and friends in your goods in all your enjoyments Isai 44.21 Thou art my servant O Israel I have formed thee thou art my servant thou shalt not be forgotten of me or not forget me the force of the word is thou shalt not bear me away 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Non oblivisceris mei but let me be in thy heart and in thy mind and remembrance always as I 'le not bear thee away thou shalt not be forgotten of me Thus you see much in him whom you are to mind to draw and hold your eyes toward him The last Argument It is a very fundamental Duty all your intentions purposes dispositions and affections in your whole course comes to nothing except they receive life from this for this is the foundation of all In the sight of God lies your Rule of direction for all your actions and all the Reason of your holy walking The mind is the Leader and it leads according to the object where it is set Job 31.7 My heart hath not followed my eye That is the natural course for the heart to follow the eye where the eye is set there the heart will be also See how the Prophet expresseth Isai 59.2 I have stretched out my hand to a rebellious people that walk in a way that is not good they follow their own thoughts They walkt in a way that was not good What led them Their own thoughts Thoughts do mould men a man that thinks much of the world grows worldly and a man that thinks much of God grows godly as he thinks so he is saith Solomon Prov. 23. And we beholding the glory of Christ saith the Apostle 2 Cor. 3.18 are changed from glory to glory If there be any comfort of hope if any flames of love if any life of faith if any vigorous dispositions or motions toward God if any meltings of a softened heart these flow from the knowledg of God not habitual but actual Quod appositio vel adaptatio ligni est ad ignem corporalem hoc est rememoratio recogitatio beneficiorum ad ignem spiritualem Gul. par de virtut c. 11 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Habitual knowledg is as meat in the Cubboard and as precious water in a glass but actual knowledg is those things in use and enjoyment We are renewed day by day saith the Apostle how by looking on things that are eternal 2 Cor. 4.16 Heb. 11. it is reported that Moses did many excellent things How came he by that excellent spirit he saw him that was invisible Plato saith that it is Philosophy to love God for that is the end of it to bring men unto God Upon all these considerations and many more that might be urged give up your selves unto this work There is not a man free but the bonds of this counsel are upon him The sum of it is this Often have your eye on God dwell in the contemplation of him let that day be as one of the days of Hell and of darkness wherein you have nothing to do with God This is certain if God be your God you cannot let your minds run at waste To turn aside from God will be very chargeable and expensive to you you will pay dear for it Children that wander from home get the rod The rod is not far from that man that loves not to stay with God God can make the thoughts of thy heart to be like Hell it self and to minister more bitterness to you then if a whole legion of Devils were about you I beseech you therefore mould your selves into this Doctrine that you be not found Despisers of the great God who will not speak in vain One of these two things will be made good upon all either the Word will subject your Souls unto the Command of God or unto the Vengeance of God and if you cannot now look up to him with delight you may know the day in which you may look up and curse Isai 8.21 Now you may look up towards God and live but the time may come that you may be in that distress that you will curse God and the world and your selves when bitterness shall be on your Souls for your neglect of this work CHAP. X. Directions concerning Eying of God Truths to be received in their power Saints are to keep in their hearts a meetness for their work Saints are to preserve their capacities for God Saints must maintain a deep sense of divine engagements A lively sense of necessities is useful Pure hearts are meet for divine converse The mind will'd without Sanctification I Shall now set before you some helpful Counsel that may enable to this great work from which the heart of man doth so hang off Certainly there is nothing which men are more hardly brought to then to this to keep the remembrance of God fresh in their spirits and to let their understandings run in this channel constantly As men do intend an end so they eye the
God Sanctification is a great thing What is the body until Sanctification comes but an untamed monster as a wilde beast O with what numberless outragious passions doth it blind and carry away the Soul Until it be sanctified it puts a man into an incapacity of conversing with God it lies not only open to all temptations but it snatcheth after them it 's a weight that lies upon the spirit of a man Pray for Sanctification which is the sequestration of the spirit of a man from vanity and the consecration of it unto God it is the putting of it into his possession the planting in it a new disposition to move towards God and to converse with God this the Apostle calls the renewing of the mind CHAP. XI Advantages that come by minding of God are to be duly considered The more we mind God the more we may Those which eye God most know themselves best Those which eye God most have most of God Forgetfulness of God cuts the nerves of Holiness Forgetfulness of God betrays to Apostacy NOw let me add another Help Weigh well with a deep sense the high Advantages which a due discharge of this work doth bring upon you this will facilitate the work The more you mind God the better you may Men cry out the work is hard It is good and sweet but hardest to those that do it least easiest to those that do it most Living in this work doth advantage and enlarge your spiritual strength and put you into more meetness and fitness into more proportion of ability for the discharge of it That as the Apostle speaks of the sinful use of the eye and of the sinful effusions of the spirit in way of evil that it works unto a necessity of sinning so that they have eyes full of adultery 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that cannot cease to sin 2 Pet. 2.14 So the more you live in mindfulness of God the more are you wrought into a most excellent and sweet necessity of living in this course Gods entertainment is very gracious unto a friend that minds him that he cannot long have God out of his eye De coelo descendit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This advantage you will also have by it the discovery of your self and truly that is a great matter for a man to know himself We are therefore so little our selves because we know our selves so little all that monstrous pride and self-love that foolish indulgence that is usual toward our selves is because we know not what we are This will make you know your selves more for when your eye is on God it is upon your Rule the Rule of all perfection the most absolute Pattern of all spiritual beauty therefore you may see what proportion and similitude there is between God and you This will breed a self abhorrency because of that infinite disagreement that is in the spirit of a man and his ways to the holy God Job in the sight of God abhor'd himself in dust and ashes Job 42.4 Here you may see how your hearts and the Rule agree Now also you may observe what impressions the sight of God leaveth upon you You say you mind God Well and I pray what comes of it what fear what faith what hope what tenderness What watchfulness is there wrought in your spirits by your minding of God What a hard heart is that which is layd under the very beams of the Sun of Righteousness and melts not What an obdurate spirit is that which in the sight of God yields no more We should come to see better what we are if we were more in this work This advantage too you shall have you shall be filled more with God What is the moaning of your Souls O saith the Saint that I might enjoy him O that God might be my God! and that his presence might be with me where ever I am All spiritual life hath its birth and growth in this work the first sight of God lays the foundation all after-sights do superstruct The first sight of God is the planting of holiness in the Soul after-sights are waterings unto more encrease and fruitfulness at the first sight of God God enters into the Soul but the after-sights of God fills and fills until they fill up the Soul If therefore it be so great an advantage consider it and let it provoke you unto this work One Rule more to help unto this work Possess your selves deeply with the apprehensions of the great sinfulness of the neglect of this Therefore men and their sins are so near together because they see not their sins more sinful When sin appears out of measure sinful then it sets the heart at the greatest distance from it Look on the sinfulness of it in the Cause of it Whence is it thou wandering Soul thou sleeping spirit thou man possessed with the world that thou sayst thou breathest after God and yet shuttest thy eye from him It is from a most woful frame of spirit Faith is dead and love dead all principles of life are put into a state of astonishment it is deep night all the spiritual powers are asleep bound up hence it is thou mindest God no more Poor Creature thou art not thy self thy heart is gone other things have born it away thou art like the Prodigal until God brings thee unto thy wits and right mind again Now see what the state of that man is by the true original of the sin of neglecting to remember God and look a little further into this matter to see it in the Effect of it Forgetting of God dissolves the bond between the Soul and God and sets it free from God It is the minding of God that doth beget and preserve a capacity of him and propensity toward him then forgeting of God shuts up thy heart from him and doth byass thy Soul unto a contrary motion to a departing from him puts thee into a state wherein thou canst not be according to the calling whereunto thou art called Thou canst not walk in the place of a servant toward thy Lord for how canst thou do his Will whom thou rememberest not If all the Reason of holy walking lies in this then the nerves and sinews of Holiness are cut in sunder when forgetfulness of God raigns in men There is this evil also thou betrayest thy Soul as much as in thee lies into the state of the Devils themselves What makes Hell but want of God and what makes the unhappiness of Devils but separation from God And this thou dost practise upon thy own self I could give a notorious and sad Instance of this truth to every one that doth voluntarily forget God in an Apostate Professor whom I knew who said The turning point and first beginning of his declining from God was his neglect of communion with Jesus Christ Therefore when you give your selves to a voluntary forgetfulness of God you betray your selves into a state of Apostacy and backsliding from
but in the water and beasts in their pastures and cannot live in the Sea And indeed there is something of the divine new nature in Christians they must live in God or they dye 2. There is the Law of Love The child loves the mother above all women though it may be there be many better the Lord hath placed the life of the child in the mother how much more the life of a Christian in himself for there is no love like that love 3. Life is cut out by the Law of Reason and Judgment by which men chuse their portion upon which they feed and upon which they make their lives This way nothing but God is eligible to a good man He saith some other things serve for other uses but not to live on Nothing but God can be made our own nothing out of God is properly our own but our sins How can a man say that is his own which he cannot command and hold Nothing can be made full enough strong enough answerable to our desires but God Hence it is that a good man lives in God because he can live no where else Though he make use of his bed to sleep on of his meat to refresh him and do as others do in the use of these things yet he would be a very dead man worse then a man layd in the grave if his life were not in God I would exhort you then Vse Exhortat that you would thus live in God it is a riddle to the world but a truth to Saints and that which their Souls can witness to The world knows no other life then friends estate and such like enjoyments the Saints know that there is no life in these they live another life which the world knows not of Live this life that is make this to be the strength reason and rule of all your walkings to be the pillar and prop of your Souls whereon you may lean and rest make this your ultimate rest that after all the troublesom turnings and tossings of this world you may take rest here in this peace of God which passeth all underestanding that you may say as David in Psal 34. He was in trouble but saith he I trusted in the Lord and said O Lord thou art my God and this was all to him against all trouble They seek my life and make me a derision but I said O Lord thou art my God Two things I premise in this Exhortation 1. That you make your Interest in God sure that you may be able to say without fear and trembling thou art my God This Interest is mutual if God be yours then you are his He is yours by gift of himself to you and you are his by gift of your selves to him Remember the day when how and by what act you did give your selves to God Have you put by your selves and all your sinful propensions dispositions and resolutions Have you layd an absolute denyal upon them never more to observe them much less to serve them And have you resolved that you will have no purposes or desires but such as are according to God Be sure if you cannot say you are his you cannot say he is yours You may please your selves indeed with fancies and vain imaginations of that which is not but know this that such a kind of Contract with God as we speak of hath evidence in it It 's not a cold and liveless acting but there is power and efficacy in it These two things will be of power in that man that hath in truth given himself to God 1. Conscience with Love Conscience without Love hath very much power in it but Conscience with Love is very potent Indeed Conscience will tell thee O man thou hast given thy self to God therefore thou shouldst walk as his And Love will take thee aside and sound the same alarum in thine ears too but more effectually 2. A second thing is the power of God in them and over them There is a power of God in such You have received saith the Apostle the spirit of power 2 Tim. 1.7 This is the difference between the relation that is between God and his people and all other relations This relation conveys the Spirit of God into men The husband and wife that are never so closely knit cannot convey their spirits one to another the husband may wish that his wife were wise and meek but he cannot give her such a spirit But the relation between God and his people always works a communication of spirit the Spirit of God is given to them Besides There is a power of God over such because he sees that there is a great power against them They are kept by the power of God through faith unto Salvation Certainly if you have not such a Conscience joyned with Love and find not such a power of God watching over you and the Spirit of God guiding you you are none of his Another thing to be premised is this That a Christians life whether we consider the life of peace or the life of holiness depends much upon his minding of his Interest in God The Apostle in Hebr. 2. tells them they had lost much of the life of Christianity how came that because they had forgotten the Exhortation that spake to them as unto Children And in Prov. 2.27 Who forsakes the guide of her youth and forgets the Covenant of her God The latter is the cause of the former because she forgets the Covenant of her God therefore she forsakes the guide of her youth You have need to seek much in God your sins are many your dangers great you know it well enough You have this encouragement Whatsoever you go for you knock at the right door whatsoever you ask you ask that which is as much your own as any thing you enjoy God hath made over himself to you in becoming yours He hath said he will be your God All particular promises are but streams from this Spring and branches from this Root Your Interest is larger then Heaven and Earth Heaven and Earth are nothing to God Therefore if God be yours you have more cause to rejoyce then if he had made you actual and sole Possessors of Heaven and Earth In the world they that have little of their own comfort themselves that they have something in their friends such a Lord such a Duke is their friend So if you have not much in this world comfort your selves in this that God is your God The Lord thought this enough to comfort his people with when they were afflicted and tossed with tempests He that takes not comfort in this either knows not what God is or denies what he professeth to know Live by Faith or as some render these words in Psal 37. Feed on Faith When you come to God you come not to ask a title but to plead a title you come not to ask any thing that was not your own before but you come to
house made a shift to live on husks and such trash for a time so do many now but the day will come when God will take these husks away from you wives children pleasures and estates and what ever it is that gives you some refreshment in this world and then you will be left worse then nothing you shall neither have God nor the world Yea such a necessity there is to look after this that you have indeed no true interest in any thing till you get aâ— Interest in God though you think you have That man that hath not God hath nothing it is most sure for he is under sentence A condemned man loseth all his estate Men will perswade themselves they are Lords and that they have this and they have that but indeed they have nothing what they have is but prisoners allowance something is allowed to condemned men till the stroke comes and this is the case of all men that have not God for their God Know also that a man is not said to have any interest in any thing that doth not add something to him if it be not something that contributes to his well-being A man doth not reckon his sickness diseases pains and such evils and miseries to be his interest in these things no man accounts of it is unhappiness Whatsoever adds not to a man stands for a cypher is nothing Interest in nothing is nothing That which we claim Interest in must have some good in it to give out unto us But now the real good of a man is no way promoted by any thing while he lives without God in the world It is the priviledg of Saints that all things work together for their good Rom. 8.28 And it 's as true otherwise that nothing works for the good of those that love not God Children and estate may tend to the goodness of one mans condition there may be good working out of them to one man and yet may prove to the hurt of another as the best good may be evil to this or that man to a man that is under the Curse all turns to bitterness and death The truth is that which kills life doth less hurt the senses then that which only destroys the peace and rest of a man A man feels more by a stroke sometimes then he doth by a Consumption or an Apoplexy That which destroys most effectually is oftentimes least felt and therefore what men feel not because of their outward enjoyments they consider not they lay not to heart But if God be your God then all is yours 1 Cor. 3. Then comes an Interest in all As he that marries the heir becomes Lord of the estate servants and cattel and lands are his he commands all the family So if God be our God the whole Creation becomes ours Men come to have much by coming to God The Apostle gives some account of this in Heb. 12. where he saith We are come to Mount Zion to the City of the living God to an innumerable company of Angels to the spirits of just men made perfect c. We come to all these to communion with these when God becomes ours We begin therefore at the wrong end when we seek any thing in this world and seek not God first for saith Christ Mat. 6.33 Seek first the Kingdom of God and all these things shall be given to you When therefore you seek estates and the accommodations of this life and do not indeed seek to make God yours you act very crosly to your own good There is a simple necessity to look after this for besides what hath been said you all live and are in a state of absolute dependance upon God who hath the power of life and death we are all in his hands and that Key by which he shuts and none can open you shall see put forth one day when you shall know what a loss it is to miss an Interest in him who hath all power in Heaven and in Earth That 's one thing which should make us serious to get an Interest in God that it 's simply necessary CHAP. VIII Interest in God most attainable Goodness and Fulness the Springs of Communication Desire easily and with most success revealed to God Poor strangers impotent persons not bar'd from God as from men Interest in God incomparable in the enjoyment A Second Argument is That it is an Interest most attainable for it is Goodness and Fulness by which we come to have Interest in any thing these are the Springs of all Communication between one and another and where these are greatest there is a wider door opened a fuller easier and sweeter entrance into Communion and the enjoyment of each other It 's the nature of goodness to be communicative and the more goodness the more ready to communicate Look through the whole Creation and you shall find it so that as any Creature is more noble and excellent so it is the more hospitable and bountiful the more ready to give out it self The Sun the Air the Sea how liberal are they Things of a more confin'd and straitened nature are but like a small Cottage into which one or two or a few may enter but it cannot give habitation to many But as Creatures abound in the goodness of God and his fulness they become like a stately Palace that gives open ready and liberal entertainment to many Now God is greatest in all Excellencies and therefore his Propensions to Mercy and Goodness towards his Creatures are unspeakably unconceiveably greater then any Propensions in the Creature can be In these two Glories God infinitely transcends all Creatures in the glory of his Being and the glory of his Working Nothing more sets out God and exalts him then his readiness to do good and communicate himself to his Creatures He hath said It 's a more blessed thing to give then to receive Indeed it 's sometimes a more blessed thing to give then to have and enjoy Take one that hath great power to do good and no love what is he but like a meer Iron Chest a Fountain sealed Now God is most ready to do good it 's his glory It 's said in Prov. 19.23 That the desire of a man is his kindness The desire of a man that is that which is most to be desired the most precious thing in a man that thing which makes him desireable that renders him glorious and beautiful is his kindness that he is a kind man such an one wears a Crown and Garland upon his head This Crown God wears above all the desire of God is his kindness And to make it yet more apparent that an Interest in God is most attainable Consider That by which we come to have an Interest in another is usually the manifestation of our desire with the tender of our love and affections to him and this is best done and with most efficacy with God for the breathings and operations of a mans spirit lie
more open to him then to any creature One may wish good-will to another and may want skill to make his mind known but you cannot have an ingenuous and hearty wish in your Souls O that God were my God! but he hears it and knows it He hears spirits and reads spirits as we do words In Psal 138.9 My groanings are not hid from Thee If thou lovest God and thine heart be towards him he needs no Interpreter or Spokes-man to tell him what thine heart is The Apostle saith He knows the meaning of the spirit When it can but sob and sigh within it self O that God were my God! he knows the meaning of that language Rom. 8.22 When Christ asked Peter Lovest thou me Lord saith he thou knowest that I love thee Add to this That there cannot be that assurance of speeding upon the manifestation of our spirits to any as there is with God I may make my mind known to another for the enjoyment of his friendship yet I may fail and come short of it but now if I come to God with an ingenuous and sincere desire to have God to be my God I shall not fail in that You seek many things in vain but God never frustrates his poor people in their desires after him He crosseth them in many of their other desires but never in that If he be so good that he satisfies the desire of all things of every living creature as in Psal 146. much more will he satisfie desires after himself for these are from his best love they spring from his own bosom and he 'l be sure to bless them they shall attain their end Other desires may be satisfied with other things if you cannot have one thing another thing may serve you in its stead if a man cannot have this friend he may have another But we must either have Gods love and his friendship or we dye for ever He hath engaged himself that those that thirst after him shall never go without him the word stands upon record the Lord Jesus Christ spake it from his Father Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be satisfied in Mat. 5. And let him that thirsteth come in Revel 22. Indeed these desires are given not only to be as a byass or principle of motion in our Souls after God but are planted in our Souls as indubitable pledges of his love and of his habitation there Other things are first desired and then obtained but God is first ours before he be desired Divine love works downward it begins in Heaven and that Communion that is wrought between God and us begins in himself and from himself He loves first and speaks first and our love is but the answer of his love If we can say to God Lord I am thine this is but the eccho of what he hath said first I am thine So in Zech. 13. latter end I will say saith God Thou art my people and they shall say Thou art my Father Oh this assurance of obtaining mercy with God for poor thirsty Creatures it is the honey and milk of our Souls our greatest joy and the satisfaction of our spirits in this life They that seek God shall glorifie him If they seek once the next thing is praise their hearts shall live for ever The manifestation of this grace mercy and goodness that is in God is the life of such as seek him In Isai 38.15 16. What shall I say he hath spoken to me and himself hath done it I shall walk softly all my years in the bitterness of my Soul O Lord by these things men live and in all these things is the life of my spirit so wilt Thou recover me and make me to live He speaks of Gods goodness appearing to him in that act which was not a single but a compound act and it was not a meer natural good but a spiritual and inward communication of himself it took him much What shall I say I shall be at rest as one quieted and satisfied in spirit after my bitterness I have had sorrow but now I have seen the love of God towards me I rejoyce I was tumultuous before and unquiet and unsatisfied but now I shall be satisfied Hitherto you have been looking upon the feasibleness of this Interest that no Interest is so attainable as Interest in God And if you will look once more consider how many bars there are to our Interests with men and you shall see how these things that are such impediments with us are of no force with God Many times a poor man a begger one in rags knows it would be his happiness to have an Interest in such a Prince but how shall he come at it In Prov. 14.20 Solomon tells us The poor man is hated of his neighbor he is afraid if he should ask something of him he should burden him Nay he is hated of his Brother and though he speak with intreaties yet he is answered roughly What thou a Begger and come so boldly to ask of me And yet we that are but poor beggers and in our rags may have free access to God In Prov. 19.7 it is said All the brethren of the poor do hate him how much more will his friends depart far from him But God turns not back our prayers though we be poor and miserable yet our Lord Jesus Christ is not ashamed to call us Brethren Heb. 11.6 Strangers have a bar in their way Come to a great one I know you not saith he I never saw you before what have you to do to come to me Therefore Ruth was much taken with the kindness of Boaz because she was a stranger to him What are we but strangers and aliens afar off and yet he rejects us not when we come near him God will not say to men I know you not though they have been strangers except when they come too late In Luke 13.25 saith Christ Strive to enter in at the strait gate for many I say unto you shall seek to enter and shall not be able that is they seek too late When once the Master of the house is risen up and hath shut the door if then you come and say Lord Lord open to us he will say I know you not But seek him while the door is open while he may be found and he will be ready to receive you Impotent persons that are fit for nothing how shall they get an Interest in great ones What can he do say they though it be but for a servants place What would become of us if God should put that question to us He receives us when we are good for nothing fit for us Nay when we were Enemies then he was reconciled to us Rom. 5. Now then you see that God hath received such persons indeed be never receives any other So that upon all accompts an Interest in God is more attainable then any other Interest That 's a second Argument I
'le name one more Interest in God is better enjoyed then any other Interest whatsoever There is no Interest to be enjoyed with that sweetness security usefulness and consolation as our Interest in God is For besides that unspeakable and infinite Fulness that is in God know that this Interest is not subject to any dissolution Interest in God now is better then it was in our first estate when we came out of Gods hand All other Interests may cease If our love or others loveliness cease our Interest is gone and the loveliness of every Creature under the Sun will have an end but God abides Take a man the most wise the most learned the most amiable the richest man all these things will pass away but our Interest in God is not subject to any separation that is we shall be never from him The absence of our friends is like the setting of the Sun they are life to us in their presence but when they are gone from us they cannot help us they are so far dead to us but God is ever with us Interests with men are oft-times very exacting A man must do this and do that and much ado to please Men do tye up their Interest so strait that except things be done at this time and after this mode we indanger a flaw God doth not impose upon his people after this manner And again Other Interests are apt to be tyred and so fall into a dull sleep of mutual forgetfulness because the goodness that is in us is but little a shallow Cistern is soon drawn dry But with God there is no difficulty at all to give out love and if he spend himself never so much this way he is not at all diminished He rests in his love Zeph. 3. His joy and self-contentment is always flourishing So that as this Interest is more attainable so it 's better to be enjoyed CHAP. IX Christians ought to clear their hopes from Uncertainties Beleevers doubt through their own fault They that seek God must pursue their end THat which follows next is Exhortation That you would not only seek this Interest and get it but that you would seek to know it and to be satisfied that you have indeed an Interest in God Live not upon hopes mingled with uncertainties and anxieties Let not this suffice It may be God is my God or I hope he is but put it out of doubt Give all diligence saith the Apostle to make your Calling and Election sure 2 Pet. 1.10 Sure as firm ground that you may so know it that there may be no trembling of heart about it that it may be a certain conclusion made up in your own spirits that you are the called and chosen of God For if you do these things saith the Apostle you shall never fall but an abundant entrance shall be administred to you into his Kingdom You shall never fall or as it is sometimes rendered you shall never offend So the Apostle James Chap. 2.10 He that Offends in one is guilty of all Indeed the sight of Interest in God carries a man with more evenness and strength in his way and keeps him in more compliance with and conformity unto God Sometimes the word is rendered stumble Rom. 11.11 Have they stumbled that they should fall If a man know God to be his God he walks with a more even and steady foot all his ways are more plain before him mountains of difficulty and danger will be layd level there will be nothing to dash his foot against to hinder him in his race and an entrance in abundance will be administred to him into the Kingdom of Heaven Fears and doubts straiten our way and hinder our passage to the Kingdom of God Suppose a man were to go into an house where he fears he shall not enter this would very much hinder his endevor But when a man shall have a blessed prospect into Heaven and see his place there that must needs further his more abundant and free entrance into it But more particularly that I may perswade you if God will to be very serious in this thing to make your Interest in God more certain let me tell you In the first place That no man that beleeves in Christ wants it but through his own fault I say it is a mans own fault if he be not able to say that God is his God I speak now according to the ordinary course of God demeaning himself to his people There is nothing of greater concernment either to his peoples welfare or the advancement of his own design which he hath upon them then the manifestation of his Love and the satisfaction of their spirits in that great Question Whether God be their God And that Spirit upon whom lies the Office of bringing from darkness to light hath this Office also of refreshing and reviving the spirit and therefore bears that name the Comforter He not only espouses us to Christ but maintains a perpetual entertainment that is his work He is not only the bond of our Union but the light of it by which we see our selves one with Christ and so one with the Father Many complain they find not God to be their God but it is not because God is not willing to shew himself what he is but because they are wanting to themselves There are two great faults that oftentimes wrong us and keep us in the dark and make that seem a secret which otherwise might lie open to our eyes One Error concerneth seeking Some never put their Interest in God to the question Some seek not at all and never put the question whether God be their God but run the hazard live and dye venturing their Souls to Eternity Others complain they seek but they cannot find fain they would be satisfied in this thing but they cannot Now I say the complaint must fall upon our selves there is perhaps a fault in our seeking This is the word that must stand fast for ever God will be found of them that seek him In Jer. 29.13 Then you shall find me when you seek me with all your heart To seek with all the heart is not only to seek truly and sincerely some seek but in words only making verbal prayers without any inward sense but to seek him strongly above all things and not only from an ardent thirst of spirit but to seek him without ceasing till we find him In due time we shall reap if we faint not Gal. 6. The Rule of Scripture you know is this that we pray incessantly 1 Thes 5.17 Mark that in Hos 6.3 After two days will he revive us and in the third he will raise us up Then shall we know if we follow on to know the Lord His going forth is prepared as the morning and he shall come unto us as the rain as the former and latter rain unto the Earth If you follow on if you follow the business you shall obtain God hath
appointed his going forth as the morning that is as the Sun riseth and fails not as the Sun goes forth in its light and grows so will Gods appearance to his people be And as the rain comes upon the thirsty Earth and causeth all things to spring afresh so shall the manifestation of Gods love be to those that seek him without ceasing What if God appear not presently and you have not that full answer to your desires Though he come slowly yet he will be sure to come his staying is not a denyal and his not shewing himself is not an hiding himself He is uncovering himself and making way for the appearance of that which you would fain have a sight of He stays a while to make his love the more visible afterward by his absence he raiseth the mind and enlargeth the heart to desire and long after his presence and then his manifestation will be fullest God is as ready nay more ready to open then you are to knock he loves that thirst in you which is after himself he loves to be loved let him be pleased as well as you It may be seeking Christians are not so ingenuous as they should be We are not to seek him only but to please him Psal 119.2 Blessed are they that keep his Testimonies and that seek him with their whole heart That seek him and his Love and keep his Law Or it may be offences have been but not bewailed Impotency is the continuation of sin You are ever doing that evil which you have not been humbled for nothing nulls it but repentance and humbling your selves in the sight of God With what face can you say to God Let thy love O Lord be upon me when as you cannot say to God Lord I love thee That man cannot say he loves God that desires not to please him Can he say his heart is with God who suffers his heart to go out after other things Why should he desire so to impose upon God that God should love him whom he desires not to love and please it is unreasonable What father would be so dealt with that the child walking in stubborn courses would have his father shew nothing but clearness of countenance and love to him David all the while he was under clouds of guilt and sorrow wished that God would shew forth the light of his countenance to him but he suffered many wrackings in his Soul till he confessed his sins Psal 32. What God hath said he will have fulfilled Heaven and Earth shall pass away but not one tittle of his Promise If he hear not it is not because he is not a God hearing prayer but because you hear not him Isai 45.19 I said not unto the seed of Jacob Seek ye me in vain I the Lord speak righteousness I declare things that are right I speak as I mean my words and my heart agree in one What ever our offences have been if we be ingenuous in our approaches to God God will not look upon our offences but upon our persons In 2 Chron. 7.14 you have this promise If my people that are called by my Name shall humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways then will I hear from Heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their Land If thy Soul be sick and thou mournest after God that hideth himself from thee and humblest thy self and repentest of thy sins with abasedness of spirit before him he will hear CHAP. X. God hath fully made known whom he loves Christians able to know themselves Gods Spirit strengthens the testimony of our spirits Christians hindered by Slothfulness and Discouragements A Second Fault is That God doth give the manifestation of his Love and we receive it not we accept it not I will for the more full clearing of this lay down these Considerations First That God hath given to his people sufficient means for the knowledg of their Interest in him for he hath told us who they are that he loves whom he hath chosen and called out of this world and made his peculiar people If he had carried on a design of love to particular persons in his own brest no man could have known who was loved of him then we had been left in the dark for no man knows the things of a man but the spirit of a man as the Apostle speaks But as the Angel marked those in Jerusalem that were to be spared so there is a mark that God hath set upon his own by which they may be known to what fold and flock they do belong And indeed the end of the Scripture so discovering and setting forth the marks of the people of God is for this purpose that we may know our Happiness So in 1 Joh. 5.13 this was the end of writing his Epistle These things saith he have I written unto you that beleeve on the Name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life and that you may beleeve on the Name of the Son of God Wherefore was it that he had told them how many ways they might know that God dwelt in them and they in God Wherefore did he make so many descriptions of those whom God had set his love upon but that you may know saith he that you have eternal life because you are such And he hath not only done thus but hath given us understanding also by which we are able to know not only other things but our selves by which we may judg our selves and our actions and what is within us Neither hath he given us an understanding meerly natural but it is raised being illuminated with his own light that we may be able to find out the work of God in us an understanding that can reflect upon it self not only in way of simple vision and apprehension of what is within us but by way of argumentation and reasoning 1 Joh. 2.3 5. Hereby we know that we know him if we keep his Commandments And whoso keepeth his Word in him verily is the love of God perfected hereby we know that we are in him God hath given us understanding to reflect upon our selves in a way of reasoning to make certain to our selves our Interest in these things Nay he hath given us his Spirit that bears witness to our spirits that we are the sons of God Rom. 8. We must not think that was a special favor given to the Saints then but it 's common to all the people of God The Spirit of Adoption hath a double office of quickening and comforting and whosoever is a son hath the testimony of that Spirit There is a double Testimony A Testimony of the things themselves so that which is of God in us doth bear witness as the effect bears witness of the cause There 's another Testimony and that is of God himself by his Spirit and that Testimony doth help our spirits it helps the testimony of the things
Reasons of both BEfore I propound the Directions how they who are sincere and ingenious toward God and indeed have him for their God may know that they have a sure Interest and Propriety in him I will premise two things of moment First That our Interest in God is more knowable then any other Interest in the world There is no Interest that a man hath which is so discernable Whatsoever it is that belongs to an Interest in any thing or any friend and doth discover it is much more here Examine it in a few particulars 1. Where there is an Interest with men there is a mutual closing of their spirits by which they know one another and come to rest secure in each others good intentions and hearty wishes Here also is this mutual closing and in a far more high and excellent degree then is or can be with any creature For that affection and love which God discovers to his people and which he doth act upon them is a Love that is transcendent that is not only beyond all other love but beyond all understanding That entire closing that is between a Beleever and God in Jesus Christ is above all that which can be found in any other his whole Soul runs this way In Psal 119.10 I have sought thee saith David with my whole heart That is the proportion which God hath cut out for himself Deut. 6.5 Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart with all thy Soul and with all thy might Christ challenges the same proportion and indeed it should not be less less would not fulfil his end which is the solid peace and satisfaction of his people in the enjoyment of him and also the subjecting and subduing of their spirits to his government No proportion of love loss then the greatest could work these things But besides this there is such a through change by reason of this Interest as no Interest in the world doth work though the closest and the nearest For the habit and disposition of the spirit of a man is altered in closing with God and he becomes a new creature he is not what he was It is true that in all friendship that is with men there is a kind of change on both sides because there must be a due and necessary application of themselves to each others spirits but that change is unspeakably inferior to this in those who have been wrought upon to beleeve and have obtained this mercy to close with God for they are changed to the proportion of as great a distance as death is distant from life and darkness from light for they are brought off from the love of all that on which their hearts were set even to a hatred of it and are subjected subordinate and conformed to the Will of God There is another thing in this Interest which belongs to the nature of it and so discovers it and that is a mutual conversing with each other with contentment Jonathan and David had much pleasure in their mutual conversings with each other and in drawing forth their spirits one to another This is much more strong in Beleevers then can be in any relation between husband and wife or between the father and child This must needs be so For first The love wherewith they love God is the highest love Therefore many will not go for Christians that pretend to be such because their hearts are not brought up to this The highest Love acts highest it takes the highest delight and contentment in its Object In Cant. 2.3 As the Apple trees among the trees of the Forrest so is my Beloved among the sons I sat down under his shadow with great delight c. In Psal 73. saith David It is good for me to draw near to God That look as others find contentment in the things they love and draw near to them so the Saints find much more contentment with God and therefore draw near to him Again Friends cannot always enjoy these Converses Oftentimes they are parted and so cannot have this felicity of expressing mutual love but God is ever with them In Psal 73. Thou art my strong habitation to whom I may have a continual resort I may always come to thee 3. There is a third thing in Interest and that is mutual Communication Love is a spring which flows forth it doth enjoy what it hath rather for its friend then for it self Gods Love hath this excellency more abundantly and transcendently Take the dearest friends that live at the highest rate of love they cannot maintain a constant Communication partly because there is not always an equal necessity and capacity partly because there is not always the same power to give forth But our necessities are always very great and vast and Gods power is always the same so that here is always a perfect Communication of Love that ceaseth not but flows forth as beams of light from the Sun Now as effects discover their causes so then especially when they are most full and perfect As you may better know any tree by its fruit then when it is in the bud and blossoms and you may better know it when the fruit is in its fulness and in more abundance then when there are but a few if there be but one or two upon a tree they may be hid but when there are many the testimony is the more abundant Abundant are the testimonies of the fruits of Gods Love in what he hath done for his So that upon this account no Interest is more knowable then that of a Beleever in his God Secondly A second thing to be propounded is this That though no Interest be more knowable yet ordinarily no Interest is less known then this This we need not prove I think it 's a Question out of question with us all The unevenness of the holiness of Beleevers in their walkings the inconstancy of their rejoycing are two strong demonstrations of this that they do know but little of their Interest in God It springs from such unhappy Causes as these That abiding Unbelief that bitter root that hath taken such strong hold of the nature of man that till the whole house be pull'd down it will not be wholly eradicated and destroyed This is that weight the Apostle speaks of in Heb. 12. that hangs on us so fast as is manifest by the Apostle's scope who perswading unto faith and the workings of faith this is that saith he that so suppresseth and bears us down from those heights of heavenly joy from that sweet contentment and rest of spirit whereto we are called Beleeving is the first stone that is layd in a Christian He that comes to God must beleeve that he is and that he is a Rewarder of those that seek him Hebr. 12. And as there is a spirit in all Beleevers that tends to the setling of them upon a sure foundation that they may stedfastly beleeve so there is a spirit that works
estate This life and the wants of it always breed motion the spirit is still moving out of one condition unto something better The constant Rest of those glorified spirits in God is a plain demonstration that there is no Life like that They know the life that we live in this world they know what honours pleasures and such things are but they are so beneath them that they do no less overlook these then a Prince doth overlook the poorest Cottage or the vilest things of this world Nay the Saints on Earth too when they are themselves do not only prefer a Life in God before all things but with contempt of all things Paul puts a note of superexcellency upon the knowledg of Christ and pronounceth all things else but dross and dung Phil. 3. In Heb. 10.34 They suffered the loss of all things for this life with joyfulness it did not grieve them to see their goods and estates taken from them because they saw this loss make for the further enlargement of their life in God And those in Rev. 12.11 loved not their lives to the death for Christs sake When Solomon had traversed all these things and I make no doubt but he had many that traversed them with him you know what he saith of them Vanity of vanities all is vanity and vexation of spirit But why should I dwell upon outward testimonies Make use of your own understands give them full scope to search and then think what proportion there is between that life that is upon things finite mixed mutable and of short continuance and that life that is in him that is infinite and all good always the same abiding for ever Descend lower then your understandings Call in the sense and experience of those several states of life which you have passed through in the world as that of childhood of manhood of a single estate of a married estate of a meaner and of a fuller condition take the best of them what did you find in them in comparison of that life that you have in God Remember all the sense you have had of the sweetness that is in the enjoyment of God and then upon the verdict of your sense and inward experience you will find that there is no comparison between the one and the other How often have you said when you have been hunting after and wearied your selves in the vanity of this world I will return to my first Husband for then it was better with me then now Hos 2.2 2. What a deplorable loss to our spirits is it when we suffer a day to pass without living in God That day we dye when as we might have been as they in Heaven What shadows of death have covered your Souls when you have been out of God! What bondage and weight are cast upon mens spirits how are they as reeds of no strength shaken with every wind with the turnings of the things in this world if their hearts be out of God We are chargeable with many sorrows and heart-breakings and God might put them upon our account God may visit us for many of our tears and complaints What will not the Fountain give water will not the full brest give milk It is a wrong to say so of God We are the cause of our own harms and losses The rest and chearful vigor of a mans Soul is of more worth then a world and that we lose whilest our spirits roul up and down Who can utter what those joys are what that sweetness of the taste of the Soul is which it hath in its sincere and secret addresses to the Father of Life in its secret conversings with him and enjoyment of him What a holy forgetfulness of all things hath this wrought what a holy magnanimity what peace passing all understanding what joy unspeakable and glorious And shall we lose all this by not maintaining our life in God Our experience and knowledg of these things should be as an attractive Load-stone and the sadness of our Souls under the heavy loss of this should be an enforcement upon us to keep near unto God The Apostle Hebr. 12.5 gives this as a reason why they were so weak You have forgotten saith he the exhortation or consolation that speaks to you as children 3. A third Consideration is The sweet and powerful attractions and invitations of the Spirit How often may that be said to us which Christ saith to them Rev. 3.20 Behold I stand at the door and knock if any man will open to me I will come in and sup with him How often and how strongly hath Wisdom cryed from Heaven and uttered her voyce saying I have built my house I have prepared my feast come my friends all is prepared for you come and eat and rejoyce in the fulness of my Love Christ hath followed us as the waters followed them in the desart mercy and goodness hath followed us all our days Hath not God by his Spirit urged us from all things from all conditions and relations from every thing that strikes upon our senses or that comes within the compass of our knowledg As his design is by all things to work us to himself so hath he not by all things pleaded with us to come home and to stay at home that we might be blessed in the enjoyment of the sweetness of his presence He hath layd up something even in death it self to bring us to him A Crown was once found in a thorny bush Surely then if God be so ready to meet us and doth so seek us if he have so richly prepared for us and set things before us we should provoke our Souls to feed on these precious things and to live that life of the enjoyment of God which only is Life 4. If we will not live this life in God it may be we shall not If nothing will prevail but we will live in the flesh and pour out our Souls upon vanities and will be wandering in this world travelling in the desart and forsaking the fulness and sweetness that is in God surely it may be that shall be our portion all our days God may and he doth hide himself from the Soul when the Soul hides it self from him God calls and they will not hear he invites and they are careless Well saith God seeing they will not come they shall not come but shall live like servants and strangers and shall have no more of the Childrens bread then will maintain them in a state of life but not maintain them in a state of peace Sorrows and troubles will seize upon men because they would not embrace sweet mercies Do you think we can violate all the mercies and goodness of God and be born with No no Remember that example in 1 Sam. 2. Eli had many and great manifestations of Gods love but his sin of fond love to his wicked children would not be done away with sacrifice or burnt-offering God said he would bring evil upon
Heb. 10. He saves those that come unto God through Him We are very apt rather to come to God as he is the great God our Creator then to come to him through a Mediator Therefore since there is no other way of life but this we had need be taught it Fourthly We are apt to think it almost impossible to live such a life as this Oh how do we greaten the matter of our duty We make mountains of mole-hills The fault is not in God but in us Certainly we might have more What saith the Gospel Doth it not call us to all joy all peace and to rejoyce always What 's the meaning of this Doth not God speak realities Shall we rather have hard thoughts of God then of our selves No no it is because we will not we thirst not It is not because water is not to be had but because we will not take the pains to draw it We say the Well is deep and the water will not come but he hath said he will meet those that rejoyce and work righteousness and that he will draw near to those that draw near to him and he will be as good as his word Certainly the fault lies either in our not seeking or not seeking as we should or in our not taking what is offered to us Do you not find that when you come to the door of grace it stands open and that God is ready to give the comfort and refreshings of a Father when you come overwhelmed with sorrows Is not he always the same Will he hear one prayer and not another If you did continue in prayer and seeking might you not have more It is very ill to fancy such impossibilities Why do you set bounds where God hath set none and make that so hard to get which God is so willing to give and so straiten your selves when you have license to ask Lastly We are apt to live much by patterns and examples We see how Christians live at the common rate it 's neither night nor day with them they have a trembling hope a mingled joy a mourning life sometimes bright sometimes clouded and this sight doth form other Christians to the same life and makes them say Seeing others live so I 'le live so too Examples are mighty Of what force was Peter's example of to the Galatians in another case Beggers form one anothers spirits to beggery and a poor kind of life Remember that counsel of the Apostle in Rom. 12. Be not conform'd unto this world Make no patterns to your selves further then they agree with the Rule that you are to go by How low did the Jews bring themselves by the traditions of their Fathers Their Fathers did so and so That 's a poor beggerly life Shall I say one thing more We are subject to slothfulness It 's strange that a Christian should be slothful of all men Should we not wonder if we saw a man slothful to gather up Pearls and Jewels of great worth Was ever any man so slothful that he would not take the pains to eat his meat when he was hungry Can a poor man be so slothful that he will not dig a Myne of Gold when he may have it What should make a Christian slothful What is it the difficulty of this Life Certainly if we say so we speak evil of God and his goodness as those Spies did of the good Land What is there difficulty in eating and drinking Our way all along is pleasure even the pleasure of living in God and enjoying of him Or is the work unsuccessful Dare you say you have let down your bucket and drew up nothing Dare you say that you went sincerely to God and could not procure him to hear you No you cannot for when his servants have come to him in their worst conditions he hath received and embraced them Could a man come to God in a worse condition then David did Psal 32. When he had run from God desperately and stayed out a great while you may well think how often he quenched the spirit in that time and contended with God and yet when he returned and came home God did not despise him God did not say to him Away wretch what hast thou to do to expect mercy but pardoned refreshed and cheered him and David tells it abroad For this saith he shall every one that is godly pray unto thee in a time when thou mayst be found Say not then with thy self that thy coming shall be unsuccessful To that which hath been said we may add these pertinent Considerations 1. If we live in God and fetch all our peace strength and satisfaction from him we shall have the best enjoyment of all things else The taste of Gods love sweetens all enjoyments 2. This puts the Soul into a secure state against all dangers it cannot be ill with him that enjoys God It puts a man into a state of conquest and victory over all things When a man enjoys God and lies upon his Love he is above all things 3. This fulfils the end of our Creation For this was Gods appointment that we might be for the demonstration of his infinite Excellency and to the enhappying of our selves in the enjoyment of him 4. This keeps the Soul in a preparedness to all holy walkings and obedience When a man lives in God his heart is tuned to all duties CHAP. XXI Several Questions concerning the forementioned Doctrine answered Saints not always equally strong Some afflictions sweetened more then others Sometimes God will have his Rod smart I Proceed now to answer two or three Questions which concern this Doctrine and Truth 1 Quest Seeing the Saints have this way for Life and that their Interest in God doth so ballance their Souls whence is it that they are so frequently dejected so under hatches 2 Quest If Interest in God be so effectual to lift up Christians spirits whence is it that there are so many weaknesses deformities and contrarieties to God in their spirits 3 Quest Whence is it that they who have no Interest in God oftentimes seem to go through very great troubles with much strength 1 Quest If the Saints life springs from their Interest in God how is it then that they are so often broken in spirit that there dwells with them heaviness confusion and distraction oftentimes as with others Answer In the first place let us know that the Saints do not all live this life equally they have not all received such measures of grace that they can with equal magnanimity pass through their troubles in this world Some pass through trouble with a spirit of glory being highly lifted up above their sufferings So Paul in Rom. 5. We glory in tribulation In Heb. 10.34 They sâ—ffered joyfully the spoiling of their goods And Acts 5. when the Apostles were scourged they went away rejoycing that they were accounted worthy to suffer for the Name of Jesus Others go not on triumphantly but stedfastly though
they are born down they rise again all the hurt of their spirits ends in a sweet recovery In Jer. 31.18 it is said concerning Ephraim Thou hast chastised me and I was chastised I was as a Bullock unaccustomed to the yoke See what a carriage here was he was smitten and smitten but still stout and unquiet restless and kicking against the Rod but afterward he saith Turn thou me and I shall be turned though there was before a froward spirit there is now a praying spirit that he might be brought unto himself I was ashamed saith he and confounded because I did bear the reproach of my youth The return of Saints is with this double excellency 1. With a deep self-abhorrency when they find they have fainted in the day of their tryal when they reflect upon the ill carriage of their spirits toward God there is a deep shame falls upon them Job is an instance in Chap. 42. when he saw God and remembered his own carriage he saith I abhor my self in dust and ashes in dust and ashes that is he was very much afflicted for that was the manner of the afflicted as you may read in Jer. 26. Oh daughter of my people gird thee with sackcloth and Wallow in Ashes So in Isai 61. I will give them beauty for Ashes that is in stead of a mourning condition I will put them into a joyful So in Psal 73. that good man confesseth concerning himself I was foolish and ignorant even as a beast before Thee my carriage was brutish and absurd 2. They attain also more subjection unto God then before they have their hearts more bowed to him then before Discoveries of sin and restored mercies do mightily work upon their spirits In Psal 39. David after his dis-rest yielded to God and came to more calmness of spirit I held my peace because it was thy doing The Lord will not lose his people his end when he comes to smite them is not to drive them from him They can say to God as he said to his Master when he was driving him from school with a staff It 's not thy staff can drive me from thee What father ever used the rod upon his child that he might alienate the heart of his child from him Nay if a father had power to bring the spirit of his child to his own heart he would do it God can and therefore he will It cannot stand with that infinite goodness which is in God by afflictions or any thing else to separate his people from himself he having set his own Image upon them What would he give the blood of his own Son for them and suffer them to be thrown away No neither will he suffer them to throw themselves away CHAP. XXII How it comes to pass that deformities creep into the Conversation of Christians since they have so high a principle of life Whence it is that those which enjoy not God seem to go through afflictions with strength A Second Question is Quest 2 If Interest in God be so effectual to lift up Christians spirits whence is it that there is such a poor ragged spirit appearing in some Christians and that so many weaknesses and frailties are upon them that so much of contrariety to God and deformity is sometimes in their carriage Answer It is a most deplorable Truth and to be lamented of all the generation of the righteous That very few of those that beleeve do enjoy a clear and constant sight of their Interest in God Many do oftentimes bring a damp upon it by their going out from him they dwell not in him and the hope of glory for the nature of that is to sanctifie and bring us into a conformity to God 1 Joh. 3.3 He that hath this hope in him purifieth himself as he is pure And Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not So far as a mans abiding is in God so far he is at a greater distance from sin 2. There is something in the natural temper I may call it rather unnatural that very much clouds the beauty of a Christians Conversation Some things will be in Christians according to that state of the body which they have here Let a man be strongly disposed to anger fear grief or sorrow these passions will oftentimes appear because they are in the constitution of the body and grace is not so perfect a Physician as to alter the state of it The end of grace is to bring the worser part into conformity and obedience and it will do it at last and in the mean time where it cannot govern it will cry out and complain as the Apostle in Rom. 7. O wretched man that I am c. 3. In great tryals the spirits of men are apt to be more serious solid and contracted then in smaller matters A Soldier gathers up his courage puts on his armor and will stand to it when he is assaulted for his life whereas he minds not the little dog that bites him by the heels Great spirits oftentimes are mov'd at small things that are not mov'd at all at greater things Aaron was sometime stir'd at a less occasion yet when that sore tryal was upon him mentioned in Levit. 26. Aaron held his peace He had a plain signification of the Mind and Will of God in the thing and he was quiet 4. Assaults upon our outward man are more visible then corruptions that dwell in us Sin comes oftentimes stealing and creeping by degrees so it did upon Solomon though he was a wise man yet he was not aware whether he was going 5. Afflictions and sufferings being things without us corruptions and sins within us it 's easier for us to bear one then the other A Giant can bear a burden upon his shoulders but is not able to bear a little stone in his bladder The Earth that is not moved by all the storms without is shaken with a little wind in the body of it 6. Outward sufferings and tryals usually are more consistent and abiding but miscarriages obliquities and deformities are transient things more sudden and so surprize us The third Question is Quest 3 How men that have not God for their God nor ever tasted the sweetness of his Love do go through very great tryals and sore afflictions with much strength It is to be granted that they do so many times but never as the Saints do Answ Look upon Saul and David and see the disproportion of their spirits in their tryals In Saul evil wrought like it self The natural product of affliction is depravation Affliction stirs up and puts life and activity into sin as when you beat a Wolf you make him more a Wolf then he was before In 2 Chro. 28.22 it 's said of Ahaz that in the time of his affliction he did add to sin against God he sin'd more and more This is that Ahaz or as some read This is Ahaz the King the same A like phrase you have in Psal 102.23 Thou art
Child that hath the brest doth not enjoy it when he cannot draw the milk A Garden is not enjoyed by him whose it is that hath neither flowers nor fruits from it That which we have of God here though it be more then we had reason to look for and is that which the Angels wonder at yet it is very little to that which we look for in Heaven it 's called the first fruits it is but the infancy of that blessed state whereto we are adopted All the enjoyment we have of God in this world is not effectual to the removing of its contrary that is to cast out all fear and heaviness all sorrow and dejection out of the mind That enjoyment of God which Christ himself had here on Earth did not keep out all fear and sorrow Fulness is reserved for Heaven 2. A second thing is A mind enlightened and enabled to a just comprehension of the excellency of God and of the sweetness of the presence and love of God By comprehensive I mean as much as the faculty can reach and extend unto But now the mind cannot have an observation of all the emanations of divine Love more then a Child can count the drops of milk which it sucks We may as well tell the drops of rain in a showre as tell the particulars of the love of God poured forth upon us Our minds cannot extend to a just comprehension of that sweetness and love that is in God It is with us as 't is with a child that hath a Jewel put into his hand of exceeding great value for the matter of it and of greater worth for the signification being the Seal of a Crown to him but the child knows it not So the mercies of God are more in their nature and in their end then we can comprehend they are far above our reach Our minds are so straitened that we cannot have a full enjoyment of God here but if in this life we find so much sweetness in what we do enjoy what will it be when our Light shall be like the Sun at noon-day 3. There is requisite a lively sense of the presence of God The Soul hath its sense as well as the body nay more for it 's the fountain of sense to the body In Phil. 1.9 the Apostle prays that they may abound in all knowledg and sense of the things of God As the body receives its life from things by the senses so doth the Soul also receive its life in the sweetness and comfort of the presence of God by its spiritual sense Take away sense and a man is as a dead thing and all things are dead to him and the presence of God would be a dead thing to the Soul if it were not for the Souls sense of it I mean the spiritual sense which the Church speaks of Cant. 2.3 I sat under his shadow and his fruit was pleasant to my taste But now the sense of the Soul hath here a dulness upon it it 's short of that quickness to which it was appointed therefore we cannot have that full enjoyment of God here as hereafter But if what we do enjoy now be so sweet what will the enjoyment be when the Soul shall be so full of sense 4. A perfect love of God is required to a full enjoyment of God Love must be in its utmost height and heat if the Soul have a compleat and full enjoyment of God Take two persons never so qualified and furnished to make the life of both comfortable if there be not love there cannot be a happy enjoyment of these two As a man loves a thing so he enjoys it when he hath it So as a man loves God so he will cleave to him and pour out himself in a blessed fruition of him As our love is so is our life and enjoyment Though our enjoyment of God here be imperfect and weak yet it 's of that strength that it conquers and bears up the heart against all afflictions whatsoever Therefore there must needs be a far greater sweetness in the fulness of this Enjoyment Thirdly A third Consideration is this Let our enjoyment here be what it will it is mixt with many sorrows many wants many straits both within and without our life is such here that our afflictions many times seem to out-weigh our enjoyments they strike quick upon the sense and come too near the spirit Hence it is that you sometimes find good men complain more of one affliction then they mention a thousand mercies Our life here is mix'd 1 Thes 1.6 You have received the Word with much affliction and with joy they are mingled Now I say If the Consolations of God from that little enjoyment of him here in the midst of many sufferings be so sweet and precious that it bears the Soul up above all what then will the full enjoyment of God be in that Land of Rest where is light and no darkness life and no death all good and no evil Fourthly The enjoyment of God here is subject to many interruptions Sometimes by our sinful diversions from God the Soul goes out from the bosom of the Father minding other things and so our hearts are taken and brought into an estrangedness from God to a poor kind of delight in other things As a bird that wanders from her nest so is a man that is out of his place Prov. 27.8 Surely a man is never more out of his place then when he goes out from God and then he is like a bird that is gone from her nest she knows not where to rest but is troubled to find the way home again and to recover the loss that she hath brought upon her self by her foolish wandering Sometimes there is an interruption by the appointment of God God will not always have you lie at the brests of Consolation nay saith God when his people are sitting by the Well of the Water of Life This must not be all your work I 'le have you about this business and that employment Now these interruptions do lessen our life and our happiness but the time will come when we shall always live in the presence of our Father and our minds shall be encumbred with nothing else but we shall be filled and blessed with the vision of God Sometimes this interruption is caused by Gods going out from us there be recesses and retreats of God he sometimes out of his wisdom shadows his love and favour but in Heaven there will be always a full visible and clear presence Fifthly The enjoyment of God must needs be sweet because it is such as fills the whole capacity of the Soul and when there is fulness there is rest When a man hath what he can wish he can go no further At thy right hand are Rivers of pleasure and in thy presence is fulness of joy for evermore Psal 16. ult The Apostle in Acts 2.28 something alters the expression that is used in the Psalms
and our Redeemer thy Name is upon us See what a conclusion here is made Doubtless thou art our Father and therefore we call to thee for help 3. There is this encouragement and strength that the spirit of a man receives in thus arguing with God that if he can say in truth I am thine God much more will say to the creature I am thine If we have so much love to offer our selves to God to become his much more will the love of God make him to become ours for God loves first and most and surest If mine heart rise toward God much more is the heart of God toward me because there Love is in the Fountain CHAP. IV. Wicked mens prayers not to be dreaded The sins of those that pray greatest Some out-live the contests of the Spirit Three things to be still done by those who have resigned themselves to God NOw I come to the Application Vse If there must be such a Resigning of our selves to God when we come to him then truly you need never fear the prayers of the men of this world assure your selves they wish you as much evil as it is possible and their hearts cannot love you they envy all your welfare and the constant vote of their spirits is that your day were turned into night and that in stead of light darkness should be round about you but it matters not though they put up such prayers to God they are but bruta fulmina The reason of it is because they come to God without that which is the nerves and sinews of prayer If they come to God and bow the knee before him that God would bless them and prosper them poor Creatures they speak to no purpose because they deal hypocritically with God for they bow the knee and call him Lord as if he were their Lord but they do what they list and are their own Lords Rulers and Commanders Hos 7.14 God saith the people of Israel dealt so with him They did not cry to me with their hearts when they howled upon their beds and assembled themselves for corn and for wine and rebelled against me They pray that God would do so such a good turn for them but they shut their hearts against God and had a rebellious spirit at the same time Though I have strengthened their arm yet they imagined mischief against me They are no friends of my Cause and Kingdom in this world but wish their overthrow though I have shewed them mercy In Hos 4.7 8. it 's said They have set their hearts on iniquity and it shall be like people like Priests and I 'le punish them for their ways and reward them for their doings or as the word is I will cause their doings to be turned upon them Men may think when they come to God that the sins of so many years past are forgotten that God will not reckon with them for sins so long past and so they come to God in their filth and with their hearts unwashen But saith God They are deceived I will turn their ways upon them and though they be sins of so long time backward yet I 'le remember them In Hos 8.3 Israel cryed to me My God we know thee What saith God Israel hath cast off the thing that is good the Enemy shall pursue him They have set up Kings but not by me c. They say My God we know thee No saith God I 'le not know you thou hast cast off the thing that is good Mal. 2.2 3. You have God expressing himself to this purpose If you will not hear and lay to heart to give glory to my Name A man dishonors God and puts the greatest indignity and affront upon God that can be when he refuseth to hear and obey Then I 'le curse your blessings and cast even the dung of your solemn Feasts on your faces c. That 's a strange thing but it was so their solemn Feasts were as dung to God and God saith he will cast them as dung in their faces and they shall be a dunghill which my Soul abhors You need not fear the prayers of such men as are without yoke and fear not God but the prayers of Saints are to be dreaded because they have power with God if they come to God and say Save me I am thine God will answer I am thine I will save thee 2. If when we come to God we must make a resignment of our selves to God and acknowledg we are not our own but his Then we learn secondly that the sins of a praying people are the greatest sins there be no sins that are so out of measure sinful as the sins of those that pray and pray most Hath God made thee as a Prince with himself hath God set open a door that thou mayst have access to him hath he given thee leave in the day of thy straits to pour out thy Soul hast thou in the midst of those mercies in the sense of the sweetness of those visions said to God that thou art his and hast thou departed from him hast thou given to him a withdrawing shoulder as it 's said of them This sin is of the highest nature for it is a renewed Apostacy Those that are without God and Christ in the world are Apostates but it is by one Apostacy it is a continued act wherein they are held but now thou art gone out from God after thou hadst returned to him thou hast gone from the unspeakable refreshings of the Father of mercies and hast offered violence to the many engagements which thou hast layd yea which they have layd upon thy Soul thou hast broken the bonds of them all Sins after Resignation and after the matter of difference is taken up between God and the Creature are not to be easily passed over they are the worst sins Remember your selves as many as have known Jesus Christ when you said to God that you would walk with him did you mean it And hast thou fallen from the truth into a lye The world many times come to God and say many good words that they will be his but as it 's said of them in Psal 78.36 They flattered with their lips and lyed with their tongues their hearts were not stedfast in the Covenant with their God They minded no such thing but thou didst and therefore boundst thy self more thou didst intend to be bound When thou engagedst thy self to God thou didst it upon the greatest reason through the enforcement of the highest Arguments thou feltst the power of God conquering and subduing thee and thou yieldedst thy self to be his for ever And remember how often thou hast said this to God Is not the voyce of thy Soul still in his ears Doth not he remember the language thou hast uttered And after thou hast said it again and again that thou wouldst do no more so after thou hast said Thou art and shalt be my God for thee to draw back
and start aside it 's a sin that wants a name it 's so haynous in its kind so horrid in its nature What high injustice is this in thee to arrogate a liberty to thy self whē thou hast so solemnly parted with it into his hands whose it was Nay was it not after thou hadst experience of walking in thine own ways Didst thou not know what sin meant It 's an argument the Apostle useth Colos 3.6 Wherein you sometimes walked You know what it is to be in your sins Did you not in the day of your sorrow say in your heart I will go to God again Oh! how happy was it when I was with him How sweet were those days wherein I walked under the Government of Jesus Christ and was blessed with the constant communication of the counsel of the Spirit of life and peace Was not that thy speech which was the Churches Hos 2.7 I 'le go and return to my first husband for then it was better with me then now Now after all this to sin against God to indulge your selves to take a liberty and freedom to transgress against him to whom you have so engaged your selves what a breaking of heart what shame of face should this be When now thou hast put weakness upon the strongest bonds what hast thou said Christ is nothing of no account there is more in my sins then in Christ there is more in the satisfaction of my own desires then in the enjoyment of Jesus Christ for thou hast left one for the other Thou didst think it was best when thou didst give thy self to him and what injury hast thou done to the great and holy one Thou hast set light by him to whom to be given thou thoughtst it thy happiness thou thoughtst it wonderful mercy that he would enter into a new Contract with thee thou thoughtst that should be an everlasting bond of Love upon thy Soul that God should again take thee a Run-away that he should again admit thee a Rebel and a Traytor and hast thou forgotten all this Is God after all this to be set by that thou canst walk so and do as thou list Therefore upon all Considerations the sins of those that are much with God are greatest because upon their conversings parlies and treaties that they hold with God still they acknowledg themselves not to be their own but his such therefore shew not the candor and sincerity of a right spirit It 's a sad demonstration of a heart not under the power of divine Love and very much alienated from God that upon sight of such miscarriages is not broken and melted I do as much wonder at the spirit and doctrine of some men as at any thing in the world that are lifting the heads of Christians above all sorrow that would absent them from all mourning that would have them to be all joy Poor men their language is unnatural They must mourn and cannot but mourn if their hearts be right He that knows and loves God cannot but feel the pain and burden of offences against him It 's as impossible that Nature should cease to feel the smart of stripes and wounds as that a spirit filled with or acted by divine Love should not feel the wounds and wrongs that it offers to his Maker Hezekiah shewed indeed his frailty 2 Chron. 32.26 But notwithstanding Hezekiah humbled himself for the pride of his heart That notwithstanding is a word to be observed When a mans heart waxeth proud before God and he can lift up himself and transgress with an high hand when the heart glories in any thing and by the brightness of other things a darkness is cast upon the spirit towards God when this man comes to be humbled it 's a great thing Hezekiah was in such a case as this yet notwithstanding Hezekiah humbled himself Vse 3 We may further improve this Truth by way of Exhortation partly to those that yet have not given themselves up to God that have not said in truth I am thine and partly to those that have done it There is a generation of men that are under no bonds to God they acknowledg him not that are free from righteousness as the Apostle saith Rom. 6.20 They have not so much many of them as felt the breakings of God and those contentions whereby he strives with their unkindness and frowardness they never so much as came to debate the matter or treat with God about this great business whether they should be his or no but live at peradventures and are at their own swinge walking after the will of the mind and of the flesh as the Apostle speaks There is another sort that have felt many tuggings of God upon them God hath been hammering the matter upon them but they have stood it out sometimes he hath brought them upon their knees and to tears nay to self-judging to condemn themselves in his presence sometimes they have cryed and roared in the presence of God such wretches there are in the world which have out-lived the workings of the power of God upon their spirits as those of whom it is said Gen. 6.3 My Spirit shall no longer strive with man God spoke of that evil and wretched world that though he had striven not only by the preaching of Noah and of the Ark which was a very loud Sermon but also with his Spirit for there is no generation of men that are ever free from those contests of God but the light that is in them hath pleaded Gods cause against their wickedness and lusts Well saith God now I see they have stood out all this while my Spirit shall no longer strive with man Let them alone as he said concerning Ephraim Hos 13. The Apostles language 2 Cor. 10.5 besides many other Scriptures supposeth that there is often a fight in our Souls against God Bringing every thought of the heart into obedience That word bringing into obedience signifies a taking of the spirit of man as with a sword or spear God comes and arms himself against men and when he comes thus in power they yield themselves to him and they are blessed But there are such that always stand out that resist the Holy Ghost as those stiff-necked Jews in Acts 7. Or if they yield yet not in sincerity not in truth but as it 's said Jer. 3.10 Yet for all this her treacherous Sister did not turn to me with the whole heart but feignedly or in falshood Now concerning these persons I shall say but very few words Canst thou come to God with such a spirit as this What state art thou in O man Thou must not thou canst not forbear praying At one time or other the worst in the world lift up their eyes and hearts to their Maker The very Heathens do not cannot withhold from this If not the light that is in men yet their straits and afflictions will cause them to come as Petitioners to God and wilt thou come to God
It is spoken concerning the time when they should be restored to a better state Afterwards shall the children of Israel return and seek the Lord their God and David their King and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days Shall fear the Lord and his goodness No father is more feared of his child then the best father that walks towards his child in the greatest wisdom goodness meekness and bounty So that the kindness of God and tastes of his Love do not lift up the Soul and make it proud That man is the most humble man in the world that hath the most knowledg of the Love of God towards him in Jesus Christ This Fear and Faith do so stand together that they cannot be separated In Act. 9.31 They walked in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost It 's the right temper of a true Christian to have the comforts of God in his Soul and yet to be with fear and trembling It 's a fear that doth inevitably arise upon a rectified nature from a sight of the disproportion that is between God and us This is in Heaven it self where the Angels in glory beholding God so infinitely lifted up above them cannot but have reverence fear and dread in their Souls towards him And it 's a fear likewise of danger not the danger of eternal death for from that they are saved the knowledg of the Love of God assures them for that but from the danger of other things which to them are as bitter as death is to the world and those are the frowns of God the rebukes of God the suspensions of Love and estrangedness of God towards them the stripes of God these things when God doth as a Father to his that know him they are most grievous and smarting and their Souls groan under these more then worldly men under worldly danger Therefore he that knows God and what it is to be in the light of his Countenance he that hath tasted the bitterness of the loss of this lives in fear lest he should provoke God as a Father to deal thus in severity with him And I speak all this the rather because some do blaspheme that which is the spring of life and peace to the Saints saying That for a man to have the knowledg of God to be his God and everlasting Portion is a snare to bring that man into a forgetfulness of God and his Duty and to blow up the spirit with pride and lull him into a sinful sleep Such like things as these have been and still are not without much cause of grief cast upon this blessed Doctrine of the knowledg of our abode with God Whereas the true knowledg of God being ours is that which doth effectually and firmly work the heart to all diligent watchfulness tenderness and sedulity Thirdly It disposeth a mans spirit to the best entertainment of all divine Determinations that are upon a mans addresses to God upon any occasion Let the answer be what it may be what seems good to God that man that knows God to be his God is best enabled to receive his answer be it I or No whether his prayer succeed or not he is put into such a frame that he can say Amen to the Will and Word of God and go from God without murmuring and repining If God hear him he is glad but yet not so glad of the thing as of his Interest he is not so taken with any thing he obtains but God takes him more If therefore he receives any thing he rejoyceth in it as the fruit of Love and makes a grateful return to God again In Psal 119.137 Save my Soul and it shall praise thee He rejoyceth in this to see how welcome he is to God and that his prayer is accepted others come and are not regarded but he hath audience The things that God gives out to him have another form and taste then to the world they come all with tastes of love to him In love to my Soul saith Hezekiah hast thou delivered me in Isai 38.17 And whatsoever he hath he hath a better enjoyment of it then others by reason of his Interest in God he hath nothing from God as a meer gift but he hath God with it God saith to that man that hath Interest in him There take that which thou askedst for and me with it that is thine and I am thine and the enjoyment of God is more to him then all the world This spirit is upon all that he hath My Father gave me it it is the fruit of the love of the God of my life therefore I must use it in order according to order from him and not after my mind only All things are best enjoyed when they are enjoyed according to Rule We spoil the sweetest things when we take them according to our wills and so use them then they become another thing When a man can sit in his enjoyment of all things and see God this is a drop from the Fountain of Life and it is more then they have that seem to enjoy a thousand times more of the things of this life whose corn and oyl increase And if he be denyed if God see it not good to give him the things he desires yet he is satisfied he doth not contend with God nor doth his spirit rise up against his Maker he hath a word ready in his spirit Not my will but thy Will be done he saith If my God will not give me this it is well that he will give me himself I may be without this but I could not be without him and seeing he hath given himself to be my Portion I will wait with patience and be content all the days of my life In Eccless 5. ult saith Solomon If God give a man the joy of his Soul he shall not much remember the days of his vanity When God denies him any thing he remembers that he comes not to God for this particular thing but for the best good We come not to God for any thing but that which is for our good A good man saith If I had this thing it may be it would not do me good and herein his spirit is satisfied he saith God knows better then I what is good for me and if he thinks not such a thing meet for me I must think so too So you see how the knowledg of a mans Interest furthers his approaches to God and helps him in these three respects that we have mentioned CHAP. VI. How the knowledg of divine Interest doth promote Holiness sets Judgment and Nature against Sin keeps the heart from inordinate reaching after and holding fast present things Faith binds the Soul and keeps it bound makes all a Christians ways easie Assurance gives a double advantage to our great meeting with God IN this Chapter I shall in some particulars shew how the knowledg of our Interest in God doth promote and