and some presumptuous persons to snatch at it when it doth not belong to them Those to whom God is a God indeed in a sweet relation of the Covenant of grace to be their God as to the Patriarks Prophets Christ the Apostles he giveth his holy spirit to witness so much to them Though the voice of the spirit is not alwayes heard in the best Children of God yet he giveth them the holy spirit that though it doth not alwayes witness yet it alwayes works something in them which may be an evidence that they are Gods 2. Now the spirit of adoption and Sonship is known by a spirit of supplication especially Whom God is a God to he vouchsafeth a spirit of prayer to go to him in all their necessities which is an issue or branch of their faith He giveth them faith to believe it and prayer to make use of it for God will not give this great priviledge without heart to make use of it which is done by faith and prayer and prayer is nothing but the frame of faith Acts 9. As soon as Paul was a good man presently after his conversion Behold he prayeth The child cryeth as soon as born and the child of God is known by his praying as soon as he is converted an intercourse is opened between God and the soul which a christian soul will never neglect If they are plac't in the worst condition they will pray to God or at least sigh and groan which is a prayer that God can make sense of Those that have any strong places of defence in trouble they will be sure to fly to that in times of war they will betake them to their Castle and place of munition And so they that be Gods in time of danger run presently to God he is their rock their refuge and place of defence repair to him by faith and prayer The name of the Lord is a Tower of defence the righteous in trouble fly thither and they are safe A man may know what his God is by his retyring in times of extremity Your carnal man if he hath any place to retire to it is to his friends to his purse to bring him out He will go to that which his instinct will specially lead him to in times of trouble As every Creature together with the nature of it hath received an instinct from God to go to the place of refuge wherein it is safe as the weakest Creature hath strongest refuge The Conies a poor weak Creature hide themselves most strongly out of instinct they have their own weakness So Gods Child being privy of his weakness and need of support and strength hath the strongest support that may be and runneth to his God Worldly men have many shifts as the wily Fox hath but a Christian hath but one but that is a great one he goeth to his God in time of need And therefore you may know who is in covenant with God in times of extremity especially by a spirit of faith a spirit of prayer In times of extremity no man but a Christian can pray with any comfort with any sweet familiarity Abba Father But they be like Pharaoh Go Moses pray to your God He had no such familiarity with God as to pray for himself And so carnal men will say pray to your God And many like Devils will have no cōmunion with God in their prosperity but their whole life is a provoking of God to emnity by swearing loose debauched irregular Carriages hateful even to moral men their hearts tell them they be even like Satan VVhat dost thou come to torment us before our time what hast thou to do with me what have they to do with God they have scarce a Bible in their Chambers If one it is for fashion sake And that they may not appear to be naught they will hold conformity in publick assemblies but for private familiarity they have nothing to do with it The shew of Religion goeth under an opprobrious name but if they would put off the shew it were nothing and not make ostentation of what they are not but they have no communion with God in prayer They will go for Gods people and own him for their God when they have no trading with him so much as by prayer Take heed we deceive not our selves I beseech you salvation dependeth upon it 3. We may further try whether our claim of God to be our God be a good claim on good grounds by our siding by our partaking for those whom God is a God to in a peculiar manner will be sure to side with God God hath two things in the world he prizes more then all the world that is his Children and Church His cause and Religion they that be Gods will be sure to side with the Church they will stand and fall with the Church and the cause of Religion they will live and die with it But a carnal Polititian that hath perhaps great parts of nature he is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the Grecian calleth him they be for all turns they can bring themselves to any figure like water that will receive any figure Take it put it into a Vessel that is square it will be square put it into a round Vessel it will be round How can they own God for their God when they will not seek him and they are yet to chuse their God and Religion And because they will be sure to be safe in all times they will own no Religion in any time And beloved is it possible any such should say with confidence God is their God will he own them that will not own him nor his Church nor his cause you know Jehu cried out who is on my side who cast her out And so God in doubtful times of danger cryeth out who is on my side who stand out appear if you be on my side if you be on my side own my cause if you be not on my side if you have no degree of goodness it will appear Christian wisdom is one thing carnal policy is another thing The wisdom of the flesh is emnity with God Many applaud and think themselves for some body in this kind but this wisdom is emnity it self against God When a man will be wise in a distinct kind of wisdom from God when he will have a cause severed from God will not side with God he must look that God will accompt him his enemy and make him his but especially in the hour of death and deep extremity he shall not be able to look God in the face to whom he hath been a traitor in the Church and in the cause of Religion And therefore as we will be able to own God for our God especially in doubtful and dangerous times side with the Church and side with Religion It was objected to that good Jehonadab a good man have we any thing to do with
such a transcendent nature The heart of man is so distrustful so faithless and the conscience is such a clamorous thing and therefore he cannot think this is too much I beseech you therefore do not lose the comfort of it that in Christ God is our God though we can say of nothing else it is ours perhaps we cannot say great houses are ours or great friends are ours or Inheritances ours that is no matter we can say that is ours which is infinitely more then that We can say God is ours in Christ Nay being exhorted to say by the spirit of faith that God is ours in Christ all things in the world are ours As you have it in that place of Scripture All things are yours why because you are Christs and Christ is Gods Whether things present or things to come Paul Apollos Cephas life death all is yours you are Christs and Christ is Gods that is all things must by a command from God conspire to make us happy affliction or Satan or death or trouble of conscience or desertion or every thing to help us to Heaven The curse is taken away and there is a blessing hid in every thing that befalleth a Christian to bring him to Heaven therefore it is a comfort of infinite extent All is yours because God is yours You shall see the extent of the comforts further by retail as it were If God be ours then all is ours too what be they the Scripture telleth you and I should spend too much time in unfolding of them 1. If God be ours his wisdom must needs be ours to find out wayes to do us good for his infinite wisdom hath found out a way in Christ by satisfaction of his justice to bring us to Heaven He can make us go beyond all the policy of our Neighbors for his wisdom is ours 2. If we be in danger his power is ours to bring us out 3. If we have sinned his mercy is ours to forgive us He himself being ours his mercy must needs be ours The whole being ours it followeth out of the strength of reason that the parts also must be ours 4. In any want his allsufficiency is ours to supply it or to turn it to good and make it up in a better kind 5. In a word God being ours whatsoever is in God whatsoever God can do whatsoever he hath is ours because himself is ours And therefore I beseech you make this use of it to get into Christ by faith to be one with Christ that so God may be our God Get faith above all graces the grace of union and the grace of communion that being one with Christ we are one with him God being ours all is ours yea the worst thing in the world is ours If God be not ours it is no matter what else is ours Alas all things must be taken from us we know not how soon and we taken from all things else What if we ha d a Kingdom as Saul had if we be forsaken of God as he was What if we had Paradise if we offend God we shall be cast out What if we had the dignity to be Apostles if with Judas we have not God what will all come to What if a man should enjoy all the world if out of Christ it would yield him no comfort As the Emperor said I have gone through all varieties of conditions Et nibil mihi prodit but it hath done me no good If we had all what is it but vanity of vanities and not only so but vexation Now when we have God to be our God he is able to fill the soul He is larger then the soul and he is able to quiet the soul he is the rest of the soul the soul is quiet in him is the Center as the place of quiet If God be ours then the soul resteth in it for God filleth the soul and quiets the soul and hath alwayes fresh comforts for the soul infinite still to all eternity There is nothing in the world but we do as it were deflorare take away the flower of it by use and it becometh stale Though a man continue many thousand years in the world yet he will be weary of all things in the world because there is no freshness in them It is finite and the soul is larger then the comforts of the world But in God is a spring of fresh comforts to everlasting Consider the things that inable him to be our God to fill the soul and to be larger then the soul to quiet and calm the soul in all the troubles of it and then to have fresh springs of comforts what a comfort is this to have God for our God Let it therefore raise up our souls to labor after our God and never rest till we have some interest in this great portion of God to be our God When we can by faith go out of our selves to Christ and lay a right and just claim to God to be our God this is a comfort that reacheth from everlasting to everlasting It giveth us forgiveness of sins when we had lost our selves because we are in Christ he hath forgiven us In all extremities and troubles when no creature can comfort us it is his glory to shew himself a God It reacheth to the Resurrection of the body God is Abrahams and Isaacks and Jacobs God when dead because he was the God of whole Abraham Isaack and Jacob and therefore of soul and body And it reacheth from all favours of this world so far as is for our good to all eternity being our God he will protect us from all extremities in this world he will speak comfort to our souls which nothing can do but God When we be dead he will raise up our dust because he is our whole God the God of our souls and bodies and we shall be for ever with the Lord. It is a comfort of wonderfull extent Vse 1. Let us therefore make this use of it Labour to make him so to us for as he is to us so God by his spirit is our comforter who being satisfied giveth us his spirit We must make God our God and then he will be a God unto us These be mutual wheresoever they be wheresoever God is God to any they by the spirit obtained by Christ have grace to make him so to themselves What is it for us to make God a God to us It is this to set up God a throne in our hearts and to give him a Soveraignty over all things in the world that we may say in truth of heart God is our joy God is our comfort God is our rock God is all in all to us When we give him supremacy of affection above all the world we esteem nothing above him we value him above all esteem his loving kindness is better then life it self for else we do not make him a God to us and then it is no comfort
they can lay no claim to him for they serve another God in their hearts their vile courses are instead of their God and in their affections above their God and therefore let them not think any promise belongeth to them in that course Let them think of God as a consuming sire as everlasting burnings while they be such and that their peace is as the peace that the soul hath when the strong man holdeth all in possession When the conscience is speechless and God hath given them up to hardness of heart which is a desperate peace This belongeth to them that are resolved not to live in any sin that have given themselves up to God and yet by reason of the remainder of corruption are driven to make use of that Petition which Christ bids them to pray forgive us our daily sins Hence issueth this truth that a Christian may be assured of his salvation in this world For first of all grant that we ought particularly to apply as God offers himself to us and that no infirmities nor sins hinder this claim then what followeth but a Christian believing and repenting of his sins daily may be assured that he is in the state of grace because there be grounds of particular application that therefore which seems to disable that interest hinders not at all And therefore labor to maintain that comfortable state of assurance by all means the grounds of it is particular application notwithstanding all sins and infirmities whatsoever because Satan envieth it most because it is a state wherein we honor God most I will not enter largely into the point because I have spoken of it in other Texts but for as much as concerneth this time we must labor for that without the which we cannot go through that which God calleth us to 1. There be many duties and dispositions that God requires which we cannot be in without assurance of salvation on good grounds what is that God bids us be thankful in all things how can I know that unless I know God is mine and Christ is mine can I be thankful for that which I doubt of and think I ought to doubt of therefore it is such a state without which I cannot perform other duties and particularly the grand duty of thankfulness And what a pittiful state is this that a man should not be thankful for Christ nor Heaven nor for the state of another world that there should be such great matters and yet they cannot thank God for them 2. Again God enjoyneth us to rejoyce Rejoyce and again I say rejoyce Can a man rejoyce that his name is written in Heaven and not know his name is written there The Disciples were very weak now and yet notwithstanding all their infirmities they loved Christ they cast themselves upon him and had not chosen another Saviour Therefore rejoyce that your names are written in Heaven and how can a man rejoyce that knoweth it not to be so By Gods writing of the Law in a mans heart he may know his name is written in Heaven Can a man alwayes rejoyce if he hath not grounds why 3. Again God requires chearfulness God loveth a chearful giver and a chearful doer It is the disposition that is required in every thing give me thy heart in every thing thou dost Alas how can I perform chearful service to God when I doubt whether he be my God and Father or no shall not I labor for a heart to yield chearful obedience doth it not come deadly off surely it doth We ought to comfort our selves and how can a man comfort himself in a condition full of uncertainties no comforts are comfortable without this That God is our God and our Father unless we know this comforts themselves are not comfortable unto us None of the comforts we have the comforts of this life are not comforts to us when the soul saith perhaps God feeds me to slaughter and perhaps I have these mercies as my portion in this world and how can he be comfortable when he apprehendeth not that they issue from a spring of love alas comforts themselves are uncomfortable And therefore shall not I labor for that without which I cannot be comforted especially it being a disposition for our good to be thankful and chearful and joyful and large hearted 4. God requires a disposition in us that we should be full of incouragements and strong in the Lord and that we should be couragious for his cause in withstanding his enemies and our enemies How can there be courage in resisting our corruptions Satans temptations how can there be courage in suffering persecution and crosses in the world if there be not some particular interest we have in Christ and in God it cannot be so unlesse we will denie obedience to all duty injoyned we must have this assurance which enters into all which is the spirit that quickeneth and enliveneth all Therefore labor for it 2. Else we shall take away the grounds that God inforceth good duties from in Scripture as he doth inforce duty from this ground As Elect see ye put on bowels of compassion I beseech you by the mercies of God Rom. 12. offer your selves as a sacrifice to God Alas I know not whether I shall have mercy or no why take away your ground and overthrow your principles And therefore shall not we labor for that state of soul wherein we are fitted to be in that disposition and to perform duty as God would have us I therefore beseech you labor for assurance of salvation That we may maintain it the better see the grounds of it It is not in our perfection for then the poor Disciples where had they been Alas they had dealt unfaithfully with Christ but the ground of firmness is on Gods side the certainty is on Gods part not ours Tell them I go to my Father and my God and their Father and their God Though we make breaches every day yet God breaketh not as Mal. 3. Verily I the Lord am not changeable and therefore you are not consumed We change ebbe and flowe are to and fro up and down every day varying in our dispositions though there be some root and seed of grace in us alwayes yet there is a change in our dispositions every day but it holdeth on Gods part and therefore Christ nameth not any qualification in them to build comfort on but my God and your God will yet maintain the relation of a Father to you that have not dealt as you should do and maintaineth the relation of a God notwithstanding your fall So that we maintain not our assurance on any part in us but on Gods love Whom he loveth he loveth to the end Our God unchangably loveth us in whom there is not so much as a shadow of change And therefore in the last of the Hebrews it is called an everlasting Covenant The God of peace that brought