and feathers compass clothe and adorn the fowl whose wings they are so the rayes do clothe and compass and adorn the Sun as it were how naked would a bird be without his feathers and how naked would the Sun be without his raies and beams Secondly because of the swift motion of the Sun not only in his diurnal course as in Psalm 19. He rejoyceth as a Gyant to run his race but no sooner is the Sun up but he doth in a manner spread his raies to all the Hemisphere as a bird quickly when she riseth spreadeth her wings abroad and therefore the Egypitans Hieroglyph of the Sun was a fowl spreading long wings every way Thirdly because the wings of a fowl are those under which she gathereth her young cherisheth them refresheth warmeth them that they may grow and increase So here the wings of the Sun are those whereby the creatures in their kind are healed and cherished as you know how the body will be benummed and languish with the cold of the night when the Sun beams come to beat on it again how doth it quicken and revive But now for the wings of the Lord Jesus what are his wings as he is the Sun of righteousness whatever answers to this Sun-beams are his wings and what are these In a word then I take them to be the Word and Spirit especially not excluding other Ordinances of Jesus Christ but these especially yea truly the Spirit in the Word and in other Ordinances of Christ I take to be these wings here spoken of The Spirit in the Word even whereby he cometh and preacheth to men even to them that were asar off from Christ is said to come and preach peace by which also saith the Apostle that is by the Spirit he went and preached to the Spirits in prison that now are in prison but not when he sent to preach to them the Spirit of Christ in the Word which Noah preached to them who was a Preacher of righteousness the Lord Jesus went and preached to them I say these are the wings of our Sun of righteousness and so they are called haply for divers reasons First that these proceeding from him even as the raies of the Sun which are his wings proceed from the Sun as the Sun sends forth his beams and influences in a powerful manner so Christ sends forth his light and his truth the Spirit as a person in the Trinity proceedeth from him as from the Father but as to his office to be an enlightening Spirit a quickning Spirit a comforting Spirit so he proceedeth from Christ I will send you the Comforter from the Father he poured out of his Spirit on his Apostles and many others who were to go forth in his name and preach the Gospel to the Nations and the Word he sends it forth out of his mouth proceedeth a two-edged sword which is his Word Secondly as the beams supply the absence of the Sun so doth the Spirit of Christ supply his absence therefore while he was yet present the Spirit was not yet given not poured out in that fulness but when he was to go he comforts his Disciples with this that if he went he would send them the Comforter another Comforter himself was one and he would send them another and that was his Spirit and he should lead them into all truth bring all things to their remembrance and be their Comforter and help their infirmities and so supply the absence of Christ Yea better then if he himself were with them as we use to say the Sun is come into such an house when the beams thereof are come in which do supply the absence of the Sun and better it is for us to have the beams then the Sun in our houses Thirdly because of the swiftness of the opening of the glory of Christ to the last ages of the world O! how swift are the beams of the Sun in a moment darted from heaven to earth and over-spread the whole Horizon So the Lord his Word being quickned by the Spirit doth run very swiftly as the Psalmist hath it in how short a time as the age of the Apostles did it overspread the Horizon gotten as far as Rome and how mightily did it prevail though the Jews did contradict and blaspheme and endeavour to take off the wheels of his Chariots yet it went on never the slower for that it grew and multiplyed Converts unto the face of the Church were as thick as the morning dew on the face of the earth which is generated by the Sun Fourthly as the beams of the Sun carry light and heat and refreshing along with them to the poor languishing earth and other creatures so doth the Spirit and the Word and the Spirit in the Word carries light with it thy Word is a light to my feet and indeed it is not Christ considered alone but as he is held out in the Gospel that is here resembled to the Sun of righteousness as I told you before their sound is gone forth into all the earth that is of them that preached the Gospel of peace and reconciliation through Christ And for heat O! how doth many a poor creature come under an Ordinance with an heartless mind cold and dead and his heart doth burn within him while the Lord by his Spirit hath communion with him in those Ordinances and what refreshings do arise to a poor weary soul when the Lord createth the fruit of the lips peace peace certain undoubted peace he doubleth it for emphasis that peace which passeth understanding and it shall surely be so and suddenly too not long he delights not to hold poor souls in anxiety trouble only what he seeth needful for their humiliation fetching them off themselves and sin and making Christ sweet to them indeed that he may be precious to them Other reasons might haply be given why the Spirit and Word and Ordinances are compared to the Sun which are the wings thereof but this shall suffice The fifth thing what is meant by healing and indeed this is large and as large as our spiritual maladies are some say there is nothing more wholsom then the Sun where it cometh with its beams how doth it purge the air wherein we breath consuming the noysom vapours that arise and would infect it quickly purging the earth from its dregs or else we should quickly find the offensiveness of it So the Lord Jesus by the breaking forth of his Spirit in the Word of Truth doth heal the air consume and scatter the venomous errors of men wherewith we should quickly be all poysoned were it not for this that be makes manifest their folly to all men and they proceed no further He heals the waters the waters of the Sanctuary how often have they been polluted yea poysoned by some and the Lord hath healed them again by his Spirit Again he heals the earth of its barrenness
is so Secondly the quid what this inlargement is which cometh along with Jesus Christ to a Believer Thirdly the quare why it is so And Fourthly the Vse of the Point First then for proof of this peruse a Text or two in that Evangelical Prophet who doth very eminently hold out Jesus Christ I the Lord have called thee in righteousness there is the Call of Christ And I will hold thee by thine hand or hold thine hand there is the support of Christ in that great work and will keep thee and give thee for a Covenant to the people for a light of the Gentiles He is indeed the Spirits of the Covenant the marrow of the Gospel the very Spirits of all the promises is Christ the speech is â—igurative Well but what is he to do To open the blinde eyes to bring out the prisoners from the prison and them that sit in darkness out of the prison-house Minde you therefore the Lord Jesus was willing as I may say to be imprisoned in our body if I may so say or if not in other respects he was in prison that he might set his people free bring them out of the prison even as Paul when he might would not go free except they came and fetched them out of prison So here sinners would never go out except the Lord Jesus came and fetched them out A Prince for Rebellion casts his Subjects into prison in the dungeon there they lie and would lie and rot there their stomack is so great they will not ask for deliverance nay if they would they cannot set themselves free the Prince cometh with his own hands knocks off the bolts breaks the bars gates and bids them follow him so the Lord Jesus doth for sinners So again in that place of John If the Son make you free ye shall be free indeed there is much liberty and freedom and you will not hear of your being in bondage but saith our Saviour to set at Liberty is not the work of every one it is the Son that only can make you free and if he make you free you shall be free indeed The Lord Jesus you know came into the world not only to work out salvation for his people but to preach the salvation he did work out not only to shed his blood but to preach remission of sins through his blood as the Apostle hath it How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation Which at the first began to be spoken to us by the Lord and afterward by those that heard him so that he himself preached salvation he himself did work it out for no other name is given under heaven now he preacheth this as a main part The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek he hath sent me to binde up the broken hearted He was anointed there is his Office and because anointed as a Prophet to preach it therefore the Spirit of the Lord was upon him poured out without measure he was gifted and fitted for it which though some understand of Isaiah as well as of Christ yet of Isaiah but as the type Well then to proclaim liberty to the Captives and the opening of the Prison to them that are bound Now surely if this be the substance of his preaching where he cometh and revealeth himself inwardly to a soul in a soul giveth himself to a soul there must needs be a going forth out of the prison out of the bondage wherein the poor soul was held so we have it in that place saith the Lord again even as in chap. 42. so chap. 49. of Isaiah I will preserve thee and give thee for a Covenant of the people c. That thou mayest say to the prisoners go forth to them that stand in darkness shew your selves and it is no more with God but dictum ac factum his words are operative words mark you they shall Go forth when the Sun of righteousness ariseth upon them his Commission is his work for to say to the Prisoners Go forth if he bid Lazarus come forth he cometh forth he calls the things that are not as if they were commands light out of darkness and so commands Deliverance and Liberty for his poor people that are bound I hope none will say this is all Old Testament proof for this is Gospel as clear as the Sun and to take away all ground of a cavil read but Luke and you shall finde this is the very Text our Saviour preacheth upon to the Jews tells them that day this Text was fulfilled that is to say that he was the anointed of the Lord the Spirit of the Lord was upon him because he was appointed to preach the Gospel to the poor to heal the broken hearted to preach deliverance to the captives and recovering of sight to the blinde and to set at liberty them that are bruised but I may not wast any more time it is but burning day light to hold a candle to the Sun It is written with a Sun-beam except you shut your eyes you must needs see it The second thing Is the quod what this inlargement or freedom is that is here promised and truly this is a large question and wherein most of our work will lie each of us in the general acknowledge a slavery a bondage we are under from which the Lord Jesus doth speak to his people to go forth yea brings them forth but we have not a distinct understanding of it and alas I am the meanest of them who make it their work to preserve knowledge yet as I have received I shall endeavour somewhat this-way to open the nature of this liberty That we may the more clearly proceed we must distinguish of freedom or liberty into Civil and Spiritual Civil is a freedom of maâ—s person from servitude of men so that he shall no more be under â—he yoke and thus the Jews misunderstood our Saviour when he spake of freedom If the Son do make you free you shall be free indeed why said they We are the seed of Abraham we are free-born and we never were in bondage to any man they meant sure they were never particularly sold for servants to any else bred in bondage to any to be their servants not meaning their publick state but private else they much did forget themselves for they had often been in captivity and bondage as in Egypt and Babylon and at present under the Romans but this is not the liberty we chiefly aim at nor may we extend it to this bondage any further then it is a curse now we know the Apostle tels us that if a man be called being a servant care not for it for such an one is the Lord his Free-man neither bond â—or free is there any difference they are all one in Christ therefore our Saviour did not come to break all yokes off the neck of
Silver tryed and purified seven times that is to say his Promise therefore he concludeth That the Lord will keep them he will preserve them for ever and so pretious so confirmed by miracles that all other truth scarce deserveth the name of truth in comparison of it either it is not so pure but hath some dross or else not so pretious O they are pretious Promises indeed as the soul knoweth right-well when he cometh to stand in need of a Promise and the sweetness of it he sucks out and it letteth down the sweetness of it upon the soul but take a parallel Scripture to shew that Gospel is called the truth The Apostle speaks plainly For the hope which is laid up for you in heaven whereof you heard before in the word of the truth of the Gospel and again to the Ephesians In whom also ye trusted after that ye heard the word of truth the Gospel of your salvation in whom also after ye believed ye were sealed with the holy Spirit of Promise So that this is the truth then the knowledge whereof shall make us free where the Spirit of Christ is there is liberty that is clear as you heard before Now how is the Spirit given but by the Gospel Received ye the Spirit by the works of the Law or by the hearing of Faith which is that hearing of Faith by the Word of Truth the foregoing Verse even that which held forth a crucified Christ to them hearing of Faith not the rumour of Faith but hearing is such an hearing as whereby a man believeth and Faith by a Metonymie is put for the Word of Faith as the Gospel is called sometimes because Faith thereby is begotten now by this the Spirit is received and therefore liberty cometh and therefore the Gospel is called the ministration of the Spirit in that place of the Apostle because therewith the Spirit is given and ministred to poor creatures whereas the Law works Bondage and Wrath Therefore Jerusalem is free which is above that is to say the Church builded upon the Covenant of Grace is free is the Mother of us all but enough of this The Gospel is the outward instrumental cause Fifthly the inward instrumental cause or Con. as some will have it which I shall not now dispute that is faith whereby we close with this Covenant it is the Word of Faith and hearing of Faith that is to say of the Gospel so as to work Faith whereby the Spirit is given which brings liberty to the soul Alas many hear the Gospel of liberty which we preach and few do receive it few believe it for it appeareth by woful experience we are yet in bondage we have never gone forth to this day many of us though we have had as much preaching of the Gospel as any other Jerusalem that now is as the Apostle cals it was in bondage then though they had the Gospel preached among them a great while they believed not except the Spirit therein be conveyed the Gospel is but a dead letter as well as the Law and a deadly letter also and so much for the causes of this liberty or freedom which cometh by Jesus Christ The third thing under this head is the parts of this liberty or freedom which we shall consider two ways First Extensively in their latitudeâ— And secondly Intensively in the degrees of each of these parts in its latitude But that we may the better understand it we must know that liberty is a relative and respecteth some bondage some imprisoning or shutting up from which this liberty is a deliverance ye shall go forth and therefore to set off the lustre of this glorious liberty it may not be amiss to run a parallel between them That there is such a bondage under which every poor creature without Christ is held we shall at present presuppose though afterward haply I shall come to prove it I would not here too far digress before we come to speak of the parts of the bondage to which the parts of liberty will be opposite and correspondent I shall say in a few words something to the Author of this Bondage and Tenure of it and but a word or two For the Author of this bondage under which poor creatures are without Christ altogether and in part also many times when they are under Christ and under Grace First Some part of it is to be ascribed to the Lord so far forth as it is meerly vindictive or an inflicting of a just penalty upon Sinners for sin so far we may ascribe it to God as will more plainly appear in the following Considerations The Law which genders to Bondage it is his Law and holy and just and good though it gender to Bondage nor will it follow because we are delivered form it therefore it was an evil in it self but only per accidens by reason of our corruption and so the Spirit of Bondage which in some is vindictive when he binds and hampers a Sinner with the cords of his sin haply never intending that he shall see through those terrors to his comfort this is from him and justly or else if it be in order to a settlement to a peace to an Adoption a Sonship through Christ as preparative to the receiving of Christ this is from him and so several other parts of it are from him under this Consideration Secondly But so far forth as any part of it is sinful there it is from Satan and from our own evil hearts for darkness cannot come from the light nor can any thing unclean come from that which is altogether pure no more then a clean thing can proceed from an unclean as the bondage under sin which more at large afterward we shall discuss Secondly For the tenure for being in bondage we are in bondage to some person properly to some thing improperly and by a kind of Prosopopeia we are said to be in such a bondage now there is some Tenure as I may say wherein they do hold us in bondage there are three or four tenures if I may so call them whereby we are thus held under Bondage until Jesus Christ come to set us free First A Sale Secondly By Birth Thirdly By Captivity or Conquest Fourthly By Tyranny and resignation of themselves up to such a vassallage but a word or two to each of them First then There is a Bondage by Captivity when People are taken Captives this is so common there is none can be ignorant of it What are the Turks Gally-slaves but the prey of their piracies all is fish that cometh to the net so it is in this case This is one Part of the Tenure we are taken captive by Satan even at his pleasure Of whom a man is overcome of the same is he brought in bondage this is the military Law the Prisoners were ever the Conquerours slaves we have seen it but too evidently with our own eyes we have
more that spirit then dwells in the heart which is his contrary principle lusting against the flesh the more the flesh must needs go down in a soul But the end is that will make up all O the reward will be according to our works when a man is rich towards God hath been faithful in a little faithful in a great deal hath laid up a good foundation against the time to come O how shall such shine in glory Me thinks our eyes should be a little forward the eye of faith as well as altogether backward to Christ and what he hath done for us to what he hath prepared for us and therefore he himself proposeth himself as a pattern to us in this very respect looking unto Jesus the Author and Finisher of our faith having laid aside every weight being set free from this bondage then run looking to Jesus the Author of our Faith who for the joy that was set before him endured the Cross despised the shame endured the clouding of his Fathers face from him that was the weight that made him hang the head it is the proposing of the end that sweetens the means health that is aimed at how it sugars many a bitter potion a man will endure any thing in such a case Well though we may have much ado with our froward and backsliding hearts and be many times wearied with them yet give not over but run work and so work as men set at liberty not in chains chearfully and strongly upon all the former considerations and this will be a right use of our liberty indeed Fifthly Then be not brought under bondage unto men that is to say to have our consciences inslaved either through the fear of men or favour of men surely if the Spirit of Christ be in us as it is if we be his it will free and make us go forth from this bondage You have seen it in all experiences when they threatned the Apostles commanded them they should not preach in that name the Spirit that was in them did break all those bonds though it taught them 〈…〉 ot to rebell to be tumultuous for it is pure and then peaceable the wisdom that is from this Spirit yet it taught them not to regard it whether it be fit to obey God or man judge ye they rejoyced the more that they were accounted worthy to suffer for Christ this wind that bloweth where it listeth it bears down all opposition there is no resisting of that Spirit that speaks and acts in them See the Martyrs how it did triumph over their adversaries they overcame their cruelty by the invincible patience and yielding their bodies to a torment rather then their consciences to the cruel commands of sinners which tend to their wounding Was there ever such a slave as Canaan a servant of servants shall he be when another man a great person is a servant to sin and thou for advantage or fear art a slave to him is not this to be a servant of servants to have this curse upon thy soul in the highest degree to be a slave to a slave is the deepest slavery that can be imagined Therefore take heed lest such a bondage creep upon us at unawares for our hearts are deceitful take heed of sinful compliances with the prevailing evils of the times for advantage this is to be a slave to men and to humours and not to be free-men to Jesus Christ But if you would stand fast in this liberty in all these respects then truly we must see to it that we do not grieve the holy Spirit of Jesus Christ for this is the principle of our liberty where the Spirit of Christ is there is liberty and according to the proportion of his presence with and working in any heart is the liberty and freedom of that soul he first works liberty knocks off the bolts of the soul pulls out of the horrible pit he only answers our doubts satisfieth the soul that is in bondage by witnessing love to the soul by applying the blood of Jesus Christ to the soul this the Spirit doth and he only establisheth the soul in this liberty establish me with thy free Spirit indeed somewhat else may loosen a man as to the outward practise from sin but the Spirit only can loosen the heart from sin and only can dissolve the sodering of corrupt affections whereby our hearts and their sinful objects are sodered and glued together and then the heart is broken from sin as well as for sin nor can any thing else keep up the soul in the enjoyment of that liberty by this Spirit and therefore if we would keep up and maintain our spiritual liberty we must be sure to keep in with the Spirit if we grieve him he will grieve us and leave us to fight with our own strength and fall under sin and so come to bondage again in part to the grief and wounding of our spirits some of us alas it may be thought once we had been free but have been brought into bondage again and held under the power of sin in terrours we are ready to wonder when the lusts we thought had been dead and buried do rise up again captive us to them but wonder not at it for how often is this holy Spirit grieved by us which is the principle of our liberty if we consider this well it will put an end to our admiration if we would keep our liberty not return to bondage grieve not the Spirit First he is grieved when he is neglected and slighted his motions to put us on to such a duty we shift and shuffle and make one excuse or another and will not do it either to set upon a duty we never performed or to do it in another manner then we have done at another time this grieveth him as for instance he puts us on to reprove our Brother for a sin not to suffer sin to lie upon him and we smother it we think it more offendeth another then us or else it is an unthankful office it is the way to lose a friend to be accounted a busie-body we see that men for the most part cannot bear a reproof but they will snarl at least if they do not turn and rent us and bear us upon their backs And therefore we neglect our duty and so for any other now alas how often are we guilty in this kind Secondly Take heed of all impurity uncleanness for he is a pure holy Spirit and will lie clean he cannot endure a nasty place this will grieve him if it be pollution of the flesh or pollution of the spirit if harboured in the heart it will grieve the Spirit and then as a man grieved he departeth that is his grieving indeed properly he is not grieved God is not subject to any passion or fears or sorrows c. because all things are alway present with him he seeth what we would be before he had to do
was big with us and O what sharp travel he had such as never was nor can be the like again and he supplies the nourishment the Word and the Spirit he promiseth shall never depart out of his peoples mouths and this is that the Evangelist hath of his fulness we receive grace for grace the sincere milk of the Word is his he prepareth the sweet cup of consolation in the promises so many precious promises so many breasts a child of God hath to suck continually there he hath prepared nourishment for our faith and so in our tryals and experiences there is nourishment for our faith and for our humility and for our love and all this is from him Secondly But then beside this there is a forming power a power of concoction digestion and assimilation to turn these nourishments into the very substance for so the Apostle Some preach Christ of envy saith he supposing to add affliction to my bonds the Devil and his Angels of light preach Christ but with no good intent not to gain credit but dishonor to the Gospel at the long run we see it by too woful experience well saith the Apostle I know this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ if a man take never so much down if he have not a power to digest it and turn it into substance succum sanguinem he shall never grow by it alas do we not see many live under the Word the sincere milk of the Word and seem to draw as hard at the breast as any hanging upon the Ministers lips that should preserve knowledge and yet grow not come not on there wants this digesting faculty the Spirit of Christ to mix the word with faith then when it is so mixed and concocted it groweth indeed the Word groweth then the poor Believer groweth his faith groweth And so the Apostle in that to the Corinthians who beholding as in a glass there is the nourishment the Ordinances the beholding Christ in them but the power of concocting these turning them to strength is the Spirit we are changed into his image from glory to glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord as there is not similitudinis but identitatis the glory as of the only begotten Son of God full of grace and truth there is the truth in general that it is from Christ and more specially that this power is his in that one place to the Ephesians from whom the whole body fitly joyned together and compacted by that which every joynt supplyeth according to the effectual working in the measure of every part maketh increase of the body he speaks of the growth of the Church in general but there is par ratio for the growth of each member for it is one part of the growing of the whole that the members grow in stature as well as in number and so in that place to the Colossians Let not man beguile you of your reward as a Judge of the race of masteries prescribes it is an exorbitant course to â—un out of the way and then promise you the reward for it this will be but a beguiling of you in a voluntary humility and worship of Angels c. and is worshiping of Saints any better then this voluntary humility and yet some there are that beguile poor creatures of their reward promising them if they run in this course they shall have it not holding the head me thinks an ingenuous Papist reading this should begin to suspect their way since to worship Angels and such voluntary humility as God never commanded as not to approach to Christ without a mediation of Saints which he never commanded is voluntary humility and so this is not to hold the head Christ Jesus from which from the head all the body by joints and bands have nourishment ministred and knit together increaseth with the increases of God it is the increase of God because he is the Author of it or else because of the greatness of the increase and its excellency for so the name of God is often used in the old Scriptures and their phrases the Apostles do often keep in the New You see the nourishment is ministred from the head as the sap is from the root of the tree and it is his effectual working whereby it is turned to an increase of our faith and love and therefore that soul that is not really and truly in the Lord Jesus though he may for a time flourish yet he will wither he may be green and yet be but a weed and they grow fast but they are not upon a right root they spring not from such a seed and therefore at their perfection they will be but wild Oates it may be or Tares which for a great while are so like to Wheat as some of the Antients speak that it is not to be discerned from it until it come into the ear and so many an hypocrite may have as broad a leaf as green a blade in externals not be behind any for enlargements and parts and notions of the knowledge of Christ and yet alas though he had more and more degrees this is not a spiritual growth this is not from the head from the root the Lord Jesus as a root of saving life I deny not but he giveth those gifts and parts but it is not as head of the invisible Church who alone shall be saved though as head of the visible Church there may be a communication of some fatness and sweetness of the Olive to them that is to say the Ordinances and priviledges of the Church which an hypocrite may enjoy yet be cut off when all is done and thereby he may make some progress of knowledge and a formality but yet this is no true spiritual growth this should make us look well about us and see if our water do arise from this fountain it will spread it self until it come to a river grow broader and broader Fifthly As it is from him and therefore we must be in him before we can grow with this spiritual growth so this growth in grace is a growing up into him and good reason if of him and by him be all things that to him should be all things also if Rivers be from the Sea they return to the Sea again there may be two things in this one expression of growing up into Christ who is the head First that we grow up into a nearer fellowship and communion with him who is the head and this is most sure whether the growth of the members where it is the faster do draw more and more yet from the head and other parts where the nourishment is prepared I shall not meddle with but this I am sure of the more grace any soul receiveth the more yet he may it is in order to further fellowship and communion with the Lord Jesus which is indeed an
neither of them that are strong men and women in Christ nor yet of such as haply natural incapacity is a great hindrance to But were we not many of us much wanting to our selves in reading meditating on the word of truth we might be much more apprehensive then we are we are in a strait indeed for some are so acute that we can scarce touch lightly enough upon things least they nauseate others are so dull we cannot dwell long enough upon them almost to make them understand something Well this is the first Argument Secondly Because men are exceeding slow to believe things O fools saith our Saviour and slow of heart to believe the things which the Scriptures c. Concerning the Messiah how he must be rejected and cut off and rise again the third day Might he not upbraid our Congregations brethren in the like manner how often have we heard the same things and it may be given assent to the truth of the same but yet are slow to believe And this Argument will stand good against the acutest hearers though they may out-run the speaker haply in apprehension they may be slow-paced enough in believing Now it is true it is not all our inculcating and pressing the same truths upon men that can work their hearts to believe until the arm of the Lord be revealed to them yet we know not when and how far he may reveal his arm It may be a little at one time and a little at another Agrippa hearing Paul once discourse of Jesus Christ was almost perswaded haply if he had had another opportunity to hear the like things again it might have proved a through work Felix trembled at the first Sermon upon Judgement to come if he had heard it the second time who can tell how far it might have wrought This the second Thirdly Alas Brethren our memories are such leaking vessels we are full of chinks hac illac difluxerimus and therefore as from thence the Apostle infers we should give the more diligent heed to the things which are spoken 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 least we run out So should we also inculcate the same truths again who is there that hath not woful experience of this other things evil and vile they have such impression upon our memories O how much ado is it to raze them out injuries are graven upon us even as with the pen of a Diamond vain words wicked speeches we have heard long since we cannot forget but a thing that is good O how much ado there is to remember it had not a riddle need often to be put into the water it will hold nothing else be not forgetful hearers of the word saith the Apostle but doers of the same how many of us are even high-way seed hearers The word is gone from us before we are out of these doors or the most part of it So the fowls of the Aire the evil spirits they steal away the word from us so that we had as much need to hear it again as when we came O saith Peter as long as I live I will put you in remembrance To do good and to communicate forget not saith the Apostle no Question they had been taught that lesson again and again and yet they were apt to forget and therefore the Apostle goeth over it again to them to put them in remembrance Fourthly It is requisite because our affections are so dull they had need to be often quickned therefore whet the word upon your children It is not one whet that will edge a dull knife but over and over with it again and again as many times in Scripture a repetition of a thing in prayer in preaching speaks the affections of him that delivereth it so it stirs the affections of the hearers Phil. 4. 4. saith the Apostle rejoyce in the Lord alway and again I say rejoyce is that a tautology or a vain repetition no sure the Apostle was not guilty in that kind but it was needful to stir the affection to the duty our hearts indeed are like so many dead Seas and it is not a little breath once upon us that will move but when the wind passeth often and strongly over us then it may affect us haply the word is therefore compared to the words of the wise which are like goads not the words of fools who are no orators sensless and know not what belongs to the Art of speaking rightly but the words of the wise are like goads sharp and they are to be often used we are like oxen in duty creatures that will often need to be pricked up therefore the metaphor is used therefore saith the Apostle I put you in remembrance of the things you knew before and were established in even to stir you up there is need of quickening the affections a man may deliver the same truth haply more stirringly one time then another and the spirit may breath in it one time more then in another and then the affections are stirrd indeed to purpose that is a fourth Gutta cavat lapidem non vi sed saepe cadendo Fifthly because of the unconstancy of our hearts if we be a little affected with a truth at one time how long doth such a frame continue upon us David was sensible how fleeting the frame of our hearts are And therefore though himself and his people were in as sweet a frame as any we read of almost when they offered with a perfect heart willingly and so willingly as that David rejoyced in it and blessed the Lord for it that they had hearts so to do this was a precious frame indeed yea David rejoyced at the willingness of others not envied at it saith he that the Lord would keep this frame for ever Keep this upon the imagination or figments of their hearts for ever Alas if he keep it not it is gone presently now upon Eagles wings soring by and by with our bellies cleaving to the earth Psal 119. 24. thy testimonies are my delight and 25. v. my belly cleaveth to the dust And therefore the words of the wise they are as goads and nails nails to take hold and fasten things together that they may abide and if they be driven to the head yet how quickly may it be loosened again is there not need of the same hammer to fasten it again therefore saith the Apostle Peter though you be established in the present truth already yet I Judge it meet to stir you up by putting you in remembrance Sixthly because we are so slow to do what we know which indeed is the main thing we do but build Castles in the Aire Bretheren if we hear and do not and yet who is clear in this point yea how often may we hear a practical truth prest upon us before we practise it yea when we are convinced to do it and resolved we will and yet with the Son in the Gospel
manner to come with a rod if there were need Again there is much wisdom to be used in the dressing the same truth again and again for the truths which you are necessarily to know they are not for number infinite and you will easily find if you consider the Scripture how the same truths are proposed to us in the Scripture an 100. waies several waies because the Lord knew our frame that naturally we would have somewhat new and were affected with variety therefore he giveth us the same truths under divers dresses 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith the Apostle the Preacher chose not acceptable words though It would not feed that itching humor that is in some yet I would allow as much as love and prudence examined together would advise because of the weakness and frame of men and if one therefore diversly dress the same truths omne tulit punctum will the Lord seal this instruction to such of us as it concerneth And Brethren pray for us that we may be wise-hearted and know how to fit our selves and bait the hook so as it may be most drawing Thirdly It may serve to humble us for our dulness then and those many other defections which are the rise of this necessity to beat the same things upon us again and again Dear friends we swallow much every Sabboth every opportunity how little doth incorporate with us how little abideth with us what pains is the Lord fain to take with us line upon line and precept upon precept here a little and there a little in season out of season and yet Brethren how little the better are we for it May we not all of us lay our hands upon our hearts is it not matter of humbling we should put the Lord and his Messengers to so much pains with us and be yet little the better for all O let us magnifie the long-suffering of God and bless him for the long-suffering of his servants with us that he is pleased to follow us up and down with this and that necessary truth It may be thou hast heard some things which now thy soul hath the experience of thou wouldst not loose for a world and many a time thou hast heard them but it hath been like water spilt upon the ground and at last the Lord hath fastened the nayl to the head if it had had but one blow it would not have stuck Fourthly It may caution us brethren against nauseating Divine truths because they are so often beaten upon us it may be the same things It is safe for you brethren it is good for you if you know the things belong to your peace say not then occidet misâ—ros crambe repetita Magistros What shall the Disciples say to Christ because he so presseth them to watch for his appearing here is nothing but harping upon one string nothing but watching and watching prest upon us we would have somewhat else we are weary of this No but rather continue O sure it is needful our dulness calls for it and it is much tenderness that he will not give us over until he hath wrought it upon our spirits Should the Philippians cast it in Pauls teeth he had told them often of those unruly masters that they had heard enough of that O no now he tels them with tears with more melting then before the same thing in a more affected manner they had no reason to lothe It was the great sin of the Israelites you know they had manna every morning this was their daily bread at last they grew weary of it nothing but this manna our souls loatheth this light bread for a while it was excellent and delightful but after a while they loathed it It seemeth it had not a taste to suite every mans palate what was most delightful to every one as some thought then they would not have loathed it but they might dress it divers waies and yet they loathed it this was a lust which put their mouthes out of taste and so far as that they prefered Garlick and Onions before it It is nothing to be taken with the word when a Teacher is as one that plaies skilfully upon an instrument toucheth every string and in such a manner as the variety maketh sweet melody but this harping upon one string is not so pleasant here is a tryal of your love to the word as it is the word whether in its nakedness and simplicity you can love it and though you have nothing but the word and the word the sincere milk Another Caution shall be this to take heed of that humour which reigns in abundance among us all affecting novelties O such itching ears would not have suited with our Saviour his manner of Preaching they have the same again and again from him A new light though it be but a Comet draweth more eyes after it then the Sun because he daily runneth his course this is a great vanity in mens minds and truly it is so in spiritual things A new Doctrine Oh how it bewitcheth men as that did the Galathians it is more then ordinarily taking with us else the power of darkness and errour had not been so great in our daies as it hath been and truly when we begin to be weary of the eternal Gospel which never waxeth old and cannot away with the same things after we have once heard them which argues we receive not the love of the truth imbrace it not because of it self but its dress or its novelties or some such accident we are in the very high-way to delusion as the Apostle saith I am sure Antiquity was the commendation of the Apostles Doctrine even to the Romans themselves he brought no new Gospel but what was from the beginning Is it not the same spirit surely that works so mightily among us whereby men would commend any thing for its novelty It is horrible pride both in Preachers and Teachers Lucifer-pride and a strong savour of the old Adam that rather then we will be confined to a course and dwell upon such things as have been received as truths in Jesus we will have somewhat new or else we will to our own inventions for it the Lord deliver us from such a spirit And lastly brethren it is necessary that the same things be thus inculcated upon us then surely we may hence learn that there is somewhat more for us to learn still in every truth we hear it may be often we have heard such a duty pressed such a sin descried there is somewhat in it that God meeteth thee it may be everywhere with the same message they spoke with one mouth the same thing to thee Is there not cause to fear Surely that is one consideration and the Lord in mercy to thee will not let thee alone but one Bell in Aarons ring sounds louder then all the rest in thine ears Surely surely there is somewhat unhealed that every one thou comes near
so humble Abigail and from Bâ—az so humble Ruth and shall not this love of Jesus Christ infinitely greater then all humble such poor filthy creatures upon whom he hath set his love Thirdly Let us hence take notice then of the many precious priviledges of the Saints We live much below them because we study them not keep not the relish of them upon our hearts I mean endeavour not so to do the Lord give us hearts now lifted up to him First then As many as by believing are espoused to Jesus Christ they are one with him in the nearest union Surely it is not for nothing that the H. Ghost delights so to set forth the believers relation to Christ by this of a spouse to a husband you know that this is the nearest union among men of one person to another Kindred are near a man his children his brethren they are usually called their bone and their flesh as the men of Judah spake to David we are thy flesh and thy bone but this is aâ— a greater distance but now in Marriage two persons that were strangers one to another never saw the face one of another within a little while by this Ordinance of God are brought to such a nearness as that Father and Mother and Children if they had any before yet they are not so near to them they shall leave Father and Mother and be joyned to their Husband here this union is the stranger by how much greater the distance between the persons were and how much the closer the union is now it is made the distance was great whether we respect the dignity of the person there was no proportion a King and a Beggar are but a shadow and a dark one too to set forth this a King and a worm to take it and lay it in his bosom is nothing to this but chiefly in respect of enmity of mind alas that such as we are at the deadliest feud haters of God and of Christ not only strangers but enemies through evil works that those should be brought so near to Christ as to be made one with him this is something indeed An impotent and weak enemy that could do nothing against him not so much as move any longer then he upheld us and yet we should be look't upon indeed a potent enemy happily in policie may be concerned to such an union but a weak enemy rather would be trampled under foot But then the nearness of the union man and wife are one flesh saith the Apostle but he that is joyned to the Lord is one spirit The union of soul and body is nearer then of man and wife if too bodies could be acted by one and the same soul this were a near union indeed Why the Lord Jesus and the saints are one and the same Spirit whereby they are knit together in love this is a near union indeed Is this a light thing a small thing to be made so near the Lord of life and glory even the Children of Israel a people near to him who is like them that have Christ so near them of that are so near him Secondly There is a sweet Communion and Fellowship ariseth upon this a blessed imparting now of all his fulness to such a soul all that is Christ's is now yours his righteousness yours therefore the Holy City the name of it is called the Lord our righteousness Now his honour is yours where he is King you are Queen as in the old custom with the Romanes they used to say where you are Caius I am Caia saith the woman where you are Lord I am Lady be the poor Creature never so contemptible yet marrying with a noble person it dignifieth her with a rich person it enricheth her because she hath an interest in all But beloved that though this be matter enough to insist upon if I could enlarge things for fear of being too tedious There is fellowship-Communion between the Lord Jesus and the soul that others know nothing what it meaneth the Lord Jesus is more open hearted to them his secrets are with them they are the hidden Manna and they again are most free to power out their souls to Jesus Christ into his bosom to power them out like water as he will hide nothing from Abraham so Abraham will hide nothing from him such a confidence hath the poor Believing soul that he speaks boldly freely 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with speaking all so the original word properly imports that which none else in the world shall know they will make known to Jesus Christ they can be more free with him then any other And not only because he already knoweth the heart as I conceive but out of a sweet confidence they have in him and experience of his bowels yerning over poor souls in such a Condition so that if he knew not all that was in their hearts they would out of this freedom open it to him Yea the Lord Jesus he dyed our death and grieves our griefs and we rise his resurrection and rejoyce in his rejoycings he partaketh with us yea indeed bears the heavier end and all indeed of our miseries and we partake of his joys the oyl of gladness we are anointed with But this is the second Thirdly another is the cohabitation of Christ with his people I will dwell with them and I will walk in them when the new Jerusalem comes down from heaven the Church of the Jews shall come in then he will especially dwell in them then the Tabernacle of God is with men but now saith the Apostle that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith though he be absent indeed in some respect at the right hand of his father absent in body yet he is present in spirit as the Apostle saith of himself as he would have us to be in Heaven have our hearts there and so to dwell there to have our conversations there our love there and where the heart is there the man is Animus non est ubi animat sed ub i amat well we then dwell with him and he dwels with us with him will I dwell saith the Lord. It is a Marriage duty to dwell one with another and if a believer have an unbelieving yoke-fellow if he or she will live with the believer they must not put them away they must not depart from them so it is here the Lord Jesus dwels with his people and this is no small priviledge to the Husband the Bridegroom at hand alway ready to pity and compassionate us in our sufferings within or without But this the third Fourthly he nourisheth and cherisheth them No man hates his own flesh saith the Apostle but he nourisheth it and cherisheth it as you have it there in Nathan's parable one poor Ewe Lamb and he laid it in his bosom and it did eat of his bread and drink of his cup by which are meant all manner of supplies
deep hypocrisie that is in mens hearts or if they had do I think they were to use it but serve Gods holy ends in following Christ his example who suffered a Devil though a white one he was indeed in the likenes of an Angel of light yet he did suffer him in his family until it broke out into scandal There is much in this one reason 1. What deep hypocrisie may lurk in the hearts of men under a plausible profession so that men can suspect nothing many times as you see Ananias and Saphira Simon Magus and others Judas carried it so cunningly and seemed so zealous and full of charity O why was this waste c. when the Spirit of Christ went with his spirit and saw his fetches and deep ends he said it because he had the bag and was a thief the more he had to row in the more bold he might make with it and it would the less be mist but his paint was so exact and so near the life that the Disciples took him to be as real as themselves any of them rather suspecting themselves then him his heart was too deep for them to fathom Because 2. They had not such an infallible spirit given nor have any of the Churches now such a spirit given whereby to know the secrets of mens heart nor do I find that the Apostles had such a spirit given them now and then indeed they had some secret things and actions revealed to them but not that incommunicable property of God to search the heart I the Lord search the heart and try the reins Peter indeed had that private action and falshood of Ananias revealed to him and from thence he concluded Sathan had filled his heart in that he lyed against the Holy ghost but what is this to the searching of the heart and this that was revealed was but for an act now and then in Acts 10. He knew not that there were men sent for him from Cornelius until the Spirit of God told him and revealed it to him so that he had not that knowledge which he had of secret things not made known in an ordinary way by sense he had it not habitually but by several acts Or if they had such a spirit which none can prove they did not act by it in admitting persons for then such as those would never have been admitted Yea 3. If the Church had such a spirit it is very likely she were not to act by it in admission For our Saviour himself though he knew whom he â—ad chosen and knew from the beginning who should betray him yet he did admit him that he knew would prove a Devil and therefore he acted therein according to his humanity and to leave us a pattern that though we may suspect happily such or such a person and not savour them according to that discerning which God hath given us of the spirits of men yet if not scandalous not to reject them making such a profession of Christ as according to charity and Scripture-rules we ought to hope well of And methinks there is somewhat in that Parable of the tares though while in the blade they were scarce discernable from the wheat yet it seemeth by the Parable that now they were come to such a growth as they did discern them therefore came with that Question whether they should pluck them up and yet he would not have if so they were not thorns and thistles and such as would altogether choak the Corn though they might hinder it if only Hypocrites though discovered if they can be discovered without prophaness and scandal they are not to be pluckt up from among the good Corn and hence it is that there are good and bad in the visible Church though the bad seem to be good all are Virgins but all are not wise virgins For the Application of this We may hence take notice of the great indulgence of God and the largeness of his grace and the riches of his patience and long-suffering to poor Creatures in that he takes many as his own within the verge and comprehension of this his Covenant that never really partake of the saving benefits of the Covenant So you know it was with Israel though they were as the sand of the sea yet a remnant should be saved All are not Israel that are of Israel that is true and yet they are of Israel though they be not Israel that is as true Now that the Lord should admit of such to be of Israel that never were nor are like to be Israel this is largeness of bounty Alas how many wild Olives are graffed in among the branches which remain and partake of the fatness of the Olive the priviledges and ordinances and gifts of God bestowed on his Church for edification and yet shall be cast out as branches broken off dryed and withered shall be taken away as barren and unprofitable and burn for ever if thou continue not in this goodness thou shalt be cut off It is not the manner of men to plant such in their vine yards as they know will bring forth nothing but leaves no fruits but sowr the grapes of Sodom and yet this the manner of God to such as shall be cast out into utter darkness yet should be admitted to be the children of the kingdom 2. That he owneth many as separated to himself in such a way before they come to own him and though they dwell under his shadow and shine and in droppings and dew of heaven yet a long time bring forth nothing do nothing but abuse his grace and this riches of his goodness and yet at last notwithstanding all he should go on to separate them to a nearer holiness to himself seize upon their hearts put another principle and seed into them whereby they should be fruitful for the time to come Ordinary experience teacheth us this how many years many a poor formal Professor hath walkt under the means of grace and passed for a Saint and yet hath been in the gall of bitterness but the Lord out of his infinit mercy and rich grace hath healed him afterward It is no question it is the case of some that that very grace which they have so long hypocritically pretended to and abused was that at last which seized upon them Why but you will say this is no priviledge nor mercy to be members of Christ his visible Church if we therein enjoy not Christ and for our Children to be owned as those separated to Christ and yet though Children of the kingdom and be cast out for none are like to sink so low into hell as those which are cast out of the kingdom such as so often abuse mercies and Gospel-grace tendered to them I answer It is true the name of the Lord our God is great and fearful as in that place of Deuteronomy And the nearer a people have been drawn to Christ within the
takes encouragement to lay the reins upon the neck to run to all maner of excess the very same you repeated by Luke therefore it shall suffice to name that I will add but one Scripture-more which happily may be of more use then any of these to some perceiving judgements for happily you will say this is but a bribed judgement of some wicked persons bribed and blinded by their Lusts indeed there is not such a delay which indeed is a great part true for the delay is for the most part to be measured by our weakness and shortness as afterward will appear yet somewhat there is of a delay and that you shall find in the Apostle to the Thessalonians Let no man deceive you by any means be not quickly removed or shaken in mind or troubled whether by Spirit or by Word or by Letter as from us as the day of Christ is at hand 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but there must first come a falling away c. which is fulfilled in the great Antichrist the Pope who sits in the Temple of God as God c. Yet the other Apostle saith the Judge standeth at the door 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Grudge not one at another complain not one of another for the Judge is near at hand ready to judge you all for it So sin lyeth at the door that is to say to be near at hand It is no contradiction to that that the day of the Lord is not at hand for that is the day wherein he hath appointed wherein he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained whereof he hath given assurance to all men in that he raised him up from the dead If this judging which is near is a temporal Chastisement he would lay upon them as if when children are envying one another quarrelling and grudging one at another accusing one another and falling out one should move them to forbear and by this Argument take heed your Father is at door with a rod in his hand and he will judge you all So he judgth the people that they might not be condemned with the world I thought good to speak thus far lest that seeming contradiction might trouble any so much for the proof The second thing will be to open the terms and First What is meant by coming the coming of Christ This will open the particle of time in the first verse then shall the Kingdom of Heaven be likened c. the same Key will open both To omit then any other opinion of it I understand it either of the coming of Christ to a particular soul which is no sooner separated from the body but cometh to judgement Now Christ may be said to come he cometh to put the sickle to such as are ripe for it he cometh to gather into his barn if they be wheat or else to burn them up with unquenchable fire Or else 2. And rather of the day of Judgement that great day and appearing of our Jesus Christ who is our life when his people shall appear with him in glory which day will find many alive who shall then be changed before they enter in with him and which day will find doubtless many in deep security and formality to have their work to do And for those that are then dead and shall be raised up it will find them in that state wherein they lay down in the dust either of faith or unbelief and accordingly either they shall be shut out or admitted to the Marriage And methinks this doom of our Saviour I know you not which is parallel to that Mat. 7. 23. Depart from me you workers of iniquity I know you not which surely doth agree to none except it be at the day of death or the day of judgement for any other time I will not trouble you with any thing about And so much for this first 2. Now for the delaying What is Jesus Christ more backward then the Church to this union that they go forth to meet him and seem forward and he delays his coming for what will make more hast then love will it not bring him upon Eagles wings yea riding upon the clouds and wings of the wind and how are we to understand this of his delay of his coming or what is he an idol-Christ that is taken up in a journey or any other business as to forget his spouse and neglect her to come speedily to make up the match to bring her into his Fathers house this were indeed agreeable to a poor finite forgetful Creature but not to Jesus Christ Yea more then this Is he not said to come quickly in divers places and how stands that with the delay of his coming See that place in Luke in the Parable of the unjust judge overcome with the widows importunity though he neither cared for God nor regarded man yet because of her importunity he would avenge her of her adversary how much more God who is love it self and tender of his people as the apple of his eye who is most just and most faithful and who doth indeed fear the wrath of his adversary after the manner of men being tender of his people and of his own name lest he should reproach his name and that reproach with ruin fall upon his people and besides all this being importuned by them as the souls under the Altar crying continually how long Lord holy and true wilt thou not avenge our blood upon the inhabitants of the Earth why saith the Text shall not God avenge his own Children which cry day and night to him though he bear long with them that is to say with their enemie I tell you he will avenge them speedily 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 speedily in a trice a moment by and by according to that of the Apostle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 quantulumcunque how little soever as little as may be and he will not tarry How hang these things together For the clearing of this it is necessary to say something And first I will shew you in what respect he is not said to delay or it is denied that he doth delay his coming but it is short and quickly and then 2. In what respect he is said to delay his coming and then come to the argumentss 2. Then he is not said to delay his coming in respect of his own eternity wherein all the differences of time are swallowed up and appear not at all there is no time long or short in eternity there is not prius or posterius there and therefore the Apostle in this argument speaks in this wise know saith he to them that were ready to mock because it was so long before the promise of his coming was fulfilled for the glorious liberty of the Sons of God from under their iron yokes put upon them by their persecutors why saith he God is not slack as some count slackness or
vigilancy there creepeth a security on a people which is a main ingredient into this spiritual sleep as the virgins here they were all secure they looked not for the coming of Jesus Christ And so when instead of a fervency of spirit in serving God a deadness a dulness creepeth upon men they pray as if they prayed not if it be but for an act it is slumbering now they are dead and then they are lively it may be next time and then they are dead again this is slumbering napping and nodding Now they can act their faith and then they cannot now they can avoid this sin and that and then they cannot but are overtaken by it this is slumbring and alas brethren are we not all of us lyable to this Yea it may be these things seize upon us more violently we not onely offend in many things but continually lying secure continue in such a dull listless frame little or no actings or strivings of faith or love or fervency or wayting for Jesus Christ and his appearing this is sleeping Well I wish we had not too general and too good proof of it by our own experience You have had already in this part of the discourse the general reason of this sleepiness of the Saints respecting our selves and that is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a seed of that Poppy-seed which lays us so often asleep a filthy heart streaming continually filthy gross vapours which clog and seize upon our graces and hold them prisoners as I may say for a time that we cannot act them But I will a little more particularly descend to speak to some cases Not to speak of that vindicative hand of God upon some when in vindicative justice he sendeth upon men a spirit of slumber and of sleep for I hardly think that is competent to the Saints though to hypocrites it may yet those are not they I am mainly to speak to in this discourse but of other causes And First A cause of it may be this sloathfulness it casts men into a deep sleep It is so in naturals and it is so in spirituals a sloathful man that will not labour the vapours gather and becloud and bemist him that he cannot break through them but they seize upon his senses and hold him prisoner a great while and if he be stirred yet a little sleep a little slumber a little folding of the hands to sleep that is the slothful mans guise and as the door turns upon the hinges up and down so the slothful man doth upon his bed Labour and pains taking it dispels the vapours scatters them and so they clear up so it is here a sloathful spirit is the immediate forerunner of this sleep therefore the Apostle exhorts them not sloathful in business fervent in spirit serving the Lord. And you shall finde brethren when he that had one talent given him he improved it not the Lord calls him a wicked and sloathful servant Alas his soul was asleep and his talent laid tosleep in a Napkin well this is one cause if we have opportunities in our hands to do good and we do it not as the Apostle exhorts us to do we are sloathful A man that is idle shall have very much ado to keep himself from sleeping a wonder brethren if we be not all asleep we have so many opportunities to do good such talents put into-our hands some of us most of us and yet do so little with them Secondly Another cause of sleeping may be wearyness you know the sleep of the labouring man is sweet so you see Sisera after he was toyled and spent with his fighting and flight he was ready to lye down to sleep presently so brethren it is in this case when we have run a while in the race that is set before us or fought against our corruptions toyled hard if we sit down when weary we are asleep presently O saith the Apostle be not weary of well-doing if you be you will fall asleep this we find in the case of them in the Hebrews they were harased and persecuted grievously their faith and patience were even tyred out alas their hands therefore were weak and knees were feeble their members began to languish and sleep to seize upon them Sometimes when we toyl all night and take nothing we spend and are spent we are apt to be weary brethren and then it is two to one but we fall asleep That is another cause of this sleep Thirdly Another Cause may be the false questions which men make the mistaking of things a man mistaking the day for the night he slumbers it may be and thinketh it is night or the day is not at hand he sleepeth this is clear I think in the present case What made the virgins thus to give sleep to their eys and slumber to their eye-lids they thought their Lord would not come yet he delayed his coming and likely they thought he would do so still and therefore thought they might sleep or else atleast they might think while he delayed his coming it was no great matter whether they slept or waked it would be of little availment to them and therefore they even laid them down formally to sleep O how easily are we lulled asleep with such mistakes as these now how false was this in the mean time for there is much to be done while he tarryes to wayt for him to have our lights burning our lamps trimmed our ornaments ready to wait for him until he come for we shall be paid for our wayting as well as for our our working and then we should be ready to open to him whenever he comes this another Fourthly Another cause or occasion at least of this sleeping what is it but a letting down our fear and care if we served the L. continually with a holy trembling as the Psalmist cals upon us we should hardly sleep a man that hath a trembling heart sleep passeth from his eys or a man that hath his head fâ—ll of cares and his heart also they will keep him waking so Jacob his sleep departed from his eys O the care he had of Labans sheep he slept not Ah how far short are many of us that have the charge of the slock of Christ purchased with his precious blood for we sleep let the Wolves come sleep and let the envious man sow tares Paul O how watchful a man washe how diligent he warned them night and day with tears what was the matter O the care of all the Churches were upon him Why brethren we have every one the care of our own souls yea and of one anothers we ought to watch over one another tender one another to walk fearfully lest we be stumbling-blocks one to another hurt one another we are our brothers keepers and if we have this care upon us lively of our own souls and others it will keep us waking The rich
God as the Apostle did not by sense nor what we feeâ— though never so much yet that must not be our life or if never so little that must not be our death but still live by faith in the son of God who liveth for ever and therefore his people shall not dye nor their Lamps be put out in obscure darkness 3. Consider then have we not declined have not our Lamps burned much clearer then now they do hath not our light been clearer then now it is and our warmth been more then now it is this is matter of humbling to us Have we not received much mixture of error in these erting times we cannot imagine how much darkness it brings upon our Lamps to have one error mixed with much truth Besides may not the Lord Jesus say to us all I have somewhat against you all in that you have left your first love Time was when you were zealous for the house of God and it did even eat you up now you are grown to a Gallio's spirit care not for these things Now we seek our own things and nest our selves in security it is well with us and therefore we consider not the danger poor souls are in by such as go up and down with the power of delusion few mourners in Zion for these things If the Church were under persecution it is likely we should lament truly I look upon its present state as more destructive to it so many Vipers â—ating at the very heart and bowels of Religion where is our burning of zeal for God against these things sure it should humble us 4. We see that Believers may decline and these times do give an abundant proof of it how many that have been as burning and shining lights have been benighted and inveloped in the most Egyptian darkness entertaning the most desperate opinions walking after their own Lusts and yet afterwards have been restored O how should this make us fear before him be not high-minded but fear here thou seest one and there another their lamps next to a being quite extinct yet thou hast light and heat maintained O boast not thy self lift not up thy self but fear before the Lord humility indeed is a kind of a nurse of the graces conservatrix virtutum as Bernard saith If he spared not the Angels in their pride will he spare thee A Novise is in danger of falling into the condemnation of the Devil in danger of being puffed up He giveth grace to the lowly but resisteth the proud Some do observe that word be ye cloathed with humility 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be ye cloathed the word cometh from a word signifying a knot because it ties all together as I may say and so knitteth the graces together as pearls upon a Braslet if the knot be broken they are quickly lost It is indeed brethren the thief in the candle the great waster the Moth in the cloath consumeth it and spoyleth the beauty and strength of it It is the worm at the root of the Guord it will smite it and we see it by sad experience when men grow so proud and pretend to Angelical perfection in our days they fall as low as hell and brutish bestiality in their lusts O therefore let us labour to walk humbly with God be not high-minded though at present we stand and flourish and shine and burn we are liable to declinings 5. If we be so liable to declinings then it should teach us so much the more to be diligent in improving I am sure the Apostle giveth it as a preservative against declining and apostatizing But grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ grow in grace and in knowledge knowledge is that whereby the Lord doth reveal himself to his people from grace to grace as you have it in that place of the Apostle whom beholding as in a glass c. But observe here keep your selves that is fall not from your own stedfastness and how should this be One means is to grow in grace If we would not have our Lamps burn dim and low we must labour to supply them so as they may increase the path of the just is as a shining light which shineth more and more to the perfect day and the wind of that Spirit which bloweth where it listeth it riseth higher and higher as some note O see to it then ordinarily while the fruit is in growth the leaves wither not nor the fruit fals except in some great storm or wind Labour to grow then first in bigness then in sweetness grow more mellow sweet full of love humility and self-denial 6. If we be so liable to decline it should teach us to avoid all those things which tend to a declining else we shall never avoid the thing it self we must take heed of sleeping then for though our Lamps be never so bright when we begin to sleep when we awake they will burn low if not extinct and will have great need of trimming up Security is the undoing evil in all things where was the joy of Davids faith when he began to be secure Psal 30. 7. Take heed of putting off the day of his appearing that will gender to security and that security will bring a neglect of our Lamps and then they will grow low and decline 2. Take we heed of false Teachers try the Spirits whether they be of God or no they have a strange influence upon the life and liveliness of mens profession were they not these that hindered the Galathians Ye did run well who hath hindered you who hath bewitched you that you should not obey the truth Ye did run well in the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the rase wherein they had Lamps or Torches but who hath hindered you The Apostle Peter maketh it the immediate cause of the backsliding and declining at least if not utter apostacy Beware saith he lest ye also being led away with the error of the wicked and fall from your own stedfastness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to be carried out of his way to go with another the power of error is greater then we are aware of The Apostle speaks thus This I say lest any man deceive you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with enticing words beguile you They have cunning craftiness 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 cogging with the die Satan changing himself into an Angel of light and his Ministers into Ministers of light and cogging with the die like cunning and deceitful Gamsters how easie is it to deceive the hearts of the simple yea the hearts of his but that they are kept by that power But a great way they may prevail and so we may lose our stedfastness and therefore take heed what spirits we give ear to Alas do we not see in our days what fearful work Satan hath made among Professors how many have their Lamps quite put out that went for zealous
loiâ—â—r nor stay in what he had received but pressed hard forward toward the mark of the priâ—e of the high calling he that aimeth short even at so much as will serve his turn and compass his design when he hath done that there is an end But I aâ—m at perfection saith the Apostle and so should we if we would keep our Lamps alive never rest 8. Be much in prayer pray hard for the supplies of his Spirit he hath promised them if we ask importunity will prevail if we be Strangers much more if Children it is the spirit that keepeth all alive and therefore pray for more and more of this Spirit of Jesus Christ See how Moses followeth the Lord with request upon request when he had been in the Mount and seen him face to face one would think this was enough to have stopped his mouth for a great while no sooner was he come down but he is praying for the guidance of that good Spirit O Lord shew me the way where in thou wouldst have us to go well God grants him this this satisfieth him not but he must have Gods presence with him an Angel would not serve his turn but his presence he must have and when this was granted this would not serve his turn neither but then O Lord shew me thy glory Prayer is the richest trading for heaven Build up your selves praying in the holy Ghost Ah it is the prayer of faith that fetcheâ—h in rich supplies from the Lord continually 9. Take heed of grieving this good Spirit then when we have his presence by any willing transgression this grieveth him our unthankfulness and slighting of him minding the world grieve him not for if he depart be sure our Lamps will be but in a sad taking 10. Then every day we must be trimming the Lamps of the Sanctuary were drest or trimmed every day he made them well as the Original word signifieth they were disordered burning every night there was somewhat wanting oyl and raising the week likely and removal of dross from them which they might contract he drest them and made them ready every morning the morality implied in this Type surely is this that we should daily dress up our Lamps they will need it every day renew our repentance renew our resolutions our walking clos 〈…〉 r with God to love him c. daily endeavour to draw nearer to him neglect your Lamps but a week or so and see what fearful work there will be Again such then as can say with Moses they have lived thus long and their sight fails not nor their strength c. They have great cause to bless the Lord. But though a Child of God is thus apt to decline his profession thus apt to grow dim his Lamp to want trimming yet it never goeth altogether out And what use should we make of this 1. It reproveth that opinion of falling away utterly from justifying and renewing grace the condition of all believers is here set down by the state of the wise virgins their Lamps indeed did decay and suffer an impairing but not altogether dye No this spring of grace once sprung in the heart springs up to eternal life though some interruptions there may be did he pray that Peters faith should not fail him and did he not pray for all believers indeed his faith did as near fail him as ever mans did but yet it revived again and so David and others 2. Yet do not abuse this Doctrine of grace as our hearts are exceeding apt to do If we cannot fall away utterly then if once Be sure we have the root of the matter in us if once we have Oyl in our vessels it will never be altogether spent our Lamps will never be blown out This is dangerous and next to desperate and therefore the Apostle in a like case with a kind of abhorrency at the thought of such a thing speaks thus shall we continue in sin that grace may abound God forbid because he hath made us partakers of the sure mercies of David that will never fail shall we therefore neglect our worthy walking of them it argues a very ungodly frame of heart where this is to be found We should the rather be encouraged our hands strengthened to work out our salvation with so much the more earnestness were it not a very unchild-like and wretched frame of heart for a child to say Well I know my fathers heart towards me let me do what I will he will not cast me out of doors his inheritance is sure he may haply be mistaken and prove himself a Bastard and not a Son And so it is here Gods Children have all of them such child-like dispositions in them as they will hardly dare to make such an use of such a rich treasury of grace Or if they do they are like to smart for it 3. A word of strong Consolation to many a poor drooping soul If once thou have but grace in thy heart the oyl in thy Vessel it is never lost again though in its own nature it be loseable Thou art afraid some temptation or another from Satan the world or thy own heart will blow it out some blast or other will wither thee O thou shalt never be able to keep thy Lamp burning in the midst of so many contrary winds of lust and corruption but though thou canst not keep it alive the Lord can do it and he will do it Indeed while the Virgins slept for any care they took of their Lamp it might have gone out but the Lord kept it burning though it were but low and needed dressing Be of good courage then poor drooping foul and he shall strengthen thy heart didst thou ever know of any that had this oyl in their vessels that had the real work of grace upon them that did quite extinguish and dye surely thou didst not If the Lord do but seal it up to thee that thou art one of the wise Virgins believe it for thy everlasting comfort thy Lamp shall never be put out in obscure darkness 4. What shall we render to the Lord for this unspeakable grace towards us how hath he lifted up our condition above innocency it self in Adam he was made liable to fall away and the Lord did not engage himself to keep him we are made now in the second Adam in a surer Condition we have a better tenure in Jesus Christ which is the root of our stedfastness and standing because he liveth we shall live If Jesus Christ could die any more then might the Saints that are in him dye again altogether when once they are implanted into him O he liveth for ever and that Spirit of Christ which liveth and dwelleth in his people it never dyeth and faileth and he hath made it the very tenure of his Covenant he will put his fear into their hearts that they shall never depart from him We it may be that
to this readiness a making the calling and election sure by adding faith to faith and grace to grace as it is in that place of the Apostle Peter Then when Simeon had gotten Jesus Christ into this arms of his faith as well as of his body and saw his salvation with the eye of faith as well as of the body then he cryeth out Lord now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace Now he was ready to enter into glory And so the Apostle Paul had such a perswasion and therefore he was ready henceforth there is laid up for me a Crown of glory c. 2. There goeth many times if not alway to this abundant entrance as a readiness or preparation to it an earnest waiting of the soul for its change a desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ which is far better There is many a poor heart when the body of death weigheth them down and tryeth them groan earnestly and could be contented to dye that sin might dye with them As Sampson said let me even dye with the Philistians if no other way will destroy their lusts But alas when they are to seek in point of assurance they look upon death as a dark passage that leadeth them they cannot tell whither this maketh them fly back this kills those desires nippeth them as soon as they put forth they come to no maturity But now when a man hath the right art of believing notwithstanding his body of death he groans under as the Apostle that yet he is perswaded through Christ it is pardoned and shall be utterly dissolved and not hinder him then he can bless the Lord and desires with Paul to be dissolved So many of the Patriarks it is said of them they dyed full of daies satisfied with daies that is to say they lived as long as they desired they had now a desire to be at home knowing that while they are present in the body they are absent from the Lord from that near and sweet and full Communion with him whereof they have had a little taste and earnest but if they know not that they shall be present with him by departure but for ought they know more separate from them no marvel if they go to death with drawing back Yet I deny not but a child of God may be ready before he desire it And may desire it before he be ready for this entrance I say a child of God may be ready before he desire it as in the case before mentioned and upon other grounds as Hezekiah and David that I may declare thy power to this generation may be ready and not have such an assurance but he is not ready for an abundant entrance until the Lord come with a full sealing of his love to his heart 2. He may desire it before he be ready as in some passionate impatient fit as Elijah 1 King 19. 4. weary of his life the King persecuting him and thinking he should fall by his hand would have God take away his life from him but he had not yet done his work And so Job God had not yet done with him he must pass through more changes and prosper and flourish again and hold forth his name to that generation before he departed he had not done his work But I speak of the serious settled well-grounded frame of a Believers heart upon a sound perswasion of the Love of God in Jesus Christ and a knowledge that he hath finished his course then for such a one to wait for his change when the blessed hour will come is a part of readiness for an entrance an abundant entrance into glory But this is not the portion of every child of God many Suns set in a Cloud c. For the second thing which are the arguments of the point they are such as these First because else Gods work would be in vain he hath prepared an inheritance for the Saints a Kingdom prepared before the world was and his work upon our hearts what is it but to prepare us for this Kingdom as the Apostle speaks he that hath wrought us to this self-same thing is God he hath wrought us to it there is no suitableness between heaven and an ungracious heart a glorious Kingdom and a vile filthy spirit therefore the Lord takes much pains with us to purge us to himself to purifie us to adorn us with the rich graces of his Spirit and all is to work us to heaven to salvation to prepare us for this entrance and therefore when God hath done this shall his work be in vain surely no not a soul that is so wrought up by the Lord to a heavenly frame and temper and nature that shall miss of an entrance when it is thus prepared else Gods work were in vain the greatest work of God 2. Because else the Lord Jesus would fail of his purchase and prayer for his poople who did buy us at so dear a rate as his own most precious blood was it think you to suffer us for ever to be at such distances from him whom he so dearly loved did his love to us draw him out of heaven to us and will it not think you draw us to heaven to him he will not have his Spouse that he hath redeemed with his blood to be absent from him any longer then is needful for his Fathers glory and their good It is a fruit of his death and of his prayer Father I will that where I am there they may be for they are the fulness of Christ and he accounteth himself as I may say imperfect without them and therefore he will have them there Indeed Brethren so dear is the heart of Jesus Christ to his people that he would not suffer so long an absence at so great a distance from them but that there is a necessity in it though at his first pitching his love upon us he looks at nothing but notwithstanding all blackness and deformity and loathsomness his love overcometh all Yet before they come to this Communion and fellowship with him they must be purified with spices and odors as those were for the King of Assyria and for other holy ends 3. Because else the promise of God and hope of the Saints would fail and heaven and earth shall sooner fail then the word of promise Christ hath promised not only to give life but eternal life God hath promised to give not only grace but glory there is a Crown laid up in the purpose and promise of God and if they should miss of this they would be made ashamed of their hope now this cannot be the Psalmist prayeth that he might not be ashamed of his hope which is virtually a promise it shall not be never any yet were disappointed that hoped upon right grounds Indeed if men make Promises to themselves of heaven let them live after the imaginations of their hearts or whether they truly believe or
But now this strait Gate is shut against them and therefore they cannot enter But so much for the proof of this Doctrine I shall not stay long upon it nor indeed is it needful having spoken before to their surprizal Only a word or two brethren for the opening of the Point and then to confirm it and then some short application of it to our selves For the opening of it What is meant by the unreadiness here supposed for it is against them that the door is shut And then the shutting of the door what is meant by that First then What is meant by this unreadiness I hope you have not altogether forgotten what was spoken lately to the readiness of a poor creature to enter in with Christ to heaven which if you remember you may easily conceive what it is to be unready we will not speak to the readiness for an abundant entrance but only for an entrance into heaven and you remember they were such things as these 1. There must be a pardon of a mans sins a righteousness of faith in the blood of Jesus Christ else a man is never ready Every unbeliever therefore is unready let him be as specious in his shews and pretences as he may yet he is unready he is in his sins condemned c. Joh. 3. And though the Gate of mercy and the kingdom of Grace â—â—and open for sinners to come to Jesus Christ yet the Gate of Heaven whereby an entrance is made into Glory stands not open to any but such as are pardoned have the robes of their elder Brother the Lord Jesus upon them Ah how sad a word is that of the Jews ye shall die in your sins then surely brethren they are not ready for heaven the door will be shut against them 2. There must be a dying to sin as well as a pardon of sin before we can be ready as you heard the roots must be withered before the wall be tumbled down therefore every unmortified man or woman is unready Hear this word of the Lord ye whose Lusts are yet in their full strength your pride and hardness of heart and sensoriousness your looseness and wantonness you that walk with a froward mouth and perverse lips whose hearts devise mischief whose feet make haste to do evil it is an ill sign that the old man is mortified you are an abomination to God as the wise man speaks and will he not clap the door against all such workers of iniquity no evil can dwell with God Ah brethren you that cherish that old man of sin as I may say rub him and chafe him and pour wine and strong drink into him aqua vitae and spirits into him by your meditations of sin vain thoughts lustful proud passionate thoughts nourish your sins ordinarily and so blow up the coal into a flame you are far from mortifying your lusts instead of bringing water and the blood of Jesus Christ to kill your sins you bring to the flame well all unmortified persons are unready let our profession be what it will the door will be clapt upon such I mean such as are altogether unmortified have done nothing in the work I know a child of God may not be so mortified as he should and sometimes for some acts may cherish sin use the bellows to the fire within but it costs him bitterness afterward he liveth not in such a course If he do it is good for him to be jealous of himself how the case stands with him Thirdly He is unready that hath no real holiness put upon him without it none shall see God he knoweth his prima facie as I may say he can see the image and comeliness upon a soul if it be there If not he will not own any bastards any supposititious children changelings that Satan laies in the lap of the Church as I may say and rocks in the Cradle of security but the Lord will shut the door against them This real holiness you know what it is a conformity to the will of God in our understandings light as he is light and no darkness in him In our wills and affections conformity to his will revealed to us A holy disposition of heart to do his will suffer his will and delight in it which occasioneth our grief when we cannot well this is holiness Hear this then ye that never mind the will of God purblind ignorant creatures stubborn rebellious creatures you that have iron sinnews and brazen faces which refuse to return or to be ashamed though the Lord do blazen your iniquities before you continually by his Heralds which cry aloud and teach Jacob their transgressions and Israel their sins and spare you not nor spare themselves yet you refuse to return and to be ashamed to conform to the will of Christ you never were brought to that sweet submissive frame of Paul Lord what wouldst thou have me to do Well believe it thou art unready the gate will be clapt against thee Fourthly Then others are unready And who are those Such as have received work to do and they have not done it men of no action for Christ then the Apostle was ready and our Saviour when they had done their work he gave them to do Christ had wrought out a perfect righteousness for his people and therefore he went up to heaven and the world seeth him no more and this the Spirit convinceth the world of if he had not done that work perfectly heaven would not have held him Remember this then Brethren they are unready that have not done their work whether Magistrates Ministers or private people He giveth to his servants some five talents some ten some two some one mind you he that had but one haply out of envy at others who had more or dejection and discouragement or thinking he had little and therefore could do little good with it hid it in a Napkin and did not trade with it and therefore was the gate open to him No thou wicked and sloathful servant saith the Master to him c. and so he is cast off the merchandise os wisdom is better then the merchandise of silver and the gain thereof then fine gold that is to say the great gain and improvement that cometh by using the wisdom and knowledge the gifts and graces which God giveth us O the tongue of the just is as choice silver and the lips of the righteous feed many Do we do our work Brethren or have we never set stroke in it God hath given some charge of souls how little have they done in it Masters of Families have the charge of children of servants their souls you have done nothing you have gifts and parts enough for every thing else Well Brethren such shall be shut out also Now to shew you two or three sorts of persons who will likely be unready in some or all these respects First then all such as trisle
in Winter the earth seemeth to be languishing and all things withered and dead when the Sun returneth how doth it heal it To it s here Beloved it is the Word and Spirit that opens the earth moistens the earth sweetly refresheth it calls forth the fruits thereof The fruits of the Spirit they are called as the fruits of the earth are called the precious fruits put forth by the Sun and by the Moon which shines by a derived influence from the Sun how precious are the fruits of the Spirit Brethren love meekness joy in the Holy-Ghost humility self-denyal these are the precious fruits put forth by the Sun the Lord Jesus by his Word and Spirit beating upon our barren hearts indeed he maketh the barren Wilderness to become a garden of God Again he healeth he reviveth the spirits which languish and are ready to go out as the poor Birds that in the Winter are hard put to it and some lye you hardly know where as if they were dead or dying when the Sun returneth how doth it refresh and revive their little spirits that were left before The night brings a heaviness and burthen along with it to the body but the morning when the Sun ariseth how doth it enliven and lighten Oh! so it s in this case many a poor soul can say by experience that when darkness hath been long on them they have no light no comfort no refreshing no breathing of the Spirit to their apprehensions in his Ordinances on their hearts O how have hands hanged down and their knees feeble and knock one against another for feebleness and that which was within them was ready to dye But now no sooner hath the Lord Jesus the Sun of righteousness looked on them but they have had their ankle-bones strengthened the joy of the Lord is their strength as Neh. 8. but I intend not here much to expatiate only these two or three things First then the first thing in this healing which is brought under the wings of the Sun of righteousness is pardon for our sins who forgiveth all-thy iniquities and healeth all-thy diseases these are exegetical one of another or may so be looked on Sin Brethren cuts off a creature from God and so maketh a wound which now is healed and made up when they are pardoned Make the heart of this people fat and let their ears be heavy their eyes closed lest at any time they should see with their eyes or hear with their ears or understand with their hearts lest they should be converted and I should heal them which Mark reads thus lest they should be converted and their sins be forgiven them So then forgiveness and healing are all one and its one thing surely included in that of the Prophet Hosea I will heal their back-slidings I will love them freely the justification freely by his grace as the Apostle calls it Poor sinner thou that ever knewest what sin was what a wound it was to thy soul knewest that thy pardon is a healing to thee So then this arising with healing in his wings is by his Spirit in his Word he conveyeth the blood of Jesus Christ the merit thereof maketh it over to the poor soul that believeth to the doing away of all the guilt So as a Sun of righteousness properly he healeth and this is the first Secondly He taketh away also the anguish and trouble that did arise from sin to the soul as when a wound is healed you know the anguish and smart is taken away though while it is healing it may be when searched and tented there will be smart and sore yet afterward it s taken away by degrees I know some of you have felt and haply some at present may feel the grief of your wounds O! how they will throb and beat and burn and smart sometimes broken bones are nothing to a broken heart nor the broken flesh any thing to a broken bone the Lord heals the broken in heart he bindeth up their wounds I have seen his waies and will heal him saith the Lord he speaks to the condition of a poor disconsolate soul under the wrath of God He was wrath and smote him yea he hid him and was wrath O how this troubles a poor soul he cannot but have his heart full of darkness and terrour and trouble that hath the face of God hidden from him well saith the Lord though he did walk frowardly before me gave me not my ends in smiting him yet I will heal him and wherein doth this healing consist Alas in restoring joy and comfort to him the poor soul now was over-whelmed with sorrow his heart now was ready to sink and fail within him and lest it should so do he will heal him and how is this but by his Word and Spirit therein which is the comforting Spitit he will create the fruit of the lips peace peace to him Here is a healing indeed the healing of broken hearts and broken bones it s the work that the Father sent the Lord Jesus for into the world in an especial manner that he annointed him for poured out the Spirit upon him annointed him with the oyl of gladness above his fellows that he might speak in due season that he might bind up the broken spirits Now the Lord Jesus Brethren our dear Saviour he delighteth to do this will and work of his Father O! he loveth to be doing with broken hearts And O that we had some work for the Lord Jesus this day he is among us now to see if there be any heart in this condition that he may heal us it s his delight to do it Well this is a second he hath his cordials as well as his purgatives his lenitives as well as his corrosives Thirdly he cometh with healing under his wings as to take away the anguish so also to purge away the filth of it to heal the running putrifying sore that it may not run and defile and pollute all that a man taketh in hand How much more saith the Apostle shall the blood of Christ purge our consciences from dead works that we may serve the living God With corrosives he eats down the proud flesh and the dead flesh he dryeth up the bloody issues then the person was healed when she touched Christ but the hem of his garment This is that which troubles many a heart more then the guilt of their sins and indeed the returning and recoyling of sin on them again and again occasioneth the questioning of their peace and comfort that they have had O how one cryeth out of this sin and another of that sin and walks heavily and sadly Well the Lord Jesus he will arise with healing under his wings for all these distempers Fourthly and lastly another healing is the taking away his anger manifested in outward calamities or diseases in a people or person I will heal their back-slidings and love them freely for mine anger is
it When we were without strength Christ died for the ungodly and while we were yet Sinners Christ dyed for us they are convertible terms a sick man a lame man a wounded man we cannot expect they should walk or work or run in a race it utterly unbefits us for any thing that is good this is a sad evil that is in sin as a disease or wound Thirdly There is filthiness and deformity in sin also O what a sight it were to see a poor creature full of running sores from head to foot all running and rotting what filthiness is here and and deformity So when a poor soul hath a lust a sore running and never ceasing how sad a condition is this Brethren how strangely will a fit of sickness change a person that the rarest piece of beauty in the world quickly becometh a gastly sight every part contracting its deformity from the sickness all withered and shrivelled joynts loosed the eye dead and dull the face thin the knees feeble the hand trembling and what not Brethren if the Lord open our eyes to behold in the glass of the word the deformities of sin and filthiness as we may see the lothsomness and ugliness of a disease we should for ever be haters of it but I will say no more to this head That sin is a disease a wound Vse 2. May be then to put us on to be more serious in viewing our selves in the glass of the Word the Law of God that we may see what creatures we are and loth our selves our wounds are so many that we are all one wound and all one disease there is no sound part in us how pale and lean do our souls sometimes look with envy at others how are we swelled with pride how great and unweildy are our bellies with this O how do some of our bellies cleave to the very dust we are bowed down as the woman in the Gospel O how lamely do we walk in the ways of God halting between two have a double object and one foot in the wayes of God and another in the way of sin alas how many wounds have many of us that we never searched to this day if we did but know them it would pluck down our feathers the proudest of us and for some of us we have great need of this admonition because alas until we see our selves wounded see our deformities we shall never care for healing for having his comeliness put upon us no nor can the people of God put a rate upon the mercy nor the rich exceeding rich Grace of God in Christ whereby they are healed except they have before their eyes the many wounds and running sores they are healed of When Paul saw that he was the chief of the Sinners then he advanceth the free Grace of God that it had abounded yea superabounded which a soul cannot admire the Lord for except he see and behold how sin hath abounded O then let us be all perswaded to this duty to eye our selves more often more seriously in the glass of the Law of liberty the Law of Christ and therein see how often how grievously we offend him see what deformities are upon us that it may be admired how the Lord can love such as we are and Sinners that are yet in sin that they may be willing to accept of pardon and deliverance in and through Christ for truly we are not any of us willing until we be reduced to extremity then the Marriner or Merchant will cast out his goods when there is necessity for it but not before Therefore let all of us be perswaded to this duty in the second place Thirdly Let us be instructed in this truth that healing is not in us I am the Lord that healeth thee saith God to Israel and therefore the Lord promiseth the Sun of righteousness shall arise with healing in his wings which were needless if healing were in our selves some creatures if wounded healing is in themselves as some fish are said if wounded to heal themselves with their own slime a Dog licks himself with his tongue Brethren sins are not such wounds as will heal themselves of their own accord neither as if a man have a slight cut it may be he heedeth it not it heals of it self believe it the least sin the least wound thou makest in thy conscience in thy soul it will not heal it self nor will a lust heal it self and wear away of its own accord as some diseases will though no physick be administred It is a deadly disease it seizeth upon the vitals and then you know it is a matter of great difficulty and skill to cure it no nor can a man cure himself if he could to what end did the Lord Jesus undergo all why he was smitten for our transgressâ—â—ns if we could have been healed by any strength of our own no we were without strength when Christ dyed for us as the Apostle bath it and as to other things so to this great work did the Lord do any thing in vain much less then would he do the greatest thing that ever be wrought in vain alas who can pardon sins but he who can bind up the broken in spirit but he who was sent into the world for this very end who can pour wine and oyl into the wounds but the good Samaritan who can give rest for the anguish of the wounds but he we cannot heal our selves if the very marrow of our bones were distilled into continual tears and all our moysture it would not make a balm to cure a wound of sin nor a cordial to support in one swooning fit there are many considerations wherefore we cannot do it and therefore the Lord in pity and bowels toward us sent us his Son to be our Physitian because we poor sick creatures need the Physitian which we should not if we could heal our selves our wound is incurable and refuseth to be healed by us First alas We know not our diseases our distempers you know a disease is half cured if curable when it is known in the cause if a Physitian mistake the disease and mis-applications according to his mistake quite contrary to the disease this is the ruin of the Patient such Physitians are of no value and such should we all be and are For we cannot know our sins nor the plague of the heart who knows his errors if we discover one lust that it breaks out in such a manner that it cannot be hid yet there is ten for one that we never saw and how can we then heal them now the Lord Jesus seeth our hearts through and through and knoweth all the malig 〈…〉 y and poysonous humours that lye there and therefore knoweth how to purge them out we know them not Secondly We have no desire to have them healed at all we 〈…〉 w not what healing means being not sensible naturally of our distempers and sores that are
his blood our services healed as well as our souls before they be worth any thing therefore I say he himself freely prepareth the Lances to open the wounds convinceth the poor creature of his condition he himself takes the pains to open the vein to empty the creature of himself to cure him of that Plethory He it is tempereth the Physick is at the charge of it O the richest Cordials in the world tempered of his own blood and water by his own Spirit to support the poor creature when ready to faint he sitteth over his people even as a tender Father over a weak wounded childe and with what a heart you may imagine he provideth Messengers of his own to be with them to minister to them to watch over them and himself is alway at hand Ah dear Friends that ever the Lord Jesus should set so high esteem upon poor sinners when we were in such a loathsom condition as that he would dwell in flesh and take part of flesh and blood that so he might have somewhat to make a restorative of a healing medicine of that we might not perish one drop every drop of his most precious blood with respect to the value which the God-head put upon it is more then if a world of pearl could be decocted into a cordial and yet he spared it not that he should visit sinners with this salvation with his corrosives his cordials with his healing vertue and power and his heart so ready to put it forth from time to time this is unsearchable riches of grace to do all this freely Yea Eighthly and lastly it will appear in this that the Lord Jesus brings his heart full and his hands full of reward with him to a poor sinner so that he will be but healed you see foolish children when they have fallen and wounded themselves they must be hired to let the Father or the Chyrurgion heal it put a plaister upon it but cryeth out as undone had rather do any thing then be healed but alas who would do it to a stranger it may be thou seest a poor leprous creature lie languishing at thy gates and thou canst heal him but he is not willing either he is in love with his disease or distrusts your good will or faithfulness or something but he is not willing to be healed now where is there a heart so full of tenderness as to be willing to offer him a reward I will give thee thus much or thus much if thou wilt but let me heal thee for I pitty thy condition Brethren a King and his subjects fall out they rebel against the King in the war the subject is wounded even to the death except there be more then ordinary care taken of him now the King his heart relents he cometh to him in the prison and doth not upbraid him with his unkindness nor pride nor stubbornness but intreateth him he will give him leave to heal him that he will but suffer his wounds to be searched to be healed to be closed so that he may not perish he will pardon all that he hath done amiss begs of him to accept of him he will make him the second man in the Kingdom he shall be near to him if he will but suffer himself to be healed Is not this rich mercy indeed is there any such Paragon to be found Surely no but lo this is in Jesus Christ and more for he not only promiseth a reward upon our healing but maketh the poor creature willing also willing to part with his lusts and to speak the truth I take this to be the greatest part of our healing when a poor sinner that was in love with sin before loved his lusts as much as his life O his merry companions were as dear to him as his very eye or his right hand he could no more part with one then the other and so his gain of unrighteousness Now when the Lord by proposing of objects which have a great force but that is not all but by a sweet and yet powerful bowing of the heart maketh the poor creature willing to be healed so that now he cryeth out with Augustine How long Lord how long this man is in a great measure healed and this is the work and yet he rewardeth for this promiseth a Crown giveth grace and glory glory with himself fellowship with him to lye in his bosom to all eternity O here is unsearchable riches of grace Brethren I have only if so much brought you to the vein where these riches lie O that you would dig a little by serious contemplating upon it You will find more then I am able to speak Sixthly Another Use shall be this to warn us that we do not upon this score because that Jesus Christ will arise with healing under his wings upon poor sinners therefore to make bold with sin it is no great matter the healing vertue of Christ will be so much the more magnified O how desperate is this would you not think that man were out of his wits that upon presumption upon the skill and tenderness of the Physitian should without any care how or where wound himself and gash himself he hath a Physitian that will heal him you that dare be so bold to sin that grace may abound and make work for Jesus Christ know this this day you know not what the grace of Christ meaneth that make such a use of it how did this stir the Apostles spirit God forbid he doth as I may say recoil as a man startled at some horrid sight O the Lord forbid you should suck such poyson out of so sweet a flower This concerneth two sorts of persons First such as yet never knew what this healing vertue of Christ is only by the hearing of the ear they hear the Lord Jesus is able to heal the most desperate wounds and that he is willing and therefore they make bold to continue in sin they may go on to inflame the reckoning a little higher yet it is all one with Christ to pardon millions as mites to swallow up mountains as mole 〈…〉 it is true if thou respect his power but how dost thou know that he will do it for thee sinner or what hope hast thou or canst thou have while it is thus with thoe It s true if sinners do not sin away the day of grace he is willing but did ever Jesus Christ tell thee that thou shouldest be healed particularly though thou go on rebelling against him wound upon wound upon thy poor soul Surely no be not deceived sinners these are the insinuations of the wicked one this is such Gospel as the Devil preacheth when he preacheth Christ as an Angel of light but in the close you will find the Law instead of the Gospel such presumption and security usually endeth in dispair the time may come that you that make so little a matter of it may cry out and roar O your wounds you refused to be
this terror and this bondage a means to their inlargement Ah blessed Prison that is only to make poor creatures willing to be at liberty well now this the Lord Jesus when he cometh and revealeth himself to a soul he brings him out of these labyrinths of fears and terrors letteth the poor creature see that himself is the way and the only way he hath undertaken the work for his people only if they will believe though they have no strength in them to do any thing nor to extricate themselves from the difficulties they find themselves in by reason they cannot fulfil the Law yet he is the mighty one upon whom help is laid and withal letteth them understand how his bowels do yern over them and how his heart is open ready to inlarge them and so perswadeth them to close with him and then they go forth when faith cometh so Christ is the end of the Law and the â—aw a School-Master to bring us to Christ But that is but the Sixth Seventhly Another part of this bondage is those after-claps of fears and terrours that after Christ hath been revealed to and in a soul may befall the creature alas you find it so they may be clapt up afterward in the pit of noise the horrible pit and be in the deeps and in darkness and like Jeremiahs dungeon sink in the mire where there is no standing they feel no bottom of their misery their fears are overwhelming or like Jonahs Whales belly they are in the belly of hell and all the waves and billows of God go over them O this is sore bondage however it be true that the Spirit of God is never any more a spirit of bondage to them to witness to them they are children of wrath afterward yet he doth not say but they may have bondage again and all fear hath torment and is bondage to the Spirit it doth fetter it and shut up and contract the spirits exceedingly Now I say the darkness of a mans own heart which doth naturally gender fear and Satan to help and the frowns of Gods displeasure for the present though he do not witness any more that a man is a child of eternal wrath and displeasure these may bring the poor creature into sad perplexities Well yet the Spirit of the Lord Jesus when he cometh brings also liberty with him from this bondage David will tel you so and Heman will tell you so do but consider what conditions they were in how came they to be delivered O lift up the light of thy countena nce upon me Son of God arise upon me shine upon my soul and then I shall be healed O restore to me the joy of thy salvation make me to hear joy and gladness c. Well the Promise doth extend even to this bondage also and to this may we refer the next I will speak of it distinctly Eightly There is another Bondage and that is the fears of death and judgement whereby many a poor creature is kept in Bondage all the days of their lives as the Apostle saith in that to the Hebrews to which I will speak a few words He came saith the Text and took part of flesh and blood that through death be might destroy him that hath the power of death that is to say the Devil and deliver them that through fear of death were all their life-time subject to Bondage Brethren death it self is a terrible thing the Simplex could say but hardly could he tell the reason of it for them that have no fear of God before their eyes but have put out the eye of reason and live like Beasts giving up themselves to commit wickedness with greediness though while they can keep off the apprehensions of death they may go on merrily but when that seizeth upon them it marrs their mirth it maketh a change in their faces and they are not now truly death is not so terrible in it self considered but that the stoutness of a mans spirit specially where there is no other consideration of it he may overcome it and live above the fears of it as the Heathens some of them did but now a man that knoweth indeed what death is not only a dissolution of the union between the soul and body taking down this mouldring Tabernacle but a Serpent with a sting it is where sin and guilt lies upon the soul it is the beginning of sorrows the arrest of the soul to judgement to come to receive its doom for all its bloody evils he hath been guilty of The wordling is not willing to give up his soul O he knoweth he can never answer for his wasting of his spirits and spending his time to lay up treasure here and in the mean time neglecting his soul and Jesus Christ and tenders of Grace he knoweth this well enough and therefore he will not yield up his Spirit they shall take it from him as it is in the Parable This night shall thy soul be taken from thee and so for any other sin and now I say this maketh death terrible and by reason of these fears of death men that have any sight or sense of their condition they are in Bondage all their lives long yea even the people of God themselves are in some measure under this bondage and according to the measure of the discovery of Christ to them and the power of faith in them is this fear and this bondage broken and the Lord Jesus came for this end to deliver them alas before his coming the Saints may be specially meant here who had indeed the knowledge of Christ to be crucified for Sinners and beheld him crucified though darkly in the sacrifices c. and in the promise from the foundation of the world but yet notwithstanding they had not that confidence usually but there was more room for doubtings and fears because they died still without the accomplishing of that promise now though such as had an extraordinary measure of faith and a prophetical spirit might see this clearly and so it might raise them much what above this bondage yet ordinarily I believe it was not so that they had such clear conviction of the freeness of grace and the abundance and riches of it in Jesus Christ and therefore it did not so fâ—lly quiet their Spirits in respect of fears of death and judgement they did not so clearly see the sting pluckt out therefore the Apostle saith those Sacrifices though they did hold out Christ could not make the comers thereunto perfect and therefore they were often repeated But now the Lord Jesus he hath by once offering for ever perfected compleated their salvation and therefore you shall find that the Apostle and others do so triumph over death and the grave and sin as we hardly find any before the coming of Christ and it must needs be so because now the Spirit which is the liberty of the Saints was poured out in a
in the flesh or a greedy wen devours all the strength and yet will by no means let the poor sinner go free Fourthly It is a growing bondage the longer a man continueth in it the faster he is held with the snares and bonds of his sins in the transgression of an evil man there is a snare saith Solomon and every act of sinning doth fasten the snare so much the more upon the soul with bands of iron and brass yea of adamant the longer they are in this dark and filthy dungeon the deeper they sink into the mire and clay where there is no standing the heart groweth more hard through the deceitfuluess of sin O the cup of delights is a bewitching cup and the more a man drinketh of it the more he may every drop of oyl you cast upon the flame maketh it the harder to be quenched every act of sinning doth strengthen the habit as in all other cases and dispose a man so much the more strongly incline him to the same sin again and so there is so much the more ado to get the heart off from these lusts there is many a poor sinner among us I believe can speak by experience what a miserable bondage it is and what a growing bondage it is the further a man goeth in it he goeth still further into the prison binds the yoak upon his neck so much the harder and closer insomuch that a gray-headed-sinner you shall seldom see recovered out of the snare of the Devil though sometimes we may This the fourth Fifthly it is so durable a bondage that it abides in part even where a soul is brought under the command of another principle it doth continue in a great part in many a gracious heart as in this place of the Apostle I am carnal and sold under sin he saith not he was but he is carnal that is to say in part as those in that first to the Corinthians are you not carnal that is to say hath not the flesh a great sway with you when you are so divided and full of strife and emulation and one for Paul and another for Apollo c. and therefore the Apostle did walk heavily under the sense of the chains which were upon him not altogether shakt off O wretched man who shall deliver me I am carried captive by a Law in my members to the Law of sin O strange that in the Apostle so sanctified so mortified a creature yet the Law in his members should have such a strength as this is to carry him captive though the spirit do lust against the flesh yet the flesh doth lust against the spirit so that they cannot do the things they would they are under bondage in part though notunder the reign of sin yet it usurpeth and tyranizeth and laies its commands upon a poor believing soul as if he were altogether his own sin will not let go its hold altogether but if it lose the Cittadel the Tower the chief Fort the Will yet it will lurk in some of the out-works still if it lose the heart it will hold by the heel still and hang about us that we cannot walk at liberty in the waies of his Commandments Sixthly The reward to the service and bondage of sin what is it but bondage upon bondage you have heard how many sad Concomitants there are of this bondage of sin doth it not subject to the curse to the wrath of God it is not only an unprofitable service what fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed that is to say what good had ye by them ye are now ashamed of them that is the reward as you see in the case of Adam it laid him open and naked before the Lord both without covering for the shame and without defence against his displeasure now he wanted somewhat in stead of his innocency to skreen him from the everlasting burnings or the presence of God who is a consuming fire yea the wages of these things is death whose end is destruction saith the Apostle whose glory is in their shame whose God is their belly who mind earthly things a man will hardly believe this that the savouring of earthly things is so dangerous a service being so pleasing as it is to men alas you little think what you do you have heard some of you how many evils do attend it you little know what wounds you get a wound and dishonour shall he get and his reproach shall not be wiped away this is nothing to the wound of the conscience O what pains sinners are at to store up gun-powder at last to blow up their comforts and their souls and all would you not think it a sad servitude where a master should delight in nothing but the cruel wounding and goring of a mans self this is nothing indeed to the service of sin you will one day find sinners the truth of this whether you will believe it now or no that sin is big with terrours and fears and amazement that sin doth nothing but wound the soul the conscience though you feel it not for the present many and many that have been as sensless as many of us are that yet at last mourned and said O how is my flesh and my body consumed O what a wretch was I to serve sin to lay out my self for sin that now hath nothing but woe and misery nothing but racks and woundings to reward me with O what a reward is it Brethren to pass fro m the chains of your sins here to those everlasting chains of darkness Se venthly and lastly it is inextricable as to our selves we cannot open the prison doors nor loosen our fetters the cords of our sins wherewith we are held and bound over as I may say to Judgement O I know the poor creature specially when his eyes are open to see what a condition he is in will be making many an attempt sometimes to break prison sometimes to loose his bonds but it will not be O what resolutions and vows you shall have many a sinner make specially after a passion in their spirits when their eyes are a little open O they will never return to their folly any more and it is the next thing they do O the bands of our own making are too slender to pull a poor creature out of the mire and clay they all break even as a thread of Tow when it cometh to the fire and there the poor soul sticks no nor is it the prayers nor tears of our own that can do it for you shall see and haply some of us know it by experience though it be wonderful to see a man pray and sin and weep and sin mourn and sin go on in the same course of sinning a long time some of our souls I believe know this we pray and are not willing to be delivered as Aug. did and so mourn upon the sight of the grievousness of a
the hint up and be doing follow him and he will bring thee through one iron-gate and through another and thou shalt find thy self at the last set free and know thy liberty and the things freely given thee of God O beg the Spirit for he is the cause of liberty it depends upon him as light upon the Sun and the Spring upon the Fountain he applyeth what Christ hath done for us knowing the deep things of God he revealeth them he only convinceth and answers objections c. The sixth Vse of the point shall be several admonitions or exhortations to them that are set free from this bondage thou hast had the Sun of righteousness shine upon thee and art gone forth from sin from that bondage those fears terrours darkness and distractions which sin brings upon poor creatures thou rememberest the time when thou couldst do nothing but sin against the Lord and grieve him continually thou couldst not cease to sin thou wast under the command of sin and now through grace exceeding rich grace the gates of the prison are open the Lord hath pluckt thy feet thy affections out of the snare What doth the Lord thy God require of thee this should be the next enquiry of the soul me thinks after so signal mercies First surely he expecteth thou shouldst give him the glory of all praise him and exalt him alone alas what are the calves of our lips they cost us nothing the poorest have this and the richest have no more in effect but this if thou be able to do little for Christ yet thou maist praise him thou maist admire his rich grace make his name glorious Truly Brethren I believe some of us are able to say by experience that our unthankfulness for the freedom we have had hath been an occasion of our being clapt up for all the design of God in Christ in redemption of poor creatures is to make his mercy and grace glorious as he did his power in the creation and wisdom Now how is it made glorious among us but by our acknowledgment of it our lifting up the Lord Jesus not only with our hearts but our tongues art thou brought back again into darkness and into the prison after some refreshing Consider wast thou thankful for what thou hadst we are all sick of the leapers disease in the Gospel ten were cleansed but where are the nine I doubt scarce one in ten of us do praise him according to what he hath done for our souls and those that do yet scarce for one act of his loving kindness in ten in bringing of-us forth it may be he delivereth us ten times from a dead heart before we once give him the glory O this Popish principle of pride that is in us is that which seals up our hearts and stoppeth our mouths from praises but opens it in complaints in discontents when we want such a mercy O if our fâ—eece be dry when others are wet we are ready to question why doth the Lord deal so with me rather then with another why have I not as much enlargement of heart as another as great gifts freedom of speech and utterance as great grace in any kind Why am I not set above these wretched carnal delights as well as others of his people as if God should do any thing for us out of respect to us we had deserved any thing at his hands whereas we may rather expostulate with our selves O why is it not worse with me then it is why am I in no sorer bondage then I am where I am once overthrown it is mercy I have not an hundred times been over-thrown with-my lusts So on the other hand it stops our mouths for returning unto the Lord for what he hath done for us we may many of us thank our selves for much of the bondage that is upon us that we so much complain of O if every time the Lord setteth our frozen spirits a melting every time he setteth our straightned hearts at large we instead of lifting up our selves we could and did but admire that grace magnifie him loath our selves would he not much more delight to enlarge us O therefore look to this Secondly Thèn look to it thà t ye stand fast in that liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free I speak not so much here to the yoak of Ceremonies which the Lord hath taken away altogether but I speak specially to our freedom from the dominion of our sins the freedom from the Law as a Covenant of life and from outward pressures and bondages you know our fears were great when we saw this cloud of blood but hanging over our heads and many of thè precious ones of God I know when I was little and scarce able to take notice of such things yet I have been an eye and ear-witness of the sad complaints made before the Lord of it Now hath God delivered us from this stand we fast in this liberty But first thèn for that of sin and our lusts hath thè Lord broken the yoak of them set thee free when thou didst groan under it O take heed of returning to folly any more hath he spoken peace to thy troubled soul loosed the cords of thy sins wherewith thou wast held and wilt thou be tampering with sin again This was the madness and perversness of Israel they would make them a Captain and return to Egypt again to the house of bondage when they had been but a little tryed in the Wilderness but we have no such discouragement upon us as to put us upon such resolutions but meerly the unfaithfulness of our own hearts and unsteadfastness of our own spirits the Apostle speaks of some who having escaped the pollutions of the world they did return with the dog to the vomit with the swine to the mire the condition of such a soul is worse then ever it was he brings seven other spirits worse then himself and the latter end of thà t man is worse then his beginning O whén the Devil can but fasten upon such a poor creature again that once hath gotten out of the prison like a cruel Jaylor now he will lay more fetters upon him now he shall be even over-whelmed with temptations now his feet his head and his heart and all shall be put in the stocks have their bolts and chains upon them Sinners you never make work for Christ but you make work for your selves lay a grievous foundation for much bitterness to your own spirits a little care a little watchfulness here may prevent heart-breaking afterwards which we do necessitate as I may say Jesus Christ to by our back-slidings to this end therefore flie sin as Moses fled from the face of his Serpent flie youthful lusts make hast away the Devil and sin will pursue hard and cast this golden apple in our way this and that occasion O take heed of them So the Apostle flie fornication and flie Idolatry c. Secondly
all the worst when they have gotten a little peace and therefore though before they walked mournfully before God and were diligent in following hard after him now they slack their pace grow remiss they have their consolations the loaves they would have and now they may take their ease O this is a horrible abuse of this liberty for therefore the Lord speaks peace that we might not return to folly and we quite cross because he hath spoken peace to us therefore give up our selves to folly is not this to walk contrary to him and will he not walk contrary to you is not this to make our liberty a cloak an occasion to the flesh a handle for the flesh to take hold of and so to bring you into bondage again and so make more work for Christ to set you at liberty again Brethren can we make our liberty a cloak to the flesh and do you think the Lord will not pluck that cloak over our ears and shew us our nakedness again and make us know how we come by it again before we have it and therefore take heed of this I beseech you lest your liberty degenerate into licentiousness Maxima libertate minima licentia said that Antient. But yet more particularly take heed of abusing of your liberty in the use of things lawful in themselves and indifferent it is a sign of a heart that hath little fear of offending God that dare walk just at the very brink upon the very line of destruction between sin and lawful liberty if it can be assigned You find the Apostle of another Spirit rather then offend his weak Brother he would never eat meat while he lived why how would he live rather upon herbs and fruits and such things then to eat flesh as long as he lived too I tell you Brethren in our daies though there is much discourse of liberty there is little true use of it when a man will offend all the people of God and his Brethren rather then he will part with an excrement and a woman rather then sorbear her spotting and painting and bedlam nakedness If the things be lawful in themselves which I think they are not or a man will rather grieve all the people of God then cross his humor this is sad Again Brethren one man may have a greater liberty then another in this case and another greater then he in another case as for instance now Abraham might look upon Sodom when it was flaming but Lot might not because there he had his desirable things lest it should draw back his heart from the journey now commanded him and so if a man do but observe when temptations and lusts meet together where his corruption lies what is the scum of his heart and what doth use to fire his lusts there he may not give himself such a liberty as another may whose temptation lies in another thing as if a mans temptation lie to excess in eating in drinking it is not lawsul for such a man now to look upon the wine when red c. to come in the danger of such a temptation and so if a man have eyes full of adultery that cannot cease to sin he may not behold an object that another may whose temptation lies not there In a word look to it Brethren that we serve one another in love this is opposed to using our liberty as a Cloak to the flesh to bear one anothers burdens Brethren we are not at liberty one from another we may not say with Cain Am I my Brothers keeper we ought not to despise the infirmities of the weak because they see not as we see and therefore are grieved and offended at many things that we make nothing of here we ought to bear their infirmities to cover them to labour to inform them and forbear them not despise them become all things to them that we may lawfully as the Apostle became all things but a sinner to gain them this is serving one another in love and the labour of love either to God or men is a free service indeed we are rather ready to serve our selves one of another for ought I perceive generally it is so then serve one another in love Brethren I doubt there is little love for Christ sake though there may be some for our own and then all the liberty we talk of it is but bondage the Law of love is a Law of liberty indeed but enough of this Fourthly Then look to it that we being free from sin we become the servants of righteousness that is to say that you give up your selves yield your selves unto God unto Christ as instruments for the holy Spirit to play upon as instruments tools weapons of righteousness for the Lord to make use of even as he pleaseth this is the end of all that liberty held out in the Covenant of grace that we being delivered from the hands of all our enemies might serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness all the daies of our lives Now hath the Lord then set thee free brought thee out of the horrible pit broken off the shakles knockt them off set open the prison what can we do less then this spend our selves now in his service O if men would but consider how much of their strength and spirits sin hath had while we were under that bondage Me thinks it should put us on so much the more earnestly specially considering how our service addeth nothing to him it is for our own good as you heard before and it is all he expecteth for delivering of us What poor Gally-slave would not most willingly yield to a Noble-man to be his servant where his service is honourable and pleasant and delightful so be he would redeem him why this is the very case Beside if we consider the fruit here and the reward hereafter the Apostle puts both together and I will not put them asunder the first-fruits and the harvest they have their fruit unto holiness the more we serve the Lord Christ the more easie pleasant and delightful will his service be the more our souls will shine with the beauty of holiness as the bondage groweth by continuance so doth the freedom by this service I dare say the more acquaintance any poor heart hath with a diligent close humble upright walking with God the more pleasant the waies of God are to him yea and the more holy that man groweth it must needs be so because he hath more communion with the Fountain of holiness even God in Jesus Christ and the Spirit also would you be holy Brethren would you be more and more freed from the remainders of bondage which are upon you Believe it the only way is to lay out your selves more in the service of Christ the Spirit of Christ will delight to be where he is entertained where his motions are received every hint is taken and followed and improved and the
with us at all but then when we do actually thus pollute our selves he takes occasion to depart to leave us to those evils and to fill us with our own back-slidings Thirdly Take heed of sinning against conviction against light this is dangerous indeed you may come to be shut up in darkness for this to be bound in affliction and iron to endure sad things upon your spirits for if the Spirit of Christ who convinceth you this or that is a sin be so far slighted as you heed it not what if he then forbear and is it not righteous he should forbear to shine upon your graces that you should see any thing that is ought in you So that you shall walk in darkness and see no light will not this be a paying of you home in your own coyn David could not be ignorant what his sin was before he committed it and yet you see he ventured upon it and what it cost him Fourthly Take heed of deliberate sinning when a man hath time of consideration of his sin to argue the case pro and con as we use to say and doth revolve with himself O this is sinful if I do it I rebell against God I do what in me lies to undo my self O but saith lust man it shall be satisfied God is merciful there is time enough to repent or it will easily be healed afterward Now upon such deliberations as this if a man will sin there is much of the will in it and so much the more wicked and therefore now the spirit must needs be grieved what can such a poor creature expect but to be brought under bondage as you see it in David his plotting and contriving the death of Vriah these sins in cold blood when a man is not under the sudden violent heat of a temptation and yet will sin O this grieves him much if a pot be on the fire and the scum rise we throw it out we expect it would rise but if no fire be under and yet a scum arise O this is so loathsom it is not to be endured Fifthly Take heed of Ranker and Malice of grudgings of heart one against another as the Apostle saith grudge not one against another prejudices heart-burnings grudgings upon injuries real or conceived and imagined O this grieveth the Spirit who is a Spirit of pure love and will have them that look to enjoy him to be a people of love to cover much bear and forbear and forgive in love for love will cover a multitude of offences Sixthly Take heed then of pride of being lifted up for the Spirit of Christ is a Spirit of humility O he loveth to dwell in the lowly spirit if we be lifted up we rob him of his honour to arrogate that to our selves which he hath been working for us to think we are something of our own of our selves he will let us know to our sorrow that we have nothing in our hearts but darkness and bondage and sin and that all was from him Seventhly Take heed of unthankfulness for what he hath done for us when the Spirit of the Lord Jesus shall be at all this pains with us contest with the quarrellings and disputings of our own hearts against our own peace and comfort and answer all our objections and still our complaints and seal up love upon our hearts remove our trembling and fears dispell our darkness cleanse our loathsom hearts in a great measure of those lusts that did so much prevail against us and we shall forget this now and not return to him the praise but either to grow into carnal security and when we have rest from that which galled us with the nine leapers go our waies never mind whence we received it or else so much pore upon the remainder of our sins as not to exalt that grace whereby we are in so great a part delivered O this grieveth him and therefore he may justly let us step back again or let loose upon us again those lusts that we were delivered from their strength and never prized the mercy that we learn to admire that grace much more might be added but this shall suffice The next use of the point shall be for satisfaction to some doubts since we are delivered and set free from the Law as you have heard from that It may be thought First that the Law was an evil that it is such a priviledge of the Saints to be delivered from it Secondly It may be doubted how far we are set free from it and therefore I will speak a little to each of them for the first First the Apostle meeteth with it or rather prevents it for seeing that carnal reason would be so ingenuous as to find out that cavil among others against the Doctrine of faith and of freedom from the bondage under the Law as the strength of sin specially What shall I say then saith the Apostle is the Law sin that we are said to be delivered from it and that sin hath its strength from it and so deliverance from sin is a deliverance from the Law as the strength of it Or is the Law death since sin by this means doth work death No saith the Apostle the Law is holy just and good the Law giveth no occasion to sin but sin takes occasion sin will not endure to be contradicted it sucks poyson out of that holy and good Law of God meeting with opposition it swells and rageth so that indeed it is sin that is the evil the Law is holy and good O but the Law it works wrath and works death and can this then be good and how can it be such a mercy to be delivered from it is it a favour to be put into golden fetters supposing the Law to be good and holy yet since it is as we may say ginns and fetters and bolts though of gold to hold the poor soul in to keep him in and up as in a prison is this so good then To this I answer It is true by the Law is the knowlege of sin I had not known lust except the Law had said thou shalt not covet whether in the last command or in each command now I will not dispute but the first motions thoughts risings and bubblings of corruption I had not known them to be sin but that the Law hath said thou shalt not covet Why but was that then that was good made death to me saith the Apostle You must know the Apostle speaks here of a death which is the receiving as I may say the sentence of condemnation in his own spirit by conviction for this is all his knowledge of sin that sin by the commandment might appear to be exceeding sinful this is the dying there mentioned sin revived and I dyed which is in order to liberty to make the poor creature see his necessity of Jesus Christ that so he might make out after him to make a pardon welcome therefore he casts poor sinners
it that it might be an easie yoak to us and wherefore have we a Law written in our hearts which is but a counterpane as I may say a disposition to do the revealed will of God except we have this revealed will of his to be a rule to walk by hath the Lord Jesus then lightned the yoak sweetened it given us his example chalked out our way thereby as a pattern to us and given us strength also to do it and shall we refuse this holy Law as a rule to walk by it is true it is not now in the hand of Moses as a School-master to lash to terrifie to bring us to Christ when once we are in him but now it is a rule in the hand of Christ in the hand of a tutor that with all gentleness doth lead us by his Spirit into all truth that is to say not the knowledge but the practise that is to be led into the truth man may know much and yet be far from being led into it know nothing as he ought to know now it is a rule in the hand of a Father before it was a Lyon terribly roaring upon us hell and wrath and ruine and so it is still to every unbelieving creature who are under it as to the satisfaction of divine Justice by suffering that is to say under the curse though as a Covenant of life none is under it since Adam for I conceive it was not given for that end but under it as to satisfaction of divine justice they are now I say it is terrible to such but when the Lyon is killed by our Sampson there is sweetness in it out of the eater came meat the very Law of God that is terrible condemning affrighting a poor guilty sinner it is the delight of a David indeed not a page of the Book of God but is as I may say a hand-writing against every wicked wretch wherein he may read his doom and not a page wherein there is not something that ministers consolation to a Believer for to see the terrours of the Law which is a wounding death overwhelming a sinner is a raising of his Spirit to consider what he is delivered from well then now it is a Law of liberty Jam. 1. 25. his commands are not grievous 1 John 5. 3. but yet we are under those commands still So the Apostle was not without the Law but under the Law to Christ we make it not void by faith but establish it But thus much shall serve to be spoken to this The last Use shall be a word of comfort to poor creatures that are yet under this bondage Something of encouragement I may give to sinners that yet are rebelling against the Lord Jesus though if you continue so doing there is no hope for you yet know this that the Lord Jesus hath laid down a ransom sufficient for all and publisheth this liberty to all he setteth open the prison doors and if then you will not go free thank your selves but of this before I doubt such sinners as these will be snatching at the comfort which belongs not to them Therefore mind it Brethren you that please your selves in sin are given up to the waies of your own hearts while you are such it is not my work to comfort you at all catch not at it it concerneth you not but I speak to poor sinners that are sensible of their condition that are striving strugling groaning under the bondagè the yoak of sin or the concomitants thereof which you have heard spoken to so at large Alas may one say I doubt all is not well with me if where Jesus Christ cometh into a soul revealeth himself in a soul he brings liberty with him to that soul then I am a poor creature without Christ to this day for alas I am in grievous bondage O there is bondage of â—ears and bondage of sin It is true I do something saith one but I doubt it is nothing but a slavish obedience out of fear for this we must know Brethren that though it be true there is a fear which is meerly slavish when a sinner looks upon god as a severe terrible Judge his Law a cruel bloody Law while he seeth no mixture of mercy and love and yet with Foelix trembles or as they at the deliverance of the Law when God revealed himself in so terrible a manner trembled could not endure the sight now a man under the curse of the Law he endeavours to do what he doth upon this ground because of terrours but a child of God he hath a principle of love it is mercy it is love it is tenderness in Jesus that setteth him a going terrours indeed do amaze and astonish and fright him out of himself but it is love in Jesus Christ that setteth his soul a work to do his will yet so Brethren as that you must know there is not all fear banished out of the soul but that we may the better understand it let us consider 〈◊〉 a little distinctly First there is to be a reverent fear of the Majesty of god in all his people let us serve him with reverence and godly fear saith the Apostle for our God is c. a great God and greatly to be feared what an awe there is upon a poor peasants spirit when he appeareth before a mighty Prince so here and I doubt we have most of us cause rather to complain that there is not so much of this holy awe upon us as there ought to be O serve the Lord with fear and rejoyce with trembling fear not saith Moses for God is come to prove you and that his fear may be before your faces Fear not that is to say be not dismayed astonished God is come now to give a rule of obedience that you may serve him with reverence holy fear and trembling Secondly There ought to be a fear of offending God as a Son his Father though he were sure never to be scourged for it or because he is his Father and carryeth so much love toward him so tender of him and good toward him therefore he would not offend him Thirdly There ought to be a fear of the judgements of God upon others David was affraid of his judgements when the Angel of the Lord was there he durst not go up to worship before the tabernacle in Gibbâ—â—n because of the Angel of the Lord I am afraid of thy judgements c. Fourthly We may fear chastizements the thing I feared is come upon me saith Job since we know we do so often offend him and grieve him we may expect and fear it yea it is hardness and security for us not to fear Fifthly A man a child of God may have a fear of everlasting damnation which serveth to rouze him up when he is growing secure when â—e hath drowned his evidences blotted them and it is necessary it should be so for why else doth the Holy-Ghost even
in the Gospel inculcate this upon the Disciples fear not him that can kill the body but fear him that killeth soul and body And so if ye live after the flesh ye shall dye but if by the Spirit ye mortifie the deeds of the flesh ye shall live these threatnings surely would not have been written to Believers except they were to make some use of them to be as an awe upon their spirits to keep them from sinning to be a quickning to their souls Now on the other hand it is true that there ought not to be in us such a fear as to distract us to drive us from to weaken our Spirits to disable us from duty to cloud and drown all our delight in his waies to blot out our apprehensions of his loveliness and compassion and bowels so as to beget hard thoughts in our hearts of God which will produce hatred of him such a fear ought not to be in us and though there may be a spice of it sometimes even in the best when they are not themselves yet this is not the prevailing principle in the soul but an holy fear of offending him which ariseth from a mixture of love towards him and holy reverence and awe of him and of his Majesty and Greatness and truly Brethren this is no enemy to spiritual liberty But I must not dwell so long upon things But secondly the main thing that I know most troubles a gracious heart is that he finds himself so much under the power of sin O I find not this freedom this liberty you speak of I am a wretch then under the power of my corruptions O the sad complaints to Christians to men continually from some poor disconsolate souls and to speak a little for their consolation if the Lord breath in it First Brethren you must know this that as sin hath had a time of settling and rooting there will be a time of unsettling it thou art of yesterday it may be and dost thou think to be so free the first day as they that have many years been wresting and fighting and praying and fasting and mourning and believing down their lusts This is a great mistake it is infinite mercy that thou hast thy hands let loose and thy feet out of the mire and clay and that thou art set upon a Rock that thou hast now a standing and liberty to fight thou must not expect a liberty from fighting and conflicting with sin while thou art in the flesh mind you the Apostles two or three verses of the same Epistle to the Romans he saith the Law of the Spirit of life the powerful working of the Spirit of life hath set him free from the Law of sin and death and yet a few verses before O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of sin and death thou groanest under the burthen whereby it appears thou art delivered in a great part thou art willing to be freed and when the will is disintangled the man is free in a great part Secondly Brethren know this for your comfort that your labour is not in vain striving against sin fighting with it you are sure to overcome though sin lie hard upon you you shall overcome it First the Lord he is able to break all the bonds if he will deliver Peter out of prison what shall hinder his chains shall fall from his hands the Iron-gates shall open of their own accord before him nothing shall be able to hold them It was somewhat hard for Israel to believe that they should be delivered out of Egypt and somewhat a strange Message of Moses at the first even as one should be sent to the great Turk to tell him the God of the Christians commands him to let them go but God tells him and them that he is that he is I am hath sent me the great God who is being it self and from himself he is what he is he is able to destroy the Egyptians dost thou believe this that he can subdue thine iniquities thy strong impetuous violent lusts Secondly then he will do it he heard Israel groaning under bondage and came down to deliver them he remembered his Covenant it was his faithfulness Brethren that brought him out the self-same day the Lord delivered them and the Lord will keep time to a day with thee that groanest under this bondage if thou werâ— but humbled if it had done its work upon thee for that and such like ends he would not suffer sin to prevail upon thee any longer for he letteth not lusts loose upon a soul to woorry it but to humble it make it out of love with sin to drive it to himself to make it for ever cleave closer to him now there is promise upon promise for this you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free he speaks this to his Disciples who did already know it in part know himself the truth the way and the life and the truth in opposition to shadows grace and truth came by Jesus Christ and it shall make you free how many promises are there as in the text therefore surely he will do it Now what an encouragement it is to fight when we are sure to overcome yea to endure hardship in this conflict But thirdly consider it is the very office of Jesus Christ the work which he received of his Father is to destroy the works of the Devil to destroy strong holds to lead captivity captive therefore he came into the world if it had not been for such poor creatures as are under bondage there had been no need of Christ he came to give himself a ransom for many and to preach deliverance to them and the opening of the prison to them that are bound you have heard already and therefore he was annointed of his Father and received the Spirit that he might set open the prison doors Now poor burthened souls if any such whose body ofsin and death presseth them down sore and they walk heavily goâ— to him spread your condition before him put him in mind wherefore he came into the world to set open the prison to loose the prisoners and thou hast an infirmity and haply been bound with it many years beseech him to exercise his Office towards thy poor soul the Lord loveth to hear his people earnest and importunate to plead it thus with him but if thou canst not yet be sure he will do the work which his Father hath given him to do and what is that but to set at liberty such prisoners as thou art that groan under the burthen and bondage of their lusts Fourthly Consider how pittiful a heart he bears to his people labouring under corruption when we are weak it may be sometimes the spirits of a poor creature are spent in labour in other services and he thinketh he should be as lively then as at another time but it is not likly so to be
the meaning of it note in the first place that growth is a motion or mutation from a less to a greater quantity as you see a babe though it be a man in a smaller letter and have part for part yet they are small and grow to a greater bigness the child grew in stature saith the text and in favour with God as well as with men And so a plant or a seed is little at first but it groweth to a tree to a blade and the sâ—alâ— to the ear and the full corn in the ear here is a motion from a less to a greater quantity So a Calf of the stall must needs also shoot forth Now for grace you know it is either Relative or Inherent and accordingly we must understand the growth Relative grace as that of remission of sins and justification in the sight of God and adoption to be sons and daughter this if lookt upon as the act of God it will be hard to say that it is intended or remitted that there is a growth or motion from a lesser to a greater quantity for remission of sins being the act of God we cannot say that one mans sins are more pardoned then anothers that believeth as well as he So we cannot say that one believer is more a Son then another they are all the children of the most high though a child grow in stature yet his relation groweth not he is a Son the first day he was born as well as when he is at the perfect stature this is plain though every Son be not a Joseph or a Benjamin yet he is a Son as well as any which by the way ministers much refreshing to a poor weak soul that eyeth his stature and growth O he is so weak such a babe a child in comparison of some of the people of God which are strong in faith and can give glory to God when they are doubting and scrupling every step they go yet I say though this be a burthen yet the main whereupon the comfort of a poor creature hangs is alike to all there is no growth there the weakest poor sickly froward-hearted child is a chiâ—d as well as he that is strongest healthiest most serviceable and though faith be weak yet the relation of one is alike the purchase the price paid the ransom is alike to all that believe though it be but in some more weakly Only here mistake not neither though this relative grace grow not as of justification or adoption yet the knowledge of this grace arising from the reflexion of the soul upon its self and the shining of the Spirit upon the works of grace he hath wrought in the soul this is capable of a growth it may be that a man may be a child of God and yet not know it alas how long are our children children and we look upon them so and hearts and bowels yearn and tender them and yet they know not that they are children we need go no further then common experience for this do we not see many a precious soul that lies at the feet of Jesus Christ for mercy whose souls are sick of love for him who prize him above all O they are willing with all their souls to close with him for all ends and purposes if he be but willing to close with them they think they are not children nor that they do not believe when they do believe for this very willingness of Christ in sincerity is believing and therefore they think they are not children when they are dear in Gods â—ight what think you of him that walks in darkness and seeth no light do you think he can see his relation to God in Christ without that light Surely no. Again another he hath some probability which begetteth an opinion in him concerning his condition and that he hath received this special grace from the Lord and been partaker of this love to become a Son of God others they rise higher then this and have a strong confidence and some a full assurance and know that they are the Sons of God that their persons are justified they can triumph with the Apostle who shall lay any thing to their charge can say my beloved is mine and I am his and my Lord and my God with Thomas they know the things freely given them of God even by the Spirit of Christ yea the same person Brethren may grow from such a doubting of his condition to such a probability such a perswasion such an assurance of his condition this therefore admitteth of a growth but not the relative grace it self but only our sense feeling or knowledge of it and so much for that Secondly There is a grace inherent which is indeed as the root and the acts and issues of it are as I may say the fruit but this grace within we shall speak to as most nearly concerning this purpose the fruits I have spoken to you know at large upon another Scripture and I would not in this discourse interfere with what I then delivered or if we speak any thing to the fruits that grow upon these internal inherent graces of the Spirit as likely enough we shall yet we shall not consider them as fruits rising from such a root but as growing fruits being bettered improved according to the growing of the principles from whence they flow But for the grace inherent by that I mean all those habits or gracious dispositions of the heart godly as that of faith that of love and humility and sincerity and spirituality and self-denyal these things and all the rest in the habit or disposition of the soul is the subject of this consideration and these Brethren you know they are but qualities though divine qualities and therefore though growth or augmentation according to terms of Art or Logick be not properly ascribed to them yet according to Rhetorick it is proper enough to speak it of any thing under a Simile that it groweth if it any way increase as if a quality Now the light for instance or heat in the fire or Sun that is intended or waxeth more clear and more hot this may be called a growing-light or growing-heat because that as in things that properly grow there is an addition of one quantity to another whereby it increaseth so here there is an addition of one degree of the quality to what was before whereby it is more intense then it was before therefore when we speak of grace growing the speech is figurative taken either from plants or sensitive creatures that all their beginnings are small but afterwards grow up to their pitch Secondly A thing is said to grow properly you know when the increase is made not by opposition as they call it but by an inward receiving that is to say it is a nutrition as the means it was a custom to cast every one a stone and make a great heap as upon Achan and Absolom Why
argument whereby the grace of Christ is as highly advanced as by any other whatsoever that he should therefore increase the strength of his poor weak children that they may draw more strongly from him and their hearts more enlarged to receive more abundantly from his fulness as a strong child will draw harder and harder still the arms of the trees as they grow stronger and stronger so they suck more juice from the root still to feed them and carry them on Now I say this is sweet to the soul and it may be a character also of our growth if we do grow in grace indeed we shall grow up into him we shall find a greater drawing of our hearts after him still and suck more strongly from him This the first Secondly another thing comprehended under this growing up into Christ may be this that all our growth is to his honour it ends in him who alone is exalted by it it is the honour of the head when the members grow and become by the communication of the animal spirits more vigorous and active and fit for the discharge of their several works this is the glory of the head this may be understood two waies First it is the end of the thing it self finis operis the thing doth much advance him when others behold such a fulness of strength and power flowing forth from Jesus Christ upon the members to see the members of a body languid and weak and withered it is not for the honour of the head specially if generally so though there may be also particular causes as obstructions and the like but these are not so visible What an honour is it to Christ to see a poor soul th 〈…〉 now is as weak as water like the poor man in the Gospel Lord help my unbelief that ere long through the supply of grace from Christ is able to say My Lord and my God to see a poor soul lie languishing under a lust and not be able to stir and yet ere long able to triumph over it to see a poor soul that ere while was cleaving to the ground and to the dust could not get up the heart and now after a while upon Eagles wings running without weariness and walking without faintness is not this to the honour of Christ But secondly It must be so intended by us else our growth is not right in the end our end in desires of and Gods end in working we must look to the end Brethren we desire strength against this and that corruption to wax more valiant in this fight to conquer to triumph over them we would have such a measure of knowledge such a measure of faith but what is our end is Christ the end in all this is it that we may more advance him Ah that soul that indeed groweth into Christ Brethren groweth downward into the root can be content to be any thing to be nothing that his blessed Saviour may be advanced so it was with John Ah so with David if the Lord will lay me aside and I must not build him a Temple but my son must do it it is the Lord why should I not submit So if Moses must not bring them into Canaan he is contented O he would not have Joshua in another case envy for his sake he wished all the Lords people were Prophets God would have the greater glory when the Lord ofâ—ered to make of him a greater people O what then wilt thou do to thy great name the enemies will say then that thou broughtest them out to destroy them he had rather die and perish and be nothing then God should be dishonoured O dear friends let this be considered if we grow we grow up into him I say it may serve for a piece of tryal though delivered in this place I would have my whole discourse as applicatory as may be Sixthly In a true growth we must know there is an uniformity as you know one member groweth in the body as well as another if it be a true growth where some of the members receive no nourishment but all the growth is found in the root this is a disease and not the effect of the principle of life within them as you see it in the Rickets a disease now ordinarily known by that name but this uniformity is two-fold First in respect of the Church And secondly of each particular member thereof in regard of the graces of the Spirit which are growing in them First then for the Church of Christ there is an uniform growth there that is to say the Lord Jesus doth not communicate his sap and vigour and vertue so to one as to spend it on him and leave another without but every wild Olive grafted into the Olive either visible or invsible Church the visible there is meant in that place of the Apostle in whom the whole body being c. they receive accordingly either the common influences of the Spirit with the Ordinances whereby they grow up in that which we call common grace and one as well as another there is none sure but thriveth more or less Secondly for the invisible there is none so grafted but he groweth he is one Spirit with the Lord and therefore sure must needs grow that hath a continual supply of the Spirit as the Apostle in that forecited place the Lord Jesus in his invisible body hath no withered arm nor legs whatever there be in the visible whatever dead and drie sticks may cleave to the visible Olive there is none so cleaveth to the invisible it is impossible a soul should hold the head and hold inward communion and fellowship with him and yet not to grow but this is but for the Church which thus uniformly groweth one member as well as another Now secondly for particular members they also grow and that uniformly also grow not in one grace only or in this grace or that grace nor in another no but they grow uniformly that a man should be all faith and no love it is impossible or all love and no knowledge it cannot be there must be an uniformity in growth if right that were more like a wen and its growth then growth of the body you would not esteem that a growth that a man should grow all in the eye and it should become as big as the body almost so that he could see wonderfully but in the mean time the rest of the parts are as small as when they were born grow in one grace and grow in every grace grow in sincerity and grow in humility grow in faith and grow in love grow in all A timpany a growth of one member more then all the rest is monstrous and so it would be in grace Now though through defect or super fluity in natural causes there may be a monstrosity in a birth or growth yet it cannot be in respect of Christ who doth alike extend his influence to the growth and increase
of one as well as another grace which he hath begotten in the soul so that if a man find he thinketh he groweth in faith and thinketh he groweth in love and yet grow not in zeal for the glory of God groweth not in tenderness of heart and plyableness to his will this is not a right growth Alas how many of us then do not grow in grace indeed Seventhly Though there be an uniformity in growth yet we must not so understand it that every member groweth in the same measure with another and yet may grow also in its due proportion and so also in respect of graces there may be somewhat of truth in it but to speak the more distinctly First consider the members of the Church of Christ and our selves if we be such indeed though all the members of the Church of Christ do grow yet they do not grow all alike in the same measure the Apostle saith according to the effectual working in the measure of every part so that you see each part hath a measure every member hath not the same relation the same office in the body and so doth not require the same measure of strength or the same quantity or greatness Yea if it have a greater quantity then is meet it is a burthen and an hindrance as if the joynt of a finger should grow as much as the joynt of a mans knee would it not be monstrous and yet both joynts grow but each according to its proportion so that they grow all â—que but not â—qualiteâ— one as well as another but not one as much as another uniformiter and yet difformiter if every finger were as big as an arm what an hand would there be holding no proportion to the body though the rest grow this over-groweth its proportion It is true every child of God is not a David nor a Paul nor is every one called to those great undertakings that they were the more eminent places in the body of Christ we have the more we must look to it that we grow If a man be a Magistrate or a Minister I tell you Brethren it is not enough that they be as other men in grace and yet alas then what disproportion do some of us make in the body of Jesus Christ that stand in that relation to the body and yet O how do other members over-grow us Brethren they are not to be blamed for their growing so fast but we for our growing no fa 〈…〉 er nor any more proportionable to our relations for a Magistrate to have no more courage nor zeal then another man that is not called so to put it forth is unsuitable and so for wisdom and knowledge and so for Ministers are we as arms in the body and have scarce the strength of a little finger O how can we work for Christ do the works of our conditions if you see some eminent as blessed be his name there are eminent and have their measure of growth to their condition you should be followers of them follow after as hard as you can therefore Ministers should be ensamples to the flock in faith in puriry in holiness 1 Tim. 4. 12. an example to believe in word in conversation in faith in purity c. But alas Brethren may we not rather some of us take examples therein how weak is our faith yet I say where there are such of eminency and thou canst not reach them yet be not discouraged because thou canst not get so much light as the eye hath be not discouraged it is required there more then in another nor so much strength as an arm a leg when thou art it may be but as a little finger only there may be a proportion yea I will tell you Brethren pitty us pray for us Magistrates and Ministers for I do verily believe there are none fall so much short of our proportion of growth in grace according to our relations as we do But this is but the first And then secondly for the graces in every believer now the measure of every grace its growth as I think is much more hard to determine whether all graces do grow according to the proportion of the growth of any one of them that is to say whether love to God and zeal to his glory do grow according to the measure of every mans faith and so patience according to the measure of his faith indeed I am at a stand here if that one habit of grace did beget another faith did beget love it would be the more clear because then according to the strength of the causes the effect would be a strong cause a strong effect the habits of grace in us being not voluntary agents but I take it for granted that the efficient cause of all grace one as well as another is the same Spirit of the Father and the Son it is the supply of the Spirit as the Apostle calls it whereby we grow in any grace now the Spirit of God being a most free agent is not tyed up by a necessity of nature to work alike upon the same heart to the increase of every grace though he do work to the growth of every grace yet whether he doth equally work to the increase of them all So that what proportion of grace a Believer hath in one grace he hath the same proportion of strength in another is doubtful specially since the Lord who works in us both to will and to do of his own good pleasure knoweth what tryals he hath for every one of us some in one kind some in another some greater tryals for their faith and some for their self-denyal and some for their love may accordingly work but this is not so much material if we can find we grow in every grace of the Spirit whether we do grow alike in the measure of love as in the measure of faith or zeal or spiritualness as it will be very hard to judge considering how hard it is to judge of the strength of our habits by their acts which may accidentally be inter 〈…〉 itted and interrupted and considering whatever knowledge we have at the best of the faculties of our souls and their workings and so of the habits of grace in them So I take it 〈◊〉 is not so much considerable if we could come to know it only if we be sure we grow in all and that we grow according to the measure proportionable to our condition or relation to the body this the seventh Eighthly and 〈…〉 stly that I shall speak to the opening the nature of this growth in grace growth here hath no determined 〈◊〉 until death until we come actually to the spirits of just men made perfect in nature there is a determinate time for growth in quantity which is properly growth about thirty years the causes of it I leave School-men to dispute it is not so proper for us in this place in nature there is in this life yea haply
grew for Jesus Christ And Hezekiah his pride in the business of the King of Babylon how it tended to humble him so much the more do we find it thus doth sin increase our grace increase even by our falls do we get ground of them yea or no if not it is not well with us And thus much shall serve for the tryal The next Vse then will be for Exhortation to us all If we find that we have none of this we grow not at all we are a company of poor formal professors we are at a stand for proficiency we know not what it means I should advise all such Brethren to look to their standing their being in Christ it may be you have been deceived all this while and except you be in him except the Sun of righteousness be risen upon you it is in vain to put you on to grow as to the event though not as to the discharge of our duty A rotten root will not carry the branches on to any increase they may be at a stand a while but they will wither and rot and perish as well as the root look to your foundation Brethren me thinks I should not need to press this upon you you know for the notion as well as it can be told you that except you be in him you can bring forth no fruit much less can you increase in fruitfulness If you do not shut your eyes Brethren wink with them as they in the Gospel did they stopped their eyes lest they should see with them the Sun of righteousness is ready to arise upon you are you willing to have it so would you have him to arise upon you would you be made one with him would you be found in him as the root the head from whence righteousness and holiness proceedeth deceive not your selves Brethren Christ offers himself to you all every one that will may come and take him for his head for his root and so grow up in him if thou wert willing then what is the reason thou art not in him well surely then thou art not willing whatever thou pretendest he would gather thee under his wings as a Hen the Chickens where they grow apace from the heat they are cherished with but ye would not ye would not look to this in the first place Secondly you that are alive through grace and have this union with Christ and yet it may be find you grow little or haply can scarce see that you have grown now will you be exhorted in the name of Jesus Christ in the Apostles words Grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ Labour to improve to come on to be fat and flourishing content not your selves to be babes in Christ no nor young men but grow up to be Fathers The prosecution of this Use the general Exhortation I shall first lay you down some particulars wherein among others specially we are to labour to grow because haply if we rest in generals each hearer hath not his skill to bring it to particulars Secondly the motives to enforce it And thirdly some general helps to growth and then come to some other Exhortations First then for the first wherein specially we are to look to our growth and first in knowledge we must â—ook to it that we grow in the first place as the Apostle hath it in that forecited place Grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ Knowledge is not here put by way of contradistinct from grace as if it were no grace but as being that special grace which doth so much promote and further the growth of all grace beside the Papists tell us ignorance is the mother of devotion and that faith is better defined by ignorance then by knowledge but the Holy-Ghost cals faith knowledge by his knowldege shall my righteous servant justifie many that is faith sure and this is life eternal to know thee the only true God now do but observe it they boast themselves so much of Peter and how little they own him in this point for saith he grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ the knowledge of a crucified Christ Now saith the Papists this is the way to errour and schism and ignorance is the mother of devotion just as the Jews made their boast of Moses and our Saviour confuteth them by Moses whom they so much boasted of there is one who accuseth you even Moses in whom you trust for if ye had believed Moses ye had believed me for he wrote of me So there will be one that will accuse them in this point of knowledge even Peter in whom they trust So the Apostle that ye may grow up in him speaking the truth in love the speaking the truth in love is the way to grow up in Christ and so the receiving the truth and the receiving of it in love a well-qualified knowledge of Jesus Christ and him crucified and therefore the Apostle desired to know nothing among them but this if they knew Christ and him crucified this knowledge would produce whatever else is requisite for them not by its own power but the Spirit of grace carrying it on And so the Apostle to the Colossians increasing in knowledge or the acknowledgment of God and strengthened with all might according to his glorious power to all patience and long-suffering with joy So the wise man himself tells us a wise man is strong yea a man of understanding increaseth strength Why but you will say may there not be much knowledge and yet little grace and therefore is this too necessary to grow in knowledge I answer It is true there may be much knowledge where there is little grace as in many an hypocrite and many know much but they know nothing as they ought to know it but yet however there cannot be grace without knowledge a compe 〈…〉 t considerable knowledge of Jesus Christ and him crucified Fuel may be where there is no fire but the fire will not burn nor continue if there be no fuel knowledge is as I may say the very oyl the very fuel wherein the flame of the Spirit liveth in the soul do but observe it grace and truth came by Jesus Christ grace and truth therefore grace aboundeth now in the time of the Gospel he came that they might live and live more abundantly because he came to reveal the truth in a more clear full manner then before when the vail is taken away saith the Apostle that was upon the face then beholding Christ with open face we are changed into his image from glory to glory and truly there is all the reason that can be for it for whereby grace is begotten by the same means it must needs be preserved and increased Now it is by the knowledge of the truth that we are begotten to God therefore the Spirit is promised to be sent
our selves with a hope-well which we ought not to do we should strive to this of Thomas My Lord my God my beloved is mine and I am his canst thou say so upon good grounds thou mayst be a justified and a sanctified person which is done by the direct act of faith which is acted upon the Word of Promise and Christ in that Promise which the poor soul doth close with taking Christ for better for worse but now this is by the reflect act of faith and is grounded upon experience of our own condition ordinarily I see I feel that I do believe that I have chosen the Lord Jesus for my portion and therefore he is mine and I am his I have many sealings of his love to me many kisses of his lips it is given to me to believe to be upright with him I can approve my soul to him as Peter Lord thou knowest all things thou knowest that I love thee thus the soul by laying up those experiences that it hath of God and laying them together doth from all come through grace to be able to conclude that the Lord Jesus is his to a full assurance of hope and faith and what an heaven upon earth is this Well labour after it though your conditions may be safe without it yet not so comfortable to your selves nor so honourable to him nor so profitable likely to others all which considerations if well weighed and improved I presume are motives enough to it You have the first thing in this general Exhortation and that is wherein we are to labour to grow and increase Now for the Motives in a few particulars and truly the first shall be that in the very Text we must labour for it because he hath promised it therefore we must pray for it and use all other means for prayer is one as afterward we shall speak God had promised he would bring Israel into Canaan but they must fight for it first to dispossess the Canaanites and so he promiseth health and strength to his people as choice mercies but they must eat and drink and use Physick as often as occasion serveth and it is an encouragement so to do because God hath promised us those things so far as good for us therefore use the means he promiseth fruitfulness to the earth what shall the plough-man therefore cast the plough in the hedge and never strike stroak it is true if God bid them stand still and only see the salvation of God it is somewhat else they must work and serve providence in the use of means so here it is promised O saith the Apostle work out your salvation with fear and trembling for it is he that worketh Labour to be more spiritual in prayer to grow therein for it is his Spirit that beareth the heavier end of the burthen he helpeth our infirmities let this be an encouragement to stir up our souls to it because it is promised think not Brethren it is enough to sit still and wait when this will fall into your mouths or that an idle complaining will do it no no you must be up and doing and labouring to use the means and the more because he hath promised Secondly Every man would grow and come on in other things therefore we should much more labour to grow in the best things you would your selves and have your children come on and thrive in body you think their meat is not well bestowed as we use to say if they should not prosper at all but should devour like Pharaohs lean kine and be never the fatter you would grow in your names and in your estates and every man would be adding bag to bag house to house land to land and here they never think they are come to a full growth O that the Lord would but make you half so dilgent in taking half the pains to grow in grace as they do that grow in the world how should we prosper It is observable that the Apostle saith of Gaius that good man he wisheth he may prosper even as his soul prospereth it seemeth the good man his inward man was renewed though haply his estate or his body might wax old and decay yet his soul prospered and he maketh that a pattern of the prosperity of his outward man may we not say on the other hand O that your souls did prosper even as your bodies prosper You are fat and flourishing and feed your selves without fear much pampering of the flesh but the poor soul O how lean and thin and consumpsit it is what fat purses and lean souls Brethren whatever you profess while it is thus I must tell you there is much preposterousness in your endeavours that all this ado should be made for a lump of clay and the soul the precious soul the price of the blood of Jesus Christ neglected men can rise at midnight and with endâ— to follow their business set it forward if need so require and other occasions c. O if we could be perswaded to use but the like diligence for the soul upon the like occasion Thirdly Consider if you grow not you decline either you increase or decrease either you ebb or flow wax or wain for it is like a man that rows against the stream if he go not forward he is carried backward So it is here we have a stream of lusts to row against and if we go not forward be sure we go backward and therefore if you observe it the Apostle doth threaten the Hebrews upon this account because they went not forward with Apostacy they were in danger of falling away quite from God that go not forward therefore consider this seriously and surely it will put us on to look to our growth there is not an Ordinance wherein we appear before the Lord but either we soften or harden we get something or lose something by it it returneth not in vain not the Word nor any other appointment of his Fourthly Another shall be this we cannot else withstand enemies bear crosses alas a child is over-born by a touch he cannot withstand a potent enemy therefore we must labour to be strong men whom resist saith the Apostle stedfast in the faith there is no stedfastness but by faith nor any resisting but by this stedfastness if we give ground the Devil will pursue the victory if we turn our backs upon him now we cannot keep our ground except there be some strength It s true every child of God is born with his armour on him as is fabled of the race of those Giants so the Saints have their breast-plate of faith to keep the heart and the shield to preserve the body but as they grow in strength so are they able to weild their shield yea it groweth stronger and more able to bear off a blow Alas our Saviour saw his Disciples were not able to bear a temptation at that time John 18. 8. therefore let them go
saith he to them that sought for him if ye seek me let these go as yet they were not grown to that stedfastness but now what if the Lord should for holy ends give Satan liberty to sift thee to the very bran and thy faith be weak O what sad work will there be then in thy soul therefore our Saviour prayed that Peters faith should not fail him but yet you see how near it was and what it cost him and so except we be grown in wisdom and understanding we shall be ignorant of his devices and he will take us alive at his pleasure because we know not where he will have us nor what his methods of deceiving are that there we might watch And so for crosses it is not a child can bear the cross specially if great some little affliction they may bear as you see our Saviour did train up his Disciples to it by degrees at first only they threatned them and charged them not to preach in that name of Jesus Christ then afterwards when by that experience of the power of God with them they were somewhat grown then they were scourged and imprisoned and as strength grew so afflictions grew we are not able to suffer much for Christ while our faith is weak our love is small our patience inconsiderable therefore we must labour to grow in every grace of the Spirit Fifthly Because the stronger our graces are the more discernable they will be this was hinted before in the arguments of the point and this will put an end to many sad complaints that a child of God maketh concerning himself when his grace becometh more visible not only to others but to himself by reason of the greatness of it and the Spirit of God shining upon it to discover it O how comfortable may such an one walk Sixthly Consider the end of all the Ministry and Ordinances God hath given it is for our growth as in that place therefore he gave some Apostles some Evangelists same Pastors for the edifying of the body of Christ now hath the Lord been at all this pains rising up early and sending messengers upon messengers one after another and pouring out the gifts of the Spirit to befit them for that work and all to build us up and yet we are children and dwarfs What a shame is this to us and what a grief is this to God and is not this the way to make him repent of the good he hath done unto us and to withdraw them Seventhly A very hypocrite Brethren may grow in some things and therefore we had need look to it to go beyond them in our growth an hypocrite may grow in parts and gifts may learn to pray and preach most plausibly may make long prayers with those hypocrites though they grow not inwardly at all therefore take heed of sticking here or because thou growest more civilly escapest the pollutions of the world and yet alas art the same in disposition a swine in nature yea there may be a growing in assent to the truth such a saith as the Devils have which maketh them tremble and some kind of affection too as Herod had but by how much we see there is danger of being deceived by so much the more narrowly we had need to look to it that we grow there where there is no deceit grow in the spiritualness of service and duty in that of self-denyal humility and saving-faith and love Eighthly Wicked men grow worse and worse and why should not we grow better and better Shall Satans Kingdom so increase and grow strong and shall not the Kingdom of Jesus Christ grow stronger also how much the more need had we to stir up our selves in this respect considering how many grow worse and worse Ninthly The stronger we grow in the habits of grace the more easie will our acting of grace be to us we come off so hard with a duty as with prayer or the like what is the reason but because we are so weak in the Grace of prayer so unacquainted with it O how a man delights to do the things which he is befitted for and habituated to O how quickly are some mens spirits up in duty like tinder to the fire of the Spirit or like the spirits of wine or oyl quickly fired therefore God would have the fat offered up it would quickly take fire and when our services come off with delight and cheerfulness then the Lord is pleased with it so you see They rejoyced they were counted worthy to suffer for the Name of Christ and yet a little before were so weak that they all forsook him what a difference is here and so they rejoiced that God had given them such a willing heart to lay out themselves upon the Temple to build an House to the Name of God when a mans love and mercy is weak what he giveth it cometh hardly from him like drops of blood as we say but afterward he can freely willingly emptie his purse for Christs sake this is one way Brethren to make the Commands of God not so grievous to us as they seem to be until we be thus grown Again We must grow to our pitch before we can enter into the kingdom Mat. 18. 3 c. Therefore upon all these considerations let us be exhorted to make it our business to improve to grow to wax stronger and stronger day by day But thus much for the Motives For Helps that will be the next enquiry what we should do to grow in Grace since it is so necessary a work lying upon us all And I might speak distinctly First To the Grace which is inherent in us wherein our holiness consisteth and Secondly That wherein our comfort consisteth even the knowledge of our relative state to God But the main thing is that holiness those several Graces of the Spirit each whereof shining with its own lustre and yet by the symmetry and conjunction with the rest make up the perfect beauty of Holiness First then in general If thou wouldst grow indeed and art in good earnest in this matter thou must exercise Grace if thou wouldst grow what a rich treasury is that of the Mind above that of a mans Cheâ—t the more he useth of the one the more he hath the more he useth of the other the less he hath How did the Talent increase but with the using that is signified by putting them out to the Changers and so the Talent or Pound gained five Talents or ten therefore it is observed by so me that the Scripture in commanding or requiring any Grace of us doth directly and immediately command the Acts and the Habits obliquely as the Fountain to the Stream So Baxter saith The way to get away our indisposedness to Prayer saith Luther is to pray it away exercise that Grace according to the ability given and thou shalt find it grow it is much to be preferred before an idle complaining a diligent soul
that is up and doing thou findest thy Faith is weak it may be thou canst scarce call it any thing but unbelief labour to act it put it forth often the nature of it lies in the souls sincere willingness to take Jesus Christ to have him for a Saviour and Lord to save from iniquites as well as from the condemnation of sin now though weakly put forth the acts of willing Jesus Christ as he hath offered himself and thou shalt find it will grow often be rowling thy self and thy burthen poor burthened soul upon the Lord Jesus cast thy self upon him and thou shalt find as much rest in it for the present so also an increase of faith and a feeling also that thou dost believe after a time And so for other things alas is there a day that goeth over our heads but there is use for Faith it is the very life of a Christian The life I now live I live by the Faith of the Son of God and therefore as much need of the exercise of it daily as of any vital acts whatsoever and you shall find you have occasions for it either some temptations from your own hearts some corruptions stirring and disquieting your peace or some scourgings from without some buffetings of Satan some deadness and security growing upon you daily O there is daily need of acting Faith as there is to eat and drink therefore Israel their Manna was their daily food and if they were daily stung they must daily look up to the Serpent and which of us is not though you have a Lamp lighted Brethren There was enery morning daily a triming of the Lamps of the Sanctuary and pouring oyl into them afresh you know they will not continue but go out in obscure darkness except there be a feeding of them with oyl this we may do and this we ought to do and indeed a man that exerciseth not his Grace is as if he had none neither hath the strength nor the comfort of his Grace for Habits are for Acts and then Acts strengthen the Habits again The Learned Aristotle said A wise man differed nothing from a fool if he exercised not his wisdom and saith the Wiseman Even a fool when he holds his peace is counted wise the Act is that chiefly commanded and that chiefly rewarded of God the exercising of Grace and that whereby it groweth which is the main thing here I mind Hath not every day its evil sufficient to it now if faith â—e not upon the wing what a condition is that soul in therefore exercise it use legs and have legs And so for love put it forth exercise it toward the Lord Jesus daily and toward his people that is the way to grow Brethren how do benummed limbs that have no feeling nor strength gather strength but by rubbing and chasing and exercising of them though a mans legs be so benummed falling for a step or two he can scarce set them to the ground yet use them a little and they will come to themselves again If Merchants money lie still it is a dead thing it increaseth not but they must turn it up and down and return it use it and exercise their trade with it and it groweth And truly I am perswaded it is the great reason we are many of us so weak as we are we lie complaining and making sad moan before the Lord of our weakness and yet are careless in the exercise of the Grace wherein we pretend we would grow The desire of the slothful killeth him for his hands refuse to labour we may mourn our selves away off our legs and spend our days in lamentable complainings and shall never be the better except we put forth into act what we have already received if we be not faithful in trading with a little will he give us more action and motion increase heat if you see a poor creature lie starving ready to perish for want of fire his legs are stiff cannot hardly move them is that the way to help him no up to the fire up and exercise your limbs rub them chafe them if you would get heat and agility into them Secondly See to it that we exercise one as well as another for there is such a sweet harmony and dependency of the Graces one upon another that they do one strengthen another the acts of our Graces do as I may say co-operate and sweetly conspire to the promoting one of another that is to say of the acts and these acts then strengthen the habits As for instance you see in an Arch one stone strengthens another take away one of them and all the rest are ready to fall upon your head and therefore the Apostle exhorts so earnestly That they should add to Faith Temperance c. not as if they could add one habit to another for they are infused together but the acts are to be added one to another For if ye do these things saith the Apostle then ye shall not be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ yea you shall never fall yea you shall have an abundant entrance into the everlasting kingdom The strength of a building you know lies not in the strength of one piece but in the due compacting of it and joyning part to his part if there be never so strong beams if the other parts be weak the rafters the wall-plates or such considerable pieces and not well joyned together the building is weak and will easily fall therefore if you would be strong and grow indeed look that we exercise all the Graces of the Spirit we have already received not only Faith nor only Love nor only Humility nor only Self-denial but all labour to act them all and Temperance and Heavenly-mindedness c. and you shall find that as each Grace doth grow by the exercising of it self so by the exercising of them all they will have a mutual influence each upon the other to strengthen one another the act of Faith will strengthen the acting of love and that will strengthen faith again and so for the rest Thirdly If you would grow in Grace You must be much in prayer for a man of much Prayer is a man of much Grace and therefore the Prophet puts them both together He will pour out the Spirit of Grace and Supplication And so the Apostle Jude But you Beloved building up your selves in your most holy Faith praying in the Holy Ghost and there is the like reason for building up our selves in any other Grace praying by the Spirit of God is the way you see to grow in Grace there is very great reason that Prayer should be a great means of increasing Grace First Because in Prayer there is the greatest exercising of Grace of all Grace usually of any other service we do to God there our repentance is exercised for you alwaies find the Saints in drawing nigh to God David and Ezra and
drunk the cup of the Lord and it hath been a cup of deadly wine to thy soul thou hast eaten and drunken thy judgement and condemnation so often that thou art even stupifyed and past feeling it is to be feared it not onely argues a desperately hard heart to come and look upon Christ crucifyed held out in those Ordinances as our meat and drink to nourish us and not to relent but it hardens us so much the more Thou mayst yet come oft ento receive the Supper of the Lord but as often as thou dost it thou dost but more deeply poyson and fill thy soul O! Brethren that the Lord would let us see this day whether this be our condition and we have rotten hearts covered over with a glorious profession that we might not dare to draw near for we cannot have a Wedding-garment upon us brethren if we have not the habits of grace if we have not Christ for righteousness and holiness how can we act that grace which we have not Thou art fit for any thing else but for the worship of God thou art fit for thine own occasions and fit to serve the Devil to be at his beck but not to worship God in those Ordinances remember remember brethren though you may have somewhat now to answer us when we preach this word and to answer your own consciences and can make a shift to silence them when they tell you though you have a profession and name and are reckoned among the Saints yet you never were born again never did put on Christ indeed you cannot have a wedding garment though you may brethren deceive your selves and us and take this and that for a wedding-garment when the Lord Jesus shall come and ask you how comest thou in hither without a wedding garment thou hadst not a dram of grace thou never puttest me on for righteousness in believing how camest thou hither how durst thou be so bold as to draw nigh to my table to meddle with my precious blood and body broken for sinners when thou haddest not a wedding garment on you shall then be speechless it shall be so evident O take him bind him hand and foot hang these Ordinances and priviledges which he hath so long abused my blood and body which he hath eaten and drunk that is to say Sacramentally the signs of them as those in 1 Cor. 10. they did all eat the same spiritual meat c. and yet most of them perished sink him sink him he hath trampled my blood under his foot counted it an unholy thing else he would never have cared to have come with an unholy heart to it therefore now I will trample his soul in my fury unto the lowermost hell O! how this will sharpen the teeth of the gnawing worm to eternity O how this will inrage the flames of those everlasting burnings therefore consider this your sad condition let it be a terrible word to you the Lord give you hearts to tremble at it And in the last place Let us take heed how we rest and lean upon a profession and a name Methinks there needs no more Arguments to move us then what hath been spoken already What folly is it for a man to hang his weight upon that which he is told will break and then he falls into an irrecoverable gulf O! that we had that alway sounding in our ears in the seventh of Mat. Lord Lord open to us we have done this and that heard thee preach done wonderful works they were visible Saints surely at least and yet he calls them workers of iniquity which they might do in secret acts with pretences for God but intending themselves What if Simon Magus had had that power to give the gift of the Holy Ghost and had done it and replenished his purse by it for likely he that would have bought it would have been as ready to have sold it again he might have past for a Saint but what would his end have been O Brethren consider your latter end the Lord teach you that one point of wisdom that so in time 〈◊〉 may flee from that wrath to come But so much for this Doctrine also Verse 3 and 4. And they that were foolish took their Lamps and took no oyl with them But the wise took oyl in their vessels with their Lamps WE may read a wise man or a fool in his actions and so here the foolish took no oyl with their Lamps and what more foolish then that For the opening of the words I shall not need to say much by the Lamps I understand here a profession of Jesus Christ a name a shew the Apostle speaks of the Saints as light-bearers they should be burning and shining lights as John was Light there is and sometimes appearing heat even in formal professors as you see in the case of John how zealous for God And Judas a man would have thought him zealous when he said Why is this waste but it is like the light of the glow-worm touch it and it hath neither light nor heat they are indeed sparks of our own kindling as it is in that place of Isaiah the sparks there may be the action of Devotion and Duty which may be elicited or educed by the help of nature and of education and custom the conscience being enlightened by the Law of God in some measure and self-love working somewhat in men will put them on to do something to quiet their Consciences but alas these sparks quickly go out and the Lamp is put out in obscure darkness There may be also somewhat of Common-grace some enlightning of the minde and some kinde of affection as the second ground received the word gladly and Herod heard John gladly but a great difference between these and the Disciples who receiveed the word gladly the one rejoyced happily in that which in the word is suitable to a carnal appetite as the Eloquence as those in the Prophet thou art to them as one that plays on an Instrument but the other rejoyced in that of Christ which is therein found So the Bee is pleased with the Flower the Sheep with the Blade the Bird with the Seed and the Swine with the Root But new for the oyl in the vessels what is that The foolish took no oyl in their vessels with their lamps By this I understand brethren the oyl of the Spirit ye have received an anointing the Spirit of grace and the grace of the Spirit of Christ the Spirit dwelling in us there is a Cruse opened that will never be drawn dry like the Fountain of waters or Rivers springing up with eternal life it never sails By this then I understand the true saving work of grace in the heart a receiving of the Spirit of grace the Spirit of Christ by faith as the Apostle speaks by the hearing of faith by the Gospel the word of faith which was blessed to the working of saith in
your souls Now this spirit works faith and that works by love and that never fails but is perfected in heaven so humility self-denyal and all those graces And not onely the graces of the spirit but this Spirit of grace dwelling in the Saints which continually supplyeth their wants so that the Lamp shall not go out forwant of oyl From the words thus understood this note will arise He that contents himself with a profession of Christ without the real saving work of grace upon his heart is a fool but he that looks to the main thing the getting grace in his heart as well as making a shew before men is a wise man Profession without the enjoyment of the Spirit of grace is but folly I will put them both together that contraries may the better illustrate one another juxta se posita and if either of them be proved both of them are proved for they will infer each other by the rule of contraries Nothing is more ordinary in Scripture then to call sinners fools sinners of all sorts are fools committing wickedness is committing folly in Israel but no fool to the wise fool wise in his own conceit there is more hope of a fool then of such a man and who are usually more wise in their own conceits then formal professors are he that hideth hatred with lying lips is a fool he that hideth hatred to God a rotten heart with lying lips whereby he professeth much love to him and carryeth a fair shew he is a fool in grain If we would know where wisdom beginneth or what the sum of wisdom is the wisest of men shall tell you the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom or the sum of wisdom some read it so And so Job who was no child in Christianity to man he saith to fear the Lord that is wisdom and to depart from evil that is understanding Mark you Whatever men place wisdom in or folly in this is the very sum of wisdom to fear God fear is put for all grace a manfearing God and eschewing evil was the highest character the Lord gave of Job It is indeed the root of all that good we do and evil we avoid and I will and but one Scripture in the â—hiddenarts thou shalt make me to know wisdom it is one thing to be wise headed and tongued and another to be wise hearted and therefore in Scripture nothing more ordinary then to set forth wisdom that is true indeed by the heart God himself is said to be wise of heart Foolish creatures Eph. a silly Dove without a heart They may have head enough notion enough flashing light appearing to others enough but they are without a heart they have not the great work there a new head and an old heart a full head and an empty heart a light and burning profession and a dark dead and cold heart he that takes up in such a condition is a fool an errant fool For the further clearing of this I shall enquire a little wherein the nature of wisdom and folly lyeth and then shew you how it is Applicable in truth unto this profession of Christ without the possession of him Wisdom then I conceive may consist of these three generals 1. In the obtaining what we want the good we want and therfore come short of happiness because we want it 2. In the keeping the good we have when once we have it And 3. In avoiding the evil we fear which would render us miserable in these three things I take it wisdom consists Now to speak a little to each of these and see how we may prove the formal professor by his defect and falling short in each them in all of them and for the first the obtaining of the good we want to make us happy Alas you know brethren we are all fallen short of the glory of God and by nature are without him and without Christ in the world and have not the things which accompany salvation neither he then is a wise man in general 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who knoweth those principles and ends which are universally necessary to a mans good his chiefest and most general good So that there are I conceive three things in this respect under this head and so proportionably under the other which go to the compleating of wisdom First there must be a knowledge of the end and a propounding of this end to a mans self an end you know is nothing but that which is good either really so or appearingly so for that is the object of the Will goodness as truth is the object of the Minde and understanding a man cannot appetere malum as it is malum and be a man to delight in evil as it is evil is diabâ—lical to delight in sâ—n or folly as it is pleasant as it is suitable to the corrupt nature to the soul the Will crooked and deprayed this is humane because though a man do thus pâ—opose sâ—n as his â—nd yet not as it evil but as it is good to his corrupt judgement and Will that is to say suitable and convenient to him An so sor suffering there is no man living can prevail with himself to be willing to be miserable they would be happy Well then it is good which is the end either real or apparent But now here in this spiritual wisdom and folly we must understand his end suitable that is to say understand it of the most supreme principle and ultimate good and that is God for what good else is there that can indeed make the soul happy but God in Christ for that good which must make blessed it must be commensurate to the soul so as to be able to fall and satisfie it else theâ—e will be somewhat wanting still and alas for all other goods below God it may be said that which is wanting cannot be numbred Now there are two things considerable in the soul of a man especially to which there must be an answerableness in the end which is to be followed unto injoyment else the soul cannot be happy The first is the vast capacity and comprehension of the soul to which there must be an answerable fulness in the object and the end else the soul cannot rest upon it as its Center and happiness and this we may take notice of especially in those two faculties of the Understanding and the Will the Affections they are but as it were the several motions of the Will a kind of Appendix to it Now to these two faculties in the supreme and ultimate end there must be an answerable ratio veri boni great enough to fill or satisfie the understanding or mind that hath for its object truth and not one truth or another but all truth it is not satisfyed with the partial discoveries of truth or here and there a little but it would have all now the Lord is the highest and the best in
people of God whom he hath made eminent strong in Faith converse with them and if they be not very communicative as some are more reserved whereby they are not so profitable to others draw it out from them dive into their experiences how they came to that measure of Faith wherein they can so glorifie God and walk so chearfully before him And so for Humility and Tenderness where thou findest any eminent in these make an improvement of them joyn thy self to them in a more special manner labour to get somewhat from them this is a special help to growth in Grace And for knowledge of your relative State lay together your experiences you have had of God beg his Spirit to shine upon them else you will see nothing but by his light but a word or two more to this afterward Thus much for the General Exhortation I have a double Exhortation which is more particular and then a word of Comfort and so shut up all For the particular Exhortation First then Be sure that we grow according to our measure For every part hath a measure according to the effectual working in the measure of every part I doubt many of us that should be as the eye to the body have much less light in us then other parts of the body and such as should be as the arm and hands to work alas are like little fingers for growth come on poorly How should Magistrates grow and Ministers grow and such as bear an Office in the body of Christ they should be much more grown their Faith should be much more strong then other mens because they have greater works lying upon them then other men and who is their sufficiency but Jesus Christ and how is he strong to any of us but according to the measure of Faith If Paul had not had a strong Faith he had never done the works of his condition with such unwearied pains no nor Moses nor Joshua Faith it works by Love a weak Faith can do little and is not this the reason that some of us in these employments alas act so poorly for Christ our faith is weak and so our knowledge is weak few Apolloes mighty in the Scriptures able to convince gain-sayers therefore the Apostle exhorts young Timothy to give attendence do his diligence in reading as well as in Exhortation give thy self wholly to these things that thy profiting may appear to all men As Jerom I think said he did discere docere as he learned a lesson so he taught it to them there is a double score then upon which Ministers are to labour to grow First upon their own account because they have greater works to do and greater temptations usually to grapple with then others have for the Devil is most malicious against the Light-bearers such as have the Torch in the hand to give light to others Even the light of the knowledge of the Glory of God in the face of Jesus He knoweth they are labouring to pull down his Kingdom and do you think he will not labour to pull them down their souls down O how his finger itches to be winnowing them as he did the Disciples he desires it he begs it as he did to molest Job that Pillar of Religion in those parts so he would buffet and exercise the poor Ministers of Jesus Christ I know not what others have but I am sure some have their hands full and their hearts full O what need then to be men grown and strong in Faith to resist stedfast of knowledge in his depths and devices But this is not all Secondly Because the growth of others doth much depend-upon our growth are they not as the bones to the body when they grow no more the body groweth no more They are called Pillars in the house of God and what proportion the pillars bear to the house the bones bear to the body No marvel If Teachers be such as know not what they say and whereof they affirm as the Apostle saith That their hearers also be like those silly women alway learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth O what need then had young Timothies to be stir themselves wholly to these things because alas else they wil be able to say nothing either for substance or manner that may be for the edification of the body It is true there are no new revelations now the Scriptures are able to make the man of God perfect to every good work but how short do we fall in our understanding of them it is matter of sadness and would be more if our hearts were more sensible to consider that for ought we know many are dwarfs because we are so our selves Brethren help us for your own sakes But there are others also that should be exhorted to look to their growth that it be proportionable to the means of Grace you have and do enjoy according to your time of standing in the Church of Christ how long hast thou been planted in the house of the Lord many years you should be Fathers in Israel and Mothers in Israel as Deborah was and is it so with you Brethren It is very sad to consider that some among us that have hoary heads found in the wayes of righteousness and have so long been in that way and yet are so heavy and so dull and so ignorant and so little Faith and Heavenly-mindedness that there are many Christians that are but of yesterday outstrip them in many things is not this a shame therefore labour to answer your mercies your experiences your light and means you have enjoyed by your growth for this is expected assure your selves there is not a Talent but shall be accounted for and if you perish not yet you are not like to have a full reward you will suffer loss for a Calf of the Stall to grow no fatter then another that hath not such feeding it will not be born to be like Pharoahs lean kine devouring all before us and yet be never the fatter but as poor and lean as if we had never lived under a lively searching Ministry as you of this place for the most part have done assure your selves Brethren your guilt is very great to be watered every moment and yet be as dry and hard as if you had never seen when good had come Thirdly Another particular Exhortation shall be to help one another Brethren were we not wanting one to another in this respect we should be a people much more strong in the Grace which is in Jesus Christ But alas you will say is this in our power to help one another to grow all the supply comes from Jesus Christ the Head It is true it doth so principally Phil. 1. 19. Joh. 1. 16. 2 Cor. 3. 18. But he communicates by the mediation of instruments there is a supply of every part by that which every part supplyeth saith the Apostle as
you see the spirits conveighed from the head to the lowest parts it is by mediation of the other parts between the head and the foot before it cometh thither it passeth through some others I know the Lord Jesus is not bound up to any instruments he can teach by his own Spirit yea and always doth sometimes without means sometimes breathing in the means and this is most ordinary and therefore something we must look to it that we supply every one of us you have heard it is the end of all Christian Society to build up one another and it is the end wherefore the Lord intrusteth us with such Talents to lay them out for the good of others whereby our own Talents grow in the using and we are instruments in the hand of God to improve others hath the Lord then revealed himself to thee thou wast in an horrible pit where there was no standing thou sunkest yet lower and lower hath the Lord set thy feet upon the Rock what then wilt thou keep this alway to thy self when called to speak of it mind you Christ and David they speak of it what God had done And many shall hear and fear and shall trust in God it encourageth them wherefore doth Paul so often speak what he had been and he had obtained mercy O that others that should come after might believe and never be discouraged by their sins though never so great And so the Psalmist Again my soul shall make her boast in God the humble shall hear thereof and be glad this poor man cried to the Lord and he heard him No sooner did Andrew find the Messiah but he tels Simon O we have found the Messiah And so Philip saith to Nathaniel and the woman of Samaria she no sooner had the knowledge of Christ O she was full she was big until she was delivered O come and see the man that told me all that ever I did is not this the Christ I would saith the Apostle that your hearts might be knit together in love and comforted c. that to this end you should know what conflict I had for every one of you wherefore are we delivered out of temptation but to set up way-marks O take heed how you come there warn others that they come not neer such a temptation when thou art converted strengthen thy Brethren and therefore comforted that we might comfort others and therefore indued with knowledge that we might feed many Now truly Brethren as the Apostle saith of the solemn meeting so I may say of the occasional meetings together it is not for the better many times but for the worse and how a sad a thing is this when Saints shall meet together to have so sweet an opportunity of stirring up one another to love to good works that either we shall spend the time in foolish talking and jesting and looseness and looseness of Spirit I tell you Brethren observe it you little know what hurt you do your own souls by this lightness nor what hurt you do to others do you never reflect in the evening what you have been doing what company you have been in what you have done what you have gotten methinks it should make our hearts ake to consider this day through the lightness and frothiness of my Spirit I have not only sinned my self but drawn others to it this is not to grow nor to help but hinder one another Or else we are discoursing of the world of this and that bargain or else raking into the infirmities of others and pleasing our selves with that specially of those that are not altogether of our minds whereby our spirits are imbittered not to stir up one another to bowels and compassions to them How many such opportunities doth the Lord put into our hands and we have no heart to them shall I beg of you and of the Lord this day that there might be a labouring either to do or receive some good O think every moment ill spent in the Fellowship of the people of God that is not thus improved and indeed if our hearts and mouths be not set a work thus they will be working upon somewhat which is worse to the grieving and wounding of our spirits and grieving Gods Spirit Thus much for this Exhortation also The last Vse then shall be a word of comfort to every poor believing soul that it may be from what hath been said may be discouraged If it be thus that such as upon whom the Lord Jesus is arisen they are in such a growing condition then what shall I think of my self alas I am weak am very feeble am at a stand c. For answer I shall say a few things First There are several states and statures in Christ there are babes in Christ and such as have need of milk and not strong meat as the Apostle saith ye have need of milk I could not speak to you as to spiritual but as to carnal as to babes in Christ that is to say such in whom the flesh was very strong and prevailing So the Apostle John writeth to all the Saints under three states some were babes some young men in their strength and vigour some old men Fathers of grown experience in the waies of Christ Fathers in Israel and Mothers in Israel some are but just entred into the School of Christ some are of a middle form some of the highest some are but gotten within the door of the house of God and happy it is for them that are but once within for then they shall go further and further Others are gone further into the inner Chambers and are acquainted with the Lord Jesus in the most inward manner What then wilt thou conclude that because thou art not a man the first day or presently therefore thou art no child of grace No suppose thou art but a child and weak and every temptation over-turns thee draweth thee aside yet remember thou art a child though thou be not a strong deeply rooted Cedar yet thou art planted it may be lately though yet for the time we might be men spiritual perfect as the Apostle saith to bear the wisdom of God in a mysterie and yet are babes it is matter of humiliation but not of despair Secondly Another is this that the people of God though they are in a growing condition yet it is not so to be understood as that every moment they grow they have their declining fits trees and plants you know have their Winters and children have their sicknesses and fits when they are at a stand though afterward haply they shoot out so much the more for it and so many times the people of God do they are under a distemper for a while and decline and a man would think they were even withering and dying but it reviveth again many times grace in the hearts of the children of God through corruption are like the light of a candle