acts of Beleevers is drawn out of the Old Testament and calculated as I may so express it to that meridian These all died in faith obtaining a good report but received not the Promise vers 13. 39. yet serveth not only indifferently for the Gospel-dayes wherein we are but indeed commends it self the more transcendently to us by how much God hath provided some better things for us having opened more fully the obiect of believing the Lord Jesus in the Gospel and poured out more plentifully the holy Spirit of Promise than it was ordinarily in those dayes which Consideration may serve to afford both mighty Aid and Argument to Believers now to encourage Christians to trust upon the Lord to do for them more than they can ask or think according to the power which worketh in them in their faithful following him Not to stand upon the opening particularly of these words nor on the exact time when they were fulfilled very likely this and some other here about had reference to the cruel sufferings in the times of the Maccabees which the Hebrews to whom this Epistle was written had reason to have a particular knowledge of although the History to us be Apocrypha it may suffice us that the Spirit of the Lord hath here infallibly determined such things were done and that the Conquest was truly attributable to this believing as it dealt with and drew vertue from the power of God So that without more a-do in the words are Four things observeable 1. Here is the Noble and Glorious Principle in which all these rare exploits are wrought on the commendation of which the whole Chapter insisteth By Faith they did it whether in all the subject mentioned it was a Faith that was saving will not be here disputed this is plain it was such Faith at least as falls within the Word of God and builds upon the Authority thereof in the business they were concerned in upon which foundation they went through and under-went what was before them in following God in their generations 2. We have here the subject or seat of action upon which this great Experiment is tryed and that is a tortured butchered massacred harmless weak Believer Others were Tortured a particular Inventory whereof made and taken in the verses following 36 37 38. such cruel usages as were beneath humanity to inflict and above humanity to sustain were exercised on and invincibly endured by these poor souls under the aid and influence of that Faith of theirs 3. Here is the magnanimity and excellency of spirit described unto which their faith raised them putting its self in the noble denyal repulse given to the tender of deliverance upon any unworthy terms They Accepted not Deliverance though their Persecuters came with torments in one hand and tenders in the other in as much as both were manifest Artifices and Engines to accomplish the same design as they slighted the threatnings of the one so they scorned the allurements of the other Deliverance in it self and as it may be considered is a mercy and the acceptance of it is a duty and consequently the refusal of it would have been their evil But if Deliverance cannot be had but upon terms dishonorable to the Lord if deliverance be a snare then to accept of such deliverance is a sin at least a great blemish to beleeving of which more hereafter 4. We have the powerful Motive and blessed Prospect that Faith took in view from whence strength was gathered to bear the tortures and forbear the deliverance and that was The obtaining a better Resurrection they had their eye and heart set upon a way of deliverance for which they would be beholding to the Lord only and this is called A better Resurrection that is not only better than their tortures but better also than any deliverance that could be offer'd to them this fixed expectation of their Faith carried them above any base or unworthy cringings to the sons of violence If you consider the words in their Connexion and dependancy on the former part of the verse you have this observable Women received their dead Children returned to life again this was verified 1 King 17.23 2 King 4.36 Others viz. other Women were tortured i. e had their living children tortured not accepting deliverance for them this is storied 2 Maccab. 6. If we consider Women as the subjects of this strong Faith who are stiled 1 Pet. 3.7 the weaker vessels Widows perhaps and desolate yet trusting in God hardly any faith out-went theirs Oh Woman Great is thy Faith we might by the way gather this Observation ☞ That the weaker vessels may be capable of exercising the strongest Faith Out of weakness they were made strong when I am weak then I am strong this treasure as well as the discoveries of the Gospel is put into earthen-vessels that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us that as the strength of Flesh may not glory in his presence so neither may the weakness of a poor Saint occasion him to sink or dispond but he that glorieth may glory only in the Lord. But I shall not stand here but proceed to draw forth and make a brief improvement of some of the Observations that lie most plain in the words themselves one of which is plainly thus Doct. 1. That the most cruel tortures that have been invented by the vilest sons of men have by divine permission been vented upon the choicest sons of God They of whom in Gods accompt the world was not worthy the best of earth was not good enough for them vers 38. in mans accompt the worst of earth was not bad enough As they are made the filth of the world and off-scouring of all things 1 Cor. 4.13 so no instruments of cruelty can be enough vile or forcible in their thoughts to rid and deliver it of them The lust and rage in all generations hath been fruitful in inventions of this kind they were stoned they were sawn asunder c. the innumerable variety of particulars are reducible to this general They where Tortured I shall only attempt to pursue this Point to an issue by speaking briefly to these two enquiries 1. What is meant by these Tortures 2. Whence hath it sprung that they such an harmless People as they have had this for theit lot or why have they been tortured thus As for the former thus The word here rendered torture is observed no where else to be used in the New-Testament and in strictness of speech signifieth to be used and dealt withal as men do with a Drum viz. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 à nomine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which figurative expression directs us for its meaning either to the manner or end of mens cruel dealing with them If the former be lookt on as intended then the resemblance is taken from the manner of their torments answering either to the violent stretching out or distending the head of the
hearts for the inscriptions of the Spirit of the Living God and that the beauty of this Ornament be set in Majesty but doth frequently commend to me that observation which your last ere this some time since was hinting to me of the need we have who design such services to wait for power by the Spirit from on high to be his Witnesses and to expect according to his Promise That showers of the latter rain shall come down to furnish a people to bear his glory in the administrations of his House answering the Institutions of the New Testament although I am no way taken with that dilatory inference wherein some seem to stick as if upon the observation that Bryars and Thorns are come upon God's Houses in the joyous City and are likely to abide there till the Spirit be poured out from on high therefore it were best and our Interest till the manifest taking place of that promised dispensation not to put our hands to such Acts and Ordinances the beautious Majesty of which must needs be acknowledged to be very much wrapt up and concerned in the hoped issues of such a Glory stepping in There being blessed ends to be by us promoted in our present state by our dutiful obedience to every Institution of our King and through infinite Grace and Mercy are there such Gifts and Graces of the Spirit to be found on some as may yield help to sober humble enquirers to get over such stumbling-blocks and contribute toward their preparing in Body and Spirit as an adorned Bride to meet the Bridegroom who loves to find his keeping all his Commandements unrebukable and without spot to his appearing In which attire I earnestly desire your whole man Body and Soul and Spirit may be found ministring a practical convincing Argument by your standing compleatly perfect in the whole Will of God that there is as there indeed is a hidden excellency in fellowship with Jesus Christ in those wayes and appointments of his upon their souls who in Faith and Faithfulness are yielded up to him therein which hath admirable Vertue in it though at present not attended with those mighty Signs and Wonders by Gifts of the Holy Spirit the which were rather for the sakes of them who believed not than for such as through Faith are directed to judge of and close with such things answerable to their tendency by good pleasure to lead into the Mystery of God and of the Father and of Christ The Reason and Efficacy whereof lies not in any just proportion betwixt the thing commanded and the Mystery proposed to enjoyment no more than there did between washing in Jordan and Naamans clensing the cause of the scornful storming of his proud spirit but in the meer soveraignty of divine good pleasure who gives us a word of Faith to guide and prove our obedience and engage our humble expectation of his own presence who is Lord of Influences to conduct the Heirs of Promise into those secrets of his Pavilion by doors at the threshold of which the Children of this Worlds wisdom stumble either by sensual Formality sticking in the letter of things or by aiery Speculations rejecting the weakness and foolishness of Christ in his Institutions but Wisdom is justified of her Children All here are well love honour and salute you Yours in Soul-service To a Friend who after some Retirement was returning to pursue his Calling in Affairs of this World The Lord be your shade on your Right-Hand My very dear Brother I Perceive you are applying your self to something men call Business in the World and I have comfortable hopes that you have studied ere this hour that lesson Finally Brethren the time is short it remaineth c. For the fashion of this World passeth away Oh my dear Brother my soul is afflicted to observe the over-greedy Engagement of many whom I love and honour for their former eminency plunging themselves into business and there even drowning themselves in ruine and perdition losing the savour of their spirits the intimacy of their Communion with Christ in the Spirit and so grow dry careless prudent fearful omissive what not till there is hardly left so much as the uniform appearance of a soul that hath been the seat of such glorious discoveries and enjoyments as men have readily spoke of formerly It may well be asked of many now as the Apostle Where is the Blessedness ye spoke of Men discourse of their primitive applications of Truth and to it speak much and frequently of blessedness in the things of the Gospel it was blessed Praying and blessed Hearing and blessed Meeting and blessed Meditating because in all these they sought after and partook of blessedness But where is that now There is somewhat of Praying and Preaching c. but where is the blessedness of all these Is it not very much departed and what may be the cause is it not much from hence Men are gone deep into the spirit of the World and are grown carnal of the Earth earthy and savouring of the Earth and thereby losing their Love Zeal Faithfulness Insensibly but very dangerously I hope better things of you and that you both do and will watch your own Spirit and stir up others to take great heed to their spirits that they deal not treacherously Yours 7th 3d month 64. To an ancient Friend giving his Apprehensions concerning the multitude of Professors with some of his Experiences both in Bonds and Sickness Kind and very much respected THe posture of the Lord 's own People even of such who in dayes past with greatest intimacy and endearment went to the House of God in company hath of late years under these stupendous dispensations presented it self to me much after the similitude of a great Fleet of Ships outward-bound who set out of their Port beautifully equipped laden trimmed in consortship and under a very prosperous promising gale all spreading their very Top-gallant sayls to shew their celerity and make the best of their way A very beautiful and pleasant prospect to an eye delighted in such expeditions But having stood but a little way in this course out of sight of the Countrey from whence they set forth a dark night and dismal storm overtaking them they are dispersed all Sea-over a great number being mindful of the Port whence they came think they have a fair opportunity and plausible excuse to return again and draw up with design to adventure such storms no more Others and they not a few being confident and conceited of their own understanding do shape their course to and fro as the wind shifteth are cast upon Rocks and Shoals to the making shipwrack of Faith and a good Conscience Many others fearing that course think yet by casting their Wheat and Tackling into the Sea they shall somewhat lighten their Ship and be the better able to weather it out and so dropping Anchors at the wrong end wish for day Few very few prefering the Interest of the
Words in Season From that late Worthy Sufferer and Servant of the Lord Jesus an able Minister of the New-Testament according to that Character 2 Cor. 6.4 5 c. Mr. Abraham Cheare VIZ. I. Faith's Conquest over the Tortures and Tenders of an Hour of Temptation on Heb. 11.35 II. The Embalming of a Dead Cause on Mark 14.8 III. Remarkable Discourses on his Dying-Bed with Copies and Extracts of Letters on several occasions Useful for those whose Hearts are engaged to serve the Will of God in this Generation London Printed for Nathan Brookes in Bartholomew-Close 1668. The Publisher to the READER I Doubt not but the following Discourses carry so much evidence of Truth and Holiness as will sufficiently commend them to the Hearts and Consciences of the upright as proceeding from one who believed and therefore spake delivered what he received as a Scribe instructed unto the Kingdom of Heaven the Fear of the Lord being evidently his treasure wherein he walked all the day long and by which he was enabled to bear those hard things which a constant Spirit in keeping the Commandments of God and Faith of Jesus holding fast the Word and Works of God drew upon him bringing him into fellowship with tryals and sufferings upon the Wayes Truths Interest and People of the Lord in this Generation It may highly concern the living to lay to heart the removal of Prophets and holy Ones true mourners that sought to stand in the Gap to turn away wrath that it might not come to the utmost I am sure it hath a sad aspect when even a Professing but too much complying People stand as on the other side or at a distance from those who earnestly contend for the Faith holding fast what they have received and are far from right laying to heart That through the hatred of the world righteous men perish and merciful men are taken away I doubt not but there remains a remnant whose minds by such providences are deeply impressed well-nigh to over-whelming further than help is given and the hand stretched forth to lead to the Rock that is higher than we when in all parts and corners the beauty and glory is cutting off as a fading-flower and how hard is it to speak and do as becometh under such astonishing stroaks and with him Ezek. 24.18 to hold on doing as the Lord Commands I am perswaded that sigh often goes up Ezek. 11.13 with Amos 7.5 O Lord cease I beseech thee by whom shall Jacob arise for he is small The reviving and desired issues of that work falling under great distrusts even with those that are the Friends thereof when if I may allude to it Luke 24.19 c those who are as Prophets mighty in deed and word before God and all the People Instruments polished to carry it on to an expected end are cut off and laying aside daily so hard is it for us to understand that thus it ought to be that so the excellency of the power may be acknowledged to be of God and not of men that all may see his Work is perfect his Word is tryed with whom is no restraint for he sendeth by whom he will the residue of the Spirit being with him who will in due time raise up and furnish Instruments for every service and if at this time men think that by cutting off and wearing out Saints and faithful Ones their nest is set on high they shall be delivered from the power of evil none remaining to cry out of their violence and spoyl to detect the unrighteousness of their wayes and doings the very stone shall cry out of the Wall and the beam out of the Timber shall witness against them I humbly pray and wish that the cast-out scattered peeled people in whose heart is the Fear of the Lord under all amusing dispensations may yet increase in the Faith that stands in the Power of God and is of the operation of his Spirit in the exercise thereof which judgeth not after appearances they may understand all these deaths passing over persons and things but needful and preparatory for the Glory that is to follow when their filth and defilements by the Spirit of Judgment and by the Spirit of Burning shall be put away the slow progress of which work with the discovery made of so great a defection from professed Light and Principles ought greatly to be laid to heart how many by reason thereof turn from the Truth and are confirmed in Athiesm even by the deceitful working of those who in the failure of outward advantages and exposal to necessities bonds and death set themselves at such a distance from the works of God our eyes have seen the begining of fulfilling Prophesies Threatnings and Promises to the last dayes as if either there was no Holiness or Righteousness in them or that they were unacquainted with the inward Life and Spirit of them so deeply hath corruption the spirit of the world mingled it self with those who not long since in greatest seeming Light and Zeal professed to seek after a better state of things Even looking for and hastning to the new Heavens and new Earth wherein dwells Righteousness but the Works of God being forgotten no wonder his Word is so little believed or his counsel waited for It was a worthy Expostulation but a few years since before some then in the exercise of Authority of one who I fear hath out-lived the force of it which though large hoping it may be of use I take leave here to transcribe If you will be able to steer your Course a-right if you would take one streight step have in a readiness an acquaintance with the work of God what it is that he aims at by which you may be guided in all your undertakings Suppose now a man or men should come and ask of you What God hath done in these Nations What he hath wrought and effected What is brought forth Have you an answer in readiness Certainly God hath done so much as that he expects you should be able to give an account of it take heed that every one of you be not ready to speak the disquietments of your own Spirits and so cast contempt on the Work of God something else is required of you I have sometimes in darkness and under temptations my self begun to think that what hath been is the thing that is and there is no new thing under the Sun as it hath been among the Heathen of old so it hath been amongst us or as it was with Israel 1 King 16.21 22. Then were the people of Israel divided into two parts half of the people followed Tibni the son of Ginath to make him King and half followed Omri but the people that followed Omri prevailed against the people that followed Tibni the son of Ginath so Tibni died and Omri reigned That a common thing and frequent in the World had befaln us wherein God had no hand but that of common Providence in dashing
a Religious Pretext for their cruel act Gen. 34.31 Cursed be their anger for it was fierce and their wrath for it was cruel Gen. 49.7 4. Another occasion of their wrath boyling up to torment ariseth from the constant bold and couragious Spirit that is sometimes found in the Lord's people that will neither be debauched with their terms nor broken by their threats this exasperats exceedingly So it is with the three Worthies Dan. 3.16 18 19. We are not careful to answer thee in this matter be it known to thee O King we will not serve thy Gods nor Worship thy golden Image which thou hast set up Then was the King full of fury and the form of his visage changed against them and commanded the Furnace to be heated seven times more thaâ— it was wont c. See also vers 22. When Steven stood in the boldness of his Testimony Acts 7.54 57. It cut them to the heart they gnashed on him with their teeth cryed out stopt their ears ran upon him with one accord cast him out of the City and stoned him If Mordecai will not bow Haman is on a rack all his comforts do not comfort him till he shew himself profound for slaughter not an ordinary gallows will serve the turn A Consideration which ought not to be improved as many do that because they are apt to be thus enraged therefore we are to slack our Testimony thereby to abate their fury but rather to wait on the Lord with the more earnestness to double and multiply his Spirit and the strengths and consolations of it with us as they Acts 4.29 Though the Heathen rage c. Now Lord behold their threatnings and grant to thy Servants that with all boldness they may speak thy Word They do not beg Prudence Policy Skill to evade and escape but more anointing to testifie boldly for the Lord which was granted fully 5. When unto all this there is super-added the opportunity of wicked men's having the power of Magistracy in their hands Prov. 28.15 16. I mind when they have a providential admittance to the capacity of making Laws and putting them in execution against the people of God having their own lusts uncontroulable and an advantage of covering their cruelty under pretext of Law and to asperse the faithfulness of Saints to the Laws of Jesus Christ with the odious charges of being against Magistracy and not being subject to the higher Powers c. the old accusation Neh. 2.19 ch 6.6 Hest 3.8 Acts 17.6 7. They now rush upon the poor Lambs of Christ with all their lusts as so many sayls bearing nay in these capacities there is occasion to draw forth those monstrous cruelties which perhaps they hardly thought were hid in their hearts as you see in that remarkable instance of Hazael who when he was told He would slay the young men of Israel with the sword dash the Children and rip up the Women with child replied But what is thy servant a Dog that he should do this great thing He thought its likely that unless he did degenerate from humanity and became a beast he could not perform such strange things but what is the answer of the Prophet The Lord hath shewed me thou shalt be King over Syria 2 King 8.18 Intimating that whatever fierce and dogged disposition lay hid in his heart against the Lords interest under what plausible pretext soever it might be covered for a time from others nay whatever better perswasions he might have of himself about it yet his King-ship would give opportunity and provocation enough to draw them forth to grow up into his conceipt Joh. 19.10 Knowest thou not that I have power to crucifie thee and power to release thee will give strong temptation to a wicked man to condemn and kill the Just though he doth not resist especially when an intrest of worldly honour seems to lie that way ver 12. notwithstanding convictions and reluctancies of Conscience to the contrary Dan. 6.14 15 16. Mat. 14.7 9. These may serve as some of the Reasons giving light why and whence it is that it hath been the lot of Saints some have been tortured thus I shall only touch a little Practical Improvement by drawing these Inferences Use 1. If it be so that the Lord's people have their times by the permission nay the appointment of God wherein they have been and may be tortured put to the most violent shameful way of dying or the most slavish miserable and disgraceful way of living though the most choice of all his Children It then may serve to caution such as are lookers on how they proceed to make a positive judgement of men and things according to the severe dispensations they are carried through a mistake upon which very great inconveniencies have often followed and yet very incident in our Censuring-day to divers who deal with the Lord's Interest in their conclusions as the Barbarians with that providence of the Viper on Paul's hand pass a judgment Without doubt this man is a murderer whom though he escaped the Sea yet vengeance suffereth not to live But such rash conclusions frequently revert as much into the quite contrary extream as it did with them Acts 28.4 5 6. It becomes us therefore to lay our conclusions of this kind upon other principles than these which are not appointed directly to signifie what we are apt often to infer from them singly considered Eccles 9.1 if the best of men have endured the worst of torments if from the beginning it hath been so such fiery tryals should be no strange things to us nor should we draw any strange deductions from it either to the censure of the persons or dislike of the cause testified to thereby Use 2. If the rage of man having all the aggravations and advantages above-named be such a fierce thing and hath been so fruitful in torments on the Saints and if we have such caution to expect more in the latter days wherein iniquity must be expected to abound then let it teach us to admire the wonderful grace of God to poor England and to the poor Saints of God in it that have lived in such times wherein men that hate them have such Laws in hand and at hand to destroy them nay having it in the power of their hand to put them in execution having also received such exasperation in the years that are past to remember and revenge many old grudges and yet so few to this day compared with the body of professing people in this Nation have suffered these things in their extremity that we should be helped to cleave to the Lord and every one of us alive before him That there is no more blood mingled with our sacrifices the Bush burn in the fire and yet not be consumed it is the Lord's doings and marvellous in our eyes and should be owned and improved as an argument to strengthen our faith against the many faintings we are lyable unto in further
might not be offended Blessed is he that is not offended in me But Oh! how strong are temptations to reason thus why this way of Professing of Meeting of Exercising is the high way to make me poor a beggar to undo me at last and what shall I do then Such Reasonings have need be rejected with utmost abhorrency Use 4. These Considerations should sweeten Heaven and Glory to us If while we live by Faith we draw the World and such a world of miseries on us it should quicken the edge of our longings not in a way of impatience neither to be dissolved and be with Christ who is far better Where sorrow and sighing shall flee away where shall be no more death neither sorrow nor crying neither shall there be any more pain for former things are past away Rev. 21.4 But to go forward to another Point By Faith some were c. Understanding it thus that by Faith as the principle that bare them up and carried them through as conquerors they were tortured This sense of it is most agreeable with the drift and design of the whole Chapter The nobility of their Spirits commends the excellency of their Faith To be tortured and bear it patiently is well but so may many do from other Principles and Causes they cannot tell possibly how to escape but now to chuse affliction with the people of God to become companions of them that are so used to improve what God doth in it and think this is best of all a Spirit thus managed and demeaning its self through the sharps of it commends the Fatih by which he doth it By Faith they were tortured the tortures on one hand and temptings on the other made no impression no alteration on them they were the same as formerly or rather much better By Faith they were so The Note is this Doct. That the Faith of Gods Elect is of invincible power to make them Conquerors in all their tortures What I have to say to the clearing up this Point I shall offer by endeavouring to shew these two wayes wherein Faith contributes to the performing this high service 1. Faith doth contribute to bear up under tortures themselves and much more under less tryals as imprisonment banishment c. by way of evidencing things to the Soul which otherwise are not so clear and substantial as its the office of Faith to make them Heb. 11.1 2. Faith contributes hereunto by way of ministring influence and assistance to the soul strengthening and heartning it to indure that which otherwise would seem insufferable break and sink the Spirit As for the former of these Faith 's proper tendency to give light and evidence to the soul and by evidence to beget a conquering magnanimity commends it self to us as its conversant about a three-fold object or imployment 1. Faiths main evidencing work is concerned about the grand Interest and Propriety that the Soul hath in God and God in him to get this case once cleared up beyond controversie and to maintain the soul in a satisfactory veiw of an interest in Christ Where this is uncertain or clouded up the soul sets upon such hazards with much trembling and good reason it should do so all things considered But where this Mystery of Union and Relation to Christ is cleared to and by believing the soul becomes impregnable as might be abundantly made out by that triumph of Faith recorded exactly and accurately Rom. 8.33 to the end Can any of the instruments of torture or cruelty there ennumerated separate such a one from the love of God who stands resolved and undoubted upon Gospel-grounds nay He is more than a Conqueror Tribulation distress persecution famine nakedness peril sword though all the day long we be killed and counted as sheep for the slaughter yet can none of these managed either by men or Angels do any thing of importance to the shaking of such a one When he arrives to that pitch of triumph Psal 27.1 The Lord is my light and my salvation whom shall I fear the Lord is the strength of my life of whom shall I be afraid You may guess how far he is hereby removed out of the way of danger inroads may be made upon him but he cannot be easily moved 2. Faith hath another matter to clear up in a way of evidence and by doing it effectually it contributes exceeding encouragement to a Believer to endure torments namely it evidenceth the Truth and Goodness and the special Relation that God hath to the Cause that it suffers in from all the clouds aspersions and calumnies that men would cast upon it I do not say that Faith can make a bad cause good but it can make an obscure cause clear It is not enough that a Christian have the clearness of a personal interest in the Lord when he comes to endure torment but it is needful that he have the clearness of a good Cause and a good Call that he suffers on or else he may suffer as an evil-doer and what thank will that be the truth and goodness of his Cause needs then to be cleared and Faith is of singular essicacy this way when perhaps the wisdom and devilish policy of men have been at work with opprobrious reproaches to vilisie it or some time-serving Apostates with their sophistical arguings and scholastical distinctions as Jannes and Jambres to invalidate and resist the Truth to which service Scriptures and Arguments are not wanting to be wrested for the perverting the plain wayes of God when the case is so and a poor Christian is frequently so assailed and baited with them that he knows not how to give a distinct satisfactory convincing answer to all these sophisms nay perhaps cannot demonstrably extricate himself from all the subtle entanglements that of this kind may be drawn about him Now is it the office of Faith to clear up the innate goodness and truth of the principles it suffers on that at least to its own satisfaction the soul is abundantly cleared and convinced therein and united thereunto And this hath helped the Martyrs of Christ to bear so bold a testimony to divers Truths of which they were not able to make a scholastical defence by way of disputation yet could set to their seal by dying or sustaining any tortures When this point is once satisfactorily evidenced that the Cause is Gods that Jesus Christ is interested and imbarked in it it gives strong consolation What an encouragement was that 2 Chron. 20.15 Be not dismayed at this great multitude for the battel is not yours but Gods So was it to David with the Philistine 1 Sam. 17.47 The battel is the Lords When a soul can see God not only interested with it but really more deeply interested and concerned than its self is it yields full assurance of good success at last I know the Lord will maintain the Cause of the Afflicted and the Right of the Poor Psal 140.12 because it can in title God
am treating as Christ saith in patience â—ossesseth the soul A man is said to possess his soul when he hath the command and disposal of all his â—houghts and faculties according to the best reason This in the case in hand is only the off-spring of â—xed Faith and admirably advantagious in sustainâ—ng torments 2. Faith contributes influentially not only as it begets peace but also as it brings the soul up to a certain resignedness unto God to a willingness to be â—t Gods dispose here am I let him do with me what seemeth good in his sight That which makes torments to be tortures indeed is when the members draw one way and the mind another but when the soul comes to be fully yielded up to divine pleasure this makes tortures become no tortures or at least to become less tortures You see this eminently set forth in the Captain of our Salvation himself while he was crucifying in weakness and tempted as are we while the humane nature would have made choise of that request Father save me from this hour Joh. 12.27 then was his Soul troubled all was dark and intollerable But when he fixeth in that resignedness For this cause came I to this hour Father glorifie thy Name then are there not only Oracles of approbation giving aid from the most excellent Glory but the Baptism he hath before him how is he pained ere it be accomplished And so in the very offering its self we see how his resignation expedited his tortures he was dead sooner than the rest for when the Souldiers came to break the bones of the thieves they brake not his bones why because he was dead already How so Why he said It was finished bowed his head gave up the Ghost and said Father into thy hands I commend my Spirit Luke 23.46 Whereas the others abode in a contest till the last gasp 'twixt spirit and members loth to part much work left undone had no certainty one at least of rest for his soul This makes sore conflicts in times of torment whereas on the contrary how sweet is that yielding up all to God mentioned Isa 50.5 6. I was not rebellious neither turned away back but gave my back to the smiters c. So chap. 53.7 He opened not his mouth but is brought as a Lamb to the slaughter c. This subduedness to the will of God by the dominion of Faith then is of exceeding moment to strengthen us to the induring these torments 3. Faith doth influence the soul to bear torments notably by bringing and encreasing a certain greatness and nobility a largness and publickness of spirit on it more than formerly Shall such a man as I flee Neh. 6.11 It begets a largeness of heart in some degree answering that of Solomon 1 Kings 4.24 unto which a base shrinking is exceeding contrary and loathsome especially considering by and for whom and to the interest of whose Name it is engaged It s marvelous to consider what many have endured to gratifie the lust of a great man 2 Sam. 2.14 15 16. to provide for their families to assert the liberties of their Country and the like and is not the will pleasure honour of Jesus Christ of far greater moment to be witnessed unto to the highest It was a gallant spirit in Joab which encouraged the people 2 Sam. 10.12 Be of good courage let us play the men for our people and for the Cities of our God and the Lord do that which seemeth him good The like reasonings will Faith suggest to beget resolutions I have now an opportunity which I may never have again to play the man the Christian the Believer for my God my Christ for his Gospel his Institutions his Cause and Interest What can be too hot or heavy to be done or suffered upon this accompt 4. Faith influenceth notably in this matter by giving the soul a prospect into and a fore-taste of that better Resurrection realizing and rendring substantial the promised Glory thereof unto it It 's remarked of our Lord that for the joy that was set before him he indured the Cross and despised the shame Heb. 12.2 Moses when he was threatned indured as seeing him that is invisible and having his eye to the recompence of reward chap. 11.26 27. They took joyfully the spoiling of their Goods who know in themselves they have in Heaven a better and more induring substance chap. 10.34 Stephen looking stedfastly into Heaven was not dismayed at the frowns threats tortures of his fierce adversaries Acts 7.55 56. I shall only draw this into an Applicatory Improvement briefly and pass along upon the whole of what hath been said to this Head Use You are with a very loud voice men and Brethren exhorted and beseeched to give all diligence to the Concernments of your Faith Above all your gettings covet a true lively Gospel-faith above all your keepings strive to hold fast and contend earnestly for this Faith If ever there were dayes that called loud for the Life of the Faith of the Son of God these dayes call for it I had fainted saith the Psalmist unless I bad believed And truly you will be apt to faint in the day of adversity as if your strength were small where your Faith is not good Take heed therefore of all things that may either adulterate it from its simplicity or stop and obstruct it from its growth God hath begun to exercise your souls and to prove your profession in a way of tryals its true you have not yet resisted unto blood unto tortures as others have and you at least some of you may The grand Question your souls should pursue to a full and satisfactory resolution is What stock have you proportionable to such an expectation Here I shall propound these Two Exhortations 1. Prove your Faith 2. Improve your Faith 1. Prove your Faith or take it in the Exhortation 2 Cor. 13.5 Examine your selves whether you are in the Faith prove your own selves Do not take up principles upon trust perswasions of a good condition upon trust in a day when you are at the point of being put upon fiery tryals Every mans work must be tryed the time is come that judgument must begin at the House of God Every one must bear his own burden Here you would be directed particularly to see 1 That your Faith be true 2 That your Faith be strong 1 That it be true feigned Faith will beget but fading Comforts nay as was said It will do greater mischief in such a day than no Faith at all Here Evidences would be needful for discovery and Arguments with Directions for exhortation that souls who upon the tryal find themselves short would not strike off through discouragements but rather strike up with so much the more diligence to make their Calling and Election sure for helps in order whereunto they must at present be referred to what hath been offered in other exercises The like might be offered to press you to
occasion to weak ones to question almost every thing whether there be any thing of Truth in it seeing the generality of all Professors have been in the entrance on this Tryal so hardly fixed to any thing that endangereth the loss of their external accommodations If it be enquired Why so many shrink and totter who profess the Truth I answer It doth not argue that their Principle was naught and so the cause of their tottering but their standing upon that principle was not sound they were not joyned to the things they professed they were not mixt with Faith Heb. 4.2 There are many principles on which many have adventured their All and endured great Tortures and yet no truth or soundness in them See 1 Cor. 13.3 Though I give my body to be burned and have not charity it were nothing Which implyeth a possibility on hollow and unsound bottoms to proceed thus far and yet find no acceptance with God at all in it We may consider a few Principles that will carry men to endure torments and yet not such as we may justifie 1. First there is Self-Righteousness a design to establish a man 's own Righteousness in opposition to the Righteousness of Christ in the Gospel its wonderful to consider what tortures it will wade through in compassing its design You know that Observation the Apostle makes of it Col. 2.23 where speaking of the attempts made to deceive and spoyl Christians of the simplicity of the Gospel partly by the Heathenish Philosophy and partly by Jewish Superstition they meet in this A shew of wisdom they have in Will-worship and humility neglecting the Body not in any honour to the satisfying the flesh Flesh will be satisfied and a design of flesh carried on vigorously to promote its righteousness though it be in a neglecting dishonouring offering violence to the body Men have and do admit great hardships on their body to promote the righteousness of the flesh Again Another principle that will carry men through sufferings wonderfully is the lust of the flesh when there is some untamed lust that seems to be crost by sufferings and especially if it can be hid under the cloak of some profession As for instance the Pride and Ambition of a man where it rageth and is unmortified it will rush and make a noise a great while through sufferings Such a man will scorn to be said to bow to be called a Turn-coat to yield to such a subdued unworthy generation So likewise headiness frowardness where it takes head and heart it will rush as the Horse into the battel The Counsel of the froward is carried headlong Job 5.13 It s master-piece is blind madness 3. Moreover Strong affections to the persons of men and admiration of them because of advantage The Disciples would go and die with Lazarus Joh. 11.16 They would follow Jesus into Prison and into Death Luke 22.33 Affections led Peter upon the Waves for Christ's company but could not keep him from sinking Many would go to the ends of the Earth for the love they bear to such a Ministry to such a People c. But if this be the height and strength of it it will abate and decay upon sharp tryal 4. Lastly When a man's case becomes desperate as Saul Men will fall upon their Sword Judas hang himself Men will desire to die and it flees from them Upon the whole this Conclusion issueth forth The goodness of a man's Bottom Spirit Cause or Principle is not to be concluded from the resoluteness of his standing and on the contrary other wayes must be sought to determine and censure the badness of a Principle besides the Apostacy of Professors from it All they that were in Asia forsook Paul 2 Tim. 1.15 At his first Answer no man stood by him ch 4.16 All scattered to their own from Christ Joh. 16.32 Sought their own things and not the things which are Jesus Christs Phil. 2.21 And yet Truth 's professed by them never the worse for all this Let 's then be less rash in judging them and their standing taking heed rather lest we fall God is able to graft them in and make them stand again Deliverance when God may be seen bringing it and enjoyed in it ought to be accepted and Faith fittest to give the best acceptation to it 2dly But to pass this by my aim in the next place principally is to consider Deliverance as it is in the tempters hand as an offer of his and as in design to carry on the same projects that he had in the Torment and that is To ensnare and debauch the person when the Tortures have made such a breach upon the members as the Tormenter thinks he hath caused some impression by way of despondency on the mind that he supposeth former reasonings are someway weakned and former resolutions abated now is Deliverance tendered as a bait to draw the soul off from its stedfastness Now Faith is of power to interpose to relieve the poor tortured tempted soul setling it upon the power of God and by gathering up his spirits to help him to make that gallant repulse that honourable refusal to it in all its painted and alluring beauty I scorn your Deliverance Got behind me Satan thou art an offence to me You have the excellency of Faith described in other subjects vers 37. They were stoned they were sawn asunder They were tempted were slain with the sword Among other conquests of believing this was not the least that in the midest of other cruel Tortures they were tempted and yet were conquerors How tempted Why as is said above v. 15. they had opportunities to have returned to have escaped and this was the nobility of their spirits they slighted such opportunities when temptation lay in opportunities We are therefore here to observe this further Supposition to be implyed in the former assertion ☞ That the fairest offers of Deliverance in a Torturers hand may carry the foulest designs of Temptation in them and then is Faith eminently concerned to take heed of them and resist them Indeed if persons will be by no means perswaded to look otherwayes than on the out-side of the offer it is not strange if they take if such swallow them down as the unwary Fish doth Hook and all but if they belong to God they must vomit them up again God shall cast them out of their belly When God hath a soul under the Rod upon the Rack in measure when it breaketh forth he will debate with it he seeks to make impressions by frequent solicitations to get entrence by some means or other for his designs of grace and holiness which he doth gradually chafe in this way Job 33.14 15 16 19 c. ch 36.8 9 10. In like manner though with a differing design when Satan can but have the winnowing Luke 22.31 and hampering of a child of God Job 1.11 12. ch 2.5 6. his whole design is to make impressions of pollution Curse God and die
bold in their God to Preach the Gospel of their God with much contention 1 Thes 2.2 approving themselves the Ministers of Christ in Imprisonments in Tumults in Stripes in Necessities in Distresses Where is the Lord God of Eliah Where is he that put his Spirit upon them who first trusted in Christ I have been often refreshed with a saying of holy Burroughs in his Epistle to the Reader of his Heart-Divisions alledging a saying of Luthers I desire to be a faithful Minister of Christ and his Church if I cannot be a Prudent one the standing in the gap is more dangerous and troublesom than getting behind the hedge there you may be more secure and under the wind but it 's best to be there where God looks for a man c. thus he Indeed in this day if ever the Lord looks who they be that will stand in the gap that will answer that Character My life is continually in my hand yet do I not forget thy Precepts They who rescued the Field of Lentiles and the Field of Barley which were part of the Lord's Land how inconsiderable soever it might seem in its self when the generalty of Israel deserted them were at last reckoned among the first rank of David's Worthies 2 Sam. 23.11 1 Chron. 11.13 though perhaps while it was in doing they might be reckoned rash heady hair-brain'd men they who cannot pass as well through evil as through good report in the Gospel of God can surely go but a little way in it he that left at Pamphilia and would go no further in the work because perhaps 't was too hot and heavy was not thought by Paul fit for the same imployment another time whatever his Kinsman Barnabas might think of him I could wish some of these things might be by the Lord let in and set home upon the spirits of such who not only Retire themselveâ— but sound a Retreat also to others who might otherwise be sweetly and advantagiously engaged to fight this good fight of Faith War this good Warfare endure this hardness as good Souldiers of Jesus Christ I am called off from pursuing this matter All here are well not else at present Rests Yours many wayes 18th 8th month 62. To a Friend released out of Prison Wisdom and understanding exceeding much and largeness of heart like the Sand of the Sea Precious and Beloved I Have my longings to know how it fareth with your Soul now you are under the advantage of gathering up at liberty the diffused Light and Anointing that is dropt with such variety in the Body of Christ especially in your City whither I observe it is the aim of most of the choice Persons up and down who either are driven or disengaged from necessary attendance in their Countrey stations to make haste promising themselves greater liberty and enjoyment there than ordinarily here can be expected In respect whereof I have been sometimes conceiting that it is a place and puts into a capacity for Believers to make the most rare Extracts and pick out the choicest Notions and Assistances of any where in the World which thoughts are easily attended with such temptations Oh! that I had the wings of a Dove I would flee far away from this stormy wind and tempest I would see that goodly Mountain and Libanon But then I am as often checked with this reproof He that encreaseth knowledge encreaseth sorrow these creaturely engagements may render a man the more prudent and rational it 's many to one if they make him more serious spiritual evangelical It may be easie to get the mind fraughted with noise news notions but to get the heart established with grace drawn into a more substantial and experimental communion with Jesus Christ according to the tenor of the New-Covenant and in the Grace and Truth thereof this is not so easie to be found and maintained without extraordinary watch and diligence These words of Wisdom may be more heard in quiet and to better purpose and improvement than in the out-cry of him that ruleth among Fools Soul-searching Heart-preparing Sin-mortifying work may have more advantage from the retirement of a nasty Prison then unless abundance of Grace be ministred from being left to walk in a large place especially if with a large principle of Liberty to touch withal but being laid in Gospel-bonds under the Instituted charge of none In these respects my much valued in the Lord I have not only had some tryals of my own soul while I have been representing things to my self in such a figure and also seen the woful issues thereof on some others who have fallen under my short-sighted observation but have withal had many a thought of you since you have been in an outward respect as a Hinde let loose I will not say I have had hints of any tamperings with you but only that it is marvellous if you have not which doth and will so much the more magnifie Grace in your being preserved in Christ Jesus stedfast in the Faith fervent in the Spirit lively and active in the wayes of God growing up more into Christ which is our Head and being more publickly diffused by a largeness of Spirit in all the members This all this I hope pray and shall to my utmost endeavour may be found remaining and encreasing in you according to the form of sound words the pattern of them who first trusted in Christ worthy of all the Grace you have received and Testimony you have born hitherto in doing and suffering and worthy of the blessed hope of the Resurrection of the Lord's Cause and the approaching of his promised Glory In a fellowship in this earnest expectation and endeavour you have the prayers of all our little Family but especially and particularly of 26th 6th month 63. Your wonted and constant Soul-Friend Unto an ancient Acquaintance taken at a Meeting and cast into Prison Entrance and abiding with joy and rejoycing into the King's Palace My never dearer than now Friend I Salute you in this new state into which you are cast by the wise hand of my good Father in fellowship with my self and other dear Companions and as you have obtained this Grace that you suffer not an evil-doer though as an evil-doer unto bonds that the Word of God may not be bound nor Gospel-gatherings unto Christ confined within and accommodated to state models answerable to the lusts of wicked men So I pray you may not miss of those full free uninterrupted streams of Strength Satisfaction and Consolation which have been the promised and experienced portion of the highest Saints that have appeared for God My soul hath had fellowship in that thanksgiving touching you Dan. 3.28 Blessed be that God who hath sent his Angel and hath kept his Servants that hath trusted in him that they have changed the King's word and yielded their bodies that they might not serve nor worship any God except their own God And I pray that you may never want the
when they saw his anguish was exceeding great and their own was not very small The Interest of words meerly such can be of little signification while the things themselves spoken of are manifestly absent Perhaps we have spoken enough if not too much for our part now God is come to speak his part which requires much quiet attention the rather for that though it be very loud yet very mysterious and deep as are many of the Oracles of God those especially wherein he designs to manifest himself to his and not to the World I could for my own part also lay hold on the like exemption and silent retirement as most befitting my present state and frame altogether entangled and perplexed and presuming that you have at hand to help not only the presence of the great promised Comforter who can supply all your wants but also the secondary supplement of many worthy Ones who have received the Anointing and thereby the Tongue of the Learned to speak words in season From you we have hitherto received the accounts given of the gradual stâ—ps of him who worketh all things according to the counsel of his own Will in the several gradations wherein we have not been wanting as enabled to pour out our hearts before him who was able to help and are now enquiring why he hath appeared as being angry with the Prayers of his People covering himself with a Cloud that they could not get through If any distinct answer be given you may expect to hear of it In mean time that Isa 57.1 is before us as verified not only in the loose generation of Professors who seem greatly hardened and estranged from the Interest of their chiefest mercies but to true even among those who seem to be most tenderly touched with affectionate sense of present privations and pressures of all kinds right laying to heart and due considerations of such stupendous works of God both in their present weight and future warning is very rare and require extraordinary teaching and conduct that neither on one hand we despise or on the other faint when thus chastised by him Your cry for help hence must be returned with the same importunity ye also helping by Prayer to God for us who though at some personal distance are yet in some sort of Sympathy pressed if not above measure and beyond strength yet to the utmost degrees of what is hitherto received yet wisdom and strength are with him with whom we have to do who hath graciously put himself under promise that as the day is the strength shall be The Lord prepare us for learning harping singing the new song which is the peculiar melody of them redeemed from the Earth which admits of no interruption from Thundrings Earthquakes Tempests Voices though they proceed out of the Throne and are subservient to the Ends of it Yours heartily 4th of the 4th mon. 67. Another on the same occasion Garments of Gladness for the Spirit of Heaviness My dear Sister WHile there is a Spirit in Heaven influencing spiritual Believers upon Earth in their frail capacities that Word will have its verity among them though absent from one another in the body how great soever their distance and how dark soever their circumstances may be yet are they present in the Spirit joyning not only in rejoycing while order and stedfastness in the Faith are manifest but also in affliction and mourning where knowledge is imparted or though but supposed of the hand of the Lord touching and bruising especially in the most tender part and on spiritual occasions such hath been the fellowship of the Spirit through Grace I trust in my soul with you under the very heavy rebuke of the Almighty wherewith you have been exercised especially of late dayes on divers accounts both personal domestick in the Church of Christ where you walk in the whole Sion of God and as in the Nation it self having a right and relation to its welfare or desolations as I also am fully satisfied you have had with me in divers proofs that have been put upon my Faith and Patience as far as they have come to your cognizance and I hope the same Grace will not only teach us to be tender but mutually helpful each to other toward the understanding and complyance more fully with our Father's mind in these stupendous dispensations so as his ends upon us may be actually furthered in the promotion of the power and beauties of Holiness Unto which issues though godly sorrow working Repentance never to be repented of hath a very direct tendency and humbling our selves greatly under the mighty hand of God is the straitest step towards the best exaltation in due time Yet when I read the present temper and its tendency of my own heart and also observe in yours and others late lines upon this heart-breaking occasion to what excess of sadness fear discouragement and even dispondency we are apt to yield the Tempter advantage to triumph over us and hardly recover our selves to a jealous thought that there is any considerable danger in the excess on that hand but that it is a kind of vertue to refuse to be comforted I say in such observations my heart hath bin smitten with reproof and somewhat awakned to stand upon its watch against incursions on that quarter lest Satan should get an advantage on us who should not be ignorant of his enterprizes It 's true we have lost a Prince and great man in Israel this day But who was his Father 1 Sam. 10.12 was it not the Father of Spirits with whom the residue of the Spirit is and who can at his pleasure set a man over the Congregation Know we not where is the Lord God of Elijah is he not in Heaven and can do whatever he pleaseth Is not his Spirit in Promise Are not all the Promises of Christ Yea and Amen Doth not the time of the Promise draw nigh of that grand effusion of the Spirit of Elijah that shall raise the Witnesses revive the Works lift up the Standard break the Yoke have not some sprinklings of the Spirit been found up and down in our dayes and should it not be owned as a token for good and turned to us for a Testimony that the Harvest is not far off Are not these discouraging complainings of ours much of the same kind and go upon the same mistakes and may righteously issue in the same dismissions to us from further service as it was with Elijah in his fainting fit after he had acted in so full a gale of the Spirit just before that now he complains They have killed the Prophets c. and I even I am left alone and my life is sought also What am I better than my Fathers We know the Answer of God to him which I trust is true at this day There is yet a remnant according to the Election of Grace and Seed that shall serve him and shall be accounted with him for a Generation
clear up the sincerity and inward value and excellency of those Virtues or Graces of Christ which are his own and his admirable workmanship in their Souls These pass up and down among men as meer delusions from the Devil and hypocrisie in the professors of them And now it is the interest of the Lord's honour and the vindication of the operation of the Spirit that these be put upon some tryal that may search their very root and bottom discover their foundation to the neck When God speaks of his Workmanship and Image in Job Satan undertakes if he could hâ—ve the stripping him of all his outward accommodations touch all he hath and he would curse him to his face That attempt failing he is confident that if he might have the torturing of him the touching and tearing his bones and his flesh he would curse him to his face and if he durst assert his confidence of his success in such an enterprize to the face of God may we think much of his confident imposing his suggestions on the projects and conclusions of his children He did attempt the green Tree and it s no marvel if he do the Dry. Now while he would bear God if possible and doth bear the World in hand so confidently that he hath instruments of Cruelty that would whip and kick the new-creature in any man to nothing and herein make God a Liar as in the former and an Imposture as in this the Lord delivers the dearly beloved of his Soul into the enemies hand though with sufficient restrictions Take him Torturer try him to the bottom and when all comes to all when he is tryed he shall come forth as Gold Job 23.10 And though till his word of deliverance came to his Josephs the word of the Lord tryes them while their feet are hurt with fetters and they be laid in irons Psal 105.18 19. They pass through fire and water yet he brings them into a wealthy place Psal 66.10 11 12. Men and Devils shall know that the Faith Love Zeal Patience Courage Holiness c. wherewith he hath endowed them have that of Truth Virtue and Worth in them as doth undeniably constitute them more excellent than their neighbours and that an excellent Spirit is found in them so as none of these tortures numbred up Rom. 8.35 to the end is able to separate betwixt them and their love to God and uprightness with and before him 3. Sometimes the Lord doth by these Tortures take occasion to heighten the honour of his own Power Arm and Influence which are day by day administered to bear up his children when it is manifest they have no external props to stay them up but are out of weakness made strong This brings out a more evident acknowledgement That the power of Christ rests upon them 2 Cor. 12.9 God is in them of a truth 1 Cor. 14.25 It s true as long as times and providences hold to keep off pains from the body chains from the legs stripes from the back famine from the belly other props and principles may be presumed to bear one up but when there is no fruit in the Vine no flock in the Field no herd in the Stall none shut up nor left yet then to rejoyce in the Lord to glory in tribulation to accompt it all joy to fall into divers of them and they great ones this is convincing that such are kept and kept up by the mighty Power of God underneath such must needs be everlasting arms What convictions came upon the two great Monarchs by the great support the three Worthies and Daniel ch 3. and ch 6. had from the Lord to yield their bodies to torment The former because they would not joyn with false worship the other because he would not cease practising the true they gave glory to the God of heaven and upon all occasions confess that an excellent Spirit was found in them 4. Sometimes the Lord brings about this end by it he hereby brings forth a more plain and naked discovery of the wickedness that is in the world through lust Many times men come in upon Dominions and the exercise of Power and Authority with most plausible insinuations protestations and declarations of their design and temper as if no other than the disposition of Lambs were in them whereon they raise a name and repute of benefactors Luke 22.25 or merciful Lords and reckon it no small part of their interest and business to raise and maintain in the spirits of people the supposition of some indelible marks of the nature and majesty of a Deity is stamped upon them and sutably to get a reverence of them as most sacred when many times to open and undeceive the minds of poor souls held in such blind devotion the Lord lets them alone and exposes the bodies of his dearest ones to their cruelty that no man may glory in men above what is written but that coming to a plain discovery of men and things in their own evidence as Psal 36.2 the sons of men as well as the children of God may breath after the Lords arising to rule the earth and become the Governor among the Nations Thus we see for high ends and unto glorious advantage some are tortured The Second Enquiry put is Why but some men would be gratified and if God be so honoured why not all tortured A few Reasons may be considered here also 1. There are but some tortured because God is pleased to accompt but some worthy to bear and wear the glory of being thus used for his Name-sake There are some of whom the Lord saith They shall walk with me in white for they are worthy Who are counted worthy to walk in white Why they who are come out of great tribulations and have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the lamb Rev. 7.14 Though there be some points of honour of which it may be said this honour have all the Saints Psal 149.9 yet it holds not true in this that we speak of they who had the first stripes for the Name of Christ rejoyced that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his Name Acts 5.41 They have marks of distinguishing favour who bear in their body the marks of the Lord Jesus Gal. 6.17 Alwayes carrying about in their body the dying of the Lord Jesus that the Life of Jesus may so much the more be magnified and manifested in their mortal flesh 2 Cor. 4.10 11. 2. All are not tortured because the Lord sees all of his Servants have not power to bear such tryals as all men have not faith so all good men have not the like strong faith though they may have the like precious Faith Their Faith may carry them to Heaven who yet may not have that degree and strength of Faith to carry them through Tortures to heaven not that they who have most have any thing to boast of above others as being better than they the differance
harm to bring him down from his excellency But he still stands on ground and fights with instruments that are invisible and invincible such Births the Red Dragon watcheth to devour casts his floods after raiseth war against upon this foot of account They keep the Commandments of God and the Faith of Jesus Upon this foundation also he exasperates all his crew acted by the spirit of this world who are enforced to gnaw their tongues for pain that in all their on-sets from generation to generation they could never come at nor quell that spring and root of action and suffering whereby they have been so perpetually baffled and all their costly and promising attempts been brought to nought Hence all their consultations and endeavours resolve themselves into this issue To rid the world of them who by a constant steady testimony of their drawing vertue as Olive-trees from the God of the whole earth being here in torments to them that dwell upon the earth 2. We may consider Faith in its Profession or the Profession of our Faith that is to say not only as it inwardly unites a soul to Christ whereby he draws forth consolations and aids to do so wonderfully on Gods behalf But also as it engages a believer to stand forth in the face of the World to testifie against it that its deeds are evil bearing witness to the Holiness and Faithfulness of God in opposition to the stream of the lusts of men Thus it contracts rage to the utmost Joh. 7.7 Me it hateth because I testifie of it that the works thereof are evil When the whole demeanour of a Christian both in point of Worship and Conversation is kept on so as not to be tempted to fall down before the Idolatry on one hand or fall in with the debauchery on the other which is proposed under Countenance or imposed by Law The world cannot bear the words of such a people Amos 7.10 c. Can the abomination of a people be offered up before their eyes and will not that Nation stone them Exod. 8.26 In this matter the Disciple is not priviledged above his Lord Joh. 15.18 19. The world will hate such a people as it hated him for witnessing against their ignorance and superstition Ye worship ye know not what we know what we worship Joh. 4.22 Ye are too superstitious whom ye ignorantly worship him we declare to you Acts 17.22 23. This is enough to get the world in an uproar This is said above Rev. 11.10 to torment them that dwell on the earth these two Prophets that have no other weapons but the Blood of the Lamb and the Word of their Testimony the Testimony of Jesus which is the Spirit of Prophecy and in this Message and under this Anointing witnessing though in sack-cloth against the evils that are in the world through lust lighting them as Gods Candlesticks the way to heaven this torments men of earth No wonder then that they torment you why your conversations testimony profession of your Faith torments them Christ came not to send peace in the earth but a sword Mat. 10.34 but a fire and what if it be already kindled Luke 12.49 Is Christ delighted with such contention nothing less But these are the consequences of the lusts of men irritated occasionally by the faithful rebukes of the Gospel of Christ and a practical profession of the Faith thereof in such as embrace and obey it A word or two of Practical Improvement and I shall leave this Point Use 1. If Faith both in the Possession and Profession of it be apt to draw the rage of the world in the extremity of it upon you this speaks the reasonableness of this Exhortation that you give diligence to it that the Faith any of you profess be Faith unfeigned 2 Tim. 1.5 Since I say Oh ye professed Believers your Faith in God and faithfulness to God is that which you must expect will enrage the world against you I beseech you satisfie not your selves with any Faith short of such as will carry all the world in a way of victory before it I have thought that at this day there is no man so miserable as a professor of Faith which is not right and real he will contract the worlds rage anger and displeasure because he professeth some Faith and he incurrs the Lords anger and displeasure because he but professeth because he hath not true Faith Faith unfeigned Interest in former dayes led some to profess at an high rate and their credit engageth them now not to fetch their turns too short upon it but the worlds rage chargeth them so hot in the rear that they cannot hold it but are forced in by open Apostacy to dash themselves against the thick Bosses of his Buckler Use 2. As it concerns you that your Faith be unfeigned so the like reason and necessity ariseth from the Promises that your Faith be unmixed in your present contest with the world that is that they may have nothing to charge you with but your single Faith and such things as are the proper off-spring of it and of faithfulness to God upon it It was the admirable advantage Daniel had against the greatest Council that day in the world Dan. 6.4 5. They could find no occasion against him forasmuch as he was faithful unless they could find it against him in the Law of his God The like had David against the envious and evil eye of Saul that God was with him and helped him in all his affairs wisely and faithfully 1 Sam. 18.12 14 15 28 29 30. There was no occasion administred to them that sought occasion The contrary whereunto is very detrimental to you when they that pursue you have ground for that charge Jer. 50.7 We offend not because they have sinned against the Lord the habitation of Justice even God the hope of their Fathers See the Spirits strict caution against this 1 Pet. 2.20 What Glory is it if when ye are buffeted for your faults you take it patiently see ch 4.15 Oh it will be your blessedness that they who pursue you though they will not do it perhaps without a colour yet they may do it without a cause may have nought to charge you with than that which when their vizor of Rhetorical eloquence and invective malice is stript from it resolves its self in a sober gracious eye into this it is for their being true to Jesus Christ their Faith in him their subjection to him their adhering to his Cause Name Works Institutions Such a bottom will render you at length more than a Conqueror Use 3. Take heed how you admit a Parley with those Reasonings which tend to prejudice you against believing to make you think hardly at least to think slightly of Faith in that it involveth you in so many dangers and perplexities Satan lies at a Bay to possess you with offence especially in such dayes as this Christ tells you These things have I spoken that you
look after strength of faith 2. Be exhorted such of you as find that good work of Faith with any power in your souls that you do not let it lye by you as a Talent in a Napkin or as the Sword behind the Ephod since there is none to it to make you valiant to do exploits Oh! be much in this work of drawing it forth upon constant quick and lively exercise as namely 1. Improve your Faith against your Fears It hath a soveraign and excellent vertue that way in the experiences of all the Saints As perfect Love casteth out Fear so doth perfect Faith indeed it is Faith working by Love only doth it What time I am afraid I will trust in thee In the Lord I have put my trust I will not fear what man can do unto me Have Faith upon its principallity of exercise when the sloods of ungodly men are apt to make afraid 2. Improve your Faith against all your offences and murmurings that you meet withal in your souls occasioned and multiplied by the stumbling-blocks of the day Proper Doctrines cannot be preached proper Duties cannot be practised proper Truths cannot be professed but Satan raiserh up multitudes of Objections against them of which this usually beareth the mastery Spare thy self they resolve themselves into this usually as their bearing reason The fear of man In such a time how needful is that Character to be found Great peace have they that love thy Law and Nothing shall offend them Psa 119.165 When tribulation and persecution for the Word cometh how by and by men are offended Mat. 13.21 It was one great part of Christ's care at parting with his Disciples that they should not be offended at mens putting them out of the Synagogues and thinking they do God good service in killing them John 16.1 2. When John was in prison it is not easie to answer the questions nor to remove the offences that arise upon it Whether Christ be the Christ or no But blessed is he saith Christ that is not offended in me Mat. 11.6 Oh! improve your Faith against these stumbling offences 3. Improve your Faith unto a full conquest of the World and the things that are therein respecting all the afrightments and allurements of it as it presents and presseth you with its objects of love and fear Oh! in such staggering times the dirt that clogs the feet of a Believer the thick clay that either in act or desire he is busied to load himself withal is extreamly detrimental to taking streight steps to your feet How easily did the present evil World draw Demas Judas and divers others to a betraying denying deserting their high profession The victory that overcomes this you have heard is your Faith 4. Improve your Faith against all the filthiness of the flesh and of the spirit let such as name the Name of the Lord Jesus depart from iniquity a little sin will destroy a great deal of valour whereas holiness carried on towards its perfection in the fear of God will yield encreases of strength and security against the worst that man can do unto you for who is he can harm you if you be followers of that which is good Holiness will secure you from harm They who torture you if they cannot defile you cannot destroy you they may kill you but cannot hurt you you shall not be hurt of the second death And in as much as you are frequently shewed what power Faith improved hath to promote holiness the Lord make you faithful herein Thus far hath been spoken to set forth the excellent and admirable nature of believing considered in its encounters with and conquest over torments It remains that we now take into view its vertue and excellency as it conflicts with and gets success against another adversary no less difficult to be attempted than tortures be no less apt to over-come and that is the tempting tenders of Deliverance And herein is the greatness of the atchievment that the Faith which enabled them to bear tortures without grudging enabled them to refuse the tenders of deliverance without complying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Redemptionem notat addita praeposito insinuare videtur perfectam redemptionem Leigh Cr. Sac◠They accepted not Deliverance The word we read Deliverance denoteth in the proper signification of it full Deliverance Deliverance very compleat and is here applyed to signifie such a deliverance as did not only consist in a meer relaxation of the torment as supposing them to be upon the Rack in such a case when the sinews begin to snap and the joynts to sever one from another if nothing more were offered in the deliverance but meerly to let down the rack and take off the creature from the extremity of torment though that may for a time seem to gain upon a meer man yet such may the case be that such deliverance may be worse than death its self You reade in Rev. 9.5 6. of a torment in which men shall seek death and shall not find it and shall desire to die and it shall flee from them Implying that such may be the torment on a poor creature as that to be killed out-right is better than to be spared Knock me in the head rather than let me live thus in Torture But the deliverance here is full deliverance a being reduced to a state of ease rest and quiet together with any other accommodations that can be desired to compleat it All this will I give thee Credit Trade Preferment Applause and what not They accepted it not They did not give it friendly entertainment such as one would shew to a stranger when he hath been long absent They were at such a pitch of raisedness that they would give such deliverance deliverance on such terms not any friendly welcome or entertainment that other men perhaps would gladly do they could not salute it bid it God speed could be in no fellowship with it That they might obtain The word doth not signifie any expectation that they had or could have of dealing with the hope of the Resurrection upon the terms of strict merit As if there were any equality or proportion betwixt their enduring tortures and their receiving the Resurrection nay when they have done all left all suffered all they are unprofitable servants but only thus in thus standing under torments thus withstanding deliverance upon unworthy terms they were in the Lord's path of expecting the comfortable foretastes now and assurances of a further glory A better Resurrection Paul pressed hard to obtain the Resurrection from the dead Phil. 3.11 which is not only a Resurrection of the dead both of the just and unjust but that which is called the first Resurrection Rev. 20.6 for the dead in Christ shall rise first 1 Thes 4.16 They which are Christs at his coming 1 Cor. 15.23 For them that sleep in Christ shall God bring with him This is called the Better Resurrection not only better than their torments but
let go thy integrity and the remembrance and experience he hath how many strong men have fallen this way encourageth and emboldens him to deal frequently this way As we see those instruments of his did with Jeremiah ch 20.10 All my familiers watch for my halting peradventure he will be inticed and we shall prevaile against him and take our revenge on him Sampson had a great spirit and by plain force could not be subdued but a Dalilah is prevalent to ensnare him David shall have Michal given him to Wife but in design that she may be a snare to him 1 Sam. 18.21 There being no Inchantment against Jacob nor Divination against Israel Balaam the Son of Beor gives counsel to take Israel in a way that had more of Efficacy to divide betwixt them and their God than could be expected from Balacks fighting them or Balaams cursing them Micah 6.5 Numb 25.1 2 3. Every man is tempted when he is drawn aside of his own lust and inticed c. James 1.14 15. By these wayes is a poor soul overcome and brought into bondage frequently when open violence will do but little harm on him Now the attempts of the enemy in such a season when the poor man is in the fear or feeling of Torture are carried on one of these Two wayes 1. Sometimes so gross is the Design so apparent is the Project to debase and debauch as every eye may see it and he that runs may reade it and consequently so as the common reason of men not only may detect it but offer relief against it when Violence springeth up into a Rod of wickedness it is usually thus and then the escape and conquest is more easily obtained the very principles of humanity guiding a man in his choice and refusal In vain saith Solomon Prov. 1.17 is the Net spread in the sight of any Bird. When the Project lies so open as Reason and Morality dictate and assist against it it s not then so properly attributed to Faith to do it But 2. Satan's Project is many times carried on very covertly and lies hid and concealed under many very specious shews and pretences the danger of standing out the reasonableness of yielding and complying are ready to be disputed with much demonstration Now when really the case is thus and the snares of Satan are thus couched and latent the soul is only preserved by the meer grace of God and Faith comes to be magnified in the glory of its operation for short of that while Faith is not upon its quick exercise the soul is lyable ere ever it is aware to be taken and carried away his reason lyable to captivity and the abundance of these Cavils may divide the man within himself against himself To be in a capacity of resolving all these Doubts and answering or at least stilling silencing all these Objections on the side of Truth This speaks the victory of Faith and proclaims the man a Believer indeed Of this there is a very pregnant Instance in this Chapter in the case of Moses vers 24 25 26. The deliberations of his mind are exprest in acts of Chusing Refusing Esteeming all which were imployed in weighing a case very like this of which the Text treateth He refused Deliverance and Preferment with all the Accommodations imaginable and imbraced Afflictions Reproaches Sufferings not as out of direct necessity but as of choice upon terms that must necessarily expose him to the common Censure of Observers We may weigh and accommodate to our use some Circumstances in that affair He refused to be called the Son of Pharaohs Daughter It s supposed and most probable Pharaohs Daughter was Heiress to the Crown of Egypt and having no Children would have adopted Moses as her Son to entitle him to the Succession of the Crown of Egypt or at least to advance him to an high capacity of Honour and Dominion in that Court Now all this he refuseth not only dis-esteems but denies to touch with it and this not on a fit or in a heat as a youthful frollick for the Spirit notes it to be when he was come to years And Acts 7.22 23. He was learned in all the Wisdom of the Egyptians mighty in words and in deeds and when he was full 40 years it came into his heart c. All which shews him to have been both as to his Age and the ripeness of his Understanding every way capable of putting forth acts of mature and deliberate Consideration especially in a matter of such moment to him Well thus capacitated he Refuseth that and it not meerly to exchange for a retired contemplative way of living wherein he might more desireably accommodate his noble genius by being sequested from the noise sensualities of the Court But He chuseth to suffer Afflictions with the people of God their state at this time was very terrible in the Iron furnace where he could expect at best nothing but lash and labour both which must needs be the more irksome for that he had not been bred or accustomed to them but he stands fixed in his choice as upon an estimate of things on all hands in which he concludes he had the better bargain Esteeming the Reproach of Christ greater treasure than the riches of Egypt c. It might be easie to represent to our selves what abundant Reason according to flesh and blood would stand up against this choice of his Would not Sence have said Never make this Choice you will never be able to endure the Brick-kilne the cruel Task-masters the hard fare of Onions and Garlick who have been bred so delicately fed so deliciously clad so honourably Would not Policy have said Never make this Choice it will savour of a design That you intend to grow popular among an heady mutinous Nation you purpose to take your advantage to rebel against the King to shake off the yoke of Servitude you are known at Court and will be eyed and incur the wroth of the King above any man in Egypt Keep your station meddle not with Changes now the eyes and expectation of all begin to be fixed on you Would not Parents and Friends have said Make not this Choice you will utterly over-throw our fortunes to which you may now be probably in a capacity to raise us in this your act you will involve us under the same cloud and common hardship and suffering with your self and to be made miserable by the hand that we expect advancement by is a double misery Would not Israel the best and wisest of them say Oh! whatever you do make not that Choice Now you are in a fair probability to do us good in a publick capacity You may be Pharaoh and then may let Israel go at least you may be another Joseph a Second in the Kingdom and in that capacity may obtain if not a rescinding yet a relaxing of the rigour of the Laws that bind our burdens so insufferably upon us that cut off
as a man not to serve Christ or do any thing for thy God as a Christian man 3 If thou art violently restrained by them the sin of any omission of Duty and Service lies at their door and to their peril be it when the King shall demand the reason of thy want of service but when thou acceptest of those terms thou becamest accessary with them art in conjunction with them it s thy sin as much if not more than theirs they think they do God good service 4 If thou art only bound by the hands of Violence the Lord looks on thee and reckons thee as his free man free in Spirit thou reservest the dominion of that for God Thou livest not dyest not as a Fool dieth but as a man falleth before wicked men 2 Sam. 3.33 34. Object Now there is little opportunity to do the Lord any such service but if ever an opportunity present I hope to be as ready as another may not such obligations be enervated repented of and a soul disobliged from them Answ It hath been and is still the crying sin of this day and of the years past That persons have thought it a very small matter to make and break these kind of Engagements according as interest presents them with an opportunity the iniquity and provocation whereof I shall only attempt to open in one Scripture Ezek. 17.12 13 to vers 20. where God expostulates the case with the rebellious House of Judah They and the King of Babylon make a Covenant and there is for ratification of it the Oath of God added The King of Babylons design was to make the Kingdom base that it might not lift up its self and in this exigency they make a Covenant The question is put Whether their taking an opportunity to shake off this yoke and break this Covenant might not be succeeded with prosperity This consequence the Lord disclaims with the highest indignation and that because of the Oath of God the quarrel and controversie of that Oath and Covenant should be required severely at the hands of such a treacherous people If thy hand have been lifted up in Truth Righteousness and Judgement already then take care how thou retract that and to whom thou lift it up the second time lest it prove a double provocation 5. If I cannot come at the good of Deliverance but I must intrench upon the Name Honour and Glory of God which he hath lifted up in the World I may not touch with that Deliverance There are some wayes and works of God wherein he hath more immediately and eminently in some generations concerned his Name than in others or than ever it was before God went to make him a Name of Greatness and Terribleness by Redeeming Israel out of Egypt and driving the Nations out of Canaan 1 Chron. 17.21 Isa 63.12 14. Sâ— by bringing Judah out of Babylon and will do by bringing his Sion from under Antichrist Toward the later whereof he hath made very glorious advances in our dayes and we have sung his praise in them so as it may be said of his Holy People at this day as of Israel of old Deut. 4.32 33 34. And all this he hath done to get himself a glorious Name Our zeal for which and love to which is now brought to tryal whether we will yea or nay deny his Name A faithful adhering to which though by a people that have but little strength is very acceptable to the Lord Rev. 3.8 9 10. And he will do great things for such in times and hours of temptation If therefore God be at this day so tender of his Name as he is that he will not give his glory to another we ought to be upon his side in this design and especially when this Name of his comes to be spoken about all our Deliverances ought to be brought to this test if they may be had with a saving to this Name they are welcome otherwayes they may not be accepted Object But whatsoever we can say was done in our dayes of that kind the Lord now appears plucking it down again leads that strength into captivity gives that glory into the enemies hand bestowes the marks of favour upon the other party who thrive and prosper and being advanced to the capacity we see them we do but follow Providence in joyning there Answ 1. The best of thy plea is God is angry with his People hath a great Controversie with them which he pleads with deep and bitter strokes and thou wilt be on his side angry with them too and plead against them In so doing thou mayest be right and safe but I must tell thee thou hast very much reason to take heed both of thy standing and frame of spirit lest his indignation take place on thee for being out of thy place the Lord is very jealous against such as offer their service to be the executioners of his rebukes upon his heritage Zech. 1.15 Psal 69.26 Isa 47.6 that was a sore word Obadiah vers 11. For thy violence against thy Brother shame shall cover thee in the day that thou stoodest on the Other side thou shouldest not have looked on the day of thy Brother c. The Lord takes special notice on what side men stand when he is dealing with his own Children for their folly 2 Moreover the Lord's rebuke is not against his People for their Principle and testimony but for their unsutableness to that Testimony and Principle of theirs which they professed And now he is come in the way of this tryal to see whether we will cleave to him with our whole heart and with our whole soul what remnant they be who will cleave to him in principles of Righteousness of Holiness of Purity of Godliness of Gospel-worship of an Heavenly Conversation and underneath the feet of these subject their interest of Ease Rest Liberty Estates Limbs Lives his Voice is therefore now in this respect who is upon the Lord's side Psal 94.16 Here it s an exceeding mercy indeed to have obtained mercy to be faithful not to deny his Name whatever it costs 6. Deliverance is then to be dreaded not accepted when I cannot come at the good of Deliverance without giving just occasion of stumbling to many to fall and of grief and affliction to the bonds of many that stand Precious in the sight of the Lord are the lives and souls of the poorest Saints and ought to be tender to us that we do nothing whereby they be stumbled offended or made weak much less destroyed for whom Christ died Asaphs first conviction of his extravagancy Psal 73.15 was if he should speak thus he should offend against the generation of Gods Children As he was tender so the Lord is very jealous of this Ezek. 13.22 how the heart of the Righteous be made sad whom God hath not made sad and the hands of the wicked strengthned that they should not return from their wicked way c. I confess
said when against this is objected the Presentness of the Worlds offer you shall have Deliverance presently Liberty presently Ease presently and will you tarry till Dooms-day for a Resurrection The conquest of this objection must needs bespeak the great power of Faith in the present choice Thirdly Now consider we the actings of Faith in its interposition to turn the scale upon the single proffer of the Resurrection and for the sake of it to slight the terror nay to imbrace the sentence of a Gibbet a Stake a Rack an Ax an Halter a Transportation into Exile surely we may conclude a man hath need deal upon notable principles that is thus furnished Now Faith helps by being the evidence of things that are not seen as 1. By annihilating and rendring very empty and vain all those things that can be offered in competition with the Resurrection 2. By realizing and rendering very substantial and precious all those things that are promised in and accompany the Resurrection Briefly thus First A discovery is made by believing of the invalidity to an Heavenly mind and its divine reasonings of all that can possibly be offered by the Tempter or his Torturers to debauch Consider them either 1 in their single nature as they all are subjected through the fall to vanity How many have this Deliverance and are cursed with it crost with it blasted in it unable to keep it oâ— comfort themselves under it Take Deliverance alone and what is it A Crust for a Dog saith Luther of the Turkish Empire a feast too empty to satisfie an immortal soul Wilt thou set thy eyes on that which is not The whole Book of Ecclesiastes practically opened is the effect of believing in a gracious heart Vanity of Vanities saith the Preacher and so saith the Believer Vanity of Vanities all is vanity 2 Consider we them in conjunction with the sin that buys them by means whereof they receive the denomination of the pleasures of sin And then whereas in the former respect they were at best but vanity in this they are vexation of spirit an evil sickness wherein many thrust themselves through with many sorrows drown themselves in ruine and perdition and in this sence to be avoided and fled from as from a Serpent 3 Consider we them in their competition with Jesus Christ and as frequently they stand in opposition to him and then they are very pernitious must be hated Luke 14.26 else we cannot be his Disciples Secondly Faith makes a discovery of the Resurruction and gives satisfactory evidence about it as that which hath weight to bear down all contrary objections the way it takes is not to fill the imagination with speculatory Notions but to put it out of doubt and quiet it in receiving the Testimony God hath given by his Son therein And particularly 1 it gives evidence of a very full and satisfactory repairation of all those breaches that all these tortures and sufferings could make upon their concerns therein They mentioned Heb. 13.34 took joyfully the spoiling of their Goods knowing in themselves they have in Heaven a better and an induring substance Whatever Losses they sustained in Stock or otherwise it interrupted not their joy they took it joyfully the Resurrection will pay for all The like is true of the marks of the Lord Jesus they now bear about in their bodies now indeed they are the badges of loss and infamy but he accounts it is better to enter into Life blind and maimed than to adventure Hell by saving them At the Resurrection of the Just our vile bodies shall be made like unto the glorious body of our Lord. In point of the perfection of them we know not what we shall be only this we know That when he appeareth we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is 2 As it evidenceth a repair of losses thus sustained so it ascertaineth a most abundant recompence not of Debt but of Grace when they that suffer with him shall receive the Crown of Life for shame they shall receive double and for confusion they shall rejoyce in their portion When this shall be remembred Ye are they who have continued with me in my Temptations and I appoint unto you a Kingdom as my Father hath appointed unto me Luk. 22.28 29. When for whatever hath been lost or forsaken of his kind there shall not only be made good the lundred-fold-promised Mat. 19.29 in Peace â—oy and Consolation in Tribulation but in that World to come Life everlasting I shall draw the whole to a Conclusion in these Two or Three Inferences of Duty 1. If all this and a great deal more that might be said hold true touching the worth as well as the truth of the Resurrection Then would I beseech you that you do not sell the Doctrine of it for a Song do not be so easily baffled as many be out of the Faith and expectation of it by a few Allegorical Notions and plausible evasions of those Scripture-Testimonies that give evidence to this Truth in which is wrapt up so much of your standing Consolation when ever you are called by any manner of death to put off your Tabernacle that your flesh also shall rest in Hope and your vile body be changed into the likeness of Christ's glorious body Whatever natural corruption weakness dishonour it be sown in yet it shall be raised spiritual in incorruption power glory and be ever with the Lord. 2. Be intreated to give your selves more unto a search and study of that blessed truth that concerns your Resurrection and the glory that shall follow and be not ye easily startled and offended at it by reason of the miscarriages of some who have been Assertours of it and been too forward to vent their rash Conceptions touching divers things about it You know the blessedness pronounced on them who reade and hear the things contained in that Book which most professedly opens the Mysteries thereof yielded in the Vision and and Revelation of it such standing Consolation unto John to whom it was made known and is a Doctrine of unspeakable strength and encouragement to the Lord's suffering banished tortured ones as many in this day have found it 3. Draw forth the Improvement of your acknowledged conceptions and expectations of that day in a way of Consolation rejoycing in Hope and pressing after the Light Faith Spirit and Power of it making sure of your right to and proper qualifications for that day Blessed and Holy are they that have a part in this first Resurrection especially improve it as I said to Consolation in all the losses you have sustained or are like to This may seem one amongst others to you that a poor worm that speaks is to part at present with you and it may be may see your face in the flesh no more doth this seem any way grievous why let us carry the case in our thoughts beyond the Grave in a path of faithfulness the Resurrection will
bring us together again and make amends for all the loss herein sustained Then we shall be ever with the Lord in that triumph of which the stranger cannot intermeddle with the Joy Comfort one another with these words and the God of all Consolation be with you Amen FINIS THE EMBALMING OF A Dead Cause OR Christ's kind acceptance of sincere though weak attempts to preserve a sweet savour upon his Concerns in the World under those many deaths he is pleased to draw on them until their promised Resurrection Heb. 12.22 But ye are come to Mount Sion and unto the City of the Living God the Heavenly Jerusalem and to an innumerable company of Angels Gen. 50.26 So Joseph died being an hundred and ten years old and they embalmed him and he was put in a Coffin in Egypt Isa 26.19 Thy dead men shall live together with my dead body shall they arise Awake and sing ye that dwell in dust for thy dew is as the dew of herbs and the Earth shall cast out the dead Job 14.14 If a man die shall he live again All the dayes of my appointed time will I wait till my change come Printed in the Year 1668. THE EMBALMING OF A DEAD CAUSE Mark 14.8 She hath done what she could she is come aforehand to anoint my Body to the burying THese words are part of Christs own Vindication of and Apology for a very acceptable work of an Holy Woman which nevertheless through their great mistake came under a very severe censure at the hands of the very Disciples of Christ themselves Mat. 26.6 who taking knowledge only of so much therein as occured to their sense and carnal reason admitted thereby not a little disquiet on their own spirits they had indignation vers 4. they murmured vers 5. and reflected much trouble upon hers vers 6. Even such high-raised and Heavenly actions of Saints as have the most choicest esteem and acceptance with the Lord may yet meet with very undue representations and procure very strange reflections from the hands of others truly dear to Christ It should therefore be no greater strange thing to us to be judged by mans judgement it s well we stand or fall to another Master But so well was the integrity of her spirit and the noble principles and springs of this action known to Christ and approved by him that himself undertakes her defence when perhaps her trouble at their hard measure might stop her own mouth and appears to plead her cause not only so far as to give a present check to their rash conclusion and a testimony to the goodness and acceptableness of her work but withal takes order by an unalterable appointment for perpetuating the praise thereof vers 9. That where ever the Gospel of Grace should be Preached throughout the world this that she had done should be declared for a Memorial of her Christians under cloudy censures lose nothing at last by leaving their censured selves and actings to be vindicated by the Lord to whom their integrity is known and their cause committed Micah 7.9 10. Where ever the Doctrine of the Grace of Christ should be proclaimed this should be produced as a lively instance pattern and example to illustrate and confirm the power and prevalency thereof in that it is of power to beget on so contemptible a weak vessel as this poor Woman was such exceeding largeness nobility and ingenuity of spirit as was beyond what the gallantest principles or endeavours of meer Man could arrive unto and yet when the memorial hereof was to be mentioned when the Gospel should be Preached either to Nations abroad or Generations to come the principal intendment was not meerly to affix a mark of honour upon this individual person or this single act for her very name is hid both here vers 3 and in Mat. 26.6 7. but to commend and advance the value of the principles and motives she went upon to the encouragement and admonition of us and others upon whom the ends of the World are come 1 Cor. 10.11 Rom. 15.4 I purpose not to mention or stay upon the profitable deductions and inferences that would commend themselves from the coherence of the words or matter round about them intending but a present brief Comment on them In the words first read we have a double Character of her noble spirit set forth First In the extent of her act She hath done what she could Secondly In the intent of it She is come aforehand to anoint my body c. She hath done what shâ— could The word doth not meerly signifie that she had stretched her self to the utmost bounds of her estate and ability that way to purchase so costly a confection as this was for the greatness of the cost manifested it self to their offence and it could no way mitigate their disquiet to tell them how much she had expended in that respect but hereby I understand Christ would have them know that a certain raisedness and greatness of spirit had acted her to the utmost beyond the ordinary sphere of Beleevers to devise and practise liberal notable things so that she was not capable of being restrained and circumscribed within a narrow compass she did what she could for she could not but do what she did She is come afore-hand to anoint By what impulse or instinct of spirit or with what distinct and evidence her understanding was assisted to receive the Doctrine of and to make provision for the Funeral of her Lord is not expresly mentioned This is evident that the Disciples generally were very dark nay averse to notions of this kind their expectations being very earthly carnal of being advanced with him to some external Pomp and Glory which his Death and Burial so suddenly was inconsistent with by reason of their weakness and readiness to be offended wherein the Lord was very tender of propounding the Doctrine and distilling the Notions of his Death among them whilst he was with them John 16.4 And what he delivered of this kind was hardly regarded or remembred till afterward John 2.22 12.16 Luke 24.8 But this good Woman had early impressions made upon her heart of this blessed Truth Shâ—â—as afore-hand not only with the dispensation it self but also with the most forward of the Disciples themselves expecting it and preparing for it To anoint my Body to the burying This was the manner of the Jewes to bury John 19.40 especially where a reverend and honourable estimation or singular affection were to be expressed What might be extraordinary in her eye will hereafter be spoken to only towards the drawing this act of hers into a way of improvement for common use it may not be amiss to consider the body of Christ not only litterally as was immediately intended in her act but in a figurative acceptation as other Scriptures may help and warrant to consider it and our concerns about it Thus sometimes by the Body of Christ is intended his Church
and People considered in their capacity of conflicting with many deaths and dangers wherein they need and depend upon him for aid and influence as their Head 1 Cor. 12.27 Colos 1.18 24. Eph. 1.23 The Body of Christ may also be applied to signifie sometimes the whole Oeconomy or administrations of the concerns of Christ in the World for the peculiar good of his Church especially with respect to the Institutions of the Gospel according as the Legal Institutions Ordinances and Administrations of Moses are called the body of Moses Jude vers 9. compared with Zech. 3.2 where the contest was about the restitution of the Ordinances of the Lord according to the Mosaical Institution after the captivity I say as the administrations of the Law are called the body of Moses about which Satan had a contest then so may by just analogy the Institutions of the Gospel be called the body of Christ against which Satan hath not only many conflicts with them that are anointed and honoured to be a Royal Priesthood but in the infinite Wisdom of God and for the bringing about and perfecting of his designs with greater glory he hath designed manifest deaths and burials thereunto that his Resurrection-Power may be the more fully manifested Hos 6.12 Isa 26.19 Rev. 11 9 10 11. Unto this his Body mystically and figuratively considered there being such promises of a Resurrection there is also a spiritual embalming to be performed to it compleat to the capacities of the Lords dear Children all essayes and offers hereunto in such â—argeness of heart and preventing forwardness as was found in this Handmaid have a very singular resentment and acceptance with the Lord as shall hereafter be shewed the which I hope may be treated of and applied to our case without stretching the Metaphor beyond the bounds of Scripture allowance or digressing from the Spirits intendment concerning us in this place The words thus opened afford us this Observation Doct. That the Lord highly prizeth all vigorous attempts of his weakest Children to preserve a sweet savour on the concerns of Jesus Christ when they are exposed to death and burial All Nations where the Gospel comes must expresly take notice for a pattern to all that shall believe what a value and estemation Christ had of and an apology for a censured act of a glorious soul laid out early and nobly upon what concerned him when under a sentence of death and burial by the wise appointment of God though to be executed by the hands of wicked men so that if it might not be preserved from rage and scorn yet should from stench and an evil savour as much as lay in her till its hoped-for Resurrection should set it above either what she could do for it or the enemies against it may we therefore in our capacities learn that lesson Go and do likewise Luke 10.37 In handling this Point I shall not confine my self to any other method than will offer it self in considering this lively instance and pattern to Believers in the Text what was the peculiar excellency of her act indiscernable to good men that were standers by and wherein the acceptableness lay and thence by way of proportion where the cogent reason and influence of it lyes respecting us at this day First Then we may consider the inward springs and motives of her action that lay hid from ordinary observation upon which her spirit was raised and her endeavours extended to this degree mentioned in the Text. Secondly We may consider the effect of these lively and ennobling principles manifesting its self in the dimentions of her activity or how it was said of her She did what she could Thirdly The business or affair it self about which she was conversant a very thankless office in the thoughts of those that were lookers on though they were the Disciples of Christ and men honourable in many other respects above her Fourthly The estimation and acceptance that it finds with Christ notwithstanding the hard measure and severe censures at the hands of men I shall only speak of all these in her so as is immediately applicable to our own case as we go along First As for the first of these namely The hidden principles and springs of motion that were open to the Eyes of Christ with whom she had to do though mistaken and miss-judged by those spectators Not to enlarge in that variety as the matter will bear there are these two that offer themselves by Christs discovery to our view and learning as being needful indeed to all generous and noble actions that are wrought 1. There lay at the bottom of her act a lively faith strong and operative in this very matter not only in receiving the discoveries of the death and burial of her Lord whereunto the Disciples were so generally unacquainted but also the assurance of his speedy Resurrection not only in the hints that himself had given of it but also from the testimony that the Spirit had long since born Psa 16.10 that he should not see corruption in the grave his early witness whereunto we have John 2.19 speaking of the Temple of his body vers 20. he saith Destroy this Temple and in three dayes I will raise it up again Till he was risen from the dead this was not understood or at least not regarded and remembred vers 22. by the Disciples only such and so great apprehensive and active was the Faith of this good Woman that she receives the Doctrine of the Death and Burial and quick Resurrection from the Grave of her dear Lord and accordingly put her self to this great Cost to signifie her complyance with the Promise that he should be buried but not subjected to that corruption and putrefaction that attends that state and condition of all others We reade of the same Mary Joh. 11.2 in conjunction with her Sister Martha that when they were concerned in the burial of their Brother Lazarus though there was no want but rather a superabundance of love to him living and dying Christ loved him Joh. 11.35 36. The Disciples loved him for they could be content to go and die with him vers 16. His Sisters loved him to some excess vers 31. and yet because they had no expectation of his Resurrection till the general Resurrection vers 24. they yielded him up to corruption Joh. 17.13 14. so that when he had been dead four dayes they concluded by this time he stinketh vers 39. plainly shewing that having not any faith or fore-sight of his return to life again so speedily they were at no cost to embalm or perfume him against the stench of the Grave but touching him whom God would raise up from the Grave not to see corruption wherein he transcended David who wrote that Psalm who having served his generation by the Will of God fell asleep was laid to his Fathers and saw corruption Acts 13.34 to the 37. Acts 2.24 to the 32. So true and strong was her Faith
herein that she deals not with him as with Lazarus but afore-hand anoints him and after he was in the Grave again prepares another Confection of choice Embalm to perfect what might be lacking in the former Luke 23.56 Mark 16.1 by which we may perceive that Faith and such as was not found in Israel ordinarily lay at the bottom and contributed aid and influence to all these great acts and to this particularly wherein she did what she could for Christ In just proportion hereunto and on the same reason is there need of Faith unfeigned even Faith of the operation of God to ingage souls to shew the like respect to the dying Cause Interest and Concernments of Jesus Christ Other men and they also good men in the main generally give it over when such distress and dying pangs come on it till Christ come in the clouds of Glory especially where the grounds of their carnal and creaturely expectations of its revival do perish and fail none have such engagements on them to lay out themselves in preparing proper imbalm for it of which mention is made hereafter but they who have upon Gospel and unmixed principles an insight into and a fore-sight of the design of God to give it an effectual reviving and Resurrection The Faith then of this Resurrection is the needful principle to enlarge souls in such a case to do what they can for Christ's sake 2dly There was also in the bottom of this famous censured act of hers fervent love in its lively operation which is a large and defusive principle actuating souls upon very noble and unparallel'd exploits its power and tendency to do so commends its self in that ample character and description the Apostle gives of it 1 Cor. 13. throughout We have a very particular account of this principle brought forth to evidence by our Lord himself in an act of like cost and signification in the beginning of her way of following Jesus Christ Luk. 7.47 she there v. 37. brings an Alabaster box of Oyntment and with it anoints his feet having as the chap. shews washed them with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head This perfume though it filled the house with its odour yet was little understood in its spring and principle by them that sate by but Jesus discovers it vers 47. Much was forgiven her therefore she loved much there was much love in her soul on work and hence she layes out her self much upon her Lord the love of Christ constrains her and this though it was to work so early yet was not soon expended but rather increased more and more neither was it clouded or abated by the expectation of an approaching death and funeral but herein also puts out its self doth what it could towards his burial Love makes her follow Christ not only in life but in death also at his death to see the utmost of him and do the utmost for him compare Luke 23.27 28 55 56. chap. 24.1 Joh. 19.25 chap. 20.1 Mark 15.40 41 47. you may perceive how Love led them from place to place where Hazard might seem to way-lay them and how unsatisfied they were with what others did tending this way It was not the fine linnen Joseph of Arimathea bought it was not the newness of the Sepulchre hewed out of a Rock in which never man lay but fitted it seems for himself Mat. 27.59 60. nay it was not the costly bed of Spices that Nicodemas laid him in John 19.29 40. could satisfie them but there must be more Spices bought to this end Mat. 16.1 Love is strong as Death all the substance of a mans house will be contemned in the pursuit of it Cant. 8.6 7. In like manner will it be where a soul or people have from the love of Christ shed abroad in their hearts a sutable reflexion on the things of Christ they being so apprehensive of and enamoured with the unalterable beauty of them as these deaths and burials they meet withal do not alter the complexion of them or abate of that dear love and streaming affection to them where it dieth they will die and there will they be buried nothing but death nay death it self will not be able to separate 'twixt it and them Ruth 1.16 17. their own lives will not be dear to them for its sake Phil. 2.30 Acts 15.26 chap. 20.24 Rev. 12.11 Secondly But let us proceed to consider the Effect of these noble and innobling Principles of Faith and Love in this affait in the Text and also in the like on the Children of God at this day where the work of Faith and Love with Power are produced this commends it self in the extent of such acts as are performed she did what she could the commendable latitude of her spirit and endeavour is a qualification well worthy a little enquiry When may a soul be said to have done what he could This and the like expressions when they are applyed to set forth the Lords acceptance of a souls inlarged endeavours after or for himself do not signifie such a perfection of intention or act as denotes perfection which is not capable of increase or addition The choicest Saints in their highest services and attainments this way have found cause to cry out when they have done all that they could at the best rate yet they are unprofitable servants Luke 17.20 here is no place for Pride boasting is excluded by the Law of Faith Rom. 3.27 The expression it self however applied here to the commendation of this good Woman yet implies some degrees of imperfection and supposes the act in some respects to be short of absolute compleatness As for Instance 1. First Though she did and a Christian in his highest endeavours may have done what he could yet may it be very short of having done what he should there lies a very vast disproportion most times betwixt the perfection of the Law and the utmost attainments of our act such as may hide pride from us The Law of the Lord is perfect Psal 19.7 The Law is holy and the Commandment holy just and good Rom 7 12. The Law is spiritual vers 14. Indeed the Holy God who is perfection it self can require nothing less than perfection for sutable converse with himself Mat. 5.48 Now between this perfect rule and our imperfect act what proportion can there be I am carnal sold under sin our unspeakable mercy lies in the new and living way of Gods own appointing to present our selves and services without spot and without blemish to himself not through the works of Righteousness that we have wrought but according to his own mercy and grace whereby he makes us accepted in the Beloved 2. Secondly Though she did and a Christian may be said to do what he could yet may there be and many times there is a great shortness of doing what he would as there is a disproportion betwixt the Act and Law of which a poor Saint often
complains So is there betwixt his heart and hand or as Christ tenderly excuseth it in his Disciples betwixt a Spirit that is willing and the Flesh that is weak Mat. 26.41 This is that the Apostle in the person of a poor Child of God complains Gal. 5.17 We cannot do the things we would And Rom. 7.15 to the 21. he finds a Law that when he would do good evil is present Here now is a Christians case and the comfort concerning his act when in all his apprehended shortness he finds a true gracious principle that delights in the Law of God and presseth after a perfect union with and a similitude to it groaning under and conflicting to his utmost with the contradictions of his infirm self where this is indeed and in truth obvious to the searching eye of Christ he puts that blessed construction on it as to his Disciples the Spirit indeed is willing c. and the Spirit testifieth 2 Cor. 8.12 That if there be first a willing mind it is accepted according to what a man hath and not according to what he hath not We serve not an hard Master that requires impossibilities or expects beyond what he hath inabled for He was judged a wicked and slothful Servant who had formed up that dreadful apprehension of a severe and cruel Master that reaped where he did not sow and gathered where he did not straw Mat. 25.24 26. We have a very choice character of the disposition of the Lord toward the off-spring of a willing mind Mark 12.42 to the end a Widow cast into the treasury two mites that make a farthing a very small and inconsiderable thing for the bulk of it but being the product of a noble mind and being extended to all that ever she had she had done all what she could and this hath more acceptable entertainment and high commendation than the many rich who cast in much of their abundance they might have comparatively to her narrow spirits though they had larger Pursses Hence was the commendation of the Churches of Macedonia 2 Cor. 8.2 3. The deep poverty was matched with abounding riches of liberality and then to their power and beyond their power they were willing of their own selevs and that was on this principle vers 5. First they gave their own selves to the Lord and to us by the will of God Souls yielded up to the Lord are the only generous spirits The greatness of Davids joy 1 Chron. 29.14 17 18. was not so much for the greatness of the gift but the willingness and uprightness of the heart his own and others that drew them out to do what they could for the House of God But a little more particularly to attempt the resolution of this enquiry When a soul may be said to do what he can for Christ 1. First We only then do what we can when our spirits are bending and pressing toward an abundance and increase of act according as we find the concernments of Christ about which we are conversant requires or needs it when as we see the distress of it increase there grows upon us daily the care of these concerns as we see the dayes are evil wicked men worse and worse and good men faint and weary we then lay about us What excellent thing do we can we do what do we more than others It s the guise of many Professors when they see Christs things go to the Wall as we say then to study Prudence and Wisdom things good in themselves and in their place but what do they signifie here but a meer politick contrivance how to preserve themselves by an abatement of their zeal a temperament and qualification of the height and strickness of their Profession the disposition of such tends this way they will do as little as they can for Christ They hope they may be saved if they meet not so often nor so publick nor so many as formerly until at length their prudence will be to leave Christ alone and repair to and care for their own things Nay it will be well if it turn not them aside to their crooked wayes where God hath threatned to lead them forth with the workers of iniquity Oh! where are those stirrings of spirit when we see a City a Nation wholly given to Idolatry ingageing the more publick frequent and fervent appearing on Gods behalf Acts 17.16 That would have entred into the Theatre had he been suffered Acts 19.13 31. That when the Decree is signed of death without mercy yet will keep on not only Moral but Instituted Worship to the utmost as aforetime Dan. 6.10 Rashness is not here pleaded for but a zeal of God according to knowledge and an holy fervency of spirit serving the Lord rejoycing in Hope patient in Tribulation continuing instant in Prayer not forsaking the assembling our selves though the manner of some be so but exhort one another daily while it is day provoking to Love and good Works and that so much the more as we see the dayes be evil and that day approacheth 2. Secondly We then do what we can when we make it our care and business to get our spirits and frames in all we do raised on more noble principles than formerly Gospel-principles are not revealed to us or improved by us to their height at first The Righteousness of God is revealed from Faith to Faith Rom. 1.17 Who walk by it from strength to strength Psal 84.7 And are changed from glory to Glory 2 Cor. 3.18 They that rest in and trust to former Attainments and Experiences will find them short of furnishing for new services of Sufferings We have need in these thorny and rocky paths to have our shoos of iron and brass and as the day is so should our strength be Deut. 33.25 We have need not only to prefer that request Lord help our unbelief but also Lord increase our Faith 3. Thirdly We do what we can then when we improve our utmost interest in others Saints and Sinners do ingage them to do what they can for Christ when the distress is publick and extended to others generally it should not satisfie our spirits to narrow up our care and endeavour within the compass of our own things It was a sad complaint All seek their own Phil. 2.21 Ye shall be scattered every one to his own Joh. 16.32 This good Woman in the Text doth not satisfie her self to make preparation for the embalming her dear Lord but she is still found accompanying and ingaging others with her Luke 23.55 56. chap. 24.10 Our forwardness and zeal as was theirs of Macedonia which provoked very many 2 Cor. 9.2 Alas we are debtors to others both Saints and Sinners Rom. 1.14 15. And we should do as much as lies in us to get them engaged to Christ as debtors to him chap. 8.12 Oh! did the worth and need of souls press more upon us we should not be so private spirited as we seem to be in
of the heart in that which is not corruptible 1 Pet. 3.4 In this also it is significant that the external cost and detriment that such vigorous attempts may bring upon us ought not to be drawn into the reckoning as worthy to be named or counted dear to our selves so we may bring him Honour bear up his Name serve our Generation finish our Testimony and hereby raise him a sweet savour in the midst of an adulterous age where we are brought forth The debate and resolution between two generous spirits David and Araunah about offering up a sweet savour to the Lord is very teaching 2 Sam. 24.24 I will surely buy it of thee for a price neither will I offer burnt offerings unto the Lord my God of that which doth cost me nothing Such as profess a perswasion of the necessity toward this confection of a rich access of the precious things of Heaven such as precious Bloud 1 Pet. 1.19 of a precious Christ 1 Pet. 2.7 apprehended by precious Faith 2 Pet. 1.1 through precious Promises vers 4. in a precious Word 1 Sam. 3.1 answering to those precious things of Heaven c. Deut. 33.13 to 16. Such I say as acknowledge a necessity of these are much overseen to stick at and stand upon things of a lower value such as Father Mother Wife Children Brethren Sisters own Life Luke 14.26 to 33. Mat. 10.37 38 39. Mark 10.28 29 30. as though they were too costly or precious to be laid down upon this honourable account if the Lord have need of them 3dly The Oyntment she brought is in this respect teaching to us That the Application of it was very Manifest Liberal and Diffusive She did not only open pierce and give some vent to it sparingly and gradually but brake the Box pouring it out upon his head It bespeaks the business performed with such good will so throughly and effectually as intended neither secresie nor reservation as his head and all his other parts were filled with the Oyntment answering that Scripture Psal 133.2 so was the whole house intentionally filled with odour of it John 12.3 Christ is principally honoured with our affairs of this kind when we appear most openly and communicatively in sending forth the savour and shewing forth the vertues of him that hath called us out of darkness into his marvellous Light 1 Pet. 2.9 The excellency of this composition is best discerned in its contest with and conquest over opposition then smelling most when censured crushed bruised most holding forth the Word of Life as Lights in the World Phil. 2.15 16. to make all men see what is the fellowship of the Mystery Eph. 3.9 We only then answer the ends and expectation of Christ now pressed after when though in censuring perilous dayes we do in our several places and capacities do what we can by a publick Testimony bear witness to every Truth and Vertue of his and such especially as are most eminently striven against by the wickedness of the dayes and places we live in We come now to speak to the special Ingredients of the Confection which is only competent to preserve a sweet savour to Christ's dying Interest about which for the encouragement and direction of the meanest Saint to do what they can this must be considered That all of them that are a sweet savour unto God they are the Spices and Powders of the Merchants Cant. 6.1 Mark 16.1 brought from far and to be bought at Gospel-prices Rev. 3.18 I counsel thee to buy of me c. That which is of our own growth Phil. 3.8 9. begged or borrowed Mat. 25.9 will not serve the turn This though very precious yet they that have a mind to trade in it may have great penyworths Isa 55.1 2 3. Nor is it the less acceptable to the Lord or thank-worthy that they bring it with this acknowledgement 1 Chron. 29.14 15 16. What am I and what is this people that we should be able to offer so willingly For all things come of thee and of thine own have we given thee all this store that we have prepared cometh of thy hand and all is thine own Moreover this should be an encouragement to the poorest weakest Believer That though spiritual gifts of deep knowledge and utterance may do much towards the raising and repute to a dying cause Yet have the graces of the Spirit shining in the hearts and conversation of a poor Believer an estimation of a greater price in the sight of God and a real and direct tendency to glorifie the Name of God in a standing way when the high and renowned gifts of Prophesie may fail and Tongues cease and Knowledge vanish away 1 Cor. 13. to the end The truth of which we have verified in our dayes and may yet further That the great learned famed men who would be thought the only Bulwarks and Champions for the Truth and Cause have shrunk from it and their Names rot and stunk whilest a few poor despised Saints that own themselves nothing and have no might have yet been preserved to abide with Christ in his temptations and having obtained a little strength do not deny his Name Thus hath it been in all Ages Not many Wise c. But God hath chosen the foolish things c. And I thank thee Father Lord of Heaven and Earth saith Christ that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes even so Father c. But more particularly 1. In all such Confections there is indespensibly necessary A lively Faith of the operation of God without which it is impossible to please him Heb. 11.6 Rom. 14.23 This contributes strength savour and duration to all other ingredients as they say Ambergreese doth to all Perfumes is in the front of all others 2 Pet. 1.5 And though it be precious v. 1. yet must have vertue still diligently added to it By Faith Joseph when he died made mention of the departure of the Children of Israel gave commandment concerning his bones Heb. 11.22 Many are the excellent exploits recorded by Moses performed by Joseph's Faith yet the Spirit singles this one out doubtless for its exemplary eminency to abide upon this Gospel-File that his Faith at dying though the Light of Israel were for the time seemingly put out with him had such a singular regard to the assurance of the Promise of deliverance that on the single evidence thereof he gave commandment touching his bones What Commandment namely the same he had given touching his Fathers bones Gen. 50.2 That they should be embalmed the better to comport and be in fellowship with the design of the Promise in the truth of which he had so much confidence as he was contented his bones should be kept though imbalmed above ground and not reposed to their proper rest till his people also should be brought to rest in the Land of Promise his Faith preferred a Cave in Canaan before a Pyramid in Egypt
words Isa 38. when he had spoken hard words of God not becoming a man of his acquaintance with divine dispensations when he sayes What shall I say he hath spoken and himself hath done it I shall go softly all my years in the bitterness of my soul vers 15. Yet recollects himself vers 16. O Lord by these things men live and in all these things is the life of my spirit so wilt thou recover me and make me to live So I have a word or hint sometimes as if the Lord would say Eat a little and drink a little as if he might have some little further work for me but then old pains and not old clearness again at other seasons making me see and say Oh! how hard a thing is it to keep an even hand with God in his various dispensations So foolish was I and ignorant as that good man once said Psal 37. Sometimes as a man then as a Beast c. but 't is good for me to draw near unto God and to say though he kill me yet I will trust in him But it pleased the Lord though by very undiscernable degrees after keeping his Chamber three quarters of a year to give him a Recovery for some season after which being seized with Sickness which continued to the finishing of his dayes the following being but few of many worthy occasional sayings of his were by the same Friend carefully treasured up Being asked by a Friend Is all well within He answered All 's well there blessed be God my God the high rock of my salvation my soul hath trusted in him and shall not be ashamed His Sister discovering something of impatience at the stroak upon him threatning his dissolution he earnestly reproved her saying Oh! be more a Woman be more a Christian Is this what you told me yesterday Being then asked by a Friend Have you ought to say to us before you leave us He replied O love the Lord all ye his Saints when and wheresoever he calls to follow go after him yea though he kill you yet love him still trust him still One saying to him Yea worthy is the Lamb to receive Glory Honour Obedience and Service from all his Saints He replied He is worthy indeed for he hath redeemed me by his blood blessed be God he is my God he is my God And then said The Lord hath strangely raised me and called me to put on a very high Profession and carried me more strangely through it to this hour though it may seem to be but a poor thing in its self considered yet the Lord hath had a care of such a poor worm and hath not left me shamefully to forsake him nor hath hitherto forsaken me and blessed be my God that hath brought me into bonds for his Names sake in this day this honour have not all his Saints though they be a People near unto him but Oh! the crowning Mercy is this that I can behold my Father's face with joy and can say in some measure I have finished the work thou gavest me to do and now holy Father I come to thee I have heretofore given some account of my self to you as you may remember as to those remarkable Passages of my Life both as a Christian a Minister a Sufferer This last I am now come to put a Seal to as they have been Sufferings for Christ's Cause an◠Kingdom as God hath given him to be Head over al things to the Church which is his Body and indeed 〈◊〉 he hath appointed me sufferings for his Names sake so I must say to his praise he hath so far restraine◠mens wrath as he hath made Enemies to be at peac◠with me and friendly to me this I would comment to you my dear Friends as an Argument for ever to trust in God There is also some thing I have been under from his own hand that hath been with great pain upon me as you have been Witnesses and my sorrows here have been oft-times greater than my groanings and this last hath been well nigh oversetting at some seasons insomuch as I thought it was impossible to have born the torments laid on my poor flesh but now I see nothing is too hard for God sometimes to lay on his own Children or for his Power to bear them up under His Sister tells him You spend your self in speaking He answers Let me speak that I may be refreshed It is refreshing to me to speak of what God hath made sweet to me Then he calls for a little Julip to drink a Friend sayes to him It will be hut a little while and you will thirst no more He replyes Ah blessed are they that eat Bread in the Kingdom of our Lord and drink Wines there he will lead them by Rivers and Fountains of Living waters where they shall thirst no more and he will wipe away all tears from their eyes His Sister desired to know how he was satisfied as to his coming hither she having been the occasion as she judged of his coming from Exon to Plymouth and consequently of his coming hither He answered Very well satisfied all have been steps of divine ordering I would not have come from Exon might I have had my own will I would not have stayed in Plymouth after I had Preached once but God would have me stay I would not have come to this place after my time of suffering was out in the Town-Hall at Plymouth if I might have had my own will but God would bring me hither and blessed be the Lord that let me not have my own will blessed be God that brought me here and blest me here with desirable Company and Mercies concerning which we have had occasions and seasons to speak well of God together yea since I have been brought here and sick here yet the steps of God have been in great wisdom with me and the bottom of them all paved with Love in the main of his goings in these dark and heavy stroakes I say in the main of them they have been attended with peace to my soul I have had Old Wine or New afforded still sometimes he hath said the Old is better and hath made ancient experiences of his Love sweet to me yet not alwayes alike clear sometimes he hath seen good to cut short within and without and this last tryal to deal plainly came on in somewhat a cloud at its entrance I was somewhat stupid thinking no more in it than ordinary but I was at last awakened by the Lord to think that this might be a long and close tryal and though he let me see the Anchor dropt within the Vail yet had I not that freshness of Evidence till within a few dayes last past when he called up my Spirit to a close search in a Night or two though I said but little of it but he graciously issued that matter in a token for good that whether I live or die I hope I shall wear to
gives Power to the faint and our strength is in the Name of the Lord that made Heaven and Earth who doth and will do much by Babes wherefore say not I am a Babe a Child c. but rather say Here am I send me that God who was Jacob's God who fed and led him all his life long he hath been and is the God of the Seed of Jacob to this day that hath led us thus far also through a vast howling Wilderness and sustained us and not suffered us to deny his Name Oh this God is our God let him be our guide even unto death The Fathers that were before us alas what were they and the Prophets do they live for ever no they were weak as we and died as must we but when the Lord had work for them to do he gave Anointing for it and then they could say they were full of Might and Power by the Spirit of the Lord to shew Israel their transgression and the House of Jacob their sin So we through Christ can do all things he strengthning us Look then to the Lord that gave the former rain and will give the latter also in its season according to his Power And my dear Brother Be not discouraged your work seems cutting short also day by day by many things though what you may live to see or suffer I know not neither do I know how meet it may be to mind you of a motion I made to you about two years since on the like occasion about remembring the poor Flock I have travelled and laboured amongst if God cast your lot in these parts but hoping you will mind what may be your Duty in this matter I shall say no more but the Will of the Lord be done be of good courage and God shall strengthen your hearts His Sister was troubled seeing him so weak which occasioned him to say Oh! be ashamed Sister of such a demeanor cannot you let a poor Believer go to Heaven Oh! did you but stand on the threshold and see what preparations God hath made for such a poor worm as I am you would never be afraid of Death more Oh! honour Christ much I think he is coming near to honour me though I know not yet that my Sentence is come out from him yet I speak not as if I had hankering thoughts to stay Oh! when shall I see the day We shall sing at parting and not mourn as now blessed be God for ever that he hath not let the Righteous to be ashamed nor Wicked men to triumph over them for my sake Ah! did they know what God hath pardoned in me they might be apt to triumph more than now they can If there seems any importunity from any Friends for any thing to be mentioned of me when I am gone speak moderately of me I beseech you but if any thing hath been seen in me worth learning let it be offered with much humility or rather I think let my Works praise me in the Gate but I limit not His Sister asked Will you drink Yea Sister saith he Have you any of the best spiced Wine He then grew faint and could speak no more at that time Afterwards being asked how he did He said All his bones were as it were out of joynt And added God hath reserved this Proof of my Ministry viz. in much painfulness until these few years last past having been little acquainted with Sickness before He then asked If it were day A Friend answered The night was far spent the day was at hand even a morning without clouds to which you seem hastening To which he replied Yes as a very clear shining after rain Being asked a while after How he did He with his eyes lifted up answered Nevertheless I am still with him he holds my soul in life will guide me by his Counsel and afterward receive me up to Glory A Friend that dwelt upon the place coming to him and speaking Religiously He replied There was much talk of Religion in the World but few had attained to acquaintance with the powerful inward part of it and then minded that much of the power of Religion indeed was comprehended in that word Phil. 1.21 For me to live is Christ not only to live on or to Christ but to live Christ in all we speak or act is a high work Lord let my soul saith he into the sight and joy of it yet more and more The same person enquiring of him How it was with him in this hour He said Blessed be God he hath washed away my sins and spoke peace to my soul and thereby obliged me to follow him while I live and much more to go to him when I die Then said O Father shall I not now go hence but return into a world of so many snares and dangers again And further tells the Person aforesaid That he was very sensible of great respects received from her and her Relation And said For a full recompence to you all I desire when ever you come to such an hour as I am now approaching to you may meet with the same Comforts that through Grace I now find A Brother coming from far a day or two after to visit him being brought in suddenly upon him seemed a little displeased saying His Spirit was not now able to bear any sudden thing without over-setting That Brother asking him how he did He answered Never better in my life But adds Think it not to be passion or words of distraction for though I am very weak in body yet God is very near to me He also then said to a Friend sitting by on the occasion of turning in his bed by reason of weariness Ah! this is not our rest it is polluted but there remains a rest to the People of the Lord and his rest shall be glorious After this he had a day or two that seemed to be hopeful to his Recovery in which season little was said to him or by him being desirous to let his spirits rest from exercise in order thereunto if so were the Will of the Lord. But his Pains returning and a Friend asking how he did He answered It had been a night of exercise to him inward and outward To which it was answered That exercises were appointed by the Lord both for body and spirit but how are you sustained under them To which he answered I am graciously born up still and kept in peace under all Being asked if he had yet any hint how the Lord might do with him as to this dispensation he was now under as to life or death He replied He had nothing in that matter he could call divine teaching but by laying all circumstances within his view in the present case together he thought he must go hence at which poor flesh was ready to shrink and murmur It was answered That must and would do so while in its present being it naturally seeking self-preservation and avoyding and shrinking at
that which threatens its destruction and it must needs be irksom to it to be following God in wayes it knows not whence they come or whither they lead but yet notwithstanding it must be brought down for a corn of Wheat cast into the ground is not quickned except it die and so in this case precedent to the quickning that is to be brought out on the proper subjects of it Death in one respect or other must be brought on upon all fleshly glory and excellency even in its perfection Whereunto he replied Yes it must so for unless it die it remains alone and cannot be brought out in its glorious state of the manifestation of the sons of God but by cracking the shell of this earthly tabernacle and so coming out to it A Friend coming to have felt his Pulse He said I have not askt your observations in my case it may be thought possibly it might adde some impressions of hopes or fears if I should know what it is The Friend replied His Observations in such cases vere not very material to acquaint him with but saith the Friend What are your own Observations in the case He answered His Hope was on high yet Flesh he found hankering in his Musings at some seasons suggesting there was much desirable work to do some of one sort some of another at this and the other place making him ready to desire to stay and loth to be gone but when looking up and considering the state of things then he is made to say to his soul Oh! haste away to thy Mountain And Oh! that I had wings as a Dove then would I flee away and be at rest I would not live alwayes and am ready to say sometimes as he Take me away for thou knowest my dayes that they are vanity But Oh! I am much more cumbred on the other hand with crying How long Lord And sometimes am ready to wish an end which way ever it be by recovery or death To which it was told him That argued him a man Yes said he a poor man It was told him again All our Poverty Weakness and Unworthiness in the day approaching shall but make matter for a song the more to the praise of rich Grace and Mercy in the Lord 's remembring us in our low estate because his Mercy endureth for ever On the same day in the afternoon a Friend asking him how he did He answered Coveting to overcome referring to a word had been spoken that day in the Family from Rev. 2.26 of which one had given him some account It was replied to him That was a good work and good in it to be eying him that had overcome by whom only we can be helpt to overcome He replied Yes to be able to say I have fought a good fight I have kept the Faith is a great word and work And further said He had had his reflections and he thought some injections also that day of his neglects of service for the Lord that he might better have improved in times past though in the main the Testimony I have born to Christ in my day is a quieting comforting Consideration through the blood of Christ though not the bottoming Consideration on which my peace is built yet 't is of great use in a secondary sort at such a season and I mention it to you that you may do much suffer much shrink not nor neglect no work for God it will be no grief of heart to any that have spent and been spent for God his Name and Interest for dayes to come Being verâ— ill and in the apprehensions of those about him like to leave them he was asked Had he any further word to them or any of the Lord's People before he left them To which he answered I have spoken to you and them already the whole Counsel of God according to what I have received and was under no temptation to keep back any thing through fraud I cannot now speak much and if I could unless the great Remembrancer set home with Power and Efficacy what is spoken upon our minds and spirits it will signifie but little and to add many words would be but a vanity but for you and them and all Saints I pray that you may abide with God and never be ashamed or tempted with fear or cowardize or unbecoming complyances with base Earthly Worldly Interests to let go your holdfast on any Truth you have professed as Truth is in Jesus I have delivered to that poor Church I appertain unto the Doctrine of a Free Gospel of Grace wherein a foundation is laid in the blood of Jesus of Peace with God through him and they also have witâ— hands lift up to the most High professedly accepted 〈◊〉 that Grace tendred to them and I being I think about to leave Earth and to go to my Father and give 〈◊〉 account of my Stewardship therein I do go in fâ—â— assurance that it is the true Grace of God wherein they stand and I do lay it before them with the utmost ability such a poor worm as I can do that they be not by Doctrine Word nor Spirit soon shaken from their stedfastness hither or thither for life or salvation but as they have been taught He farther said I also have been engaged in a witness to the Royal Soveraignty of Christ in his Institutions against the Inventions of men opposed thereunto which Testimony hath been born up against blindness and ignorance in a poor dark world that lies in ignorance and wickedness and their Testimony in fellowship with this of mine hath flourisht in former dayes under those more promising propitious Prospects we were then encompest and encouraged with it had then by them and others Hosanna's ascribed to it but since God hath seen good to try this Testimony and Spirits of such as profess it with a day of adversity that many looked not for and they have hereby been tempted basely and unworthily to throw away the Shield as if it never had been anointed the thoughts whereof hath many times almost broken my heart in pieces But let all such know I go away in this firm perswasion as to the things we have together professed as aforesaid that they are the true sayings of God and that such as in this hour of temptation have deserted their Profession of â—hem God will meet with all such if he love them to â—waken and recover them from such paths and postures â—f back-sliding or else to make them know to their â—hame and confusion of face that they have dealt disâ—onourably with Christ and his Concerns and dangerâ—usly with their own souls which I desire they may â—nd Mercy to repent unfeignedly of before it be too â—ate I have been also concerned in a Testimony with divers Churches as to a work God hath had on the wheel among us in our dayes very mysterious in many parts of it there have also many tryals been upon it and to try it and to
great Owner and Fraughter beyond their own Lives determine to stem the storm and press toward the Port unto which they are bound in the face of all difficulties and of these few Alas How rare is it that two keep in company with intents to strengthen and help each other as they can I need not make the Application particularly to spiritual things the day we live in gives sad evidence of the Truth of all these Instances and now the case being thus how desireable should it be to such who in disposition desire and endeavour are pressing forward to meet with good Neighbours who may keep company and yield if need be advice supply or assistance till we all come to drop Anchor within the Vale whither the Forerunner is for us entered If in this providential coming-up with one another it might be of any encouragement or advantage to you I could at large acquaint you That by the Grace of God I am what I am who have great occasion to exalt wonderful loving kindness that hath helped hitherto so as after five year imprisonment in more than five Prisons and in this last year above nine months sickness with divers tryals of Faith and Patience I have never yet seen the least reason I praise Christ my Lord never been under an hours temptation to relinquish or repent of my Testimony in Word or Deed to any one persecuted Truth of Christ for which I suffer and though my present lot be in a place where the salt sharp Air is manifestly ruinous to my health exposing me more than ever I was in my life to daily distempers and under a Sentence of Primunire and in a readiness on all occasions for threatned Transportation besides other threatning and straitning circumstances yet under all is Christ as precious to my soul as ever and so is his Cause Work and Institutions and faithful Children and every way as worthy of my All as I professed him to be in the greatest fulness or plenty of all things neither durst I for my life balk the least Truth of Jesus which is to be witnessed unto for the obtaining any health liberty or other accommodations whatever nor can I express the constant satisfaction and sometimes consolation that my soul is made to enjoy in following God especially when in my greatest sickness about this time twelve month and at other seasons when I have been ready to step into Eternity Thoughts and Pen cannot set forth the Peace passing understanding wherewith my soul was possessed in respect of the present Truths of Jesus Christ and his heart love to me therein which do to this day abide in their excellency and obligation engaging my soul to love and praise the Lord for his unspeakable gifts of Grace to me herein who have as fearful cowardly unbelieving slothful self-saving a poor heart as I think any poor Christian alive is pestred withal In the mention therefore of this or any part of it I would not be understood to intend the proposing my self to any high Thoughts that should be had of me as if I were better than others or had attained to any praise-worthy or exemplary degree of stedfastnest herein for I have much more to say in way of self-judging humbling and loathing before the Lord but my design in this liberty of speech is to engage you to a like freedom and to give you in part a Character how you may represent me to your self in your addresses before the Lord but principally that hereupon I may take occasion as from experience the more confidently and earnestly to beg you That you would be much in the searching and trying your heart and wayes examining to the bottom if that work have layen neglected as in too many it doth how it stands between the Lord and you in point of union and relation toward each other The dispensations that are over us are come to lay the Ax to the root of every Tree if the root be found to be rottenness the blossoms of an external Profession will go up like the dust Nothing short of true Interest in Jesus Christ laid in real Regeneration and the renewing of the holy Spirit will hold out to the end of this tryal to any purpose forms of Godliness will expose to man's wrath and where there wants the Power of it it will expose to Gods wrath whose fire is in Sion and his furnace in Jerusalem Nor will it suffice that Interest in it self in Christ be safe barely considered unless also Influences from him be obtained and Communion with him be improved unto a daily resignation to him and walking in the beauties of Holiness before him Any sinful shortness neglect abatements losses of this kind are very perilous in such a time as this it 's one to a thousand that is under decayes of this kind and proceeds in a path of it without early sense and repentance but that word is verified Men gather them they easily sink down into an earthly carnal sowre discontented fearful heartless posture of spirit and then are unable to make resistance to any temptation whether to sin or sinking They therefore have of all others the advantage who by the constraints of Faith and Love abide close serious spiritual faithful conscientious with and towards the Lord not slothful in business fervent in Spirit serving the Lord rejoycing in hope patient in tribulation continuing instant in Prayer That you may be found in this attire waiting for the coming of our King is the sincere desire for you of him who would be glad to hear from you and to serve your soul in any thing within the compass of Yours in true respects A. C. To a Friend advising to look well to his steps in some quick turns of Providence An Hiding-place in the Cleft of the Rock till the Indignation be over-past Desired for you Honoured and Beloved WHat a blessing beyond compare is it to be as those living things mentioned Rev. 4.8 Full of Eyes within and before and behind v. 6. Indeed so short are the turns that the Lord takes so mysterious are his works his way in the clouds and paths in the deâ—p waters that we must needs say as he Job 26.14 Lo these are part of his wayes but how little a Portion is heard of him the Thunder of his Power who can understand When I either look back and see what hath the Lord wrought Or forward and think what great things seem to hover over us in Promises The former things are come to pass and new things he doth declare truly I have many tremblings in my self Alas Who shall live when God doth this On what a single foot have I need stand both in point of Hope and Holiness that I may preserve a station undefiled and not be ashamed before him at his coming I was never more fearing my self and others than in this half-work that seems to be in a capacity of being done before us the bottom is
mixtures of this kind which are apt to steal in insensibly upon spirits influenced either with the Fear or Love of Creatures in this staggering and back-sliding hour of temptation wherein men's politick and prudential contrivances to preserve themselves from danger hath abundantly weakned and wasted the Courage if not the Conscience of Testifying Duty It 's of no small advantage I find by blessed experience to be giving daily diligence in observation how nearly and firmly the great Concerns of the Lord's Glory in his Works and Wayes are related to the Lord Jesus in his raised and exalted capacity and how directly the weight of them all rests upon his shoulders who is mighty to bear and with what infinite wisdom and according to what an exact platform of eternal counsel all these seeming Meanders and Laborynths of exteriour transactions are managed according to the integrity of his heart and the skilfulness of his hand who is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working In the Faith and Hope of this the Soul of a Beleever hath gracious invitations and engagement to return to its rest knowing that in quietness and confidence is its strength and are as the secrets of a Presence-Chamber for it till these calamities be over-past and though it look on but cannot interpret signs in Heaven and on the Earth perplexity distress of Nations the Sea and Waves roaring through approaching woe to the Inhabiters of the Earth and of the Sea yet it can acquiesce in the infallible knowledge of that Interpreter one among a thousand who is concerned in all these things engaged by Covenant and resolved in absolute Will to bring about in the best time and way the Ends of his Glory and its blessedness in a most sweet harmony and conjunction This saying to the righteous It shall go well with them and commanding their fluctuating tempestuous souls into a calm is yet very far from inducing them to that carnal security and idleness wherein tyred Professors are apt to wrap and bless themselves concluding we must leave publick things to Providence and retire into a closset-converse with our selves and the Lord things good in themselves but usually abused into the generating of a private selvish narrow frame of Spirit unfit to serve God in our generation by Converting Sinners Edifying Saints or saving themselves from an untoward and adulterous generation by a faithful testimony That the contrary hereunto may be your blessed lot namely largness of Heart like the Sand on the Sea-shore accompanied with cleanness of hand and a Spirit clensed by the Blood and set free by the Spirit of the Gospel is the earnest desire for you of him who is Yours assuredly These Parts yield little only fresh gazing on a new Blazing-Star in the East and divers talks of the beautiful Star in the West few think of the Star of Jacob that bright Morning-Star they who overcome shall have him as a certain fore-runner and prognostick of a Morning without Clouds they must be up early who look to be visited with the comfortable beams of it Even so Amen 1st of the 2d month 65. Another to the like effect Supplies of every good thing from the Shepherd and Stone of Israel Dear Heart IT is in my desire for you that you may obtain the favour of a marked Mourner securing you from approaching Plagues and reserving you for expected Salvation among the Palm-bearing throng who only are competent to learn the new song as one of the One hundred forty four thousand that are redeemed from the Earth And though you are fed with the Bread of Affliction and Waters of Adversity and that also by measure and stealth yet you may not want the satisfactory sight and hearing of a Teacher that may guide you into all Truth as it is in Jesus keeping you upright in this staggering day when so many reel to the right hand and to the left I confess sometimes I have hopeful expectations of seeing some such effect as this oâ— all these slidings some of them of understanding sâ—all fall to try them and to purge and make them white even to the time of the end but yet It is a fearful thing thus to fall into the hands of the Living God My lye that promotes his Glory makes me no whit less a sinner or my doing evil that good may come thereby I think I was hinting to you last time the Caution the Lord hath ministred to me by Prov. 25.26 A righteous man falling down before the wicked is as a troubled fountain and a corrupt spring detrimental and infectious to all that have any thing to do with him The accompt that you give of the Wall of the Daughter of Sion much-like his Neh. 2.13 which was once such an inviting prospect Psal 48.12 13. would engage to that Out-cry Lam. 2.18 19. but that there is hope in her end That her Children shall return though now they are not her dead men shall live together this dead body shall arise A review therefore of her from the munition of Rocks sutable to that Landschip Isa 33.20 c. is becoming the Children of the King but especially hath it been of use to me to feed upon that discovery made of the temper of his heart who is principally interested and concerned in all these mutations He shall not fail nor be discouraged till he have set Judgment in the Earth Isa 42.4 The youths shall faint and grow weary and young-men utterly fail they who stand upon their youthful vigour and greenness may and shall give way but he who hath such engagements with him and for him as vers 5 6. he waits without weariness and expects without impatience till his enemies be made his footstool A fellowship through faith in in his Spirit will furnish to a similitude in his patience to a being armed with the same mind that was in him Rests Yours dearly To a Friend upon the death of a Zealous Faithful and therefore Persecuted Servant of the Lord. Where is the Lord God of Elijah My true Friend IT comes to my lot to take you now by the hand though you may justly and earnestly challenge and expect it from a righter and more instructed heart and hand who being under deep pressures and considering there is a time to be silent especially when put to shame as well as a time to speak is not easily drawn forth to any thing of this nature till he can recover a little strength waited for to comfort others with the same comforts wherewith himself hath been when he hath been comforted himself of the Lord dreading especially under such a dispensation to utter any thing rashly knows that to speak his troubles will add little to the allaying of yours and that as Vinegar upon Nitre will be the singing songs to an heavy heart his own or others wisheth therefore his present silence may have no worse interpretation than the seven dayes silence of Job's Friends who answered him not a word
tryals Use 3. If from the Spirit that is in poor fallen man there be such ill fruits as those mentioned against the image people and heritage of the Lord let us not only prize that grace which hath delivered us from that power principle and interest to which all the former fierce Characters do naturally and necessarily agree But on the other hand be very conversant with the Lord for subduing in us the remains of that spirit that lusteth unto envy even in us and that towards them that persecute us there may be shewed forth our Dove-like innocency in pressing toward that Gospel-qualification of praying for them Mat. 5.44 45. Rom. 12.17 to the end 1 Pet. 3.9 and doing them good for all the evil they do to us that we may shew our selves to be the Children of another Father living in another principle and referring our selves in all the injuries done unto us to another judgment and if the Lord will bless it to that end we may hereby leave a powerful conviction that they hate and persecute us as they did our Lord before us without a cause I proceed to take some other Observations from the words Others were tortured Some were tryed otherwayes others this way some were tortured not all all are exercised some way or other every man's work must be tryed Whosoever will live godly in Christ Jesus must suffer persecution 2 Tim. 3.12 He chasteneth every son whom he receiveth Heb. 12.6 Whomsoever he loves he rebukes and chasteneth Rev. 3.19 But though every man must be tryed it is not appointed that they must all be this way tryed tryed by fire and water tryed by tortures Some were tortured where I note Doct. 2. That though the Lord hath provided tryals for all his Children yet he hath designed tortures but to some of them Thus Christ expresseth himself to his Disciples Some of you they shall put to death Luk. 21.16 The Devil shall cast some of you into prison Rev. 2.10 All Saints are some way tryed they be but some Saints are alwayes tryed All men are born to sorrows Job 5.7 yet but of some it is properly said they are men of sorrows Isa 53.3 Lam. 3.1 Psal 88.15 This is a plain case and obvious to frequent experience Yet because it may be seasonable and useful we may consider it by inquiring into these Two Things 1. Why some are Tortured 2. Why but some are Tortured For the former We now respect tortures as they are more immediately under the disposal and ordering of the Lord appointing more or less in point or measure to more or fewer subjects as it pleaseth him they being such bitter things as afore is described it is enquired Why the Father appoints it to any of his Children To this is answered 1. Negatively not from any love God hath to the Torments or from any lack or abatement of love to his Children he doth not take pleasure to see his precious believing People lie scattered up and down as they are described Psal 141.7 79.2 3. Lam. 4.1 2. as so many marks and monuments of the cruelty and butchery of the sons of men no saith the Psalmist Psal 116.15 Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his Saints he esteems them precious in their lives and puts a value on them in their death It goes as we may speak with reverence near the heart of the Lord to see his Jewels thus dealt withal In all their Afflictions he is afflicted and the Angel of his Presence is with them Isa 63.9 He that toucheth them toucheth the apple of his eye Zech. 2.8 He doth not afflict willingly or grieve the children of men Lam. 3.33 much less the Children of God but rather like as a father pitieth his children so the Lord pittieth them that fear him for he knoweth our frame and considereth that we are but dust Psal 103.13 14. nay he hath testified the greatest displeasure against such as have bin executioners of his rebukes when they have not performed them with pity Zech. 1.15 Isa 47.6 Psal 69.26 27. His Anointed Ones must be very tenderly handled and have no harm done against them Psal 105.14 15. wheresoever they wander Moab hath a charge to do so Isa 16.3 4. and in defect thereof his controversie is dreadful with the Nations Ezek. 25 throughout so chap. 26.2 3. c. 2. But positively and in general thus Though the Lord doth not assign these Tortures these fiery Tryals to his Children for want of love to his or from any delight he hath in such Tortures considered in themselves Yet many times the Lord hath higher and better ends to promote then their deliverance ends that have more of good in them than these Tortures can possibly have of evil and when it is so these dispensations are not only excusable but are to be justified Good is the Word of the Lord. As namely 1. Sometimes in giving his darlings thus to the power of the Dog he designs to bring to light the worth and excellency of some Truths of his which otherwayes would be much obscured if not quite excluded from among the children of men namely such Truths in the vindication of which his children are called and brought forth thus to suffer being wrought to a contentedness rather to endure torments than to let them go When a soul or people having obtained help from God continue witnessing to such Truths whatever it costs them There is reflected this honour upon Truth as was said of it of old Great is Truth and it shall prevail whereas if it should be as it is with the generality of Professors at this day when a Truth comes to be spoken for there is such a shrinking twisting shifting to evade the dint of the Tryal how would the World have too just cause to say What is there in your beloved Truth more than in our beloved Error What is your Profession more than ours your Religion more than ours If there were any excellent thing in it you would do and suffer somewhat excellent and extraordinary for it to take off this stumbling block and occasion therefore from them who seek or desire occasion the Lord is pleased to steel a people to this height We can do nothing against the truth but for the truth 2 Cor. 13.8 And then to shew a proof of Truth in them and the power and goodness thereof he puts them on a tryal proportioned to this design he hath some truth of the Gospel to shew in Paul and then must he be troubled on every side 2 Cor. 4.8 9 10. chap. 6.4 10 11. chap. 11.23 to 29. If the truth of Christ be in him no man shall stop him of his boasting none of these things move him or separate him from the love of God Truth shall be tryed in those vessels of earth though it be by fire seven times and the furnace seven times hotter than aforetime 2. Sometimes the Lord doth by these Tortures assert and
is only in bestowing mercies which are distributed variously even as the Spirit will 1 Cor. 12.11 yet still a proportion of tryal is measured out sutable to their strength 1 Cor. 10.13 for he knows our frames and in measure doth debate with us and as the day is so our strength shall be Deut. 33.25 and even as there are children young men and Fathers in Christ 1 John 2.13 so have these their tryals as they can and that they may be able to bear them 3. All are not tortured because all are not called to be tortured the Lord hath other imployments for some that shall as sufficiently prove their faithfulness and improve their strength as if they had been tortured Some of the Saints may as really honour God in a Meeting as others of them may on a Gibbet every member hath not the same office Rom. 12.4 1 Cor. 12. throughout not the same imployment shall not by the same manner of doing or dying glorifie God John 21.19 God seeks for a man to stand in the gap and make up the hedge Ezek. 22.30 Every man is not looked for in that place of danger it 's good to be where God looks for a man 4. All are not tortured because the Lord will be magnified in distributing the tryals of the body of Christ otherwayes than he did the tryals of their Head its true the tortures that were laid on him were to meet on him alone he was to tread the Wine-press alone and of all the people there was none to help him they that thought they could drink the Cup he was to drink or be baptized with his Baptisme did not understand themselves He looked and there was none to help he wondered there was none to uphold therefore his own Arm brought him help c. But now in the fellowship and similitude of Christs sufferings assigned to the body although there be a compleatness of suffering appointed to the whole of which the Apostle speaks Col. 1.24 and though there be a common spirit of fellowship and simpathy of bearing one anothers burdens through which they are all baptized into one body yet is there distribution made of them into the various parts each member having that assigned him which infinite wisdom sees proper for him so that none may boast against others as if he had no need of them though Paul had laboured and suffered more than all yet he had not suffered all and could not say to the weakest I have no need of thee 5. Lastly All are not tortured because the Lord will roll away the reproach and remove the usual stumbling-block which Satan raiseth up to the turning the weak out of the way of the Lord namely That the enquiring after and profession of Jesus Christ doth indispensibly necessitate and bind over unto all manner of hardships such can never be in reasonable expectation of good day more but must bid adieu to all creature comforts and espouse the quite contrary extremities its true A dying to a denying nay a hating of all our lower comforts is required to be learned in the beginning of their way who will be his Disciples But whether they shall be actually put upon that tryal and really deprived of them is left to be disposed of in the brest and good pleasure of him who knows what part of the wrath of men and suffering of Saints will praise him and the remainder he will restrain the absolute conclusion therefore of stumbling Sinners and discouraging Saints as if their bread would fail and as a Lion he would break all their bones are hence to be expelled as having no just ground to be insisted on as real obstructions to our following the Lord. Tempted Souls are apt to get their spirit quite worn out with a fearful expectation of the most fiery tryals when as it may be the Lord hath appointed no such thing at all for them and in their following on in this way they have met with little or nothing of what they feared A few Practical Inferences here shall close up the Point Vse 1. Is it so that God hath appointed but some to be Tortured not all it then yields some stay against those surprizing amazements that are apt especially in such dayes as these to seize upon the spirits of people who are looking toward Zion with their faces thither-ward most good people are looking upon Penal Laws and Statutes made and making against them if they hold on in such a profession as they have made hitherto of Christ Jesus all must be banished all must be sold as slaves all must be impoverished imprisoned or the like Why then saith a poor creature what shal I do I can never lie in a nasty prison being used to a soft bed fresh air good diet Saith another I shall never endure another clymate to have lash and labour that have been bred up in a Land and State of fulness I can never live if I am forced to such hunger and poverty as the Laws do threaten me Why Soul do not reason thus thou knowest not what supplies of strength the Lord may furnish thee withal if he call thee to such a condition Out of weakness many have been made strong But besides thou shouldst not fret thy self with such an expectation thou knowest not that any part of this shall be thy portion Yes yes will such object I am sure if any man in the town or countrey it will be me such and such have particular enmities to me c. Why yet thou knowest not but the Lord may preserve thee in his way from such rage of men and strife of tongues thou mayst be of them whom God reserves Baruch cryed out Wo is me now for the Lord hath added grief to my sorrow c. Jer. 45.3 perhaps of the heavy and dangerous service he was called upon to go where Jeremiah could not ch 36.5 6. he feared ruine and tortures inevitably yet God had wayes to hide him v. 26. and to give and secure him his life for a prey ch 45.5 Moses had many dreadful objections and discouragements against going upon that thankless difficult hazardous message God sent him on Exod. 3.10 What am I vers 11. they will say what is his Name vers 13. They will not believe me nor hearken to my voice ch 4.1 I am not eloquent of a slow speech and of a slow tongue vers 10. Send by whom thou shouldest send v. 13. All springing from fear of the issues of the undertaking and of the miscarriage in it which when it came to be put in practice there was not one of the feared things occurred in his path though some other tryals did Unbelieving fear of these dreadful consequences of following God is very fruitful in forming Lions in the way as if there were no avoiding of them or no restraint designed by that Arm which setteth bounds to the Sea Hitherto shalt thou go and no further there shall thy proud waves be