Tim 1.6 Heb 1.9 2 Joh 2 2. ungodly sinners and enemies 1 Pet. 3.18 Rom. 3 6 8 10. that whosoever beleeves on him should not perish but have everlasting lift that the Son of God gave himself a ransome for all and tasted death by the grace of God for every one is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world Well then if thou beleevest the testimony of God by his Apostles and surely that is to be credited before what men say then maiest thou see that this appertains to thee if thou beest a man or one of the world then God gave his Son for thee and the Son of God came down from his Father into the world to be a Saviour for thee and died and gave himself a ransome for thee and is the propitiation for thy sins this is thou feest the language of the Scripture and of the testimony that God hath given of his Son that he died for sinners for men for all and there is none but will confesse that it 's meet that we should beleeve Gods saying as that which is in it self undoubtedly true Why then it 's meet that thou believe him in this particular too else thou dealest unrighteously with him and givest him the lie and if thou faiest ah but thou wouldst have some sign or token of the truth of this as concerning thee from him in something to be done by him to thy soul before thou canst or wilt give credit to it and judge it true then dost thou Mâ—tâ—h 12.33 as that adulterous generation which Christ reproveth seeking signes and tokens when God himself witnessed in his word concerning him and if thou shouldst persist in that way thou maist be given up to delusion to beleeve a lie and to be drawn from the truth asserted in the word by lying signs and wonders such as God sometimes orders to those that receive not the love of his truth that they might be preserved and saved by it 2 Thâ—s 1. 〈…〉 〈◊〉 Parath in Râ—n 9. If thou wilt not beleeve Gods word thou art in a dangerous way of miscarrying It 's a good counsel that Erasmus gives in such cases Desine disceptare incipe credere ita citius intelliges Leave off disputing and questioning about Gods word and opposing thy vain reason against it offer up thy reason as * Hoc est juge illud sacrificti vesperâ—â— ii matuâ—â—…um Novi Testamentâ— Vespertinum mortificare rationeâ—â— matutinâ—â— glorificare Deuâ— luâ—h in Gal 3.6 Luther advises as an evening sacrifice let that be mortified in whatsoever it sets it self against the word of God and instead thereof do thou begin to beleeve and give credit to what God saith and so thou shalt soonest come to understand which counsel I the rather commend because it sutes with the word of God it self it agrees with that of James 1.19 Be swift to hear slow to speak slow to wrath ready to listen what God saith in his word of truth but slow to be putting in thy glosses and corrections upon it and slow to wrangle with it or to be offended at what is said therein and so in Isa 7.9 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which Tertullian renders thus Iâ—â—o taamiâ—â— Kâ— lo reamenu Tertul advers Marciod 4 c 32 Nisicredideritis non intelligetis unlesse ye beleeve ye shall not understand God would have us take his word and then he will let us see the truth and faithfullnesse of his word Man is apt to look the wrong way in first desiring to have his reason satisfied before he will beleeve but if thou wouldest prove and experiment the truth and certainty of his word to thy soul and have the profitable understanding of it do thou first receive it and close with it holding it for true and certain and then beleeving it to be true thou wilt judge it but a meet and righteous thing to commit thy soul to him and betrust thy self with him that hath prevented thee with so much goodnesse and declared such love to thee before-hand that thou mightest be perswaded to beleeve in him and that it 's thy great sin and evill that thou art so diffident and distrustfull of him yea in closing with that word of his grace in which he hath testified such love towards thee in Christ Isa 50.2 thou shalt in due season finde and feel the power of God put forth to save thee from distrusting him and so enabling thee with thy heart to beleeve on him so as it shall be imputed unto thee for righteousnesse Christ himself shall be made thy righteousnesse and thou accounted and accepted as righteous in him And now to bring thee again to the businesse where Christ is so received by faith as that the soul depends upon him and he becomes it's righteousnesse and presents him righteous to his father thence he will be operative in the soul too by his Spirit teaching the soul to walk righteously and act forth righteousnesse both to God and man For the faith that so receives Christ is not a bare dead notionall apprehension of a proposition sloating in the brain but such a cordiall closing of the heart with the word of God as that it closeth with loveth prizeth and leaneth on Christ held forth therein and ascendeth up to God by him loving admiring panting after and cleaving to God in him the Spirit of life that is in Christ Jesus working effectually in the soul and filling it with divine and heavenly vertues and operations as to devote it self to God for his great love towards it to expect further good from him to submit unto him c. and so be filled with peace and joy in the manifestation of Gods accepting it and witnesse thereof bearing to it with love and charity to men inward desires of their good and readines really to endeavour it as opportunity is offered as knowing that God would have them to be saved and that what Christ hath in his death and sufferings procured into himself it is free for any to come to him for whosoever will may take freely of the waters of life as also that it is acceptable to God that they should so walk towards others as he hath walked toward them and indeed faith as it gives a sight to the soul of the glorious grace of God so is it a means of the souls being transformed through that glory seen into his similitude to love as he hath loved pity where he shews pity and to delight in that which he delighteth it teacheth us to deny all ungodlines and worldly lusts and to live godly righteously and soberly in this present world to hold forth the word of life and work the works that are acceptable to God and profitable to men not in any thing to injure or wrong them but in all things to seek their commodity as occasion is presented to them that they might glorifie God in the day of
beleeve and close with his sayings that they being intertained Christ himself to whom they bear witnesse and whom they set forth may be beleeved on come to and received into the heart he may be entertained into the fouls affection desire delight confidence c. that so he that is Gods righteousnesse provided for us and given unto us being received and entertained thou mai'st in him be presented righteous to God and filled with the fruits of righteousnesse both toward God and men that so thou having of the spirit of Christ within thee it may lead teach support and comfort thee and in the midst of dangers yea and of death it self fill thee with a lively hope of life and glory Friends do righteously in beleeving the word of God and looking to Christ by faith be not enemies to your selves by heeding lying vanites put not away from you your own mercies run not desperately through a spirit of envy or malice or through worldlinesse pride presumption Atheisme loosenesse into your own destruction What good will you get to your selves in the issue by being wicked by being envious against the Gospel and grace of God by quarrelling against and resisting the truth by scorning contemning hating and reproaching them that out of love and good will preach and hold it forth to you by rejecting the testimony of God and closing with every vain phantasie by which you think your selves strengthened against it whom do you fight against in opposing the word of God is it not against God himself and is it not against your own good Do you not endeavour thereby to pervert your own waies to make his grace and goodnesse questionable as concerning your selves and so put your selves from having the word of God the ground of your faith to fetch the ground of it from some blinde conjectures and good conceits of your selves Oh stand not in your own light neglect not so great salvation as is set before you nor rest in such a notion all profession of truth as leaves the soul destitute of the power of truth such a consent to it and profession of it as yet leaves the soul unrighteous brings it not into Christ nor receives not the power and Spirit of Christ into it Let not love of the world and worldly vanities keep you out either from attending to and receiving truth nor from submitting to and walking out in the power of truth perhaps you are rich some of you and injoy much in the world you can fill and satiate your selves with the profits advantages and delights of it you finde a great deal of satisfaction in your own waies some in coveteousnes others in pride and others in voluptuousnes c. But oh consider the emptinesse and vanity of all these satisfactions will the world and the things thereof last for ever is not God even now powring out whole vials of his wrath upon it and is he not staining the pride of all glory and bringing to contempt all that 's honourable in the earth Is he not marring the form of it and casting bitternesse into all the comforts of the earth and what will your riches profit you if God come to plead with you with sword famine and his sore judgements do you think to bribe his wrath or make an agreement with hell and death do you think that his hand will not finde you out or do you think your riches honours pleasures accomodations in the world will then fill your souls with hope O no beloved these things will then prove more empty vanties you may live as richly and sumptuously and in as great pleasure as the rich man in the Gospel Luk. 16. yea and perhaps to have as honourable a buriall and yet the next news may be that that was his unhappy portion that you are in hell tormented what then will all these things you here set your hearts upon advantage you what will it profit you could you get and enjoy the whole world and to lose your souls in the getting it die like stocks or blocks without God and without Christ and without hope or to die howling out with vexation and despair Alas what good would all his riches and places or great funerall c. have done this gentleman if he had died without faith in God and without the hope of his glory and so before his body had been interred his soul had been in hell Be you willing to follow his steps in owning the truth of God and the grace of God therein declared and in so laying down your selves to the Crosse of Christ and cordially desiring the knowledge and enjoyment of Christ that so your end may be as hopefull as his you may not be afraid of death and faint under it but hope in it and rejoice over it for the righteous man is he that hath hope in his death 3. To conclude let me speak one word to you that do follow after righteousnesse even the righteousnesse of God you that have received the record of God concerning his Son beleeved his love and therethrough are brought to appreach unto him to have good thoughts of him and have cast your souls upon him and set your hope in him what hath been said may be usefull unto you for your encouragement and consolation I shall say this to you my brethren hold fast your integrity follow on yet after righteousnesse Rev. 22.11 be not weary of well doing nor saint in the way he that is righteous let him be righteous still and be that is holy let him be holy still let him continue and increase in holinesse and righteousnesse serving God in them all the daies of his life abide in Christ and in his way attending to the grace of God and submitting thereto to be acted and led thereby to deny all ungodlinesse and worldly lusts Tit. 2.11 12. Heb. 13 1â— 16 and to live soberly righteously and godly in this present world looking diligently that none fail of the grace of God that none be prophane as Esau to sell the hope set before him the birthright given you for a messe of pottage for any worldly carnall transitory vanities take heed of consulting with flesh and bloud lest you be turned aside from the word of God to other doctrines or to be corrupted to worldly waies and evils take heed that the cares of this life and the deceitfullnesse of riches or love of other things in this world do not by little and little steal in upon your spirits to cheak the good seed of the word of God and so to make you content your selves with a barren profession of Christ without power and fruitfullnesse Hold fast your hope and confidence in Christ Heb. 10.35 and hold fast your good conversation according to Christ knowing that your confidence hath a great recompense of reward 1 Cor. 15 18. Gal. 6 7. and your labour shall not be in vain in the Lord in due time ye shall reap if ye faint
rightly fetcheth in all this good to the soul the ground of it being of that pretiousnesse in it self and acceptablenesse with God as doth cause these fruits to spring from it and put an everlastingnesse into them the vertue and goodnesse of the righteousnesse of mans hope in God springs from the goodnesse of the spring and rise of it The Pharisee hoped for great things from God Luk. 18.9 10. as that God would accept him and account him righteous and deal with him as a righteous man ah but his hope was naught because it sprung from a wrong foundation it sprung from his own goodnesse and good performances which he conceived to be the effects of Gods love towards him he knew nothing of love to him in God before his good performances to spring them up in him but he concludes now that God did love him from his good performances God I thank thee that I am not as other men are he thought that he could not have been so good as he was if God had not had speciall and eternall love and favour towards him But the righteous mans hope grows upon another root he first heard of and was perswased of Gods love towards him in the promised seed the gift of Jesus Christ for him while a sinner and ungody and the belief of this Gods love in him brings him in to beleeve in him and hope in him he therefore hopes and expecteth that God will support and carry him through death and bring him to such glorious injoyment of eternall life as hath been mentioned yea to greater glory then can be mentioned because he sees and beleeves that he hath already in Christ prevented him with his love in whom death is abolished life and immortality brought to light sin satisfied for law fulfilled eternall redemption obtained God well pleased that man should have eternall life and to that end hath put it in his Son and put it upon his Son to bestow and give it to every one that leans upon his grace and submits to beleeve on him for it to which end also he sees in the Gospel and in his heart beleeves that God hath given his Son infinite glory power and authority to subdue whatever in the Beleever or without him would hinder him of his glory appointed him judge of quick and dead to forgive and pardon all sins to all that by his goodnesse are brought to him to give them his good Spirit preserve them in trials come again and raise them out of death and make their vile bodies like his own glorious body and in the issue possesse them with himself and of his own glory for the effecting all which in and for him the righteous man judges and beleeves him both able and faithfull in which hope he is confirmed by the experiments of the divine grace calling and quickning him and from this free-grace in Christ which brings the soul to do righteousnesse in beleeving on him and so leads it to the enjoyment of Christ for righteousnesse with God springs up in his most dying condition this hope of the glory and further grace before expressed And so we have done with the explication of those two things propounded and so with the explicatory work about the proposition It remains that we come next to the confirmation of it For confirmation of this point I shall only do these two things 1. Shew that it hath been so with righteous men in former ages such as the Scripture mentions and 2. Shew that this our deceased Friend and Brother as others of this place before him found it so 1. Scripture instances of the cloud of witnesses produced therein prove this to be true That the righteous hath hope in his death It mentions a large catalogue of Worthies that lived and died in faith though they received not the promises I never see the righteous faith David forsaken Psa 37.25 Why then not in death neither God hath given them hope in that too How sweetly sung old Jacob when he breaths forth this confession in the midst of his blessings Gen 49.18 I have waited O Lord for thy salvation So David when in great danger of death many conspiring to take away his life see how his heart then hoped in God I said O Lord thou art my hope my times are in thine hand Psal 31.15.19 And a little before his giving up of the Ghost how sweet are his expressions 2 Sam. 23.3 4 5. These are the last words of David David the son of Jesse said the man that was raised up on high The anointed of the God of Jacob and the sweet Psalmist of Israel said the spirit of the Lord spake by me and his word was in my tongue the God of Israel said the Rock of Israel spake to me He that ruleth over men must be just ruling in fear of God and he shall be as the light of the morning when the sun rises a morning without cloud as the tender grasse springing out of the earth by clear shining after rain Although my house be not so with God yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant ordered in all things and sure for this is all my salvation and all my desire although he make it not to grow Sweet expressions of assured confidence flowing from Gods love in his covenant with him whereof Christ is the Mediator if not rather the summe and contents of it and yet these were the expressions of a dying righteous man Act. 13.3 4. Job 19.25 26 27. What should I mention Job whose voice it was in the midst of distresse I know that my redeemer liveth and he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth and though after my skin worms destroy this body yet in my flesh shall I see God Whom I shall see for myself and mine eyes shall behold and not another though my reins be consumed within me A glorious triumph over death in the midst of deaths 2 Tim 4.8 I shall add no more from Scripture but that of Paul Henceforth is laid up for me a crown of life which God the righteous Judge shall give me All which instances are evident witnesses of this truth That the righteous hath hope in his death To which I might also have added the constant confessions and sweet hopefull expressions of many Martyrs but I passe them over for brevity and so come 2. To this our Friend and Brother decased he was another instance of and witnesse to this truth as all that were eye and ear witnesses of his carriage in his sicknesse will affirm For though he was known and noted to be a man naturally of a timerous and fearfull disposition afraid of dangers yet such the more abundant operation of the grace of God in him in his sicknesse and at his death he was nothing at all afraid of death though the king of terrour nay so far was he from fearing it that it was his desire to be dissolved and to
particular viz. Application with which we shall conclude You hear friends what the Scripture saith Application and you have heard severall instances of the truth of it minde well what ye have heard minde the Scriptures and minde the end of the just ones even such as you have had amongst you The first tels you That the righteous hath hope in his death the other hath experimented and proved it and rejoiced in affliction and death for the hope of the glory which they expected further to be revealed on them Both Scriptures and their experience commend to us these following instructions 1. Take notice of the excellency of righteousnesse and of the condition of a righteous man how good it is to receive by faith the righteousnesse of God and how well it goes with them that so do What is there in all the World to be compared to righteousnesse We may say of it as Solomon of wisdom and indeed it 's a high point of wisdom to do righteously in beleeving Prov. 3 14 15 16 c. The â—â—â—ch and so thereof is better then the merchandise of silver and the gain thereof better then of sine gold She is more precious then rubies yâ—â— all that thou canst desire is not to be compared to her She is a tree of lift to all that take hold of her c. Alas How empty are the riches and honours and pleasures of this world in comparison of righteousnesse they may make a man frolick outwardly in this life and yet not that neither except God give health and power to enjoy them but often times in the midst of that jollity and bravery the heart is sad the conscience torn and broken and alas when death comes and judgement appears at the back of it then what trembling then except the conscience be hardned seared and grown utterly carelesse what terrours and pangs of despair torment it All these things that the world so much prize are but bread that perisheth They may perhaps make us a little glorious to the world but cannot give us peace with nor hope in God Riches deliver not in the day of wrath but righteousnesse this righteousnesse of faith which is accepted with God for righteousnesse and so Christ received and beleeved on delivers from death Prov. 11.4 That will give a man boldnesse in the day of judgement while he knows his Judge is his righteousnesse and will protect him from wrath and vengeance Oh that men did see the worth of righteousnesse the righteousnesse of God surely then they would not trifle so much time and strength and talents away about empty lying vanities they would not so swell with conceits of themselves and look so big for a few muddy riches for a little fading appearing worldly glory they would not be so cheated into a contentednesse with some painted shews of righteousnesse formall devotions so much religion as may serve them to live in credit with men and lull their consciences asleep till they satisfie their earnall earthly desires no certainly they would count all things but losse and dung that they might win Christ and enjoy him for their righteousnesse Well friends however you may pursue after other things and blesse your selves in your enjoyments possessions ease pleasures vanities now yet there will come a day in which all these appearing deceitfull you will wish for righteousnesse you will see then what hath been now shewed you and what the wise man saith viz. That the righteous man is more excellent then his neighbour Prov. 12.26 as he is more excellent in his life because exalted in Christ and inriched with him and his priviledges as also because of his spirit in him conforming him to Christ and putting something of heaven and heavenly vertues into him so will he be found more excellent in his death when his heart shall have hope and rejoicing in God while other mens sink within them or die like stones being without God and without hope to God Oh that now therefore you would take notice of the excellency of righteousnesse above all things in the world that you may not slight it and so want its sweet and satisfactory usefulness when you have most need of it 2. Be we exhorted to follow after righteousnesse Vse 2. to imbrace the righteousnesse of faith to receive the Lord Jesus Christ the bread of life and the true righteousnesse that God gives us Know and beleeve friends that God doth give you righteousnesse in Christ he hath sent him into the world for you to be your Saviour hath laid the sin of the world upon him and he hath born it and suffered death for it this he hath done for all therefore beleeve and know it is true for you and that God having raised him from the dead hath given him in the humane nature all fulnesse of power and authority so that he is able to the uttermost to save you to forgive you your sins he having died for them for otherwise according to the order of Gods proceeding he should not be able to forgive you if he had not shed bloud for your sins Heb 9.22 for without bloudshedding there is no remission But know that he I say is able to forgive and save you With him there is forgivenesse that he might be feared Col. 1.14 And if the knowledge and belief of it work so with you as to turn you in to fear him you shall have that forgiveness with and in you it shall passe upon you yea he is ready to receive and forgive you he cals you to him that he might confer this grace upon you Let the wicked forsake his waies and the unrighteous man his thoughts and return to the Lord for he will have mercy c. and to our God for he will abundantly pardon Isa 55.7 Yea he sent his Son to turn every one of you from your iniquities Act. 3 Only he would have you to look to him for it and be saved by him Isa 45.22 Now oh be perswaded to do righteousnesse seeing righteousnesse is so excellent a thing and hath so great recompence of reward Receive the word and grace of God give credit to the record that God bears of his Son that he hath given us eternall life and this lift is in his Son He that hath the Son hath life c. That God hath sent him forth to be the Saviour of the world and he hath given himself arausome for all and so died and is risen for thee and hath life is himself for thee to look after and to receive in looking to him that God in him hath thewed forth exceeding grace towards thee and be not of a gainsaying heart and spirit wrangling against the word and patting it from thee Let the unrighteous man forsake his own is righteousnesse wrong unbeleeving thoughts and lay down all the suspitions and contradictions of his own reason against Gods truth and turn to the Lord to minde receive