grounds â—y that God loves thee but it is not every Knowledge of God that will Characterize a person to be an object of Gods love for if we look into 1 Rom. 21. we may see that there were some that had a rational confused Knowledge of God in the book of the Creatures and yet we see in the latter end of the Chapter they did rush into the greatest Abominations imaginable A Knowledg of God in the book of the Creatures only will not keep the Creature from committing the greatest sins against God But thou that wouldst Know upon sure grounds that God loves thee see if thou doest know God in his power as to Fear him in his Mercy as to Love him and his faithfulness to believe him And if all the Attributes of God have such an influence upon thee then I dare tell thee for thy comfort that thou mayst assure thy self that God Loves thee For Christ who is Truth it self sayth John 10.14 That those sheep of his whom he knows with a Knowledge of Approbation they know him with a knowledge of Love and Obedience But if thou art one that doest not fear God for his Greatness nor love him for his Goodness nor believe him for his Faithfulness but in straits and troubles canst allow thy self in taking indirect courses with Saul and Ahaziah 1 Sam. 28.7 2 Kings 1.2 it is a sign thou hast at Present but little grounds to hope that thou art an object of Gods Love 2. Thou that wouldest know whether thou canst assure thy self of the Love of God examine thy self whether thou hast received from God those peculiar favours which he doth give only to those who are the objects of his Love Now there are special favours which God bestowes only on his own peculiar people Ezek. 11.19.20.36.25 26 27. Those special favours are A new Heart and a new Spirit an heart of Flesh a saveing knowledge of himself a self-loathing for Sin and an enlightned understanding the fear of God and Love to God and Sincerity before God and all the gifts and graces of the Spirit of God Now these are the special favours which God bestowes only on those that are the objects of his Love Oh my friends take heed you do not build your hopes of Interest in Gods love upon the sandy foundations of outward injoyments Many are ready to look upon their outward injoyments as Health Strength Peace and Safety and the blessing of God on their outward injoyments to be infallible signs of Gods love whereas indeed those outward things are many times instead of being signs of Gods Love being Unsanctified and Misimproved are signs of Gods Reprobateing anger But if God have bestowed those other favours upon thee before mentioned then thou mayst be sure that God Loves thee The Love of God doth in a providential way extend it self to all his Creatures But his everlasting Love and his choycest and endeared affections these amongst the sonnes and daughters of Adam are only partakers of to whom God hath given a new Heart and such a practical Knowledge of himself together with all the gifts and graces of his Spirit 3. If thou art one that canst upon good grounds assure thy self that thou art an object of Gods Love then this Love of God hath been of an attractive nature to draw thee to all thy Dutys both Relative and Religious as we have it in Jeremiah 31.3 I have loved thee with an Everlasting Love therefore with loving Kindness have I drawn thee My friends I beseech you try what influence the Love of God hath upon your Hearts in the drawing of you to â—hose duties which are the most contrary to corrupt nature and the most loathsome to the flesh After that Christ had manifested his love to Zacheus and told him that Salvation was come to his house then he could take shame to himself in the acknowledgement of his Extortion If thou canst assure thy self of the Love of God then the Glory of the God of Love will be thy ultimate End in all thy duties And when thou perceivest pride or self or vain-glory creeping into thy duties oh how is thy soul perplexed and disturbed But on the contrary if thou art one that doest that which is thy duty but art drawn thereto by wicked ends thou hast but little grounds to assure thy self that thou art in the Love of God If thou art conversant in religious duties towards God or charity towards men and art drawn thereto by Pharisaical vain-glorious ends It is then high time for thee to look about thee for that hopes thou hast of the Love of God is but 〈◊〉 delusion of the Devil therefore see if it be Love to God that makes thee give to the Poor and desire after communion with God that draws thee to hear the Word of God and to pray unto God If it be so with thee thou mayst go home with comfort for I dare warrant thee from the Word of God that God hath loved thee with an everlasting Love that thou hadst a being in the love of God before thou hadst a being in the world for though a wicked man may be contented to be found in the outside of duties for such self-ends as he proposes to himself yet there being enmity in his heart against God it is impossible he should propose Gods glory as his main and ultimate end Therefore if thou art brought to propose Gods glory as thy ultimate end it is an infallible sign that thou art an Object of Gods Love 4. Another sign of the Love of God manifested to the Creature is when we are fruitful in our places to draw others unto Jesus Christ as well as to bring forth the fruits of an holy conversation our selves After that the Spouse had been setting forth the excellency of the Love of Christ and had been begging a kisse of her beloved she was so taken with his love that presently shee crys out Can 1.2 4. Draw me we will run after thee draw me in the singular we in the Plural will run after thee A person that has tasted of the sweetness of the Love of God waites all opportunitys to say with David Come and see what God hath done for my soul oh saith the soul I was by nature an enemy to God and not only so but I had enmity in my heart against God And blessed be his name that was pleased to bring down that enmity by shedding abroad his love in my heart Thus the object of Gods Love will endeavour to bring others in Love with this lovely object the Lord Jesus Christ in Hosea 14. after that God had in the 4. verse manifested the freeness of his love to believers we may see in the 5. and 6. verses that God will be as the dew upon Israel and that he shall grow as the lilly and cast forth his roots as Lebanon by which is meant nothing else but the fruitfulness of it 5. That Soul
us aside out of the way when we are off from our watch And presently we like David are surprized with sins and devilish lusts which do quickly rob us of our comforts making us to stand in need with David to cry Restore unto us the joy of thy Salvation and God seemes to take but little notice of us but when our spiritual enemies shall go about to take away our spiritual life for it is in the nature of predominating corruption that it would in time eat out the very life and power of Godliness and so to expose us to eternal death Then is the time for our Spiritual husband to shew his love to his poor spouse in destroying those enemies and thou that canst assure thy self of the love of God thou rejoycest more when God doth manifest his love in destroying thy corruptions than in all outward injoyments whatsoever But if on the contrary thy corruptions grow and thrive as much as ever thou hast no ground to assure thy self that God loves thee When Christ manifested his love to his spouse in incourageing of her to duty Cant. 2.14 15. Oh thou that art in the clifts of the rock in the secret places of the staires let me hear thy voice let me see thy countenance for sweet is thy voice and thy countenance is comely Pray mind what follows Take us those foxes those little foxes which corrupt the vines or spoyle the vines for our vines have tender grapes by those foxes we understand as well sin in the heart as heretick in the Church which sins the soul rejoyceth in the destructions of which have got an evidence of Gods Love 11. Another sign of our interest in the love of God is if we have received spiritual life from the God of life and love this we may see in the 16 of Ezekiel comparing the 6. verse with the 8. In the 8. verse we have the impulsive cause of our spiritual life that is the love of God thy time was the time of love In the 6. verse we have the effect of the Love of God towards us and this is spiritual life I say unto thee live So likewise in the 2 Gal. 20. see how the Apostle makes out his interest in the love of God saith he speaking of his spiritual life I live yet not I but Christ that liveth in me and the life that I now live is by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me Now my friends I beseech you draw out your hearts before the Lord and deal faithfully with your own souls and see whether you can say with Paul that the life that you now live is by the faith of the Son of God then indeed you may comfortably read on the verse and say who loved me and gave himself for me till we have received spiritual life from Christ we can never assure our selves of the love of Christ nor any benefit by the death of Christ And so in the 2 of the Ephes we may see that our spiritual life is an effect of the great love of God toward us in Jesus Christ Saith the Apostle in the 4. verse According to the great love wherewith he hath loved us In verse the 5. Even when we were dead in sins hath he quickned us together with Christ Now let us see whether the Spirit of life in Christ hath made us free from the law of sin and death Now we know that the difference between a dead man and a living man is this A dead man hath not his use of his senses as hearing seeing feeling tasting smelling but a living man hath the use of all or some of them Now soul wouldst thou read the love of God in thy spiritual life then see whether thou hast thy spiritual eye-sight hath God anointed thy eyes with spiritual eye-salve and made thee see in some measure the beauty of holiness and the excellency of Christ the worth of Gods favour the vanity of the world and the loathsomness of Sin so as to loath thy self for Sin now as dead men haveing no sight can see no more beauty or brightness in the Sun than in a dunghill so a Person dead in trespasses and sins can see nor Brightness or Splendor Beauty or Lustre in the Sun of Righteousness But if thou art one that canst experience the love of God in raising thee from the death of sin to the life of Righteousness thou canst no longer say with the daughters of Jerusalem What is thy beloved more than another beloved Cant. 5. but thou wilt be ready to say with the daughters of Sion my beloved is white and Ruddy the cheifest of ten thousand Cant. 5.10 And as this spiritual life doth convince a man of the Excellency of Christ so likewise of the ugliness of Sin Now soul see if thou hast this spiritual feeling we know that as a dead man cannot see so he cannot feel though you should â—ay a milstone upon him he is sensible of no more weight than if it were feather but a living man is quickly sensible of a little weight so is it with one spiritually dead in trespasses and sins he feels no weight in his Sins though they be heavier than the whole creation though sin be so heavy that it is a burden to God good angels good Men wicked Angels and the whole creation yet a wicked man that is spiritually dead feels no weight therein but if thou hast this spiritual life thou art made sensible of the burden of Sin whether in action in thought or in word and thou hast much trouble upon thy spirit for those sins which a wicked man would make nothing of and if it be so with thee then go home with comfort thou art one that mayst say that God hath loved thee with an everlasting love and that God hath manifested his love to thee in raising thee from the death of sin to the life of righteousness 12. And lastly wouldst thou know whether thou art an object of Gods love then see if God be the highest object of thy love for though Gods love to us do not flow from our love to God for saith John 1 John 1.9 we love him because he first loved us yet our love to God is an infallible symptome and glorious effect of Gods love to us for though God doth not love thee because thou lovest him yet till thou doest love him thou hast no ground to believe that he doth love thee now in regard that Gods beloved ones are so ready to question their love to God as well as Gods love to them I intend to insist upon this Particular by it self and all that I shall say to it at Present is this that if thou art one that lovest God thou doest love the People of God and the ordinances of God and wilt not sit down satisfied in an ordinance without communion with God in the ordinance and thou hast an implacable
us more earnestly to labour after the enjoyment of them when Gods beloved ones have too much delight in and too much love to the world so as to undervalue the heavenly manna of Gods love then the God of love will manifest his delight in and love to his people in leaveing them as to his comforting presence with the prodigal to seed upon the husks of outward injoyments till they are brought to see the incongruity that is between the empty inticeing transitory vanity of this World and their sublime and immortal Souls which can receive no real comfort from or any satisfactory delight or complacency in any thing but what is of its own nature For 〈◊〉 the soul of a believer meerly as it is a Creature is an immortal substance and the very breath of God and therefore no wonder though the creature find such an insufficiency of comfort in all outward injoyments they being so much below and unsuitable to its nature And that I take to be the reason why Solomon saith Prov. 14.13 that in the midst of laughter the heart may be sad the fading earthy mortal body may laugh in the injoyment of fading earthly momentany things and yet the heart and soul may be sad for want of something of its own nature for to take delight and complacency in Now let us draw to Conclusion in a word there must be an assimulation between the Object of delight and the Subject delighting it self in that object As for example a fish of a cold and moyst nature delights in the passive element of water being of its own nature But the Salamander being of a fiery nature delights in the active element of fire So a true believer being a new creature born of God by regeneration cannot but mourn in the bitterness of his soul when it does consider how the fleshy part has prevailed against his Spiritual part being off from his watch as with Michal to send away his blessed King David as to his comforting presence and have left nothing but an Image of outward Injoyments in the room thereof And if Gods beloved Sampsons will be solaceing of themselves in the laps of the deceitful Dalilahs you can expect nothing but that those sweet Syrene-like songs should end in the shipwrack of their spiritual Joys Having provoked God to deliver them up with Sampson to the Philistins to cut off the seven locks of their spiritual strength and leave them in the hands of their spiritual enemies that will by filling of their Souls with horror and vexation of Spirit do their utmost to keep those from heaven whilst they live which they see they cannot keep from heaven when they dye And now I come to the North wind of affliction which does often make Gods Davids cry out I have cleansed my heart in vain and with Gods Jobs to look upon outward afflictions to be signs of Gods anger and displeasure whereas indeed as well the North Wind of sanctified afflictions as the South Wind of sanctified prosperity blowing upon our gardens will make our spices flow forth will make us to be much in exercising the gifts and graces of the spirit of God in us Now soul see which of these winds it is that has blown up this dreadful storm in thy soul if it be the East Wind of sinful security or the South Wind of unsanctified prosperity or the North Wind of adversity And indeed as sin is the meritorious cause of affliction so affliction makes a soul apprehend it self to be a greater sinner than others when it is more afflicted than others And the Devil has a great hand in this for as he perswades the◠that their prosperitis is a sign of Gods love so he perswades Gods people that afflictions are signs of Gods hatred If the people of God did but know the gracious end God has in afflicting them they would never look upon them to be signs of his displeasure For Gods ends in afflicting his people are to glorify his wisdom in their Direction and his holiness in their Sanctification and his power in their Supportation and Preservation and that they might be more conformable to Christ their head and that they may hate sin the more and contemn the world the more and long after heaven the more and that they may be in the better capacities to sympathize with Gods people in their suffering when they are under the like afflictions and to make heaven the sweeter to them by makeing the world bitter Now soul thou that art under these clouds and tossed with these tempests and not comforted be sure to look often into the waters of the sanctuary upon the bended knees of thy soul and there thou shall see the Comet that has made the interposition between the shineing rayes of Gods love and thy poor soul and when thou hast found out this Achan that troubles the camp that made thee flee before the men of Aie and after thou hast conquered Jericho and by Gods ministers sounding of the Gospel-Trumpet beat down the walls of the cursed Jericho of the Kingdom of darkness in thy soul when thou hast found out the Achan that would preserve any of the cursed thing be unpotant with thy blessed Joshuah which brings his true Israel into the land of promise that he would pass the sentence of death on this thee vish Achan that first stole thy heart from the God of comfort and consolation and then stole from thee the sweet consolations of thy God Oh soul let not the Silver or Gold of worldly-mindedness which lies hid in the midst of Achans tent let not any external profit that thy sin may bring thee in make Achan faire ever the better but seek diligently for it for it lyes hid in the midst of the tent where it might be the least suspected see if Achan has not been a troubler to thee by stealing something else besides the wedg of Gold see if he has not got a cloak of Shinar or a Babylonish garment of self-righteousness My meaning is this look diligently into thy heart see if thou art not ready to be prideing of thy self in thy dutys and having had great Inlargements in prayer art thou not ready to think that that duty as it comes from thee is more likely to find acceptance with God than those poor broken expressions of thy friend whom it may be thou contemnest as not having such abilities as thou hast Now soul if thou canst find this in thy heart then thou mayst say there is the Babylonish garment which the old man the unregenerate part the cursed Achan has stole and by which God was provoked against thee but if thou canst say of a truth upon serious self-examination that it is otherwise with thee and that thy heart doeth not condemn thee of stealing these wedges of gold that thou hast not an inordinate love to the world that thou hast not stole the Babylonish garment of spiritual pride in duty and