our best then unholy creatures full of pollution and spirituall uncleannesse It is his most holy Spirit that must cleanse us from all the filthinesse of our flesh and spirit 2. Cor. 7. 1. and work us daily to further degrees of sanctification He that is holy let him be holy still Rev. 22. 11. neither can there be any thing more abhorring from his infinite justice and holinesse then to justifie those souls which lie still in the loathsome ordure of their corruptions Certainly they never truly learnt Christ who would draw over Christs righteousnesse as a case of their close wickednesses that sever holinesse from justice and give no place to sanctification in the evidence of their justifying Never man was justified without faith and wheresoever faith is there it purifieth and cleanseth Act. 15. 9. But besides that the Spirit of Christ works thus powerfully though gradually within us That he may sanctifie and cleanse us with the washing of water by the word his holinesse is mercifully imputed to us That he may present us to himself a glorious Church not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing but that we should be holy and without blemish Eph. 5. 26 27. so as that inchoate holinesse which by his gracious inoperation grows up daily in us towards a full perfection as abundantly supplyed by his absolute holinesse made no lesse by imputation ours then it is personally his when therefore we look into our bosoms we finde just cause to be ashamed of our impurity and to loath those dregs of corruption that yet remain in our sinfull nature but when we cast up our eyes to heaven and behold the infinite holinesse of that Christ to whom we are united which by faith is made ours we have reason to bear up against all the discouragements that may arise from the conscience of our own vilenesse and to look God in the face with an awfull boldnesse as those whom he is pleased to present holy and unblameable and unreprovable in his sight Col. 1. 22. as knowing that he that sanctifieth and they than are sanctified are all of one Heb. 2. 11. SECT 16. Christ made our Redemption REdemption was the great errand for which the Son of God came down into the world and the work which he did whiles he was in the world and that which in way of application of it he shall be ever accomplishing till he shall deliver up his Mediatory Kingdome into the hands of his Father in this he begins in this he finishes the great businesse of our salvation For those who in this life are enlightned by his wisdome justified by his merits sanctified by his grace are yet conflicting with manifold temptations and strugling with varieties of miseries and dangers till upon their happy death and glorious resurrection they shall be fully freed by their ever-blessed and victorious Redeemer He therefore who by vertue of that heavenly union is made unto us of God Wisdome Righteousnesse Sanctification is also upon the same ground made unto us our full Redemption Redemption implies a captivity We are naturally under the wofull bondage of the Law of sinne of miseries of death The Law is a cruell exactor for it requires of us what we cannot now do and whips us for not doing it for the Law worketh wrath Rom. 4. 15. and as many as are of the works of the Law are under the curse Gal. 3. 10. Sinne is a worse tyrant then he and takes advantage to exercise his cruelty by the Law For when we were in the flesh the motions of sins which were by the Law did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death Rom. 7. 5. Upon sin necessarily followes misery the forerunner of death and death the upshot of all miseries By one man sin entred into the world and death by sin and so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned Rom. 5. 12. From all these is Christ our Redemption from the Law for Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law being made a curse for us Gal. 3. 13. From sin for we are dead to sin but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord Rom. 6. 11. Sin shall not have dominion over you for ye are not under the Law but under Grace Rom. 6. 14. From death and therein from all miseries O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory The sting of death is sin and the strength of sin is the Law But thanks be to God which giveth us victory through our Lord Jesus Christ 1. Cor. 15. 55 56 57. Now then let the Law do his worst we are not under the Law but under Grace Rom. 6. 14. The case therefore is altered betwixt the law and us It is not now a cruell Task-master to beat us to and for our work it is our Schoolemaster to direct and to whip us unto Christ It is not a severe Judge to condemn us it is a friendly guide to set us the way towards heaven Let sinne joyne his forces together with the Law they cannot prevail to our hurt For what the Law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh God sending his own Son in the likenesse of sinfull flesh condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousnesse of the Law might be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh but after the spirit Rom. 8. 3 4. Let death joyn his forces with them both we are yet safe For the Law of the spirit of life hath freed us from the Law of sin and of death Rom. 8. 2. What can we therefore fear what can we suffer while Christ is made our Redemption Finally as thus Christ is made unto us Wisdome Righteousnesse Sanctification and Redemption so whatsoever else he either is or hath or doth by vertue of this blessed union becomes ours he is our riches Eph. 1. 7. our strength Psal 27. 1. 28. 7. our glory Eph. 1. 18. our salvation 1 Thes 5. 9. Esa 12. 2. our all Col. 3. 11. he is all to us and all is ours in him SECT 17. The externall priviledges of this union a right to the blessings of earth and heaven FRom these primary and intrinsecal priviledges therefore flow all those secondary and externall wherewith we are blessed and therein a right to all the blessings of God both of the right hand and of the left an interesse in all the good things both of earth and heaven Hereupon it is that the glorious Angels of Heaven become our Guardians keeping us in all our wayes and working secretly for our good upon all occasions that all Gods creatures are at our service that we have a true spirituall title to them All things are yours saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 3. 22 23 and ye are Christs and Christ Gods But take heed my son of mislaying thy claim to what and in what manner thou ought'st not There is a civill right that must regulate our propriety to these earthly things
and the seed of promise the old man and the new the flesh and the spirit and these have their lives distinct from each other the new man lives not the life of the old neither can the old man live the life of the new it is not one life that could maintain the opposite struglings of both these corrupt nature is it that gives and continues the life of the old man It is Christ that gives life to the new we cannot say but the old man or flesh is the man too For I know saith the chosen Vessell Rom. 7. 18. that in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing but the spiritual part may yet better challenge the title For I delight in the Law of God after the inward man Rom. 7. 22. That old man of ours is derived from the first Adam as we sinned in him so he liveth in us The second Adam both gives and is the life of our regeneration like as he is also the life of our glory the life that followes our second resurrection I am saith he the resurrection and the life What is it then whereby the new creature lives surely no other then the Spirit of Christ that alone is it that gives beeing and life to the renued soul Life is no stranger to us there is nothing wherewith we are so well acquainted yea we feel continually what it is and what it produceth It is that from whence all sense action motion floweth it is that which gives us to be what we are All this is Christ to the regenerate man It is one thing what he is or doth as a man another thing what he is or doth as a Christian As a man he hath eyes ears motions affections understanding naturally as his own as a Christian he hath all these from him with whom he is spiritually one the Lord Jesus and the objects of all these vary accordingly His naturall eyes behold bodily and materiall things his spirituall eyes see things invisible his outward ears hear the sound of the voice his inward ears hear the voice of Gods Spirit speaking to his soul his bodily feet move in his own secular wayes his spirituall walk with God in all the wayes of his Commandements His naturall affections are set upon those things which are agreeable thereunto he loves beauty fears pain and losse rejoyces in outward prosperity hates an enemy his renued affections are otherwise and more happily bestowed now he loves goodnesse for its own sake hates nothing but sin fears only the displeasure of a good God rejoyces in Gods favour which is better then life his former thoughts were altogether taken up with vanity and earthed in the world now he seeks the things above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God Col. 3. 1. Finally he is such as that a beholder sees nothing but man in him but God and his soul finde Christ in him both in his renued person and actions in all the degrees both of his life and growth of his sufferings and glory My little children saith Saint Paul Gal. 4. 19. of whom I travell in birth again untill Christ be formed in you Lo here Christ both conceived and born in the faithfull heart Formation followes conception and travell implies a birth Now the beleever is a new-born babe in Christ 1 Cor. 3. 1. 2 Pet. 2. 2. and so mutually Christ in him from thence he grows up to 1 Joh. 2. 14. strength of youth at last to perfection even towards the measure of the stature of the fulnesse of Christ Ephes 4. 13. 2 Cor. 13. 9. Heb. 1. 6. And in this condition he is dead with Christ Rom. 6. 8. He is buryed with Christ Rom. 6. 11. He is alive again unto God through Christ Col. 3. 1. he is risen with Christ Rom. 8. 17. and with Christ he is glorified Yea yet more then so his Col. 1. 24. sufferings are Christs Christs sufferings are his Rom. 8. 17. He is in Christ an heir of glory Col. 1. 27. and Christ is in him the hope of glory SECT 10. A complaint of our insensiblenesse of this mercy and an excitation to a chearfull recognition of it DOst thou not now finde cause my son to complain of thy self as I confesse I daily do that thou art so miserably apt to forget these intimate respects between thy Christ and thee art thou not ashamed to think how little sense thou hast had of thy great happinesse Lo Christ is in thy bosome and thou feelest him not It is not thy soul that animates thee in thy renued estate it is thy God and Saviour and thou hast not hitherto perceived it It is no otherwise with thee in this case then with the members of thine own body there is the same life in thy fingers and toes that there is in the head or heart yea in the whole man and yet those lims know not that they have such a life Had those members reason as well as sense they would perceive that wherewith they are enlived thou hast more then reason faith and therefore mayest well know whence thou hast this spirituall life and thereupon art much wanting to thy self if thou dost not enjoy so usefull and comfortable an apprehension Resolve therefore with thy self that no secular occasion shall ever set off thy heart from this blessed object and that thou wilt as soon forget thy naturall life as this spirituall and raise up thy thoughts from this dust to the heaven of heavens Shake off this naturall pusillanimity and mean conceit of thy self as if thou wert all earth and know thy self advanced to a celestiall condition that thou art united to the Son of God and animated by the holy Spirit of God so is the life which thou now livest in the flesh thou livest by the faith of the Son of God who loved thee and gave himself for thee Gal. 2. 20. See then and confesse how just cause we have to condemn the dead-heartednesse wherewith we are subject to be possessed and how many worthy Christians are there in the world who bear a part with us in this just blame who have yeelded over themselves to a disconsolate heartlesnesse and a sad dejection of spirit partly through a naturall disposition inclining to dumpishnesse and partly through the prevalence of temptation For Satan well knowing how much it makes for our happinesse chearfully to reflect upon our interest in Christ and to live in the joyfull sense of it labours by all means to withdraw our hearts from this so comfortable object and to clog us with a pensive kinde of spirituall sullennesse accounting it no small mastery if he can prevail with us so far as to bereave us of this habituall joy in the holy Ghost arising from the inanimation of Christ living and breathing within us So much the more therefore must we bend all the powers of our souls against this dangerous and deadly machination of our spirituall enemy labour as for
a beeing thou shouldst follow me with succeeding mercies who but thou who art infinite in goodnesse would love that which is not Our poor sensuall love is drawn from us by the sight of a face or a picture neither is ever raised but upon some pleasing motive thou wouldst make that which thou wouldst love and wouldst love that which thou hadst made O God was there ever love so free so gracious as this of thine Who can be capable to love us but men or Angels Men love us because they see something in us which they think amiable Angels love us because thou dost so But why dost thou O blessed Lord love us but because thou wouldst There can be no cause of thy will which is the cause of all things Even so Lord since this love did rise only from thee let the praise and glory of it rest only in thee SECT 2. How free of us that had made our selves vile and miserable YEt more Lord we had lost our selves before we were and having forfeited what we should be had made our selves perfectly miserable even when we were worse then nothing thou wouldst love us was there ever any eye enamoured of deformity Can there by any bodily deformity comparable to that of sin yet Lord when sin had made us abominably loathsome didst thou cast thy love upon us A little scurf of leprosie or some few nasty spots of morphew or but some unsavory sent sets us off and turns our love into detestation But for thee O God when we were become as foul and ugly as sin could make us even then was thy love inflamed towards us Even when we were weltring in our bloud thou saidst Live and washedst us and anointedst us and cloathedst us with a broidered work and deckedst us with ornaments and graciously espousedst us to thy self and receivedst us into thine own bosome Lord what is man that thou art thus mindfull of him and the son of man that thou thus visitest him Oh what are we in comparison of thine once glorious Angels They sinned and fell never to bâ—â—â—covered never to be loosed from those everlasting chains wherein they are reserved to the judgement of the great day Whence is it then O Saviour whence is it that thou hast shut up thy mercy from those thy more excellent creatures and hast extended it to us vile sinfull dust whence but that thou wouldst love man because thou wouldst Alas it is discouragement enough to our feeble friendship that he to whom we wisht well is miserable Our love doth gladly attend upon and enjoy his prosperity but when his estate is utterly sunk and his person exposed to contempt and ignominy yea to torture and death who is there that will then put forth himself to own a forlorn and perishing friend But for thee O blessed Jesu so ardent was thy love to us that it was not in the power of our extream misery to abate it yea so as that the deplorednesse of our condition did but heighten that holy flame What speak I of shame or sufferings Hell it self could not keep thee off from us Even from that pit of eternall perdition didst thou fetch our condemned souls and hast contrarily vouchsafed to put us into a state of everlasting blessednesse SECT 3. How yet free of us that were professed enemies THe common disposition of men pretends to a kinde of justice in giving men their own so as they will repay love for love and think they may for hatred return enmity nature it self then teacheth us to love our friends it is only grace that can love an enemy But as of injuries so of enmities thereupon grounded there are certain degrees some are sleight and triviall some main and capitall If a man do but scratch my face or give some light dash to my fame it is no great Mastery upon submission to receive such an offender to favour but if he have endeavoured to ruine my estate to wound my reputation to cut my throat not only to pardon this man but to hug him in my arms to lodge him in my bosome as my entire friend this would be no other then an high improvement of my charity O Lord Jesu what was I but the worst of enemies when thou vouchsafedst to embrace me with thy loving mercy how had I shamefully rebelled against thee and yeelded up all my members as instruments of unrighteousnesse unto sin how had I crucified thee the Lord of life how had I done little other then trod under foot thee the blessed Son of God and counted the bloud of the Covenant an unholy thing how had I in some sort done despight unto the spirit of grace yet even then in despight of all my most odious unworthynesse didst thou spread abroad thine arms to receive me yea thou openedst thine heart to let me in O love passing not knowledge only but wonder also O mercy not incident into any thing lesse then infinite nor by any thing lesse comprehensible SECT 4. The wonderfull effects of the love of Christ His Incarnation BUt oh dear Lord when from the object of thy mercy I cast mine eyes upon the effects and improvement of thy divine favours and see what thy love hath drawn from thee towards the sons of men how am I lost in a just amazement It is that which fetcht thee down from the glory of the highest heavens from the bosome of thine eternall Father to this lower world the region of sorrow and death It is that which to the wonder of Angels cloathed thee with this flesh of ours and brought thee who thoughtst it no robbery to be equall with God to an estate lower then thine own creatures Oh mercy transcending the admiration of all the glorious spirits of heaven that God would be incarnate Surely that all those celestiall powers should be redacted to either worms or nothing that all this goodly frame of creation should run back into its first confusion or be reduced to one single atome it is not so high a wonder as for God to become man those changes though the highest that nature is capable of are yet but of things finite this is of an infinite subject with which the most excellent of finite things can hold no proportion Oh the great mystery of godlinesse God manifested in the flesh and seen of Angels Those heavenly spirits had ever since they were made seen his most glorious Deity and adored him as their omnipotent Creator but to see that God of spirits invested with flesh was such a wonder as had been enough if their nature could have been capable of it to have astonished even glory it self And whether to see him that was their God so humbled below themselves or to see humanity thus advanced above themselves were the greater wonder to them they only know It was your foolish misprision O ye ignorant Lystrians that you took the servants for the Master here only is it verified which you supposed that God is
a perpetuall light the heaven of heavens is open to none but him thither his eye pierceth and beholds those beams of inaccessible glory which shine in no face but his The deep mysteries of godlinesse which to the great Clerks of the world are as a book clasped and sealed up lye open before him fair and legible and whiles those book-men know whom they have heard of he knowes whom he hath beleeved He will not suffer his Saviour to be ever out of his eye and if through some worldly interceptions he lose the fight of that blessed object for a time he zealously retrives him not without an angry theck of his own mis-carriage and is now so much the more fixed by his former flackning so as he will hence forth sooner part with his soul then his Redeemer The termes of entirenesse wherein he stands with the Lord of life are such as he can feel but cannot expresse though hee should borrow the language of Angels it is enough that they two are one spirit His reason is willingly captivated to his faith his will to his reason and his affections to both He fears nothing that he sees in comparison of that which he sees not and displeasure is more dreadfull to him then smart Good is the adequate object of his love which he duly proportions according to the degrees of its eminence affecting the chief good not without a certain ravishment of spirit the lesser with a wise and holy moderation Whether he do more hate sin or the evill spirit that suggests it is a question Earthly contents are too mean grounds whereon to raise his joy these as he baulks not when they meet him in his way so he doth not too eagerly pursue he may taste of them but so as he had rather fast then surfet He is not insensible of those losses which casualty or enmity may inflict but that which lies most heavily upon his heart is his sin This makes his sleep short and troublesome his meals stomachlesse his recreations listlesse his every thing tedious till he finde his soul acquitted by his great Surety in heaven which done he feels more peace and pleasure in his calm then he found horrour in the tempest His heart is the store-house of most precious graces That faith whereby his soul is established triumphs over the world whether it allure or threaten and bids defiance to all the powers of darknesse not fearing to be foiled by any opposition His hope cannot be discouraged with the greatest difficulties but bears up against naturall impossiblities and knows how to reconcile contradictions His charity is both extensive and servent barring out no one that bears the face of a man but pouring out it self upon the houshold of faith that studies good constructions of men and actions and keeps it self free both from suspicion and censure Grace doth not more exalt him then his humility depresses him Were it not for that Christ who dwels in him he could think himself the meanest of all creatures now he knows he may not disparage the Deity of him by whom he is so gloriously inhabited in whose only right he can be as great in his own thoughts as he is despicable in the eyes of the world He is wise to God-ward however it be with him for the world and well knowing he cannot serve two masters he cleaves to the better making choice of that good part which can never be taken from him not so much regarding to get that which he cannot keep as to possesse himself of that good which he cannot lose He is just in all his dealings with men hating to thrive by injury and oppression and will rather leave behind something of his own then filch from anothers heap He is not close fisted where there is just occasion of his distribution willingly parting with those metals which he regards only for use not caring for either their colour or substance earth is to him no other then it self in what â—hiew so ever it appeareth In every good cause he is bold as a Lion and can neither fear faces nor shrink at dangers and is rather heartned with opposition pressing so much the more where he finds a large door open and many adversaries and when he must suffer doth as resolutely stoop as he did before valiantly resist He is holily temperate in the use of all Gods blessings as knowing by whom they are given and to what end neither dares either to mis-lay them or to mis-spend them lavishly as duly weighing upon what tearmes he receives them and fore-expecting an account Such an hand doth he carry upon his pleasures and delights that they run not away with him he knows how to slacken the reins without a debauched kind of dissolutenesse and how to straiten them without a sullen rigour SECT 2. His expence of the day HE lives as a man that hath borrowed his time and challenges not to be an owner of it caring to spend the day in a gracious and well-governed thrift His first mornings task after he hath lifted up his heart to that God who gives his beloved sleep shall be to put himself into a due posture wherein to entertain himself and the whole day which shall be done if he shall effectually work his thoughts to a right apprehension of his God of himself of all that may concern him The true posture of a Christian then is this He sees still heaven open to him and beholds and admires the light inaccessible he sees the all-glorious God ever before him the Angels of God about him the evill spirits aloof off enviously groyning and repining at him the world under his feet willing to rebell but forced to be subject the good creatures ready to tender their service to him and is accordingly affected to all these he sees heaven open with joy and desire of fruition he sees God with an adoring awfulnesse he sees the Angels with a thankfull acknowledgement and care not to offend them he sees the evill spirits with hatred and watchfull indignation he sees the world with an holy imperiousnesse commanding it for use and scorning to stoop to it for observance Lastly he sees the good creatures with gratulation and care to improve them to the advantage of him that lent them Having thus gathered up his thoughts and found where he is he may now be fit for his constant devotion which he fals upon not without a trembling veneration of that infinite and incomprehensible Majesty before whom he is prostrate now he climes up into that heaven which he before did but behold and solemnly pours out his soul in hearty thanksgivings and humble supplications into the bosome of the Almighty wherein his awe is so tempered with his faith that whiles he labours under the sense of his own vilenesse he is raised up in the confidence of an infinite mercy now he renues his feeling interest in the Lord Jesus Christ his blessed Redeemer and labours to get in every