way in all the world comparable to this to breake their hearts and to make them throw sin far away Time was when they said true it is Christ calls and invites mee to come but I am so defiled so sinfull I dare not come I will reforme my life and get more power against sin and then I may goe with boldnes But this soule who hath injoyed the loves of God so sweetly so intimately he findes this is the way to remaine foule still And though hee might refraine sin yet he was not purged from sin This end and that end wrought with him something from self and to self but sin as sin was as strong as ever But he found this way the only way to heale sinne and get a new heart a new nature viz. to throw himself upon his Father into his Fathers armes Though Abraham be ignorant of us Isai 63.16 yet thou art our Father And this going to God frees us from our sinnes and nothing else To say I am legall and I am full of corruption I am weake and I can doe nothing all this while we stand at a distance and weaken our selves more We are not free we are lockt up in our selves and strive by our own strength But if you would be holy throw your selves into the loves of God this very injoyment will give you an inlarged a free and broken heart then sin will be hated from a new nature God dos not say I love you if you be holy but I love you to make you holy Beloved this is the new covenant that the Gospell holds out to us and herein lies the power of the Gospell to make of unrighteous righteous to work by love not by constraint Men that never had experience of this life they lay Lawes and Constraints upon men to duty and know not the power of love When the Prodigall had but a resolution to throw himself upon his fathers loves you see how he was received No sooner dos God open his heart to a poore sinner but he sees the everlasting roling bowels of a Father toward him and then they interchange loves and bowels Hos 11.8 That their repentings are kindled together Ier. 31.22 I doe earnestly remember him still my bowels are troubled for him Jer. 3.22 Bowels role towards one another and then the poore sinners come to see their own names writ in their own hearts that before was writ in the heart of God And see his dearest loves have ever been toward them for good He sees now he was not excluded from God because he had departed away from him and blacksliden but was the rather cald to come to him because hee had blackslided and defiled himselfe Jer. 3.22 As Jer. 3.22 Returne ye backsliding children and I will heale your backslidings Behold we come unto thee for thou art the Lord our God He has experience that he had laine long striving against sin but found no power from a right ground from a right principle But when he it may be after many years striving with his lusts to subdue them and bring them under he resolved at last to goe to God and said Lord here is my heart as bad as can be the more I strive with it the worse it is I have striven long and cannot conquer one sinne but Lord doe thou now take it doe with it what thou will all this while I was asham'd to come to thee my heart was so bad now I commit it to thee and then hee found a subdued heart and never before So long as I look upon my obedience and my conformity and when I see a want I hold off from God this breedes obstructions between the soule and God Your praying and your duties and your obedience doe declare that you live in God and not that they may bring you to God Brethren this is the way have you finned and falen from God stay not but returne to God then he will heale your backsliding Stay not as men usually doe till your selves have healed your own backslidings and then you will beleeve This way doth never rightly overcome the heart but be ye weake Christian or be ye strong try this way and you shall find a wonderfull change in your spirits you may draw nigh to God with boldnesse the way stands open God never chid a soule that throwes it self upon him Againe this often recourse to and familiarity with God it makes a man rightly to understand God to know his very nature men that live out of God mistake God they judge otherwise of his nature then it is Saints by injoying God they know God what a God of sweetnesse and loves he is how free in communicating of himselfe what an unchangable God he is how ready to receive a sinner what loves run from him into them when once they are come in to him though God frowne they know his nature is nothing but unchangeable loves however he deales with them in his Providence they know all his wayes are wayes of love to them He cannot hate them nor doe any thing as a fruite of hatred They understand God they know his wayes with his Saints though he kill them yet will they trust in him Isai 55. Though in externall Providence hee seemes to frowne yet they know what 's in his heart they take all in good part their Father doth unto them This is that which raises up their hearts to a holy boldnesse of spirit What ever men intends they know God smiles what ever his providences are they know his loves are constant unchangable This makes their hearts rejoyce and triumph to live above though the body be under sufferings yet their spirit is free walkes up and downe in loves is compassed about with joyes swallowed up in GOD and lives amongst Divine Crownes If a man have no experience of these things he lives darkly mournfully he measures God by himself if men be angry he thinks God is angry if providence change they think God changes and this raises not but overwhelmes the spirit of a man this sinks his spirit for he judges God like himselfe but what sayes God are my wayes as your wayes and my thoughts as your thoughts Isai 55. As high as the Heavens are above the Earth so high are my thoughts above your thoughts and my wayes above your wayes Secondly they are bold for God ye never see any principle but it works sutable to itself so the Saints have a principle from God which qualifies them so that they can stand for God 1. In suffering for him if it be his will they shall suffer losses ignominy derision yea Death it self they have a principle from God will beare them out Look upon Paul what a spirit had he when they told him of bonds Acts. 21.13 what meane ye to weepe and breake my heart for I am ready sayes he not only to be bound but to die for the name of the Lord
what can that man feare that is thus transacted transplanted united to God drawne up into God in whom all selfe and flesh and carnall ends 2 Cor. 12.9 is perished dead and buried and he made a new man in Christ rissen in and with Christ Here is the man is here spoken of Here is the boldnesse of a Saint No marvell all the world nor all the fluctuation of and in the world cannot disturbe this mans Spirit for he is above all aloft he is in the bosome of Christ Oh dearest friends this life is a hidden thing and you that injoy it know it and none else I know your experiences of this life farre exceed what ever my tongue can expresse when men have imprisoned you and thinke they have overcome you then are you most at liberty When they have brought you to poverty then have they most in richt you when ye die ye live when you have all things then have you nothing 2 Cor. 6.10 when you have nothing then have you all things Phil. 3.8 you are so taken up with Christ that all below Christ is as drosse and dung Gal. 6.14 and you say with Paul God forbid that I should rejoyce in any thing save in the Crosse of Christ by whom the world is crucified unto mee and I unto the world While you are with Christ what can hurt you all the troubles in the world sease no more on you then water on a Ducks back While the world is reviling you are singing while the world is imprisoning you are imbracing While the world is hating and persecuting you are loving While the world is casting you off for sects and scismaticks you are in your injoyings While the world smites Christ is kissing such a mysterious hidden secret is the life of a saint that it befooles all the world When the world thinks they deserve their hatred they love and pittye them while you think they look upon you they looke above you their eye is not upō their opposers but what they injoy from Christ they are of more noble higher spirits then to fasten their eyes so low as upon their opposers I professe when God brought mee of from one condition of boldnesse to another but especially when hee fetcht mee off from legall and pharisaicall boldnesse in so much that I saw that all boldnesse which had its rise and birth in self from self and to self it must bee confounded and I came to see that all true boldnesse must run out from the very heart and loves of Christ it must bee from a spirit fild with such royall noble divine bloud as none but the sonnes of God pertake of and then I saw the world was of a bloud so low and base that it cannot bee sensible what this life is The second thing we would come to shew is wherein this boldnesse dothcōsist A soule thus made one with God made righteous by God in the injoyment of God and by the righteousnesse of God revealed in us he is bold in these three regards First He is bold with God Secondly He is bold in declaring for God Thirdly He is bold in undergoing any thing laid upon him by God First He is bold with God he is free and familiar with God There is such intimate communion between Christ and him that he can freely and with a sonlike spirit and affection ask any thing of God his enjoyments embolden him For he sees God so unbosome himself to him that his very heart is not too much for him Hee asks not as a servant with slavish fear but as a sonne as seeing all his inheritance is in God He knowes what ever is in God in Christ is as freely his as they are Christs he hath as true right to them as Christ Hee layes claime to all the beawties and glories of Christ to all the riches life and treasures in Christ as his owne proper portion He does not aske with a daunted fearfull spirit he approaches into his very Bosome to his very Heart and what ever is there hee knows is his owne to aske and injoy and this he does freely fully he layes claime to all Divine loves And by this injoyment he makes returnes of loves all the loves his heart can hold shall all run out to God againe by this very imbracement he comes to act in God and God in him And I pray you observe this and think of it when you do not see mee The very injoyment of God carries over your spirits all you are to God to give up your selves to him you will not stand upon such needlesse questions Whether saints are bount to duty they by that very act of injoying God make themselves over to God to be acted and ruled by God their owne will ceases and Gods will is become one with theirs and theirs with his you cannot chuse but love act for God for you are with God in God Friends I hope some of your spirits doe eccho to these truthes and finde them true by your injoyments in some degree Doe not thinke that this is the life you must look for only hereafter when you are come to Heaven after this life I tell you this life is now and I verily beleeve the time is coming that saints shall come to see this life made good to them and in them more and more Object But it may be some will say you speak of a very high life is it possible that such poore Creatures such poore Wormes as we are should be so imbraced by the Eternall God How comes this to passe Answer Answ In three regards the Saints have experience of these things First In regard they know they have a propriety in him Secondly In regard they have knowledge in experience of recourse to him Thirdly of a constant familiarity with him First They have a knowledge of propriety in him they know that God hath made himselfe their Father and they his sons this makes them bold who can be more bold with a Father then his sonnes Though Abraham be ignorant of us yet thou art our Father Isal 63.16 behold we come unto thee for thou art the Lord our God They know God does not cast them off because of their sins this does not make them no sons but they look upon God as an infinite gracious loving Father They have experience that coming to their Father is a meanes to purifie their hearts and if they stand off till they have clensed thēselves this has been a means to throw them more into sin and though they have sinned yet they throw themselves into his armes they have experience that he dos not upbraid them for coming to him in asking themselves how durst they aproach to him being so defild with sin But they finde that bringing their hearts to him is the only way to cleanse themselves they finde such loves in the bosome of the Father such bowels to pardon such embracements that they know no
point we must open all the words 1. To be made righteous what it is We shall not now speake how we are made righteous by justification as righteousnesse is purchased for us and held out to us Because I conceive the words intend a man in the other sense a man made righteous by revealing of righteousnesse in us in that we are made one with the life and glory of Christ we speak now of a righteous spirit a freed spirit a spirit made one with Christ a spirit overcome in the enjoyment of Christs spirit a spirit wrapt up overwhelmed by the sweet inflowings and comings in of the glory of Christ a spirit wherein Christ sits in glory and displayes his loves to the soule so that by the very coming in and injoyment of Christ they are made one with Christ transformed into the very nature and glory of Christ So that all selfe and the very forme of the old creature is annihilated and all turned into Christ Hee is removed from his former center his owne bottom there is a new ingrafting and being carried up into Christ so that he is transformed into the hidden divine superexcellent glory and riches and life of Christ so as he is as I may say christed with Christ made glory with the very glory of God and Christ so that this they not onely know in their understandings but have feel and enjoy it and it works in them a life and fruit sutable to this glory and transformation Those that lie in the heart of Christ that have found themselves transplanted from themselves transformed into Christ by Christ they finde their heart transformd with loves ravishments towards him to him and none else but as they see them and enjoy them in him and him in them there are intercourses returnes of love to each other This is not the righteousnesse of Justification when Christ holds out a righteousnesse purchased for thee and thou by faith laying hold on it for the acceptation of thy person but this is Christ himselfe his hand taking hold of thee bringing thee over from thy selfe into himself and transacting thee into himselfe and this is that that causes interchanges of loves so that Christ in loving thee he loves himself and thou in loving him lovest thy selfe in one and the same act and in all your acts Christ acts and in all Christ acts within you you act so soone as ever you are brought over into these injoyments you are swallowed up in Christ and in your lowest acts Christ acts as well as in your highest in the very lowest estate you may have the highest injoyments that when you are trampled on by the world when your enimies think they have got the day and have their will of you then may you have such sweet injoyments of Christ Mat. 5.11.12 that in this regard you may rejoyce and be exceeding glad when you enter into divers temptations Jeames 1.2 when the world and persecutors thinke they have taken from you all your comfort and bereft you of all your life then may you be more then conquerers injoying a life hidden from them that when they think you are captived they themselves are captived and you the conquerers as deceivers 2 Cor. 6.8.9.10 and yet true sayes the Apostle as unknowne yet well knowne as sorrowfull Col. 3.3 yet alway rejoycing as poore yet making many rich as having nothing and yet possessing all things you are dead to the world but your life is hid with Christ in God by this you may take a sight and small tast of what is meant by a righteous man in this place the righteous are as bold as a Lyon Secondly what is meant by this word bold truly friends I must confesse I have been along time mistaken what this bold spirit in a saint was I tooke it to be this and that and mistaken in all time was when I had a naturall boldnesse which many men have which is borne with them being of a resolute bold hardy temper of spirit yet this was discovered to me to be but nature and many a wicked man is possessed thereof then afterward I came to be a civill man then in that I paid every man his owne and lived uprightly to menward so that no man could taxe me of doeing any man wrong herein I grew bold But this also was discovered to be but civill boldnesse and upon false grounds Then I came to Legall boldnesse attaining to such a degree of obedience to the Law that I thought my selfe all most blamelesse and herein I grew bold indeed and I thought it was true boldnesse but it was discovered this was not the true boldness neither and there is many other kinds of boldnes there is a sinfull boldnesse men being ignorant of themselves and what sinne is and what God is they are bold to sinne and sinne with a high hand daringly with brazen faces So also there is a pharisaicall boldnesse when men are bold because of their externall conformity to the Law and externall submitting to Ordinances because they are in a right Gospell way because they are of a fellowship where they injoy pure Ordinances And am not I say they as good as you what doe you more then I I doe not speake this that you should neglect Ordinances and forsake fellowship for I know the High God may be injoyed in a low Ordinance And you ought also to hold forth God in Ordinances to others to men of the World and Saints below you though you injoy that which is farre above all Ordinances even the reall and lovely presence of the Lord Christ in himselfe Many men because they injoy Ordinances in puritie and hold forth a great Profession they gather hence a great boldnesse and looke bigg upon themselves and think who may walke more bigg bold and confident then they what they not Saints who is a saint then I that have gon thus sarre and tied my self constant to duty what not I of thus long standing But beloved none of all these is the true boldnesse a Saints boldnesse is from other principles of a more noble and higher frame His boldnesle is because he lives with and injoyes the highest God In that they are gotten above all the world Things below are too base for their spirits they count it gain to lose themselves the other count it gain to gaine themselves And hence it is because they see themselves gottē above all things they live undaunted noble lives They live in the upper Regions where Christ lives above all things inferior to himself They are so much drawne into Christ that they cannot much minde these things below they are not much troubled how they ebb or flow because they are aloft They are not tumbled to and fro as they in their Tides tumble too and againe They are fild with noble bloud divine bloud the Spirit and Glory of Christ and God rests upon them and runs in all their veines Beloved
love for Christs love to them causes their love to returne to him and they love Christ also in the Saints these loves are the saints feast they live by Christs kissing and embracing them and by their kissing and embracing Christ and also in kissing and embracing one anothers spirits by communicating to each other their experiences and enjoyments of Christ there 's no greater joy nor higher act in them then to act love these are the dainties they feast on then are they transcendent in their spirits and then are they most full of Christ Secondly Doves are made fruitfull by loving so are the saints when thrive they more then when they have the sweetest communion and are most open to one another to each others injoyments and so kisse and embrace each others spirits No sooner hath a saint kist the heart of Christ but it is made fruitfull by that very kisse by that embracement and by that enjoyment The very enjoyment of Christ makes them fruitfull And they cannot be otherwise They being once come to this to enjoy Christ they cannot be unfruitfull Here is a saint then his very love his very nature provokes to fruitfulnesse if he be not fruitfull what ever he may be taken for as a great Christian because a great professor hee never yet enjoyed Christ never yet knew what the loves the overcomming transcendent loves of Christ were Fruitfulnesse is made over to the soule at that very instant it is like the opening of the pores of the body then the bloud interchanges and have free course and mingles it selfe through the whole body this love of Christ I tell you friends it opens the pores of the soule love and fruitfulnesse runs from Christ into the saints interchangeably as Christs heart is open to you so is yours to him there is a secret convayance to each other in the acts of loves And thirdly they die without it saints as saints except they love they die I pray observe saints as saints cannot die but their life dies their joy dies they live uncomfortably and as dying as if they had no life I speak now in regard of actings a saint when he acts not love he dies he may have ordinances and use externall intercourses to Christ and with the saints and yet he as good as dead no more life in act and comfort then the men of the world if the warm heart-bloud of Christ doe not run and have free course into his soule the saint acts not as a saint but yet he may act in religion worship but t is but to him selfe to his own credit and honour and esteeme among men or for some other selfe-end and yet have no life as a saint The new man and Christ is as dead and acts not and therefore it is sometime a saint has overflowings of spirit mightily inlarged his spirit has no bounds another time he is bound up straitned the pores of his soule are lockt up he hath no intercourse of loves from Christ and therefore has no breathings no declarations of Christs loves to him no experiences he is wrapt up in himselfe and to himselfe and therefore this makes him the soule being as sensible of this as of death for 't is a death to him this makes him to goe to Christ and complaine heavily oh how he grones in spirit till he be revived till his spirit till his loves come into him againe and cause him to act and live Oh! sayes he let my Christ come into me or I die I cannot live 't is true sayes he here is ordinances and here is a fellowship externally but what 's all this if my soule be frozen if my heart be bound up if I live within my selfe if I have not intercourses and returnes of loves from my beloved I die I die Now beloved would you have me make some use of this point from the particulars thereof I hope you have done that your selves as I went along but I will a little make out some uses I cannot be large because of the time and my owne weaknesse and I would make it out to you of what I have found in my own experience though I must confesse it is but lately and no great light neither there are depths there are glorious transcendent truths in these experiences but oh how dark at how small a crevice doe wee see How short doe we come I tell you though I have many times spoken of these things yet how coldly no ravishings no inlargings no overcommings of spirit how bound up truth is I had the Theorie in my understanding and I thought I had practised them because I knew them but 't is but new 't is but small the experience of them but God wil reveale and lead on his saints from step to step that they shall go from strength to strength digging up fountaines till they appeare before the Lord in Zion Professors talke much of heaven but I professe they never were in heaven nay never will be if they come not to this life you hope it may bee this life will bee hereafter But I tell you your heaven is here as well as hereafter in a degree be not deceived to pers wade your selves you are saints and you are Christians and have not this life we have described so farre you are in your sins you are yet below Christ you are yet in your selves you are not come up to the life of a Christian to the life of a Saint Vses from the particulars first are the saints so happy in their priviled ges that they are Christs Doves and so precious to him is it the priviledge and portion of the saints to be so precious to Christ then take this as the first consectory this will follow if it be so Then they will not long to be precious to the world you will not bee troubled though the world though men though friends though enemies regard you not so you be precious to Christ this is enough for you what though such a friend speake evill of you what thongh such a Professor loves you not and there another professour suspects you and you are troubled VVhy saints where is your life in the world or in Christ if in the world no marvell you are troubled no marvell you are offended if your life bee in Christ you will say what matter so Christ thinkes preciously of you if you have the sweet and mutuall embraces of Christ and your spirits run into each other and kisse and embrace each other here would be your rest Secondly observe from the next particulars is nothing in the heart of Christ too good for saints does Christ embrace salute kisse ravish the saints in his transcendent loves Does he endow them with the same glory he himselfe hath with the Father for I must put things together strength will not hold out to take them all severally as the things deserve Have any of you felt these things in your owne experience I do
creature must needes simpathize and bee sutably qualified to the creature But he that sits above with God is above all change in the creatures element hee is selfe-denied to the world and all in the world Againe this is the way to persection so far as we are satisfied with God and satisfied with truth so far we live in perfection I doe not say that person is perfect or without sin no but so farre as we live this life so farre we come toward perfection and live in perfection and live with God The new man carries us to God and perfection it assends and carries us upward to God and Christ but so farre as we come not up to this life so farre wee live below God and are drawne downward to the Creature to the World to Hell-ward to Divell-ward as one when he saw a Bird tyed with a stone to her Legg as she mounted to flee upward still the stone drew her downe to the Earth and thereupon he fell a weeping because it did so fully represent to him his own condition hee could not but weepe Grace carries and drawes a man on to perfection but the old man drawes downe to the Earth to defilement to destruction 3. Againe this conditon of a Saints rest is a gathering condition it puts him in a gathering way I pray you observe it this mā is the thriving man he only is in a thriving way this man is like to grow a rich man indeed All our wayes are scattering wayes if we live on the creature we gaine not but scatter and lose all he that lives this life of a Saint that God has taught him this lesson flowing from his own selfe from the very heart of God and the bosom of Christ he gathers such precious flowers of experience and gaines such precious Jewels and Pearles that he counts himself rich in them and in nothing else If hee live beside God he lookes on himself as a man that scatters all as a growing to be a banckrupt one that has no experience of the rich gainings of grace 1 Tim. 6.6 Godlinesse with content sayes the Apostle is great gaine Ther 's no true cōtent but in gaines by grace and the rich experriences of Gods workings in the soule to see which way corruption comes to be crusified and he kild to the world and the world to him to see how his power and life comes in and to observe the glorious outgoings of God and the manner of his glorious and Godlike proceedings with his soule this satisfies and composes his heart to see how sweetly God hath conquered his soule and brought his will into subjection that was so raging so rebellious Then he counts it all joy to fall into divers tēptations knowing finding by experience that the trying of faith worketh patience Isai 13.9.10 to be intire wanting nothing and so farre as he comes into this life of perfection to rejoyce in that he is made low and he that is of low degree in the creature to rejoyce in that he is made rich in God and high in God Ro. 5.4 and he sees how patience bringeth forth experience and experience hope and hope maketh not a shamed We will now come to some short uses and consectories from this point and from the benefits thereof Vse the first Is contentation a saints lesson is a saints spirit a satisfied spirit then so far as any one of us have not a satisfied spirit so far we have not a Saints spirit so far we are not saints So far as we are not satisfied contented at rest and composed so far wee are short of God and have not the life of God so far as we live not with God and in God For this is held out to us in the very nature of God God is in himselfe at rest serene composed no distraction in the Creature touches him he sits above that is hs is free from all changes and all alterations in the world so is that man so farre as he is a Saint being united and made one with God though he live among the creatures as God has his being in and through all the creatures yet he is not altered by the creatures So has this man as he is a saint not his joy his life his riches his treasure in the creature but in and with God above all creatures Againe is a saint as he is a saint of composed satisfied spirit composed of one spirit for that is promised in Jer. I will give them one heart Ier. 32.39 and one spirit then he is not of a devided discontented spirit hee is not troubled with those wishings and wouldings as men below are Oh that I had this condition or that condition but saies he let any condition come so I have God in it God is my rest and not the condition be it riches or health or the best condition wherein the men of the world and so farre as we are unregenerate to think therein is rest oh saies one had I but such a ones conditition such Lands such Honours I could be contented and satisfied oh saies another had I not such enemies were they but cut off overthro wne I should have rest this is not the temper of a Saint as a saint But he sayes I have found that promise fullfild I have the desire if my heart Psalm 37.4 my rest is in God and I cannot tell what to wish other then I have what I have I would have and what I would have I have if thou art not come to this thou hast a devided heart Some men they are ready to say and blesse themselves in their condition and say I thanke God I am contented but wherein is thy content thou hast a good estate and thou hast the desire of thy heart in the creature thou hast rare parts or thou art honoured among men herein thou art satisfied and thou thinks this is a gracious content thou dost not murmur but blessest God for thy condition alasse this is but sensuall this is but nature if thy content were right it would not be in the creature but in God Should God wheele thee into another condition and wheele away these outward contents then where will be thy comfort And some who are gone a little higher they can boast and say I blesse God I am content I am in poverty in disgrace in prison c. I am perswaded to submit to thē because it is so and it cannot be no other waies t is therefore better to bee content then to fight against the conditiō except I could help it this is but reasoning a mans selfe into content this content is not a Saints content that is to be content as seeing an excellency in this condition as seeing beawty and loves Psalm 68.24 and the glorious outgoings of Gods proceedings They have seen thy goings O God who art in the Sanctuary therefore the Virgins love thee oh the sparkling