the Lord made me to understand by his hand upon me in writing If you would know what that was v. 12 13. The Pattern of all that he had by the Spirit of the Courts of the House of the Lord and of all the Chambers round about of the Treasuries of the House of God and of the Treasuries of the dedicate things also for the courses of the Priests and Levites and for all the work of the Service of the House of the Lord Texts of Scripture which they are not aware of who bring in David as an instance of a Prince who added new Acts or Modes or Rites and Ceremonies in the Worship of God David ordered no more than the Lord had made him to understand in writing by his Spirit and by his hand upon him One would think that mens common reason should judge it safest to keep to the Divine Rule and that it should be the easiest thing But so vain hath man been in all Ages that you shall find they could never content themselves with that Rule but as if they had had a mind to pull down the Vengeance of God upon them they were continually devising new waies and methods after the example of other Nations and copying out their Idolatries and Superstitions The Jews must make a golden Calf in imitation of the Egyptians then they fall in with the Idols of the Moabites Micah must have an Image Jeroboam must set up Calves at Dan and Bethel In short this was the constant vanity of the Jews to all reasonable mens just admiration Christ left us a perfect Rule for Worship under the New Testament But how soon was the Primitive Church in matter of Worship turned aside from the simplicity of the Gospel It kept Doctrine in good degrees of Purity for five hundred years after Christ but the Purity of Worship was abated in many places within less than three hundred years and every Age still grew worse and worse till the Pope got into the Saddle and then that Pope was no body who could not think upon one trifle or other to be added to the Rituals of Worship Till the Popish Worship came up to be what it is at this day a mixture of Paganish Jewish and Christian Rites And it is a very hard thing for any who readeth the Gospel and observeth Christ's Rules and the Apostles Practice and Rules for Worship and Ordinances to find any thing amongst them which hath upon it Christ and the Apostles Stamp and Impression 8. In all times this hath been a temptation to sincere Professors and many both Ministers and People individual Believers and Churches to deviate from the Divine Rule Either the Commands of Superiours have prevailed as in Jeroboam's time it is laid to the charge of the Israelites Hos 5. 11. That they willingly followed the Commandment It is like some not very willingly neither but the more of their will was in it the greater the guilt was and they are chiefly blamed so Micah 6. 16. The Statutes of Omri are kept Or else the Example of their Leaders in Church or State have had the force of a Law upon them Or the gaudry or specious pretences made for things introduced have had a force upon them Many things having as the Apostle saith a shew of Wisdom and Will worship and a neglecting of the body 8. And lastly When these things have happened they have been the blackness and pollution of those Souls and those Churches that have been so far prevailed upon Black and white in this case must be determined and adjudged from a strict adherence to or a deviation from the Divine Rule Those that are brought over to such compliances have discoloured themselves more or less according to the degree wherein they have offended They have kept others Vineyards but their own they have not kept The trust which their Lord and Master committed to them as to the Ordinances of Worship they have not kept 1. These things bring a blackness and unloveliness upon the Soul or upon a Church in the Eyes of God and of Jesus Christ He may not presently give them a Bill of Divorce and say unto them they are not his People but he looks upon them with an ill Eye as a speckled Bird Jer. 12. 9. Mine Inheritance saith God is become unto me as a speckled Bird they kept something of Divine impressions and institutions but they were speckled they had some colours fetched from the Moabites and Ammonites and Philistins c. It is his will that those who worship him should worship him according to his will in Spirit and in Truth such the Father seeketh to worship him now these things spoil the truth of Divine Worship which must be measured from a Divine Institution And they spoil the spirituality of it reducing Carnal Ordinances and setting them up instead of the Spiritual Worship of God Such indeed the Jews had for a time as you read Heb. 9. 10. but they were to hold no longer than until the time of Reformation The Gospel-worship was to be exclusive not only of Ordinances that were typical prefiguring a better and most excellent Sacrifice and Service which were fulfilled the Antitypes being come but it was also exclusive of Carnal Ordinances such as were pleasing and gratifying to the flesh and outward man The Worship of God according to Christ's Institution was to be more reasonable plain and spiritual 2. Nay Errours in the matters of the Worship of God do not only defile and make the Soul guilty but exceeding guilty Errours of Worship look like controulments of the Divine Wisdom who sent his Son and his Apostles to establish a Rule of Worship These additaments speak the Establisht Rule imperfect for otherwise they must be idle and superfluous nothing of which nature is to be admitted in so grave and sacred an action The Assertion of the Divine Rule as not perfect in the matter of Worship reflecteth upon our Saviour either as not knowing what it is that in worship would be most acceptable to his Father or as not faithful in the House of God Or finally as carelesly leaving things of that nature to the wills and fancies of men as whose wildness even from the beginning of the world to that time had shewed it self in nothing more But besides how can we better measure the greatness of any guilt than by the Revelations of God's will and wrath against it and in reference to it If you observe the Old Testament throughout from the time of the Israelites coming out of Egypt to their coming out of Babylon you fhall find the will of God fully revealed against no one sin or kind of sin like this of corruption and faileurs in the matter of his Worship so as such Souls must needs be black in the Eyes of Christ because guilty and that not in an ordinary degree 2. Hence also these things have made them black in the Eyes of the sincerer part of Christians Thus
and desireth the continuance of it The Ignorant bold presumptuous Sinner desireth not the Love of God the pardon of Sins he thinks he is sure of all Hence now it is that the believer desires the Loves of Christ it apprehendeth them good possible and what its Soul doth stand indaily and further need of which apprehension is the reason why our Souls desire any thing be it of what nature soever we can desire nothing but what we must apprehend good sutable to us in some of our circumstances possible to be attained and such as either wholly or in some degree at least we need 2. According to the degree of our knowledge or apprehension of the goodness of any object so are our desires after it This will justify itself upon experience in all other things we do not desire them according to the degree of goodness in them for then every man must desire the favour of God Union and Communion with him but according to the degree of our knowledge or apprehension of such a good as such Now there are various degrees of knowledge 1. The first and meanest is the meer act of our Understanding which by the help of our Eyes and Ears gaineth the knowledge of things And thus the vilest of men may know that the Loves of Christ are good yea good before wine that is they may have so read in the Bible so heard from Ministers of the Gospel And even this knowledge may produce in a bad man a desire after these things proportioned to his apprehension Hence such a man may faintly will and lazily desire these things 2. A Second degree of Knowledge is Opinion This riseth a little higher the man who thus knows that the Loves of Christ are good doth not onely know it from reading or hearing but from probable Arguments Nor is it difficult for a wicked man thus also to know that the Loves of Christ are good Assoon as he can be made to believe that there is a God and that he is the Fountain of Good and that Jesus Christ is the Eternal Son of God and Equal with the Father both in Essence and all Divine Perfections his Reason will persuade him that there must be a Goodness yea a transcendent Goodness in Christs Loves But while Flesh and Blood only revealeth this thing unto him his Knowledge is incertain and faint and he is subject to thoughts that he may be mistaken and therefore though he may sometimes desire Christs Love yet it is but by fits and with incertainties according to the Nature of the Knowledge and Apprehension he hath of the truth of the things 3. A Third degree of Knowledge is Persuasion arising from Demonstration Now there is 1. A Demonstration of Sense thus we know the Sun shines the Fire burneth c. 2. A Demonstration of Reason when we can conclude a thing from infallible Principles of natural Reason 3. A Demonstration of Faith which is the Demonstration of the Spirit When men know things from the holy Spirits fully persuading them of the truth of this or that from a Divine Revelation This is the Demonstration of faith 4. There is yet a further and higher degree of Knowledg that ariseth from Experience being a sensible Evidence of the truth of what the Soul had before received a little of from the sight of the Eye and hearing of the Ear and more from the persuasion of the Spirit and some Argumentations within itself I say now that according to the degree of the Souls knowledge and apprehension so are the workings of the Affections This of desire in particular Hence the desires of Believers to the Loves of Christ must necessarily be the strongest For the degree of the Knowledge and Apprehension the Believer hath of the goodness of them is higher than it is possible any other Souls should have Other Souls may have read Books discoursing the Loves of Christ or heard Discourses of that tendency or judge so from Arguments of Scripture which may make such a thing probable to them But none but these have any persuasion wrought in their Souls by the Spirit of God of the Excellency of them none else have had any real Tasts and Experience of them Knowledge and Experience of the Goodness of any Objects being those things which move the Soul to desire them and the degree of the Souls apprehension of such Goodness and Excellency in Objects the ground of the Souls Intention in such desires it must necessarily follow that a good Christians Knowledge and Experience of that Goodness which is in Christs Loves must be the grounds of their desires after them There needeth no Scripture to prove this it is evident to our Reason Yet take the Instance of David Psal 4. 6. David desires of God to lift up the light of his Countenance upon him Observe now v. 7. what made him prefer the light of Gods Countenance to the Worldlings Corn and Wine and Oil Thou hast put gladness into my Heart Accordingly he tells us Psal 9. 10. They that know thy Name will put their trust in thee Hence you shall observe that David concludeth many of his Psalms of Praise with Prayer But will some say If they have had experience of the Loves of Christ why should they yet desire them None desires what they have This is true if our Enjoyments were perfect but there is an heighth and depth and length and breadth of the Love of God in Jesus Christ an heighth which the Soul hath not taken a depth which the Soul hath not fathomed a length and breadth which the Soul hath not measured from end to end It is true we desire nothing but what we want either in whole or in part therefore in Heaven will be no desire That which is perfect will be come and all that which is in part only will be done away But we shall never be filled with the Loves of Christ till our Mortality be swallowed up in Life I come now to the Application We may learn from hence That God must shew some act of Love to us before we can shew any Love to him Desires after the Loves of Christ though sincere are the least and first and lowest motions of our Souls toward God These you have heard must arise from a Knowledge and Experience of the goodness of those Loves Now this Knowledge this Experience must be the Gift of God to and the work of God in and upon the Soul yea and that not in a way of common Grace and Illumination but in a way of special Grace for though a common Illumination may produce some faint desires yet it will produce no sincere and effectual desires because the Knowledge begot by them will be flitting and incertain and attended with Doubts Fears and Incertainties So as till the Lord by his Spirit hath wrought in the Soul a persuasion of Faith commanding the Soul without dispute to give credit to what he hath revealed in his Word
because they agree the truth of the Propositions of Scripture they may miserably deceive their own Souls a Man by a mere natural power may as well agree that there was such a one as Jesus of Nazareth once in the world who went about doing good exhorting men to a good life and was Crucified c. as that there was in England a William the Conqueror or any thing else that is to be found in other Books of tolerable credit and reputation in the World Or if men think that they do truly believe because they agree many propositions of the Gospel which are evident in the light of Reason they again deceive themselves here may be nothing of the operation of God in this faith Nay if they agree the Propositions of the Gospel because they are revealed there and in the mean time do not agree the Scriptures to be the Word of God but look upon them in the same rank with human writings or only by an human saith agree them to be the Word of God because the Church hath so deliver'd and transmitted them here is all this while no thing of the special operation of God Nor will this agreement produce any steadiness and firmness of practice commensurate to the Revelation but only commensurate to the nature of the Assent which being not fixed constant nor it may be not universal but to some part only of the revelation must necessarily bring forth no more than a saint partial and incertain practice Hence it is that Hypocrites may do many things contained in the law and at one time be more warm than at other times But if thy Assent be the special operation thou assentest to the whole revelation because God hath fixed in thy Soul a persuasion that it is from him who cannot lie it is also steady and fixed and tho some doubts may possibly incumber thee sometimes yet they hold not long and thou firmly and generally with allowance for the frailty and infirmity of human nature endeavourest to live up to the whole of that duty which the revelation imposeth upon thee which thou canst not do without relying on Christ and him alone for Salvation and having a respect to all the Commandments of God And indeed herein that agreement or assent which is the special work of God in the Soul differs from that which is but a meer natural action 1. In that it is more fixed certain and universal and this must be so for our assent is according to our light we must first see before we agree the truth of a proposition now the light of the holy Spirit is without doubt the clearest and brightest light Our natural reason gives us but a dim light as to matters of Faith 2. In that it layeth a stronger obligation to practice Reason will tell us that the more firmly we believe the truth of Propositions holding forth rewards and punishments relating to our practice the stronger we shall find our obligation to practice in order to the obtaining such rewards or avoiding such punishments 3. In that it layeth an obligation to a more universal practice The obligation to practice riseth no higher than the assent so as if there be any duty to which we do not agree our assent obligeth to no practice of that Now the holy Spirit persuades us of the truth of the whole revelation and that in the fullest and truest sense Hence it is that the true believer is more warm and universal in his obedience than it is possible another should be because his assent unto the truth is from a quite differing light and a quite differing work of God the assent of the former proceeding but from a common work of God in nature the latter from a work of special grace by the Spirit of God upon the Soul I will not much contend with those who will have true Faith to be a practical Assent to the Proposition of the Gospel if they by Assent mean a firm and steady Assent and by practical such an Assent as obligeth strongly to an universal practice of whatsoever is revealed as our Duty 1. Because I know a reliance upon Christ for eternal Salvation must be the effect of such an Assent 2. Because I know there can be no reliance on Christ without such a praevious Assent to the Proposition of the Gospel 3. Because I know there can be no such thing without the mighty Power of God upon the Soul So that in this sense the Soul must be drawn by the Father before it come to Christ Only let none deceive themselves as to this point of true Believing by fancying such an Assent to the Doctrine of the Gospel true Faith wherein God hath no further concern than as he influenceth acts of Humane Nature flowing from that order of operations which he hath set in all rational Souls True Faith must be more than this 2. As to Faith men are also prone to cheat themselves by calling their Natural presumption Faith we say Faith lies in a resting and reliance on Christ Now many will tell us they rest and rely on Christ and yet it is no difficulty to evince they do but presume and not believe Resting and relying on Christ for Salvation must be the Father's drawing Natural presumptions are meerly from our selves Every man is willing to hope well for and to prophesie good unto himself Hence living under the publication of the Gospel and having heard of an eternal Life and Salvation and this to be had through Christ and by resting on him many naturally cry they rest on Christ and trust in him and him alone And our Saviour lets us know that men may die with such confidences Matth. 7. 22 23. Now there is a resting and reliance on Christ which is the Operation of God yea and the mighty work of God upon the Soul and this many a poor Soul finds that lives months and years under the Spirit of bondage before it can rest on Christ and quietly commit it self unto him and there is a resting which is no more than a natural hope or confidence arising either from the Souls natural desire of good to it self or from its ignorance of the true grounds of a true resting and reliance And indeed by this may these two be distinguished and known asunder That resting and reliance upon Christ for any spiritual and eternal blessing which is the Operation of God is alwaâ—es bottomed on a Promise and testified by a life suitable to the condition upon which that Promise is made These two things are alwaies in it 1. I say first it is founded upon a Promise for all Grace and Eternal Life being the gift of God it is as vain a thing for any to be confident they shall have it without God's revelation of his Will as to it with reference to them as it is for any man to pretend a confidence and trust in another for the making him rich with a great part of his Estate
the worst of all upon the opinion of some conceited righteousness in our selves or some spiritual power and abilities we have or judge our selves to have the latter is Spiritual Pride nor is any thing more opposite to the truth and Grace of the Gospel the whole design of the Gospel is to exalt Christ as the Lord our righteousness and our strength and our great duty is to accept him in that notion nor indeed can he be truly received in any other notion now can it be reasonably imagined that he whose arm useth to bring Salvation when he looketh and seeth there is none to save should bring Salvation to a Soul that apprehends it hath no need at all of him he hath done enough for it in giving it a reasonable Soul and the Preaching of the Gospel These are now some of those great Evils that are consequential to this error imbibed by the Soul but you will say to me what can a Man or Woman in his or her natural state do in order to his being drawn by Divine Grace To this I answer 1. He may not oppose or set himself against the workings of this Divine Grace 2. He may do some things that may be conducive 1. In the first place do not resist the Grace of God nor set your selves in opposition to it You will say then can Grace be resisted did not you tell us it is powerful and shall be obeyed I answer I did tell you that Grace is powerful and cannot be finally resisted but it may be a long time resisted and opposed The holy Spirit is the most potent agent and must at last overcome but it may be vexed and grieved I know what some will say what if I do resist if I do oppose it if God hath determined me to lise and to Grace as the means it shall at last overcome I answer that is true but yet it is no vain counsel to give any to advise them to take heed of such resistings and vexings of the Spirit of God as it is capable of and that upon a threefold account 1. Because he who thus resisteth the Holy Spirit justifieth God in his condemnation and not putting forth such a power of Grace as shall be effectual of its Salvation those who plead so highly for a power in man to what is Spiritually good lay a great stress upon their fancy that if we do not allow this we make the destruction of a Sinner to be from God not from himself but they do not consider two things 1. That whatsoever destruction we derive from Adam is from our selves for in Adam all died saith the Apostle God is neither bound to restore unto us the Grace he once gave us and we lost nor yet unjust in requiring of us the exercise of that power which we once had of his gift and have lost through our own default for the default of our first Parent in whom we all sinned and dyed was our own 2. That the resistance of the holy Spirit in its more common Grace and operations is a sufficient clearing of God in the condemnation of Sinners though he doth not give out his effectual Grace he hath said that to him that hath shall be given The sense of which tho Mat. 13. and in the parallel Text it may be to him that hath any thing of special distinguishing grace shall be more given of the same nature and kind yet is plainly Mat. 25. 29. where it is used in the exposition of the parable of the Talents To him that improveth what he hath and may very well be interpreted into a promise of further Grace to him that makes a good improvement of common Grace The justice of Gods judgment upon those of Hierusalem was from this manifested to the world That Christ would oft-times have gathered them as an Hen gathereth her Chickens under her wings but they would not If a man must be ruined yet surely he should not ruine himself 2. Secondly Tho if thou beest one ordained to life the Grace of God towards thee shall not be finally resisted yet thy resistances and opposition may make the new birth much harder and more full of pain to thee It is a most certain truth that the foundation of God standeth sure the Lord knoweth who are his and not one of those whom the Father hath by his Eternal gift given to Christ shall be lost they may for a time oppose and resist the motions and knocking 's of his Spirit but it shall at last overcome them but the Soul in its coming unto Christ usually meets with the Spirit of bondage making it to fear before it receiveth the Spirit of adoption teaching it to cry Abba Father Now thy opposition and resistances to the Spirit of Grace may keep thee much longer under the Spirit of bondage and for this I appeal to the experiences of all those who have been brought home to Christ whether they have not found the oppositions and resistances which they have made to the knocks and motions of the Holy Spirit have not lain heavy upon them before they have been able to discern a gracious acceptation whether when their faith in Christ hath got above their other sins the follies and vanities of their youth they have not found it stick here They could hope in Christ and in the free and infinite Grace of God through him were it not that they remember how often they refused the tenders of Grace and put off the holy Spirit knocking at the door of their hearts Now what knowest thou O Christian but that thou art an elect vessel one ordained to eternal life and salvation if so thou shalt certainly be brought home to Christ and be saved notwithstanding thy present resistance and opposition but it may be as through fire why shouldest thou make thy new birth more painful and difficult 3. Thirdly When thy Soul is brought home to God if ever thou seest that happy hour it will while thou livest he a grief of heart unto thee to think how long thou didst oppose and resist the Grace of God bringing Salvation in the tenders of it to thy Soul The People of God have their sad and dark hours as well as their hours of light and comfort they will tell you from their own experience that when they reflect a sad Eye upon their former ways they find nothing lying more sad and heavy upon their Souls than their so long resisting and opposing the Grace of God before they submitted to it to all their sins they have added this great iniquity that when the Lord said to them yet Believe and you shall be saved they to go on in their sinful courses put off the Spirit of God from day to day and sent him sad away from their Souls and why should Christians make themselves matter of trouble and sorrow hereafter how graciously soever God will deal with their Souls O therefore let all that wish well to their own Souls be
influences of the Spirit are the influences of Christ I shall instance in a sixfold influence of the Spirit of Christ upon the Soul as to all which he is a bundle of Myrrh to his beloved 1. The first is his convincing influence Joh. 16. 8. When he is come he will reprove the World of sin In respect of this influence the Spirit of Christ is called the Spirit of bondage Rom. 8. 15. They say of Myrrh that in the gathering it makes the hands of the gatherers exceeding bitter but gathered it becomes incomparably sweet Thus it is with the Lord Christ as to this influence of the Spirit upon us the Soul for the time that it is under this influence is full of bitterness but it turneth to an exceeding great sweetness The Book which St. John did Eat was in the Mouth as sweet as hony but in the belly more bitter than wormwood A fit emblem of sin The convictions of the Spirit of Christ are of a quite contrary nature in the mouth they are as bitter as wormwood but in the belly they are exceeding sweet the Soul in the hour of conviction is exceedingly sad and troubled but when convinced how it blesseth God who was pleased to convince it of sin Like the woman who in an hard labour is full of pain and wisheth she had never bred a Child but being once delivered forgets her pain and remembers her throws with pleasure 2. A second influence of the Spirit of Christ is Illumination The Spirit is the Spirit of wisdom and knowledge Isaiah 11. 2. It teacheth us all things Joh. 14. 26. 1. Joh. 2. 27. That is all things necessary to Salvation The things which Eye hath not seen nor Ear heard nor can it enter into the heart of man to conceive even these things are revealed to us by the Spirit 1 Cor. 2. 9 10. Concerning the manner of the Spirits teaching how consistent with the teachings of Ordinances and yet distinct from it I have else where shewed you my business now is to shew you that Christ in this influence is a bundle of Myrrh Light is sweet to the Eye saith Solomon knowledge is that about which the understanding which is the Eye of the mind is exercised and is every whit as pleasant unto the Soul as light is unto the bodily Eye Now as all knowledge is sweet to the Soul so especially the knowledge 1. Of things hidden from others 2. Of such things as are of nearest concernment to us especially if the knowledge be certain 1. I say the knowledge of such things as are hidden from others such knowledge we upon experience find to be very sweet and such a knowledge the Spirit of Christ gives to the Soul The Gospel of Christ is it self called a mystery a thing hidden from ages and hidden from the wise and prudent This indeed is more generally revealed to all but more especially and fully and clearly to the believing Souls But further the Spirit of God reveals the secrets of God to the Souls of the Saints 1 Cor. 2. 9 10. Even the deep things of God its particular election and the truth of its graces c. Now this knowledge is sweet to the Soul 2. The knowledge of such things as are of nearest concernment to us is most sweet Such is the teaching of the Spirit it teacheth us to cry abba Father it teacheth us to see the things that are freely given us of God Add to this that by how much any knowledge is more certain by so much it is more sweet the understanding is not so pleased with probable notions as what is matter of demonstration and assured to the Soul such is the teaching of the Spirit 1 Cor. 2. 4. It teacheth by demonstration leaving no doubting in the Soul This is a second influence of the Spirit of Christ upon the Soul in respect of which he is a bundle of Myrrh unto the Soul 3. A third influence of the Spirit of Christ is its Sanctifying influence Rom. 15. 16. being Sanctified by the Holy Ghost It is Christ that Sanctifieth Heb. 2. 11. Sanctification is expressed under the Notion of being conformed to the Image of Christ Now as to this influence of grace Christ is a bundle of Myrrh to the believing Soul The unbeliever hates holiness but the Child of God Loves it and desires further degrees of it Rom. 7. 22. I delight in the Law of God after the inward man saith Paul Rom. 7. 22. He his highly pleased when he finds the power of grace in his heart overpowering lusts and corruptions and his Soul every day growing more and more like God and like Christ more full of Spiritual desires Spiritual affections his heart more willing to deny it self to be under the plenary power and Command of Jesus Christ when he finds that it is not he that liveth but it is Christ that liveth in him Christ in respect of this influence is to the Souls of his Saints as a bundle of Myrrh 4. A fourth influence of Christ upon the Soul is his strengthening influence Phil. 4. 13. I can do all things through Christ that strengtheneth me He strengtheneth the Soul 1. In doing Spiritual duties 2. In resisting Corruptions 3. In suffering sharpest trials The Lord stood by me saith Paul But it is not my present business to discourse either of the several sorts of Spiritual strengthening influences Nor yet of the ways and methods by and in which Christ meeteth the Soul with strength and Communicates strength unto it My work is only to shew you that this influence of his is as a bundle of Myrrh to the Soul Now that Christ in this influence is exceeding sweet to the Soul needs no other proof then the daily experience of the Souls of Gods People how refreshed do they rise up from Prayer when they have found the Spirit of Christ in it helping their infirmities with strong cryes and groans It is said of Hannah 1 Sam. 1. That she rose up and her Countenance was no more sad This was that which made the holy Martyrs take joyfully the spoiling of their goods the burning of their bodies And made them feel no more pain to use the expression of one of them then if they had been upon a bed of Roses So that their Persecutors cursed them saying they had a delight to burn 5 A fifth sort of influences are the Quickening influences of the Spirit of Christ I have formerly told you that the Scripture mentioneth a threefold quickening All of them from Christ and by the Spirit 1. The quickening of the dead body mentioned Rom. 8. 11. This will be as a bundle of Myrrh exceeding sweet when it comes when in the resurrection we shall be like Angels And the thoughts of this are exceeding sweet while we live here 2. The quickening of the dead Soul mentioned Eph. 2. 1. This is exceeding sweet to the Soul when done Oh how pleasant it is to a Soul to remember
Church understands it of the Doctrine of the Law which also suiteth with Davids high commendation of the Law of God in his 19 Psal and in the 119. more largely 2. But reading it Loves possibly they may better interpret it who understand it concerning the Graces of Gods Holy Spirit When we speak of the Grace of Christ we either understand that goodness which is essentially in him as he is the fountain of all Grace full of Grace and Truth the fulness of the God-Head dwelling in him or that goodness which he communicateth to his People in the free pardon of their sins and acceptation of their Persons Or 3 dly Those fruits of his Spirit which abide and dwell in us such as faith love I find some Interpreters both ancient and modern interpreting the Text of the latter So Gregorius Mag. That love to thee and to my Brethren which thou hast wrought in my heart But Beza observeth That it is not usual to Saints to commend their own graces and therefore doubtless it is to be understood of that Grace which is and remains in Christ subjectively of which we are the Objects and to this sense agree the most sober and spiritual Interpreters making the phrase to signify that sweet pleasure which the Soul takes from the feeling of Christs love And possibly this is that Vis lactandi that suckling vertue which Delrio mentioneth which Christs puts forth refreshing the Souls of his Saints with his consolations The word is in the plural number by which the Hebrews were wont not onely to express a multitude of things but also the infinite vertues and dimensions of any thing You must not think saith Beza That in the One Essence of God there are more numerical loves No in him all things are one and he is one But his grace is manifold in respect of our feeling and apprehension and he deals out his love to us in different measures according to our different necessities or capacities The Chaldee Paraphrast with some of the Heb. Doctors understand here the Concret by the Abstract and interpret God's loves to be his beloved people of the Jewish Nation whom he preferreth before Wine viz. before any other Nations threescore and ten Nations to which purpose by their Cabalistical Art they have found out the numerical letters for 70 in the word which we translate Wine But I shall not insist upon so fond and improbable a Notion Having therefore spoken Enough for the Explication of the Subject Thy loves Let us indeavour to understand what is praedicated of this Subject 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They are better then Wine good before wine saith the Heb. Text which is but the same thing in their dialect who so use ordinarily to express the Comparative degree 1. Good in the Philosophical notion of it is whatsoever is the Object of our desire the nature of it lying in a convenience and sutableness of the thing unto our natures which makes it desirable which a thing may be either upon the account of pleasure or profit or nobleness Accordingly the Heb. word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is variously translated merry Esther 1. 10. Beautiful Ruth 3. 7. Thy loves are more good i. e. more sweet pleasant profitable than Wine 2. Wine in its primary signification is the juice of the Grape whose proper Effect it is to make the heart of man merry Psal 104. 15. But this were too low a signification for it in this Text. We must therefore allow a figure The Hebrews were wont under the notion of wine to express all other delectable and pleasant things Hence Ahashuerus his feast is called A Banquet of Wine though it cannot be imagined that Wine was all the guests had for their intertainment It is an usuall Synecdoche to express all things that fall under a common genus by some Eminent Species Some of the ancient Rabbies understood by Wine here quamcunque Laetitiam whatsoever is pleasant and acceptable And in that sence Mercer and the best of modern Interpreters agree For that other interpretation which some make of it who understand by loves Gospel Doctrine and by Wine the Doctrine and dispensation of the Law though it seemeth to have some advantage by the use of Wine in the legal oblations and it be a truth That the Doctrine and dispensation of the Gospel being more sweet and perfect is better than that of the Law which brought nothing to perfection Yet I cannot think it the sense of this Text. Let us conclude then that the words are the Language Either of the Church of God preferring the injoyment of God in the Doctrines and dispensations of his word and Gospel or the words of the believing Soul preferring the influences of divine grace before the sweetest of all creatures comforts And this I take to be the most free and consistent sense and interpretation of the words The particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may be conceived here to have a double use Either To give a reason of her former desire that her beloved should kiss her with the kisses of his mouth Which she professeth to be like theirs who desire wine They desire that because it is good She desires these because there is a far greater goodness in these heavenly influences than there is in the best of created comforts by which she shews that she was not carried out to these desires insano quodam affectu sed prudente consilio saith Beza by prudent advice and deliberation reason dictating to us the choice and desire of the things which are most excellent Not by an heady and misguided passion Or else to make an argument which might be advantageous to her for the obtaining of her request drawn from the Estimate of Christs love with which her Soul was possessed Lord I esteem thy favour to me above all created comforts in the world Therefore let not my Soul want it And so it suteth with that of David Psal 4. 6. Lord lift thou up the light of thy Countenance upon us Thou hast put gladness into my heart more than the time that their Corn and Wine increased And thus these latter words of the Text contain the Spouses first Argument by which she urgeth her petition mentioned in the former part of it She proceedeth v. 3. V. 3. Because of the Savour of thy Ointments Thy name is as ointment poured forth therefore do the Virgins love thee The Sept. translate it thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Vulg. Latine joyneth the former part of this verse to the former thus Thy breasts perfumed with the best ointments are better than Wine The difference is not much nor is it an easy labour to determine it because the points and stops which make it are of no great antiquity at least as some think the Hebrew translated for a word seemeth to be thus To the smell of thy good Ointments Thy name is as Oil or Ointment poured out
they have in them cravings and lustings of the flesh David prayeth hard for his life Psal 39. ult and Abraham for a Child and Job for health Jonas is fond of a gourd and Agur beggeth food convenient for him and although Rachel may be too importunate for a Child and Paul for the removal of the Thorn in his flesh yet there is a lawful desire of the good things of this life allowed yea commanded us in that form of Prayer which our Saviour prescribes We are bid to pray Give us this day our daily bread But the Child of God first seeks the Kingdom of God and the righteousness thereof according to our Saviours prescript Mat. 6. 33. I remember David hath such an expression as this Psal 27. 4. One thing have I desired of the Lord that will I seek after that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to behold the beauty of the Lord and to enquire in his holy Temple If a Child of God had but one thing to ask of God this should be it that it might behold the face of God this is that which it would seek after and look out for Yea this is that which their Souls desire eminenter These are the things for which they will wrestle with God and will not let him go until he shall bless them with them Other things they will beg but these are the things their Souls will spend their strength in and lay the stress upon did you hear the secret pleadings of the awakened Soul with God you would easily discern the difference between the desires it hath towards outward things and those which are in it towards Spiritual and distinguishing mercies and be easily able to say Those are the things that this Soul would have pardon of Sins sense of Gods love victory over its lusts and corruptions strength and inlargement of heart in the service of God These are the things which this Soul would have It asks a Ring but the kiss is that to which it hath most mind And all this must be understood of the gracious Soul when it is itself not in its fits of passion and infirmity then Elijah and Job and Jonah and any of the Children of God may speak according to the flesh the law of their members prevailing against the law of their mind hath brought them into captivity to the law of Sin These things being premised for the explication the truth of the proposition will be abundantly evidenced from the example of the man according to Gods own heart holy David and that in several Psalms Psal 4. 6. Lord lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon me There be many that say who will shew us any good but Lord lift thou up the light of thy Countenance upon me The light of the Sun will please others but 't is only the light of thy Countenance that will please me Psal 63. v. 1. 2. My Soul thirsteth for thee my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land where no water is To see thy power and thy glory in the Sanctuary The sight of the Sanctuary will please another but nothing will please David but the sight of Gods power and glory in the Sanctuary Other-where he prays that the Lord would shew him his way and unite his heart to fear his name That God would come unto him and shew himself unto him c. Nor is it hard to find out the reason of it which lies In the sanctification of the renewed man he hath a new heart given unto him A new heart signifies a new understanding a new will and new affections New not as to the faculties themselves but as to the motions and operations of them in which the soul still follows the dictates of reason and proceedeth in the method of a rational creature 1. The Soul is renewed in its understanding from whence proceedeth a new notion and Judgment concerning things The old Serpent cheated our first Parent when he persuaded her that the fruit of the forbidden Tree was to be desired because in the day she should eat thereof her Eyes should be opened and she should be as God knowing good and evil for from that day forward she was struck blind and the Disease according to Divine ordination proved hereditary All we who are the Children of Adam are born blind neither able to take the true notion of good and evil nor yet to make up a Judgment concerning either discerning the things that differ but naturally every one calleth Evil good and good Evil. The Psalmist saith that man stood not in honour but became like the Beast that perisheth In this much like the Beast indeed that we are meerly led by the conduct of a sensitive appetite not discerning those things which are truly and spiritually good and the reason of this is our not understanding our selves for the nature of all good lying in a conveniency and sutableness of the object to us a knowledge of our own state and wants must reasonably be supposed to a right judgment concerning good and Evil. But amongst other Evils accrewing to us by the fall this was one that we are by nature Blind as to our own State and Strangers to our own Souls not understanding that we are by Nature Children of Wrath poor miserable blind and naked but conceiting that we have need of nothing Hence it is that the Soul is not able to judge of the goodness of Union and Communion with God pardon of sin reconciliation with God c. Nor indeed doth it come to understand it until the Eyes of the understanding be opened by the application of Spiritual Eye-salve laid on by the Finger of the holy Spirit of God Till this time the Soul seeth no beauty in Christ nothing for which he should be desired The goodness of Riches and Pleasures and Honours it knows but as for that transcendent goodness and Excellency which is in Christ what it is it doth not understand Hence it naturally desires life health riches honours success in worldly affairs and such common gifts as may serve it in the world with credit and applause and reputation But for spiritual things for distinguishing tokens of love it is not able to take the heighth and length and depth and breadth of the love of God in them nor to discern their conveniency and sutableness to its undone state and condition hence with the Cock in in the Fable it prefers the Barly Corn before that Pearl of great price for the purchase of which the wise Merchant is willing to sell all that he hath But now the regenerate soul hath its Eyes open to discern the things that are excellent and as it is taught by the Spirit of conviction the truth of its natural and unregenerate Estate so its Eyes are opened to see that nothing but the special love of God in Christ is a good suitable to it or worthy of its caring for
discover it and to manifest himself unto his people As the Sun in the Firmament whose Light in it self is alwaies the same and which hath alwaies the same ability and aptitude to illuminate the Air and to refresh the Earth with its Beams yet gives out its Light variously according to its position in the Firmament or aspect upon the Hemisphere its nearness to or distance from the Object to be inlightened or refreshed or as it is more or less hindered by the interposition of Clouds or Vapours so doth the Sun of Righteousness also diffuse his Beams variously Or as indeed a prudent Father though at all times his heart be full of love to his Children yet in the discoveries and manifestations of it he governeth himself by his own prudence relating to the Child 's good and with respect to the Child's behaviour and demeanour towards him So though whom God loveth he loveth with a great love and to the end yet as to the discoveries and manifestations of it he governs himself by his own Infinite Wisdom and with a great respect to his Peoples carriage and demeanour towards him Hence it is that though every Child of God be beloved of God with the same special and distinguishing Love yet every one lives not under the same manifestations and emanations of it He sheweth to some more to some less to some scarcely any according to the Wisdom of his Counsel and the good pleasure of his own will One soul shall have just light enough to discern that the day is broke in his soul that the Sun is arisen with healing in his wings upon him another shall hardly have so much light as to discern that but shall walk in the dark and see no light Another shall have the Sun of Righteousness more fully shining upon him and be able to say with Job I know my Redeemer lives and that I shall see him with these Eyes and though Worms shall destroy this body yet in my flesh I shall see God Or with Paul Rom. 8. 38. I know and am persuaded that neither life nor death nor any thing shall separate me from the Love of God in Jesus Christ Yea the same soul shall sometimes see its Beloved standing as it were behind the wall and looking in upon it through the Lattice see him in a Glass darkly another time it shall see him with a fuller sight as in the house with it face to face One while it shall only see as by a Wicket of hope open and possibly but imperfectly open neither another while its vision shall be as it were of the Heavens opened and Christ sitting at the right hand of God making intercession for it 2. The more or less of special and distinguishing grace is often measured by the soul's apprehension and particular fancy which judgment possibly is not alwaies according to Truth but yet such as we ordinarily make Thus we commonly judge the comfortable reflections of Divine Love to be the greatest tokens of it The sweetest indeed they are but possibly the strengthening Influences of Divine Grace by which the soul is inabled to perform its spiritual duties and to fight the good fight both against motions to sin from within and temptations to sin from without may be no less manifestations of special and distinguishing grace But take your measures how you will the gracious soul valueth at an high rate the least manifestations of such grace as may evidence to it that it is beloved of God with a special and distinguishing love I do not say the least of these will satisfie such a soul That it will not for the soul in which God hath caused by his Spirit a spiritual thirst after himself is continually crying out Give Give The soul will not be satisfied until in the Resurrection it awakes with God's likeness but in the mean time the least influences of this nature will be to it very precious and desirable The truth of this Proposition will appear to you from the petitions of several of the Servants of God in holy Writ more eminently those which we read of concerning David Psal 4. 6. There be many that say Who will shew us any good Lord saith he lift up the light of thy countenance upon me and in the following words he declares that it should be more to him than the worldlings Harvest or Vintage greater matter of gladness than their increase of Corn Wine or Oil And Psal 84. 9. he asks no more than that the Lord would look upon the face of his Anointed What can be less than Beholding and giving the soul a good look The liberty that the Birds of the Air the Swallow and the Sparrow had to make their Nests about the Lord's Altars one would think argued but a small favour yet David prefers their condition before his One would think the Office of a Door-keeper in the Lord's House were but a small preferment yet David valueth it above a Mansion in the Tents of wickedness The several expressions which David maketh use of in the Psalms to testifie his desires after God such as Beholding Looking upon him Remembring him c. are all evident proofs of this The Woman Luk. 7. 38. counts it honour enough to sit at Christ's feet to wash his feet with her tears and then to wipe them with the hairs of her head The Woman of Canaan is called a Dog and contented with it so she may but lick up the Crumbs under her Master's Table You read of another Woman that cried out If I may but touch the Hem of his Garment The Prophet Zechariah foretold of a time when men should take hold of the Skirt of a Jew saying We will go with you for we have heard God is with you Any thing of Christ is precious to a soul that hath once tasted how good he is Joseph of Arimathea must have his dead body and the Disciples must run to the Sepulchre where he was laid The People of God of old had a favour for the dust of Zion and the stones thereof But much more precious must the least emanations of that virtue be which is in him suited to the wants the spiritual wants of poor souls What can be less than a look a smile a word yet we find these have been very precious to the People of God What can we think of less than the hearing of a Prayer yet David esteemeth this ar an high rate Psal 116. 1 2. For this he professeth his love to God and his resolution to call upon him so long as he lived One would think that of all other Fellowship and Communion with Christ a Fellowship with him in his Sufferings were least desirable St. Paul glorieth in this and speaks of it as a thing desirable Phil. 1. 10. ch 3. 11. And we read of the Apostles praising God that they were thought worthy to suffer for the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ The same Spirit that was in all these
Servants of God is yet to be found in the souls of such as have any acquaintance with or relation to the Lord Jesus Christ And indeed our reason will tell us that it must be so if we consider but these following particulars which will give you a reasonable account of the truth of this Proposition The least token of special distinguishing Grace is of an infinitely sweet and salvifick nature and evidence There are common gifts of the Spirit of God which indeed may be sweet and very grateful to a spiritual nature such are the gifts of Prayer and Prophecy c. but yet are not of a saving nature or evidence a man may have them and perish for ever but it is not so with such influences of the Spirit as are tokens of special distinguishing love spiritual gifts are to be coveted because of a subserviency in them to spiritual and saving ends but they are not of a saving nature and have nothing of a saving evidence in them but in the least token of special distinguishing love there is something of an evidence for Salvation the least of it is of a saving nature Faith that is but as a grain of Mustard seed is as much saving as the strongest Faith is The measures of our comforts much depend upon degrees of grace but our Salvation doth not Christ bids Zacheus go home for that day Salvation was come to his house Salvation cometh to the soul that hour in which the least of special love shineth upon it the least of that brings Salvation and consequently is exceeding sweet and must be so if you consider this soul as first seeking the Kingdom of God allarumed with the spiritual sense of its misery by nature it s lost and undone condition in Adam This is the one thing that such a soul seeks after in comparison with which all other things are as dross and dung to it That it may discern it self beloved of God one of those for whom Christ died and whose sins are washed away with his blood for this it hath wept and prayed and resolved to seek after it and resolved not to be silent There is no evidence of special Love but is suited to some great spiritual want of the soul Our souls are exposed to a great variety of wants All the tokens of God's special Love are suited to some or other of these wants Our souls are impotent and weak both to the performance of spiritual duty and to resist our spiritual adversary to this want now strengthening grace is suited They are dull and heavy and move heavily in spiritual duties to this quickening grace is suited They are sad and troubled for fear of God's wrath to this consolatory grace is suited There is no influence of the special Love of God but is suited to some special want or burden of our souls and therefore the least of them must be exceedingly desirable for so every thing is that suiteth our necessities and so much the more as it suiteth some more special and eminent wants If the Sun doth but arise upon the soul it healeth Mat. 4. 2. though it shineth not out in its fullest glory if Christ spreadeth but a wing over it there is healing in that wing His very shadow gives delight to the soul Cant. 2. 2. the least of his fruit is pleasant to its taste If saith the woman I can but touch the Hem of his Garment I shall be whole Such is the purity of the Saints Love that though they may have an Eye to the Recompence of Reward which his Love brings yet they love him for himself who appears to their souls as Totus desideria altogether desirable It is his Love which their souls thirst after now the least special token of Love sheweth that he loves it and his heart cleaveth to it He that valueth the Love of his friend regardeth not the quantum of the Token but the nature of it if it be of such a nature as he doth not ordinarily give to any common friend that is it which he eyeth If a soul can see any thing which speaketh its Lord joyned to it cleaving unto it this is it which makes it valuable A discerning soul will take little joy in gifts of common providence Riches Honours good Relations common gifts It may and will desire these things while it is in the flesh as they fill up some emptinesses in that our state but it can by no means be satisfied with these things As Haman said when he had been telling his Wife of his great preferments and honours All this doth me no good so long as I see Mordecay sitting in the King's Gate my Enemy is honoured and advanced as well as I So it saith The Lord hath given me riches honour c. but all this doth me no good so long as I see the haters of God enjoy as much of these things as I do let me have some special token of God's Love Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth Fourthly The Child of God knoweth That the least token of Christs special love is more worth than all the world There is no proport on betwixt a corpâ—ral and a spiritual good betwixt what is sutable to our flesh and to our wants in this life and what is sutable to our Souls and necessary for us with respect to our eternal felicity The Philosopher could say Animus cujusque est quisque The mind of a Man is the Man The Christian knows that Anima cujusque est quisque The Soul of a Man is the Man What shall it profit a Man if he should gain the whole world and lose his own Soul The sensual Man values his life above those things that are only good because of their subserviency to that The rational man valueth his mind above his flesh and accordingly sets a price upon knowledge and moral Virtue above those things that meerly gratify his sense The spiritual Man valueth his Soul his Soul considered not only as a rational Being but as a Spirit an immortal Spirit capable of the favour of God and an union and fellowship with him and ordain'd to an eternal existence not only above his body which he knoweth is made up of dust moulded up into flesh and blood and bones but above his mind It really is of more value and he is made apprehensive of it hence he cannot but value the least that tendeth to make that happy above any thing else whatsoever Besides he knows himself created to an eternity and believing that his reason teacheth him infinitely to prefer what is good for him with reference to an happy existence to eternity above any thing that can only serve him for the short time he is to be clothed with flesh and to live in this world This Election of the loves of Christ before all things else and the value he puts upon the least tokens and manifestations of it doth naturally and rationally follow his
to and in your soul to inable you further to perfect holiness in the fear of the Lord. 3. After the beatifical visions of God in another life Learn hence the great difference there is betwixt earthly and spiritual objects of our desires and delights The worlds Crums are little valuable tho some are fond of its Loaves The good things of the world derive much of their value from the quantity of them that it throws into our laps The minimum quod sic the least portions of the pleasures profits or honours of it have little of value in them but the least of Christ is exceeding precious the things of the world affect not the Soul or or its necessities they are not certain pledges of greater measures they will go but a little way to fill the creatures emptinesses but it is otherwise with Spiritual blessings in and through Christ Thirdly You may from hence observe the difference betwixt the Hypocrites and the Saints desires after Christ An Hypocrite may pretend some desires after Christ nay he may really desire something of his love consider Christ as a Saviour as one that brings the Soul to life and immortality so he must necessarily be the object of the desire of every man that hath any view of his own mortality and that Eternal State to which man is ordained Even Balaam saith Oh that I might dye the death of the Righteous that my latter end might he like his But mark ye these are the fullest manifestations of Divine Love these are more than the kisses of his Mouth but for those tokens of love which are below these for such manifestations of the love of Christ as tend to the inabling of the Soul to serve and glorify God by the subduing of Mans will to the will of God the mortification of lusts and corrupt affections these are not at all valuable to a sensual man not indeed to any but to the changed and renewed Soul I do not know any one thing from which a Man may take better measure of himself and a good Christian may better distinguish himself from one that walketh in a vain shew and meerly glorifieth in appearance than this To a good Christian the least of Christs distinguisâ—iâ—g love is exceeding precious and more precious than the greatest portions of the worlds goods The workings of the Spirit of Christ within and upon the Soul subduing the will of Man to the will of God mortifying our Members and the deeds of the Body Taking the affections off the Earth and Earthly things and fixing them on more sublime and spiritual objects the giving of the Soul a good hope through grace these are things which we usually count some of the least tokens of special and distinguishing love Really they are great things nothing of Christ is little but we judge ordinarily according to sense we ordinarily esteem a sense or assurance or full persuasion of the love of God a much greater thing than these But now for a Soul to set an high price and value upon these to be more satisfied more to triumph and rejoice in the conquest of a lust the victory over a temptation than in the conquest of all our Enemies More to desire that our hearts may be filled with love to God desires after God delight in God than to have our Barns filled with Corn or our Purses with Gold and Silver this I take to be such a difference between a Christian indeed and a Christian in a meer Name Title and outward Profession as a Christian may rest in when he is inquiring into his Soul for evidences of the truth of grace Other manifestations of the love of God may be desired for our selves and with a respect only to our selves and the quiet relief and peace of our own Spirits a Christian can desire these only for the glory of God Try your selves therefore Christians by this Touchstone An Hypocrite may desire to know that his Sins are forgiven and that God would not impute Sin to his Soul or that he would impute a righteousness without works an Hypocrite may desire to live with God in glory but these lesser tokens of love he valueth not But alas even the best of Gods People must I fear be here reproved not for their no valuing of these kisses of Christ that is incompetent with a Child of God but for their not enough valuing of them and being too passionate and unsatisfied for want of the comforting manifestations of Divine Love I have before told you that these sensible manifestations of Divine Love are exceedingly desirable and there is no Child of God but is concerned to wish to pray to labour for them But we must take heed that we be not like our little Children whom we shall sometimes see too much slighting and undervaluing and ready to throw away what good things they have because they want some particular thing which they have a mind to which it may be we that are their Parents do not see so proper for them especially under their present circumstances It was lawful for Rachel to wish for to pray for Children but she sinned in saying to her Husband give me Children or else I die Hannah was much in the same error 1 Sam. 1. 8. weeping not eating and vexing her self because she had no Child and in the mean time forgetting that God had given her an Husband who was better to her than ten Sons So it is lawful nay the duty of a good Christian to pray to endeavour for the sweetest and fullest manifestations of Gods love But I have often thought that though these be good things of a Spiritual nature and so vastly differing from the good things of this life yet in this they agree with them that they must be asked with submission to the will of God because they are not de necessariis ad salutem things that are necessary to life and eternal Salvation but such which a Soul may want without any breach of Gods Covenant with the Soul 2. But for a Soul not only too passionately to desire these things which speaketh its not submitting to the will of God in his not dispensing them to it but to over-look deny or undervalue all the tokens for good which it hath received from God meerly because it hath not these and to conclude that it hath nothing of Christs love this is certainly what doth no become a Christian Certainly a Christian ought as much to value himself upon those emanations of grace by which he is inabled to serve and honour God as upon those by which his Soul is rendred more at ease more refreshed and comforted Every kiss of Christ every measure of special distinguishing love is and ought to be precious to a believing Soul Let me in the last place bottom upon this discourse a double word of exhortation The first respecting the Men of the world those I would persuade to leave off their pursuit of
say some interpreters desires his manifestation in the Flesh the publication of the Doctrine of the Gospel together with the comfortable application of those Doctrines to her conscience I am sure there is a truth in that Let me therefore a little make use of their notion Take this for the Proposition Prop. It is of the nature of a believing Soul to thirst after a communion with Christ in his Word his Gospel especially and the teachings of his Spirit in and by that I here join two of those propositions together which I distinguished upon the opening of the words She desires the kisses of his Mouth 2. That he should kiss her with the kisses of his Mouth This Proposition will offer me an opportunity to discourse to you the affection of the believing Soul to the words of Christ both in the more external and more spiritual and internal teachings and ministrations of it The words of the Gospel are the words of Christ the kisses of his mouth whether they be applied and set home to the particular conscience yea or no. The ministration of the Gospel is in itself exceeding glorious Therein saith the Apostle is the Righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith Rom. 1. 17. Therein in Gods way of Salvation revealed to lost sinners and by it life and immortality are brought to light Now this word of God is to be considered As written for our Instruction For saith the Apostle Rom. 15. 4. whatsoever things were written before were written for our learning that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope As preached So it is the Ordinance of God for our faith and therefore called The word of Faith Sanctification Consolation and Eternal Salvation for indeed the supply of all the spiritual wants and necessities of our Souls Hence there are three ways by which our Souls have a communion with God in his Word Reading Hearing and Meditation Reading is one means by which we come to the knowledg of the will of God in his Word The King of Israel was commanded to read in the Book of Gods Law all the days of his life that he might learn to keep the Law of his God and there is a blessing pronounced to him that readeth Indeed he that readeth the word as it lyeth before us in our Bibles hath this advantage that he is sure what is there plain to his understanding is the undoubted pure Word of God and while a man readeth the Scriptures he is but repeating of Gods Word to his own soul or hearing God immediately speaking to him Hearing the word preached is another means of communion with God in his Word This is an Ordinance of God and such a one as he honoureth with being the great means of calling and saving such as he hath ordained to life So as in that ordinance a soul hath an opportunity to meet God to draw nigh unto him to hear him speak unto it We must take heed that we do not think that all which we hear out of pulpits is spoken by God God no further speaketh by the Minister than the Minister keepeth unto his Text speaketh according to the Scriptures either by way of interpretation or application And therefore every good Christian is to search the Scriptures whether what their Preachers deliver be consonant to them Those noble Bereans mentioned Acts. 17. did so when St. Paul was the Preacher and are commended for it The Scriptures are to be judged by no other rule but Sermons are to be measured by the holy Scriptures No man hath communion with God by hearing further than so far as that is consonant to the will of God which he heareth But admitting the Minister of Christ answereth his name and Office and faithfully revealeth and applieth the will of God while we hear we have communion with God God communicateth his holy will unto us and we communicate with him by an obedient Ear who hath comanded us to hear that our souls may live A third way is by Meditation This is an act of our inward man standing upon the things which we have read or heard as necessary to the souls spiritual nourishment as Digestion is to the nourishment of our bodies by what is their proper food a duty much practised by David Psal 119. 97 99. And a good man is described by it Psal 1. 3. He meditateth in the law of the Lord night and day By this the soul doth not only fasten the word of God upon it self but it also dives deeper into the depths of it I say this communion with God in his word is very desirable to the spouse of Christ I added his gospel especially The Word of God in the holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament is made up of several parts There is in it sacred history no unuseful part of holy Writ it being that which more than any other acquainteth us with Gods way of of providence with his people of old You have in it many Moral Instructions and Precepts of Christianity and Godliness an admirable part of Scripture that which makes the holy Scriptures to be what no other book in the world is a light to our feet and lanthorn to our paths Shewing us what we are to do what to decline and avoid but yet these are not properly called Gospel doctrines You have in it many Prophesies or predictions of what God intended to do in the world most of which are fulfilled some we yet live in the expectations of You have also in it many terrible threats and curses and many woes denounced against the violaters of the law of God these are excellent portions of holy Writ to keep your souls in awe and make us afraid of sinning against God but these are not properly Gospel Doctrines but properly belong to the Law which declareth and worketh wrath You have also in those sacred books many declarations of the good will and love of God to poor lost Sinners declared in and through Jesus Christ You have an historical part of the Gospel declaring what Christ hath done and Suffered for us a declarative and promissory part proclaiming Salvation to poor lost creatures and promising life and Salvation and all grace to some poor undone sinners promises for the conferring and increase of grace These and such like I principally understand by Gospel Doctrines The Doctrine of Gods free grace in the pardoning of sin and the imputation of Christs Righteousness to the soul Doctrines that reveal Christ and tend to bring the soul to Christ or direct the soul in walking with him Now I say tho the believing soul values every line of holy Writ and hath a reverence for the whole Word of God and desires a communion with God in reading and hearing and meditating in every part of his revealed will yet it hath a special thirst after those portions of it which contain these Revelations Other parts are
reasonings of one part of the world that have pretended to more Learning and Knowledge than others and the prophane scoffs and mockings of a more silly part of it at the greatest Mysteries of the Kingdom of God Some by Wisdom know not God being under the meer conduct of reason and tying up themselves to the meer informations of that natural Eye Some knowing less have blasphemed God and the holy things of God counting their own Ignorance a sufficient excuse for their Blasphemy None knoweth the things of God aright but he that is under the Teaching of the Spirit Take the first Principle of all Religion viz. That the holy Scriptures are the Word of God no Soul knoweth this as he ought to know it but he that is under a further Teaching than that of the Church or of Reason much less doth it know the momentous Propositions that are contained in those holy Writings To all knowledge there is required 1. A sufficient Revelation 2. A sufficiency in our faculty to receive and comprehend the Revelation The holy Scriptures are a sufficient Revelation of all Truth There are no Mysteries of the Kingdom of God to be admitted but what are there revealed But we want a visive faculty a sufficiency in our understandings to apprehend and to conceive them till the Lord by the finger of his Spirit toucheth our Ears and saith Ephatha be opened When Peter made his confession of Christ for which Christ blessed him Christ addeth Flesh and blood hath not revealed it to him Secondly The Spirit teacheth by a special Application of the Word to the Conscience The Word as written is no more directed to one man than to another it equally concerneth all men When we Preach we are like Benhadad's Archers we draw Bows at adventures and let the Lord's Arrows fly who is it that directs them betwixt the joints of one harness more than another that when we reprove sin and denounce the Judgments of God against it saith to this or that sinner Thou art the man or when we display the grace of the Gospel and open the Promises of God teacheth one Soul to apply them while another refuseth the comfort of them All special Application of the Word to the Soul which indeed is the true Teaching is from the holy Spirit of God It is the Spirit that was promised Joh. 16. 8. to convince the world of Sin Righteousness and Judgment It is the Spirit which convinceth the Soul of Truth of Wrath of Love indeed of any thing of Spiritual Revelation It is the Spirit that makes the Word stick to the Soul All the Ministers on Earth cannot make a threatning to stick to the heart of an hard and impenitent sinner nor a Promise stick to a broken and contrite heart until the Spirit comes and joyneth with the Ministration of the Word We sometimes meditate of the Lord's terrours and compose Discourses with the best Art we are able and in the vanity of our hearts are it may be sometimes saying within our selves Surely this Sermon will alarum some sinners open some blind Eyes Another time we study the Grace of the Gospel and with the best Art we can compose Discourses to affect Souls with the sense of the love of God in Jesus Christ and are ready to think surely this Discourse will affect some Souls and bring them to love and admire Jesus Christ to seek to him for pardon and forgiveness to receive him as the Saviour of man as their Saviour We go about our work and when we have done we see cause to return unto the Lord that sent us mourning and saying We have laboured in vain and spent our strength for nothing and in vain The Spirit of the Lord moves not upon the face of our waters there 's not one Soul washed from its filthiness The Angel comes not and troubles the waters though our people lye from year to year at the Pool yet possible not a Soul is cured of its infirmity The Word is but a dead letter it is the Spirit that quickeneth whom he pleaseth The Word the Minister teacheth us by communicating notions but the Spirit only teacheth by particular and effectual Application of notions to our Souls advantage Thirdly The Spirit teacheth by evident Demonstration There is a threefold Demonstration of things 1. The Demonstration of Sense Thus it is demonstrable that the Fire burneth that Snow is white all know that spiritual things come under no such Demonstration 2. The Demonstration of Reason thus a proper effect is a demonstration of the cause Some Propositions in Religion are indeed capable of this demonstration The Creation demonstrateth a Creator c. But alas there are very few things in Religion that fall under the demonstration of Reason most Propositions of that nature depend upon Revelation and theâ—truth of them is to be judged from thence That Christ is the eternal Son of God That he took upon him our Nature died for Sinners In short all the main Propositions of Religion all Propositions immediately concerning our Salvation all Articles of Faith are things which fall not under the demonstration of Reason 3. There is therefore Thirdly a Demonstration of the Spirit St. Paul tells us his Preaching was in the Demonstration of the Spirit that is attended with the Demonstration of the Spirit and let Scoffers say what they will if this Demonstration of the Spirit attendeth not all our Preaching we do but beat the Air and labour in vain Logicians rightly tell us of two sorts of Arguments The one they call Topicks the other Demonstrations The difference of them lies in the effects they have upon our minds The former make a thing only probable to us the other make it certain If a notion appears only probable to us we have some doubts and fears and suspicions about the truth of it Nothing is demonstrated to us but that of the truth of which we have no further doubts against which we can make no Objections Now nothing but the Spirit of God thus teacheth The Gifts of Ministers are various the discourses of some may be meer words oratorial discourses these of all others have least influence upon any but airy Souls others more mind their work and knowing that nothing but the Word of God layeth hold on the Conscience endeavour to prove what they say by holy Writ and some in this are more happy than others as they are more skilled in the Scriptures and the true sense of them others are more rational in their discourses men of great parts good reason though the second sort of these best discharge their Office yet the effect of the best is to make a thing but probable to the Soul The Soul will find out some distinctions excuses and evasions until it comes under this Teaching of the Spirit it is an easie thing to make it probable to the Soul that it is in a road and high-way to Hell and eternal destruction that sin is the
vilest thing in the world that there is no way of Salvation but by Jesus Christ In short any Gospel Proposition may easily be made probable either by reason working from connate natural Principles or at least to those Souls that own the Scriptures to be the Word of God from Propositions of holy Writ but still I say till the holy Spirit of God comes to teach the Soul the Soul will not be fully persuaded indeed not at all persuaded but have this and the other thing to say against it Nothing silenceth the Soul to the revelation of any Spiritual Truth so as it disputeth it no more unless it be perhaps in a fit or under some great temptation but this Demonstration of the Spirit Fourthly The Spirit teacheth by Recapitulation or bringing to remembrance I have my ground for this from that of our Saviour Joh. 14. 6. The Comforter which is the Holy Ghost whom the Father will send in my name he will teach you all things and bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I have said unto you This Teaching by way of bringing to remembrance is an excellent way of Teaching It is one reason why Christians profit no more by hearing because they never meditate they seldom or never call to remembrance what they have heard If a Schoolmaster should learn a Child his Grammar Rules once and never make him bring them again to his remembrance he would learn but little An improvement in notional knowledge of spiritual things doth depend upon often calling to remembrance what we have heard But the Spirits bringing to remembrance is yet a more excellent thing and there is the same disproportion betwixt our own bringing to remembrance something we have read of the Word of God or heard out of it and the holy Spirit 's bringing to remembrance that there is betwixt Ministerial Instruction and the Instruction of the Spirit of God at the first As man's instruction and first teaching reacheth no further than that power of man's Soul by which he receiveth the bare notion of a thing and that imperfectly too but the holy Spirit instructeth the heart and reins and teacheth the secret and inward parts of the Soul So man's bringing to remembrance things which we have heard from God doth no more than revive the notion of them in our understandings making the first prints of them more deep plain and legible But the holy Spirit 's bringing things to remembrance is a bringing them to the remembrance of the whole Soul renewing those motions of the will and affections which it taught the Soul with reference to those Propositions which by Ministerial Teaching or by reading the Word were first by the help of our Eyes and Ears brought into our Souls and carried by the holy Spirit of God further into the understanding the will and affections by which the Soul is anew instructed convinced comforted strengthened c. to which our repetitions of and discourses of what we have read and heard serve but as means to so noble an end and without the attaining of that indeed is of very little significancy to our Souls real profit and advantage Lastly The Spirit 's Teaching is by strengthening and quickening the Soul to practice We call upon men not to be hearers of the Word but doers of it also but we cannot make them so we cannot give them an inward Principle of Life either strengthening or quickening them to do what we call to them for and this is the reason why we oft-times labour in vain and spend our strength for nothing and in vain Old Adam is too hard for young Melancthon We see this in the experience of every School-Boy The best Teaching is by practice Let a Child learn his Rules never so well he understands them not till he comes to reduce them to practice therefore the best Teachers put Children upon practice as soon as they can Solomon tells us Pro 1. 7. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of Knowledge The end of all Knowledge is practice We therefore desire to know that we might practice he that hath not been taught to practice in the things of God hath indeed learned nothing By this time I hope I have shewed you that admitting the teaching of the Letter and of the Ministers there is none left for the teaching of the Spirit and that there is a vast difference betwixt a meer external Communion with God in his Word and an internal Communion with him in and by the Word so as we have no reason either to despise Ordinances or to rest in that external homage which we pay unto God in the observance of them and sufficient reason why the Soul of an understanding Christian should not be satisfied with the reading and hearing the words of Christ's mouth without the kisses of his mouth For the proof of the Proposition I shall give you first the instance of holy David take it as it lieth before you Ps 63. 1 2. 3. O God saith he thou art my God early will I seek thee in a dry and thirsty Land where no water is he means no waters of the Sanctuary The title of that Psalm tells you that Psalm was composed when David was in the wilderness of Judah in the time of his persecution by Saul when he had not the liberty of God's Publick Ordinances In this condition he thirsteth he longeth for what for thee saith he Further yet v. 2. To see thy power and thy glory so as I have seen thee in the Sanctuary Because thy loving-kindness is better than life You see David's desires are not terminated in a coming into the Sanctuary but a seeing the power and glory of God in the Sanctuary in an understanding the loving-kindness of God revealed in his Sanctuary And in the expression of the same passion Psal 42. 1. As the Hart panteth after the water-brooks so panteth my Soul after thee O God My Soul thirsteth for God the living God when shall I come and appear before God It is manifest by the last words that the thing which David thirsted after was a communion with God in the Ordinances of his Worship but yet not after a meer external communion with him My Soul panteth after thee O God for God the living God So in Psal 119. v. 18. Open my Eyes O Lord that I might discern the wonders of the Law not my Ears only to hear thy Law or my Eyes that I may read the Doctrine of the Law but that I may discern the wonders of thy Law Paul did not think it enough that the Ephesians and Colossians had the Word of God amongst them and Preach'd to them by Apostles and men immediately deriving from them but for the former he prayes that the Eyes of their understanding might be opened and for the latter That the Word of God might dwell in them richly but what need have we of any Scripture in the case I appeal to the experience of
good pleasure yet he breatheth upon he teacheth no Souls but those Souls that are willing and desirous to learn and to be instructed It is true it is he who first maketh them willing who first enclineth their Ears to hear but he first prepareth the Heart and then causeth his Ear to hear as to Prayer so in hearing he first circumciseth the Ear of a man and enclineth him to hear his Statutes and then he teacheth them He dealeth not with us as with Stocks and Stones but as with rational Creatures in a rational way Attend unto the word which thou goest to hear No teaching no good is to be expected from any teaching where the person only lends an Ear but suffers his Mind extravagantly to wander here and there The Schoolmaster hath no Patience for such a Scholar I am sure God hath no Blessing for such a Soul as in hearing doth not hear nor encline his Ear to Understanding The Scholar gets little by his Master or Tutors reading upon an Author if the Scholar attendeth not to the Text of the Author The Spirits teaching is but a Commentary upon the word it bringeth to remembrance the things which we have heard from God The Soul that attends not to the word which he reads or heareth can expect nothing of the Spirits teaching the word is not like to dwell in that Soul that will not suffer it to come so much as over the Threshold into it I mean into its memory or notion Take heed of Vexing the Spirit in its Teachings It was laid to the charge of the Israelites Isa 53. 10. that they vexed his holy Spirit They vexed the Spirit by an afterwork rebelling against his word not being obedient to what they were taught But men may in hearing vex the Spirit in its Teaching either by Non-Attendency suffering their hearts to be wandring elsewhere when God in his word is teaching the Soul this vexeth any Father or Master in teaching a Child but of this I spake before And not only so but by not giving a special regard to its special Instructions Scarce any of us but in hearing shall find some notions of truth some particular passages that God sets more particularly home and do in a special manner affect the Soul The not observing them or quick forgetting of them is a special vexing of the holy Spirit in its Teachings of our Souls Work together with the Spirit in calling to remembrance what you have heard Talk of the Law of the Lord when thou liest down and when thou risest up when thou sittest by the walls of thy House when thou goest out and when thou comest in The Jews had Phylacteries Rolls of the Law fastened to their Garments to keep the Law in their mind perpetually Our Saviour blamed them for their broad Phylacteries and narrow Practice but he blamed not the means to keep the Law of God in their minds only they used them to a wrong and false â—nâ— used them not to the end for which they made them Follow the word with Prayer Do not only pray for the Spirit before thou hearest but pray for the abidings ofâ— it after thou hast heard to bring to thy remembrance what thou hast heard from God Labour to practise what thou hearest The Master or Tutor is weary of teaching the Scholar to whom he hath read Lecture after Lecture but yet he will do nothing but on the contrary how chearfully doth an ingenuous Master teach that Scholar that to his utmost pâ—tteth in practice what he hath read to him and then cometh to his Tatâ—r begging to be further taught and instructed The Spirit of God will give over that Soul that pretends to be ever learning and yet never comes to any practical Knowledge of the Truth He that is not a meer hearer but a doer of the Word also is the man that shall be blessed indeed Sermon VIII Canticles 1. 2. Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth for his Loves are better than Wine I Have done now with the matter of the Spouses that is the Churches or the particular believing Souls prayer in this her first Petition I have nothing as to the petition it self to consider but the form of it As to the matter we have found that the thing she would have is Some Special distinguishing favour Some token of God for good to her which might speak him to love her with the Love of a bridegroom to a bride a Husband to his Wife I have shewed you that she asketh modestly but a kiss thereby letting us know how precious the least of Christs Special distinguishing love is to the truly believing Soul Not that the least dispensations and measures of grace will satisfy the Spiritual hunger and thirst of a pious Soul it is one thing for a pious Soul to prize and value the least another thing to be satisfied and fully contented with it she therefore mentions Kisses in the Plural Number as well to signifie the variety of gracious Influences as their frequent Emanations I have further taken notice of her particular desire after a communion with God in his word especially Gospel Doctrines and that not only a more external Communion with God in reading hearing and thinking upon it But the more reall internal Spiritual communion with God in his word which the Soul hath by the teachings of the Spirit She desires not onely to hear the words of his mouth but to be kissed with the kisses of his mouth I have now nothing to do but to consider the form of her words and see if from thence we can gain any further Spiritual Instruction The words are first Vox volentis the Language of a Soul that was willing to receive these impressions if she were not willing she would not have made them the matter of her request Secondly They are Vox cupientis not onely the Language of one that was willing but of one inflamed with a desire after the object willed and proposed They do not express a bare velleity with an indifferency as to the thing They sound a great deal more then He may if he will kiss me with the kisses of his mouth Lastly They are Vox petentis the language of one upon her knees begging it of God as the great thing which she sought after And as I observed to you in the opening of the words she begs reverently modestly humbly boldly fervently The form of her Petition speaketh a well ordered Prayer a Prayer according to the Rules which God hath given us for putting up our Supplications Hence results the Proposition Prop. That believing Souls are not only very willing but exceedingly desirous of a near spiritual communion with Christ and to obtain it will use rightly ordered Prayer In the Proposition here are three things predicated of such a Soul as is the Spouse to this glorious Bridegroom 1. It s willingness that the Lord should have a near and spiritual
for food to him But we are blessed with Spiritual Blessings in Christ and upon the account of Christ he giveth the first grace upon the account of Christ's Intercession pleading for the Application of the purchased Redemption He giveth further grace upon the account of Christ's Intercession for us and the Spirit 's Intercession for us For we know not what to pray for as we ought but the Spirit it self maketh Intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered and he that searcheth the heart knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit because he maketh Intercession for the Saints according to the Will of God Rom. 8. 26 27. Now a due estimate and value of the Love of Christ in a Soul is an Indication of the Spirit of Christ dwelling in the Soul hence it must needs be an Argument of force with God for he that searcheth the heart knoweth the mind of the Spirit making Intercession for the Saints according to the will of God Secondly The force of this Argument lies here in that it layeth hold upon many Promises The Promises are but as so many Bonds in which God hath made himself a Debtor to his Creatures All Promises oblige the truth and faithfulness of those persons that make them God being the true and faithful One cannot lye He is faithful that hath promised saith the Apostle so that if it be a sufficient Argument to use with a man to obtain any thing we would have to tell him He hath promised it it holdeth towards God more strongly as his truth and faithfulness is much more certain and infallible than any Creature is Besides that it is a further advantage when Promises are made upon a due and just consideration for these is not only the truth but the justice also of the person promising is concerned to the fulfilling of them Hence in Scripture you shall ordinarily find the Servants of God pleading the Word the Covenant of God spoken to and made with them Psal 119. 49. Remember thy Word unto thy Servant upon which thou hast caused me to hope and in many other Texts of Scripture I say when a Soul can go to God and say in truth that he valueth his love and favour above Wine above Life above all created comforts this Argument layeth hold upon several Promises of God I will a little enlarge upon this â— It layeth hold upon a Promise of filling and satisfaction Matth. 5. 6. Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after Righteousness for they shall be filled It is a mighty large and comprehensive Promise To fill a Soul with the influences of Divine Love is a very great thing It is not easie to fill the covetous man with Wealth but he may be sooner fill'd with Riches than the Soul of a good man with the Love and Grace of God But here is a Promise of being filled Open thy mouth wide saith God and I will fill it To whom is this Promise made To him that hungers and thirsteth after Righteousness Righteousness is Grace whether you take it for the Righteousness of Justification the Righteousness of Christ in which every Soul must stand righteous before God Or the Righteousness of Sanctification habits and acts of Holiness wrought in us and done by us they are both from Grace from the free Love of God shining upon our Souls He that hungers and thirsts after it is he that intensely desires it Hunger and thirst are natural passions arising in us from our want of due aliment nature inforcing in us a sense of that want and of all other they are the most vehement Thence our English Proverb Hunger will break through stone walls and experience tells us to what hard things these passions have brought people not only to eat Carrion but to kill and eat their own Children yea the flesh of their own Arms so as hungring and thirsting after Righteousness importeth vehement desires after Grace which desires testifie the Soul's estimate of it and value for it and to those who thus hunger and thirst the Promise is made that they shall be filled Again such a Soul hath a right to those Promises of all Grace propounded in the most large and comprehensive terms and general phrases as where God promiseth a new heart the water of life his coming unto Souls dwelling in them abiding with them The Soul that can go to God and truly say that he prizeth the Loves of Christ above all things layeth hold of all these Promises of which the holy Scriptures are full Isa 55. 1 2. Ho every one that thirsteth come you to the waters and buy without money and without price buy wine and milk So Rev. 22. 17. Let him that is athirst come and whosoever will let him drink of the water of life freely Joh. 14. 23. If any man love me he will keep my words and my Father will love him and we will come unto him and make our abode with him So v. 21. He that loveth me shall be loved of my Father and I will love him and manifest my self to him These now and such like are general Promises comprehensive of all the Love of Christ to the Soul in the various manifestations of it according to the Soul 's diversified necessities with respect to its several circumstances Now observe to whom these Promises are made to those that love Christ and in evidence of that love hunger and thirst after him to them the Promises are made 1. That the Father will love that man or woman 2. That both Christ and his Father will come unto him 3. That they will manifest themselves unto them that they will dwell and make their abode with them That they shall have Wine and Milk without money and price Now I appeal to any ordinary capacity what evidence of Love any Soul can give greater than the valuing of his Loves above all other things So that where this can be said in truth to God God is challenged upon a multitude of Promises even so many as are made to the Love of God and Christ and to the Soul's hungrings and thirstings after him Nay there is yet another sort of Promises which such a Soul challengeth viz. all those Promises of a further supply and increase of Grace to those that have the Seed of Grace As Matth. 13. 12. To him that hath shall be given and he shall have in more abundance I might add many more of like nature but there is hardly any of you but know how to furnish your selves with them Now where the Soul can challenge God upon a Promise and lay claim to the mercy which it asketh from an obligation which God by his Word hath laid upon himself to give it This is a great Argument for it toucheth God upon the account of his Truth and Faithfulness 3. Further yet this argument toucheth God as he is a tender Father God you know to let us know his heart to his poor Creatures amongst other names
he may go to God or no whether he hath one good Argument to use which may be of avail with God We have many words to say many Arguments to use and when it is a clear day with the Soul it can easily discern it and fill its mouth with words of several natures but in a dark day under the prevailings of Melancholy or boisterous Temptations it can find many Arguments to deter it from Addresses to God it s own vileness and unworthiness considered with God's purity and holiness the multitude of its sins its former Prayers as it fancieth lying by not answered but it cannot find one Argument to incourage it But every Christian hath at all times many Arguments if he could discern them David made his vileness and unworthiness an Argument Psal 25. Pardon mine iniquity saith he for it is great That 's an Argument all have and at all times Ah! but saith the Soul this is no other than the vilest person hath He may plead the freeness of Divine Grace The Soul that goeth to God for Free Grace can never want an Argument but still this is common and no more encouraging a Believer than another man We may plead our own misery and sad state misery is the object of Grace and Mercy but still this is common The vilest sinner may go and plead with God for mercy because his state is miserable A true Christian would have an Argument of a more special nature and such a one as in the use of he could go boldly and with confidence to the Throne of Grace Admitting this Proposition every good Christian hath such an Argument such an Argument as no unregenerate man hath such an Argument as he may go to God with with boldness and confidence God was never yet wanting to the truly hungring and thirsty Soul after his Love such an Argument as if pleaded with God and being in truth alwaies prevailed with God I shall shut up this Discourse with some few words of Exhortation 1. To all To labour to bring up their hearts to this to prize the favour of God above all other things whatsoever How you shall know whether your hearts be brought up to it or no I have before shewed you but suffer me here to give you some Directions in the case and to press it with some Arguments Until we do find that our Souls do set such an estimate upon the Loves of Christ we can never use it as an Argument with God This is therefore the first thing which we have to do to be restless till we find that we can say it in truth that we value Christ's Loves above all earthly things Nor will this ever be effectually done till the holy Spirit of God comes upon our hearts with its impressions and demonstrations all that we can do will bear no more than the notion of means in order to that blessed end Of that nature much may be directed First Let thy Soul and its immortal state with its condition referring to that state be much in thy thoughts It is one great reason why men neglect and are careless as to the Loves of Christ because they do not remember they have immortal Souls nor consider any future state or their own circumstances relating to it Men know that they have bodies and experience hunger and thirst and cold and so are very busie in taking care what they shall eat and drink and put on but they do not know at least they do not attend to their knowledge of it and have no certain knowledge and persuasion that they have immortal Souls that can no more die with the body than eat drink or sleep with it so as they take no further care than for their outward man Neither do they attend to the consideration of the condition of their Souls with respect to an eternal existence but run away with presumptuous fancies that God will not suffer them to perish for ever determining concerning their Souls according to their fancies and the dictates of their own vitiated reason not according to the revelations of the Divine Will would men think more of their Souls and consider the immortality of them would they determine concerning them according to Divine Revelation it were impossible they should so far as generally they do neglect the care of them They would quickly see that all the good things of the world could not affect the Soul with any good and therefore must needs be invaluable things compared with those things that will secure the Souls happiness both here and for ever If men believed they had immortal Souls their reason would teach them quickly to conclude that they are better than the body which is but earth and which must return to dust and consequently whatsoever is good for the Soul must be infinitely more good than what only serveth the necessities of our earthly part and that neither but for a little time But the truth is as the Fool hath said in his heart there is no God So he hath also said in his Heart I have no Soul no such immortal substance as Preachers talk of there is no such thing as Heaven or Hell most unregenerate men are in their Hearts Atheists The natural reason of all men teacheth them to look after their concerns and interests and to prefer greater before lesser interests and to value what makes for their greatest interests above what is only subservient to an interest of lesser value Mens preference of created comforts before the loves of Christ proceedeth meerly from their ignorance that they have Souls to look after or at least unbelief of it if they notionally know it their not understanding the nature and spiritual concerns of their Souls or at least their erronious fancies and conceptions of an universal Salvation of all or all at least that are baptized the first thing to be done rationally to possess Men and Women of the excellency of Christs loves above Wine above all sensual things or any sensible things is to possess men of this knowledge and to keep their Eyes waking to the consideration of it and to engage them to take their measures of these things from the revelation of the will of God in his word not from their own wild fancies and ratiocinations Secondly Possess your Souls of the impossibility of their receiving of any good any thing suited to their necessities but only from Christ There is no other name given under Heaven there is no Salvation in any other The power over all Souls is committed unto Christ The Father forgives Sins but it is for Christ's sake as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you saith the Apostle we have Redemption forgiveness of Sin through his blood In him we have righteousness peace through him we have access an entrance into the holâ—est of all the Father hath given unto him Eternal life that he should give it to whomsoever he pleaseth There is no good thing suited to a Souls
contain three Petitions which the Spouse by which we understand the Church or the believing Soul maketh to her Beloved the Lord Jesus Christ The first I have done with together with the Arguments ments which she used to enforce it I am now come to the second comprehended in this Verse with the Arguments by which she presseth it Her first Petition was in those words Let him kiss me 〈◊〉 the kisses of his mouth Here she saith Draw me Our English Annotations make the connexion thus Lord do not only invite and call me by the Preaching of thy Gospel which are the kisses of thy mouth but command me by the Power of thy Spirit Or thus Let me not only be passively happy in receiving tokens of love from thee but make me active in maintaining communion with thee Let me run after thee and to this purpose do thou draw me Thus the coherence of her Petitions seemeth to lie Some there are that do not make this a new Petition but adjoyn the beginning of this Verse to the latter end of the former and read it thus The Virgins love thee and have drawn thee after them thus the Seventy read it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and after them Origen and Greg. Nyssen expounding it of the Faith of the Saints by which they draw Christ after them according to his Promise Where two or three are gathered together in my Name I will be in the midst amongst them But though there be something of truth in this yet this Interpretation is I think justly slighted by Lud. de Ponte and others even of the Papists the greatest Admirers of the Fathers And although the Copies of the Seventy which we have indeed thus read it yet Symmachus and Aquila the two other Antient Greek Translators read it as we translate it And I am sure that is the true Translation of the Hebrew where the Verb is in the Imperative Mood though there be a little change of the Vowels in regard of the Affix according to the Rules of Grammarians For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so I conclude they are clearly a Petition and thus the Vulg. Lat. reads them with the Tigurine Translators Pagnine Montanus Piscator Junius and indeed almost all others Agreeing therefore in that let me consider 1. The parts of the Text 2. Then open the terms And thirdly and lastly Raise and handle such Propositions as it will afford and may be useful to us You may in the Text please to consider 1. The Spouse's Petition Draw me 2. The Argument by which she enforceth this Petition We will run after thee Where 't is observable 1. The parties promising We. 2. The thing promised A running after Christ 3. The Spouse's Acknowledgment of her Beloved's speedy Answer to her Prayers The King hath brought me into his Chambers 4. And lastly The Effects this Answer had upon her they are three 1. We will rejoyce 2. We will be glad in thee 3. We will remember thy Loves more than Wine Then you have the Spouse's Justification of her self in this passion The upright love thee Let me now come to open the terms This word for it is but one in the Hebrew contains the Spouse's Petition It is agreed by all that it is the Spouse that speaks by which the Jews who understand nothing of the Gospel-Church in this Song understand Abraham and the Church of the Jews Aben-Ezra a Jewish Doctor would have these the words of Abraham speaking to God to draw him out of his own Country into Ur of the Chaldees according to that hard Precept to flesh and blood Gen. 12. Solomon Jarchi another of them makes it the voice of the Jewish Church speaking to God to bring them back again to Hierusalem out of Captivity The old Chaldee Paraphrast and Lira with him make it the voice of the Church of the Jews coming out of Egypt speaking unto God that he would go before them as he did by the Cloud and the Pillar The Righteous of that Generation then said Draw us after thee O thou Lord of the whole world We will follow thee in the way of thy goodness Mr. Cotton makes the Spouse to be either Solomon himself desiring to be drawn to Christ or the Church of the Jews desiring Solomon by Laws and Edicts and Proclamations to draw them to their duty Rupertus his notion applying the words to Elizabeth John Baptist's Mother and of some Popish Writers making them the words of the blessed Virgin are hardly worth mentioning any more than theirs who would make them the words of the Queen of Sheba to Solomon We have fixed the Spouse with the most and best Interpreters to be the true Church of God and every individual believing Soul and then it is easie to know to whom the words are directed viz. unto God and whether we understand the first or second Person in the Trinity is not at all material For besides that they are both but one in their operations respecting the creature Drawing is made in Scripture the act both of the Father and the Son No man saith Christ cometh unto me unless the Father draweth him And again When I am lifted up I will draw all men after me But drawing is a term of motion there must be a term to which Whither would the Spouse be drawn This is not so plainly exprest in the English as in the Hebrew I shall speak more to it by and by but I shall first open the term Draw and shew you what the Spouse desireth of her Beloved in this term I find the Verb 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Hebrew signifying four things 1. It sometimes signifies no more than to go to go on and forward so Jud. 4. 6. Go and draw toward Mount Tabor Exod. 12. 21. Draw out and take you a Lamb that is go out Job 21. 33. Every man shall draw after him that is by little and little follow him to the Grave But it would spoil the sense to interpret it so in this place The Me following makes this sense inconsistent 2. Sometimes it signifieth the pulling of a thing or person to a place by some violence or force Thus you read of the Heifer that had not drawn in the yoke Deut. 21. 3. So it is said God draweth the mighty with his power Job 24. 22. And you read of the man that drew a Bow at adventure That is an act of strength and power you know 1 King 22. 34. So they drew Joseph out of the Pit and Jeremy out of the Dungeon Gen. 37. 28. Jer 38. 13. And David prayeth that he might not be drawn away with the wicked Psa 28. 3. In all which places this word is used 3. Because in love and fair persuasion there is a kind of force compelling a reasonable and ingenuous person The word is sometimes used to express also such an action It is said of the wicked Psal 109. v. 12. He draweth the poor into
now if we rise higher and enquire how some come to use common Grace better than others when all have an equal Natural power to do those acts of Moral discipline and of Religion also which extend no further then to a bodily labour how it comes to pass that some get leave of themselves of their Lusts and Passions to do them others do not We must say there is an influence of God's Spirit of Grace more upon the one than the other inclining them thereto but so long as others have a Natural power thus far which they do not use God is acquitted of their Blood and their Damnation is of themselves though his abounding grace be more seen as to others whom he doth further incline to a better use of common Grace and their natural abilities but of this I have spoken before and do now little more than repeat 2. The same account must be given of the uneven pace which is discernable in such as are Christians indeed The running of God's own People is not alike though they have all the same renewed Nature and inward principle of life To will is present with them all yet they have not all an equal strength to perform Nor an equal life liveliness freedom and chearfulness in their walkings with God there may be much blame to be laid upon themselves for not using the Grace of God as they ought to do not keeping their Watch as they ought to keep it but the Original cause is the want of Divine drawings which are sometimes with-held as a punishment to some loose and careless walking sometimes as the product of Divine Wisdom for the exercise of some habits of Grace which are not so well tryed and exercised under the full influences of divine grace upon them as under the partial withdrawings of it There might be other uses made of this point but they would be mostly such as were proper to the former Doctrine and there inlarged upon So as I shall proceed no further in Application of this Discourse Serman XXIII Canticles 1. 4. Draw me and We will run after thee YOu have heard the Spouses Petition opened what she means when she saith to her Beloved Draw me you have heard her Promise or Argument opened We will run after thee She prayeth for drawing she promiseth her running Drawing was the act of her beloved Running was her own Act though in force of his drawing But here is as I before observed an alteration of the Number She saith Draw me She addeth We will run She begs but for one she promiseth for more she prayeth for her self she promiseth for others How is this 1. I told you when I opened thé words that some by We understand The Spouse and the Spirit of God in conjunction I and thy Grace This is a Sense hinted by Genebrard and De Ponte upon the Text and it may seem to have some colour from that of Christ Without me you can do nothing and that of Paul Gal. 2. 20. I live yet not I but Christ liveth in me and the life which I now live in the Flesh I live by the Faith of the Son of God It is a great truth that when ever the Soul runs after Christ the holy Spirit assists its motion but yet it is drawing that is Christ's and his Spirits work running is ours Grace works together with the Child of God but it worketh by drawing the Soul works by running it is not Christ or the Spirit of Christ that is in us that runneth the way of God's Commandments but it is the Soul of the Christian in and with the strength and power of Christ Grace is the Principle of our Spiritual life like the Spirit within Ezechiels Wheels without which the Wheels move not but they are the Wheels that move I cannot therefore agree this sence 2. Bernard hath another Notion She begs saith he The sowre part for her self the sweeter part for others but this is an interpretation which to me seemeth to have many faults 1. It maketh the drawing here prayed for to be a drawing by Afflictions which are indeed the Lord's Cords but such as he seldom draweth Souls to Christ by not are they the proper matter of our Prayer Secondly It turneth the Promise into a Prayer and makes the Sense to be to this purpose Lord for me Draw me with the Cords of Affliction Let others run after thee but I see no ground at all for such an Interpretation It is not others but We she includeth her self It is not let others run but we will run 3. Thirdly If by the Spouse we here understand the Church speaking The Church being many yet make but one Body So the Spouse prayeth for her whole Body which is but one and saith properly draw me and then promiseth for every part Rom. 12. 5. We being many are one Body She prayeth for Grace she promiseth not only action and obedience but unity in her obedience and action God's Kingdom is not divided against its self not different from it self especially in the Fundamentals of Faith and Holiness They are an Army in order and fighting together against the World the Flesh and the Devil but this still is more than I will run 4. I rather choose another sence of this Promise A promise of an endeavour to cause others to run after Christ or a Prophecy that others would run so as the sense should be this Lord draw me and I will endeavour to be a cause of more than my own running after thee others seeing or hearing of thy Grace and Goodness to me shall also by my example be provoked to run after thee In this sence I shall carry it The Proposition resulting from hence is this Prop. That God's sweet and powerful drawing of one Soul to or after himself will be a means of causing others also to run after him God's drawing of John 1 John 26. draweth first two other Disciples who when they heard him followed Jesus and Andrew drew Simon Peter v. 40 Christ's drawing of Philip was the occasion of Nathaniel 's running v. 45. Philip findeth Nathaniel and saith unto him We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and the Prophets did write Christ draweth the Woman of Samaria John 4. v. 28. She leaves her Water pot and goes her way into the City and saith to the men of the City Come see a Man which told me all things that I ever did is not this the Christ Then they went out of the City and came unto him and v. 41. Many more believed because of his own word There are two main grounds upon which the truth of this Proposition depends 1. The first is the alluring nature of Divine Grace 2. The Second is The exceeding Charity of every pious Soul I will alittle enlarge upon them 1. I say first Divine Grace in the effects of it is exceedingly attractive The love of God saith the Apostle constraineth nor doth it only constrain the
that understand you have Souls under an ordination to an eternal Existence that know the state of the Soul by nature and have tasted also how good the Lord is to you to whom Christ is precious and whom you will easily acknowledge your chief Joy I am calling to you but for the exercise of an habit with which God hath indeed indued you the exerting of a power with which God hath blessed you the using of a right which God hath given you There are amongst others two great causes why Christians do not so rejoyce in Christ as they ought to do 1. The first is Their giving too much way to unbelief and despondency Though we cannot increase our own Faith without special grace assisting yet we may promove our unbelief favouring our despondency and cherishing our doubts and giving way to our groundless fears and forgetting the Covenant of Grace not saying often enough to our Souls Why art thou cast down O my Soul c. 2. The second is Their too much carnality or worldliness Where almost is the man to be found that cannot rejoyce in his worldly Affluences although he wants the sense of the Love of God in Christ or that if he were tried would not find it an hard matter to rejoyce in God if the Fig-tree did not blossom and there were no fruit on the Vine How ready are we to rejoyce in our creature-comforts when we have them more than in the Love of Christ to our Souls whence is this but from our too much savouring minding and living upon Earth and earthly things Is the hearing of Prayers such a matter of joy to a gracious man how should this engage us 1. So to pray that we may receive an answer of them from the Lord 2. To look after our Prayers and the answers of them that the sense of such an answer may excite our joy in Christ As to the first I have spoken so fully to it under the first Doctrine I handled from this Text that I shall not need again to inlarge upon it here I shall only inlarge upon the second Foolish Children that shoot Arrows and never look after them lose that pleasure and content in their game which those have who observe what becomes of their Arrows and how near they come to the mark to which they are directed and levelled Formal Christians who send up Prayers to Heaven and never look after them never consider whether the Lord answereth them yea or no lose that pleasure and satisfaction which the Soul hath that watcheth his Prayers and with David when early in the morning he hath directed his Prayers to God as Psal 5. 3. looketh up You read of the Prophet Habakkuk when chap. 1. he had been putting up his Prayer to God he resolveth chap. 2. v. 1. to stand upon his watch and to set himself upon the Tower watching to see what God would say unto him Here now comes in a considerable question viz. How a Christian shall know whether God hath heard and answered his prayers yea or no The difficulty lies upon two things 1. Vpon God's different ways of answering 2. In regard we may receive the good things we receive from God meerly from him as a God full of pity and tender compassion seeing and pitying the misery and needs of his creatures as our Saviour saith He hears the young Ravens when they cry unto him Not as from a God in Christ reconciled and hearing us upon the account of his Truth and Promise and the Intercession of Christ Now the answer of those Prayers only which are answered upon the account of Christ and testifications of the Love of God in Christ can bring the Soul to a gladness and rejoycing in Christ upon that occasion and motive As to the first 1. I see no reason for a Soul that hath been importunate with God for some good thing which it hath not yet received if it finds it self satisfied under the want of it and content to submit to the Will of God in the denial of it and to resign up it self to his good pleasure as to the collation of it upon him I say in such cases as these I see no reason for a Christian to question whether this answer be from God as a God of Truth and Faithfulness fulfilling his promise to the Soul His promise to his people is to with-hold from them no good thing that is nothing which shall be truly and really good for them considered in their circumstances Now where a sensible good is with-held and denied that a real good may be bestowed and the Soul is also brought to see its own mistake in the desire of that sensible good and to acquiesce in the good pleasure of God in not giving it nay to acknowledge that it is better for it not to have it and is quiet and satisfied certainly this is one of the clearest answers of our prayers and no Soul ought to question but this is a return of prayers Let us put a case Suppose a Christian lying under the power of some mortal disease under which he hath often prayed that if it were possible God would make the bitter Cup of Death to pass from him Still he or she groweth weaker and weaker worse and worse as to his or her bodily state but they find within themselves a further contentedness with the good pleasure of God a power to glory in their tribulation and to rejoyce in the hopes of that glory of God to which its affliction is bringing it a desire not to be unclothed meerly and free from its pain but clothed upon that mortality might be swallowed up in life What reason now hath a Christian to suspect whether this be in answer to its prayers and slowing from God as a God of Truth fulfilling his Word seeing as the Apostle saith 2 Cor. 5. 5. He that hath wrought us for the self same thing is God who hath also given us the earnest of the Spirit It is a good thing here that is given the Soul it is given it by God it is he who hath wrought the heart into this frame It is given in upon and after earnest prayer and though it be not the very thing in specie which we asked yet it is in value more abundantly compensating the things we asked and finally the thing which we did ask we asked with submission to the Will and Wisdom of God so that as to these kinds of answers I take the case to be clear 2. As to the giving in of such spiritual mercies as we have begg'd of God in their kind whether they be peace of Conscience strength against temptations power against corruptions sensible consolations more freedom and liveliness unto and in duty there is as little reason to doubt because they are the very good things we a kt 2. Of such a spiritual nature as God doth not use to give them to Souls that are strangers to him 3. The matter of
promises The only thing that I can fancy why a Christian should make a doubt here is because they may be consequent to the removal of some bodily distempers whose influence upon the mind might cause those troubles that weakness or dulness such as Melancholy c. But hath God no hand in bringing or removing such bodily causes if he hath as certainly there is no evil in our bodies more than in our Cities which he hath not done why may not God both afflict us as to our spirits by sending such distempers upon our bodies and also remove the former which are the effect by the removal of the latter which he hath made to be the cause So that admit these things consequent to the removal of some bodily distemper yet they are the effect of God and may be and ought to be looked upon as the answer of our prayers 3. The greatest difficulty of judgment in this case is as to those things which are but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the things which concern this life which God giveth to the righteous as well as the wicked to the sinner crying unto him as well as unto his Children How a Christian shall discern that God when he gives him in these mercies gives them in as a God of Truth and Faithfulness remembring his promise to his Servants nor indeed is this Judgment very easie to the most discerning Christian Something I shall say in the case whether what will be satisfactory or no I cannot tell 1. If they have been given in after prayer made with a Spirit indifferent not too importunate I mean for the receiving of them we may hope well We may observe in Scripture that sometimes common good things have been wrung out of the hands of God by too much impatience and importunity which have never proved blessings Such were the Quails Num. 11. 31 32 33. the Text saith while the flesh was yet between their teeth e're it was chewed the wrath of the Lord was kindled against the People Such was the first King given to the Israelites even Saul the Prophet saith Hosea 13. 11. I gave thee a King in mine anger But when a Christian begs of God any good thing without too much impatience and importunity with an indifferency of Spirit resigning up himself to the will of God as to the receiving of it and God after such a prayer gives in the mercy I know not why we should not conclude it an answer of prayer This I think was the case of Hannah 1 Sam. 1. She was indeed grieved and troubled because God had denied to her the blessing of a Child in this trouble she prays in a solemn manner we read not of any anger in her Spirit against God any impatience or sinful importunity but she prays as a Woman of a troubled Spirit the Lord gives her a Child it was but a mercy of a common nature wicked Women have Children as well as others but it is given in after a solemn prayer she looks upon the Child as begged of God For this Child saith she I prayed and the Lord hath given me my Petition which I asked of him 2. I shall add but one thing more viz. When together with the good thing there is an heart given to the person to improve and make use of it for the honour and glory of God James lets us know that God never gives us in mercies in answer to our prayers and as evidences of his love and faithfulness that we might consume them upon our lusts when he tells those to whom he wrote James 4 5. You ask and receive not because you ask amiss that you may consume it upon your lusts when God giveth us in an outward mercy if he giveth it us in performance of his promise and in token of his love and favour he together with it gives in an heart inclined and ready to make use of it for the honour and glory of his name This is also exemplified in the case of Hannah in the text before-mentioned 1 Sam. 1. 27 28. For this Child saith she I prayed the Lord hath given me my Petition which I asked of him therefore also I have lent him to the Lord as long as he liveth he shall be lent unto the Lord. In the margent of your larger Bibles you will see it may be read He whom I have obtained by Petition shall be returned to the Lord. You have another no less famous instance of it in David Psal 116. v. 1. I love the Lord because he hath heard my voice and supplications The Lord hath heard his voice v. 1. He had inclined his ear unto him v. 2. The Lord had dealt graciously with him v. 7. He had delivered his Soul from death his Eyes from tears and his feet from falling Now mark the product of this He loved the Lord because of it v. 2. He resolveth to call upon the Lord so long as he lived v. 9. To walk before the Lord in the land of the living v. 13. To take the cup of salvation and to call upon the name of the Lord. v. 14. To pay his vows v. 16. To be the Lords Servant v. 17. To offer the Sacrifice of Thanksgiving c. Now where upon prayer for a more common mercy suppose life health riches success in business we find that the Lord hath given us both the thing which we asked of God and an heart to honour God with it and to make a due improvement of it we have there no reason to doubt but that it is given us in answer to our prayers and in testification of his faithfulness and love towards us This now is of great concern to us in order to our gladness and joy in him upon the receiving an answer of our prayers for how shall we rejoice in him upon any such occasion unless we discern our good things coming from him This I think is enough to have spoken to this question and upon this whole argument I shall now proceed as God gives me opportunity to the other effect this mercy had upon the Spouse We will remember thy loves more than Wine But of this hereafter Sermon XXIX Cant. 1. 4. We will remember thy Loves more than Wine YOU heard in my last discourse the first effect that the Beloveds favour shewed to his Spouse in the quick return he made to her prayers and the royal favour he had bestowed upon her in bringing her into his Chambers admitting her to some more special and intimate degrees of communion with himself had upon her it put gladness into her heart and brought her up to an exulting and rejoycing in him Joy is but a passion cito fit cito perit that doth not last alwaies it is like a Land-flood that is sometimes up but will in a short time abate Ordinary Joys do so But the Spouse resolves to keep up here and to this end she saith She will remember the Loves of Christ and give them a
God and whose heart is sincere before God is an upright and righteous Soul In this Sense the upright heart is the Sincere heart Thus David saith of himself I was upright before him 2 Sam. 22. 24. And God saith of Job He is a perfect and an upright man The Proposition must be understood of the latter he that is Evangelically righteous or upright for there are none of the former upon the Earth none that are legally righteous 3. Thirdly As there are degrees of Sanctification so there are degrees of uprightness The text seems to speak of the highest degrees Uprightnesses It is very ordinary with the Hebrew to express the Superlative degree by the plural number besides this is Signified by putting the Abstract for the Concrete we usually call men notoriously vile and wicked by the Abstract names of vice and persons eminently good and virtuous by the Abstract Names of virtue and goodness Those that are highest in grace who do most excel in holiness are fullest of love to Christ Love teacheth every Child of God the weakest babe in grace to cry after Christ and the grown Christian to delight in him and to walk up and down in his name Every righteous every upright Soul loveth Christ and that with a true sincere love though not in an equal degree she saith our Saviour who hath much forgiven will love much Having premised these distinctions let me a little further inquire into the true Notion of these upright men upright by this Evangelical rectitude In short they are such as are justified and Sanctified made righteous through Christs righteousness imputed to them holy through the Sanctification of his Spirit 1. Such as are justified This is the first thing requisite to an upright right man let the unjustified Soul be what it will do what it can it cannot be upright either in heart or way Suppose a stick naturally crooked you may pare it and paint and colour it and cover its crookedness alittle but until it hath been in the fire and bended right it will be crooked still the natural man the Soul not justified by grace not washed with the blood of Christ may be pared by education and brought off from some flagitious and enormous practices he may be coloured and painted over by some acts of moral vertue and some formal performances of religious duties but still in Gods Eye the Soul is a crooked Soul until the Lord hath made it right till it be justified by faith 2. To this uprightness is required not only justification or the removal of the Souls guilt and imputation of a righteousness a perfect righteousness but the sanctification of the heart God never sanctifieth any whom he doth not justify hence no Soul can be said to be an upright Soul that is not justified nor doth the Lord at any time justify a Soul but he at the same time also reneweth and sanctifieth it hence the upright Soul must be a renewed Sanctified Soul But yet in regard our regeneration and sanctification is not as to degrees perfect though as to parts Divines say it is that is the whole man is renewed it may be yet worthy to be inquired from what degrees of Regeneration and Sanctification a man may be denominated an upright man the rectitude of any thing is to be judged from its conformity to some rule The rule of mans uprightness is the Lords Statutes which are right saith the Psalmist Psal 19. 8. holy and spiritual and just and good Rom. 7. Thy judgments are right saith David Psal 119. 75. 128. It is said so of nothing else so as from a conformity to this rule must rightness or uprightness be judged And thus 1. There is an uprightness of judgment when the Soul judgeth according to truth both concerning notions and practices when it judgeth aright concerning truth and is not warped by error and when it judgeth aright concerning the ways of God then the Soul is upright with respect to the understanding and judgment 2. There is an uprightness of the whole Soul with respect to the scope and bent of it when the heart of man doth not stand inclined and bent to sin but the Soul can say with David I hate vain thoughts but thy law do I love I hate every false way c. The man that in all his actions designeth and intendeth the honour and glory of God and obedience to his will though in many things he cometh short and offendeth yet this man is an upright man his end and general scope is right 3. There is an uprightness of will in this the uprightness of a mans intention discovereth itself when to will is present with the Soul as St. Paul saith Rom. 7. Though he wanteth a strength to perform the man or woman in heart willeth the honour and glory of God and this not by fits but steadily and certainly and is really unwilling to do any thing by which God may be dishonoured though through ignorance he may offend and through a natural impotency not being able to love the Lord with all his heart and strength yea and through moral impotency and a mixt infirmity through the great power of temptations whether from the seduction of lust or the violent motions and impressions of Satan 4. There is an uprightness of action which lieth in a true and sincere endeavour to do the will of God and by this both the uprightness of intention and will also is to be judged This is the upright man though he may stumble and fall and oft doth fail who liveth and sinneth not against God And as these holy dispositions are found in the Soul in more remiss or intense degrees so the Soul is more or less upright and the man deserves this honourable denomination less or more These now are the Souls that love Christ To love any object whether person or thing signifieth to take a delight and complacency in it Whether in the thoughts of it if absent as the Apostle saith whom we having not seen yet love or in the contemplation and fruition in converse and communion with it if more present This Praedicate concerning the upright that they love Christ is to be understood exclusively and inclusively concerning the Person of Christ and whatsoever beareth his image and superscription 1. Exclusively these and none but these love him Others may talk of loving Christ but it is but a talk and pretence they love but in word and tongue only not in deed and truth there is something else either lust or the world something or other that hath more of their affection more of their heart then Christ hath 2. Inclusively These and all these love Christ there is not an upright Soul in the world but loves Christ and takes a pleasure complacency in him and preferreth him before his chief joy 3. They love the person of Christ He is in their Eyes altogether desires the chiefest of ten thousand there is nothing in the
can we imagine that we should be more concerned to discover our own vileness and naughtiness then Gods Grace and Mercy But of this I shall speak more fully in my handling the Second part of the Proposition Sermon XXXV Canticles 1. 5. I am Black but Comely O ye Daughters of Hierusalem c. I Come now to the second part of the Proposition I raised from these words I had no more time in my last discourse then to handle the former Prop. There are times when Christians are bound to own their graces and to declare what God hath done for their Souls There are such times when good Christians must not only say they are Black but also own that they are Comely That this is a duty appeareth from the practice of the Servants of God in holy Writ Psal 66. 16. Come and hear all ye that fear God and I will declare what he hath done for my Soul And indeed what are most of the Psalms of David but declarations of this nature to say nothing of Pauls speeches before Festus and Agrippa c. But whatsoever I intended for the proof of it I shall bring under the explication applying it to the particular cases The Question is Qu. When and in what cases are Christians concerned to own acknowledg and declare unto others their grace and what God hath done for their Souls As I said of the other piece of a Christians duty so I shall say of this It is their duty 1. To own and acknowledg it to God 2. To the Church of God 3. To the Men of the World sometimes 1. To God This is their unquestionable duty at all times and you shall find it the frequent practice of the Servants of God in Scripture If we have any Comeliness it is Christs Comliness put upon us and it is but reasonable that God should have the acknowledgment of it to his Honor and Glory But of this there is no question neither is this the acknowledgment of the Text she is here speaking not unto God but to the Daughters of Jerusalem It is our duty also in some cases to own our Comeliness through grace unto men 2. To the Church of Christ and to particular Christians 1. To the Church and that in two cases 1. Upon our Admission into it 2. Upon our Re-admission and restoring to the Priviledges of it We find in the first Plantation of Churches of the Gospel there was ordinarily such a confession and acknowledgment It is said Mat. 3. That those who were Baptized of John were Baptized in Jordan confessing their Sins Matth. 3. 6. After Christs Ascension into Heaven we read of the three thousand Souls added to the Church that they were first pricked at the Heart and said to Peter and to the rest of the Apostles Men and Brethren what shall we do and in Acts 8. 36. when the Eunuch said to Philip Here is Water what doth hinder me to be baptized Philip answereth if thou believest with all thine heart thou maiest and he answered and said I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God In those first admissions into the Gospel Church it is plain that Confession of Sin and Profession of a Faith in Christ were required as necessary and previous to Baptism by which Persons were admitted into a fellowship with the Church of God But altho the first admission into Gospel Churches were only of Grown Persons able to make Confessions of their Sins and a Profession of their faith in Christ which were alwaies done upon such admissions yet the Children of such persons so Baptized have been alwaies taken to be within the Covenant and so Members of the Church also but whether compleat Members or no hath been a question and indeed generally denied and something further required of them before they have been taken into a full Communion with the Church in the Ordinance of the Supper For that being an Ordinance of the Gospel which is a Seal of the Righteousness of Faith as was said of Circumcision with reference to Abraham Rom. 4. 11. It is but reasonable to conclude that none have a right unto it but such as are made Partakers of that Righteousness of Faith those that by an eye of Faith can discern the Lords Body by an hand of Faith lay hold upon Christ under those sensible signs and representations and that by Faith can Eat the Flesh and Drink the Blood of the Lord Jesus Christ while with the Mouths of their Bodies they Eat the Bread and Drink the Wine Hence the Apostle commands us to examine our selves and so to Eat of that Bread and Drink of that Cup and telleth us that whoso Earteth the Flesh and Drinketh the Blood of the Lord unworthily Eateth and Drinketh Judgment unto himself and hence it is that some evidence both of Knowledg and Regeneration is judged necessary to such as have a full Communion in this Ordinance with the Church of Christ The best evidence whereof is undoubtedly an holy conversation That a verbal declaration in this case is absolutely necessary I cannot say which may be made in hypocrisie and it made signifies nothing if not confirmed by an holy Life where it can be made in truth and with freedom of Spirit it is doubtless exceeding satisfactory both to the Ministers of Christ who are Stewards of the Ministries of God of whom it is required that they should be faithful distributing their Masters goods according to their Masters order and to the Members of the Church with which they are joined But I by no means think that it ought to be insisted on as to many Christians who may be under fears and doubts and despondencies but evidence the change of their hearts by a holiness of life Thus far I have a little digressed to give you my judgment in this point By which you may se how little the difference in this case is betwixt Brethren would they calmly listen to hear and to understand one another and not judge each other not heard 2. Upon our re-admission or restoring to the Church of God The judicial separation of Scandalous persons from the Church is a sufficient evidence that no persons unholy in their lives ought to be admitted into a communion with it and that they are no more then presumptive members of it or if you will visible members that is such as in outward appearance are so but when by any open action they discover the contrary they ought to be separated from it and not restored without repentance of which repentance indeed it being the change of the heart we are no infallible judges having no rule of judgment but being forced to trust to the sincerity of Profession joined with a visibly reformed Conversation The Church of Christ in all ages so far as we may trust any account we have had of it hath required both 1. A verbal declaration of what God hath done for the offending party working in him or her a Godly shame
of God Let us take heed that we be not made black by afflictions of this nature which we shall be if by them we be moved from our good opinion of the ways of God from our profession or practice of them there is no sinner more black then the Apostate See 2 Pet 2. 20. 21. For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ they are again intangled therein and overcome the latter end is worse with them than the beginning For it is better sor them not to have known the way of righteousness then after they have known it to turn from the Holy Commandment delivered unto them Indeed failings in a time of Persecution are caused from a double cause Sometimes meerly from the fear of life or some great danger that will befall to men if they adhere to their former profession failings of this nature make a Soul look black but many such recover themselves and the Lord who can have compassion upon our insirmities pities them and recovers them out of the snare of the Devil this is a blackness we ought to avoid by putting on the whole Armour of God that we may be able to stand in the day of the Lords Battel But there is another defection which is occasioned by Persecutions and Afflictions of this nature That is when men out of a greater love to other ways in a time of tryal renounce the truths of God they have formerly owned and forsake the ways of God in which they have formerly walked to these now Persecutions and Afflictions of this nature are but a slight occasion of their defection and Apostacy and this eminent difference you will find betwixt the others and these The others though they may be prevailed withal to warp and start aside because of the greatness of the temptation it was Peters case in the High Priests Hall yet will never be prevailed with to speak evil of and to revile the truths of God which they have owned nor the ways of God in which they have formerly walked and others yet walk The others being prevailed upon to their Apostacy meerly from the lusts of their hearts and the greater love they have alwaies had tho like Hypocrites they have concealed it to looser principles and a looser way of living take themselves concerned to reproach their former ways and those who yet walk in them This is a dreadful blackness not a tincture upon the face only but a tincture of the heart which by occasion of Persecution for the Gospel breaketh out into the more exteriour conversation To enforce this caution I shall only mention three things 1. That this is the affection only of the stony ground Mat. 13. 6 21. It is a certain sign that those never received the Seed of the Word into honest and good hearts that they never had any root in themselves who when tribulation and persecution ariseth because of the word by and by they are offended He that receiveth the truth in the Love of it cannot so easily abandon the profession of it 1 John 2. 19. They went out from us they were not of us for if they had been of us they would no doubt have continued with us but they went out that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us The day of Persecution and tribulation for the Gospel sake is the day of the manifestation and discovery of hypocrites I do not think that all shrinking in a time of persecution is a note of hypocrisy there is a shrinking through fear in the time of great temptation so Peter shrank But for men to make a defection out of a principle of lust and greater Love to other ways and to reproach and speak Evil of the ways of God which by the way is a certain indication of such a defection this speaketh the man or woman to be no better then an hypocrite nor ever to have been other tho to serve his lusts he disguised himself with a mask of holiness and Religion 2. Secondly consider That no sinner so reproacheth the good and holy ways of God as such a sinner doth He tells the World that he hath tryed them that there is nothing in them that nothing but the ignorance prejudices of his education youth led him into them that the ways of sin profaneness of Formality and Superstition are better and therefore he is at last grown wiser then to take such pains to go to heaven If I would pick out a wretch out of the whole herd of sinners to reproach God to blaspheme the Gospel and the ways of holiness I would pick out onethat had been formerly a professor and had turned away from his profession this wretch pretendeth from experience to justify what others do but loosely discourse 3. Thirdly no sinners must expect a more dreadful Vengeance The reason is evident because none sin against more light There is no man who hath made a profession and lived in any practice of Religion but knows that there is no iniquity in it nothing but what suteth the common reason of mankind not debauched through lust and that those who in any measure live up to the profession of the Gospel are if sober heathens were to be judges the best of men with respect to all duty which the light of Nature teacheth toward the Divine Being and all good offices towards men I say there is none who hath made any profession but knows this and in all his Evil speaking of them doth not sin like an heathen nor like a profane man who speaketh ill of the things he knoweth not but speaketh contrary to the dictate of his own conscience I would not have this understood of those who are made black through these afflictions from the temporary prevailing of a strong temptation these with Pâ—ter tho they fall yet go out and weep bitterly and are recovered and made stronger by their fall but of those others before mentioned to whom Affliction and Persecution are but the externall occasions to draw out the lusts of their hearts which waited but for an opportunity to discover its self 2. Finally to shut up this discourse let this caution us from Judging the Spouse of Christ black because the Sun hath looked upon her You have heard that this is but the Worlds judgment not according to any measures of truth or righteousness To this End 1. Root your selves in this truth That none can judge of Gods Love or hatred from what happeneth to him in this life It is Solomons Maxime and a great truth God governeth the World according to the just Oeconomy of his Providence with respects unto his own wife Ends and no spiritual judgment can be made of the state of any from those administrations oft-times he maketh Princes to go on foot when servants ride on horse back and the wicked to devour those that are more righteous then they 2.
Word strict in their walking ready to exhort to reprove and admonish such as walk disorderly and not as becometh the Gospel Hypocrites and false Brethren are no more able to bear this then they are able to obtain of themselves to do like them Hence are their censures of them as Persons that are righteous overmuch needlesly strict and severe hence their envy and reproaches and their watchings for their haltings and taking all advantages to blazon their infirmities and to make them as odious and to look as black as they can 3. Another reason of it lyeth in the looseness of their principles both their principles of Doctrine and Faith and their practical principles directing their lives and conversations False brethren are alwaies looser in one or both these sorts of principles then the sincere Christian is The study of the Hypocrite is to form his faith and to interpret the law of God into a consistency with his lusts that he may keep his lusts and yet protect himself from the checks and reverberations of his conscience and flatter himself with hopes of Eternal Salvation and also keep up his credit and reputation with the world The sincere Christian hath no other design then to form his faith according to the revelations of truth in the Word and his conversation to the rule of life in the Word of God the Word is a lamp to his feet and a lanthorn to his paths and from that he dares not start when the false Prophets told Micajah that the Prophets had all with one mouth prophesied good to Ahab and suited his humour Micajah answers them As the Lord liveth whatsoever the Lord bids me speak that will I speak The same is the language of every true Christian whatsoever Propositions of truth I find spoken by Holy Men that were inspired by God in his Word that â—nd nothing but that shall be an article of my faith What way soeâ—â—r God hath prescribed me in his Word to Worship him in and by that will I do neither adding thereunto nor yet diminishing therefrom whatsoever rules God hath given me for the order of his Church to them I will adhere whatsoever laws God hath given me to guide my conversation to the observation of them I will keep thus he is in all things tied up to a divine rule But now the false Professor hath looser principles He dare allow the judgment of his own natural reason in determining of truth as the object of his faith and of the Traditions and Practice and Precepts of men as the rule of his Worship and the will of men as to the order and government of the Church and from one of these three causes most ordinarily proceeds that opposition which is given to the strict Servants of God from the anger of their Mothers Children I come to the second Member of the Proposition 2. This opposition is one great cause of the Spouses appearing black Both the opposition which the particular Christian hath from his own impetuous lusts and motions to sin and which that part of the Church which is alone the Spouse of Christ hath from false Brethren and the opposition given her by them are a great cause of the Churches blackness or appearing blackness The grounds of it are 1. Partly that trouble and sadness which usually attends those conflicts in the Spirits of Christians The time of War is a time of sadness in that part of the world which is the seat of it and the hour of this Spiritual War and Conflict is a sad time in the Soul Paul cryeth out O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from this body of death Hence are Christians sad and heavy walkings which the World counteth blackness 2. Partly from the prevailings of sin sometimes in the Soul David complained under the Old Testament that Iniquities prevailed against him and Paul complaineth under the New Testament not only of a War but of a Victory in some Skirmishes that the law of his Members got against the law of his Mind so that he was brought into a captivity to the law of Sin which was in his Members Rom. 7. 23 Now sin is that which maketh the Soul really black and where any of the People of God in the view of the world so discoloureth himself the world needeth no provocation to call them black The Eye that is directed by a Soul full of malice envy and hatred spies the least miscarriages in the Soul that is hated and aggravates them with the highest aggravations And as this is true concerning that opposition which the particular Soul findeth from its inbred lusts and corruptions that makes the believer black so it is as true that the opposition which that part of the Church which is the true Spouse of Christ meets with from false Brethren will make the Church appear black This will appear from the several unlovely consequences of such opposition 1. From hence are Errors and Heresies Schisms and Contentions in the Church of Christ of these you read in the Episties to the Romans Carinthians Galatians then which nothing make a Church appear more black in the Eyes of the World and they are more especially the reproaches of the Church of Christ by how much the Gospel which is their rule in which they are instructed and to the rules of which they profess a submission is a Gospel of peace and Christ Jesus which is their head and the Author of the Gospel is the Prince of Peace Errors rise up in the Church from men of corrupt principles The Apostle tells us of perverse disputingâ— by men of corrupt minds 1 Tim. 6. 5. and 2 Tim. 3. 8. you have it again men of corrupt minds reprobate concerning the Faith Hence also are Schisms and Contentions Only by Pride saith Solomon cometh contention The cause of 〈◊〉 is generally some corruption in Churches and deviation from that Order which Christ hath set and established which that part of the Church which keeps close to the Word as its rule cannot bear with Indeed sometimes they are caused from mens corrupt principles as to the faith and love of preheminâ—â—ce their rashness and want of Judgment how far Christians ought to preserve unity but I say generally they are caused by such as are â—â—lse Brethren who if they be not those who divide yet are those who give the cause of the division 2. From hence are â—â—srepresentations of the Servants of God 〈◊〉 Pharâ—â—â—â—ical generation that say unto others stand far from us we are 〈◊〉 then you such as would be too pure and righteous ovâ—â— much that make a shew of more then indeed thâ—yâ—ard Hypocrites Precisions that are over-nice c. Such kind of charges and imputations as these proceed ordinarily from Mothers Children saâ—e Professors and Brethren such as have a form of Godliness and deny the power of it such as are Mâ—mbers oâ— the Church but their hearts are not perfect with God 3. From hence Thirdly are
put on thy shoes upon thy feet and cover not thy lips It was also a token of shame Harlots were wont to cover themselves Gen. 38. 14. It was also done as a token or signification of modesty so you read of Rebeccah Gen. 24. 65. when she heard of Isaac his coming towards her she hasted and took a vail and covered her self this custom of Virgins covering themselves was of long use in the Church of God so that Tertullian who lived 2 or 300 years after Christ hath a particular Book to persuade the upholding of that custom which it should seem then began to be disused Our Translators interpret the word turn aside The cause of the difference lies in the doubtfulness whether the Hebrew root be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the first signifieth to turn aside the second to cover Hence also ariseth the difference of Interpreters about the next term By the flocks of thy Companions Those who interpret the former word turn aside understand by Companions Idolaters and Superstitious persons who indeed make themselves the companions of Christ or rather make their Idols his companions some interpret it of Hereticks Idolaters make their Idols Christs Companions by giving that Homage to them which is due to him alone Thus the Papists do to their Images and Crucifixes to Saints and Angels Hereticks make their leaders Christs Companions making them the guides of their faith and practice which is an Homage due unto Christ alone Indeed Christ hath properly no Companion consider him as to his Divine Nature He is and there is none besides him nor hath he any Companion as our Mediator and Intercâ—ssor He trode the Wine-press alone neither was any of the People with him he had no Companion either in his Kingly Prophetical or Priestly Office But he hath some who call themselves his Companions and arrogate to themselves that title nay which others sinfully make his Companions Beza thinks these are here meant 2. But secondly Christ hath some who though they are not strictly his Companions yet he graciously so calleth them being as the Apostle saith not ashamed to call them Brethren of these I should chuse to understand the text and though I am very tender of differing from the received translation of a Church in any matter of moment should be more inclined as I said before to translate the former term one covered So the sense is For why should I be amongst thy People as a Mourner or as one that is an Harlot with whom thou wilt have no communion or fellowship Why should I walk as one covered either as a Mourner or as a Strumpet amongst thy People whom thou hast so far owned as to declare thy self not ashamed to call them Brethren or Companions This I take to be the sense of the Petition O thou whom my Soul loveth above all other objects whatsoever who art my Shepheard let me know where and how I may enjoy communion with thee how I may have fellowship with thee in a time of trouble and affliction and when I may have the nearest fullest and most uninterrupted communion with thee for why should I for want of thy presence be under a constant temptation to turn aside from a true fellowship and communion with thee to the Synagogues and Assemblies of Idolaters Or why should I walk amongst thy People either as a Mourner or as an Harlot whom thou hast cast off or divorced To this now her Beloved answereth O thou fairest amongst Women it is an Hebraeisme a way they have to express the superlative degree so Luk. 1. 28. 42 Thou art blessed amongst Women that is very much very highly blessed So the Lyon is said to be strong among Beasts Prov 30. 30. that is the strongest Beast It is no more then in our dialect O thou that art fairest to whose Beauty in my Eyes no others Beauty is to be compared If thou knowest not the Hebrew is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Septuagint translate it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if thou dost not know thy self the vulgar Latin Aethiopick Syriack and Arabick Translators and indeed most ancient Interpreters that I meet with follow the Septuagint and translate it If thou knowest not thy self Hence Bernard upon the place runs into a large discourse concerning Christians ignorance of themselves and the profitableness of our knowledge of our selves according to the ancient Precept of the wise man amongst the Heathen 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 But undoubtedly though this be a great truth yet it is nothing to the sense of this text where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is a Pleonasme as both Tremellius Mercer and Mariana three Interpreters very learned and critical in the Hebrew Dialect do all agree so as we translate it truly according to our Idiom If thou knowest tho in the Hebrew it be If thou knowest to or for thy self It followeth Go thy way by the footsteps of the flock and feed thy flocks by the Shepheards Tents These words now contain her beloveds direction if she were at a loss what to do in a time of streights or how to enjoy the most full and free communion with him she must go her way by the footsteps of the flock Interpreters vary in the sense of these words according to their different notion of the former If thou knowest not Those that will not allow 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to be Paragogical or Pleonastical but will interpret them If thou knowest not thy self and so make the whole to be a rebuke or chiding of the Spouse for her ignorance or pride will have the flocks here to be the flocks of Idolaters and Hereticks and by the Kids here understand her own vain imaginations and make this speech to be the language of an angry God giving up a People in wrath according to that of the Apostle to strong delusions to believe a lie for their wilful ignorance and non-improvement of the means of grace This is the sense put upon the words by Hierome Gregory Bernard Aquinas Lyra and others And there is a truth in this when a people continue in the bosom of a Church under the means of grace ignorant proud and unprofitable God often in wrath giveth them over to Seducers and leaves them to the vanities and delusions of their own hearts a Judgment of all others most formidable But certainly this is not the sense of the words Delrio though a Papist differs from them and gives us a good reason telling us if that had been our Lords meaning he would never in the same breath have called her the fairest among Women Therefore Tremellius both the English and Dutch Annotators Deodate Piscator Mariana and others understand here by the footsteps of the flock and by the Shepherds Tents the Precepts and Examples of Moses and Aaron the Prophets and the Apostles and the purer Church of God and by the Kids mentioned they understand particular Souls So that the sense of the words
and they will find at last that God will give men for them and People for their lives Possibly some will say to us but how shall we know these whom Christ calls the fairest amongst women if we knew them we should give a a due respect to them It is true the Apostle saith The world knoweth us not Nor can they perfectly know them for the Kings Daughter is glorious within saith the Psalmist But yet our Saviour tells you Math. 7. 16. By their fruits you shall know them do men gather grapes of Thorns or Figs of Thistles even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit Will you know what is good fruit see Gal. 5. 22. The fruit of the Spirit is love joy peace long suffering gentleness goodness faith meekness temperance against these there is no law No law of God Add to this Phil. 3. 3. We are the circumcision which Worship God in the Spirit and rejoice in Jesus Christ and have no confidence in the flesh these are the true Jews that are such inwardly in the heart and in the Spirit and not in the letter whose praise is not of men but of God See you therefore any man or woman or any party of men and women in the World who disclaiming any confidence in the flesh any priviledges of birth or Church-state or the merits of any works they have done or can do place their hope for Salvation in Jesus Christ alone trust in him rejoyce in him and Worship God in the Spirit tho it may be not with those external rites and Ceremonies that you do nor under the same circumstances yet heartily Worship God according to the rules which God hath given them that Love God and have a love to all men though more especially to those that fear God and desire to live in Peace as much as in them lyes with all men that are gentle and meek not giving way to rude and boisterous Passions that are good in their behaviours temperate no drunkards no unclean Persons but squaring their lives by the rule of reason because it is also the law of God Let me tell you that against these there is no law No law of God which is the regula regulans the rule by which all the rules and laws of men must be guided or they are nullities and no rules at all These are those whom that God whom you own as your Creator and the great Lord of Heaven and Earth that Christ whom you call your Redeemer your Saviour and who most certainly shall be your Judge and give unto you at the last according to what you have done in the flesh calls the fairest amongst women the most beautiful and lovely Souls in the whole creation judge you whether you ought not so also to call so to account them so to deal with them These are the best men and women in your Cities Parishes c. Take â—reed of using hard Speeches concerning them God will for them execute Judgment as well as for ungodly deeds much more take heed of any hard actions against them he that toucheth them toucheth the apple of Gods Eye Zech. 2. 8. Deut. 32. 10. They have prayed with David Psal 17. 8. Keep me as the apple of thine Eye God hath said concerning them Zech. 2. 8. He that toucheth them toucheth the apple of his Eye Be wise now therefore O ye Princes be instructed O you men of the Earth whether great or small be assured Christ will revenge his Spouses quarrels even the quarrels of all those whom he judgeth the fairest amongst women Let none think to cover their malice against Religion and Godliness under pretences of executing humane Laws the Apostle saith against such is no law no law that will be justified by the law of God no law that will justify either the lawgivers in making it or the Executors in execution of it 1 Tim 1. 9. The law is not made for a righteous man but for the lawless and disobedient for the ungodly and for sinners for unholy and profane for Murderers of Fathers and Murderers of Mothers for Whoremongers for those who defile themselves with mankind for Man-Stealers for Lyars for perjured Persons and other things contrary to sound Doctrine The law that is the law of God is not made for them that is to punish afflict torment them it is made for them to live according to the rule of it It is made to protect them For rulers are not a terror to good works but the evil Rom. 13. 3. And all Magistrats ought to be Ministers of God to Christians for good Rom. 13. 4. Now all humane laws must be either in affirmance of the law of God and to force that or in civil things left to their power as they shall judge to be most for the publick Peace or necessary to uphold Nations and Polities O therefore take heed what you do lest you be found fighters against God Much less let any think to cover their malice with pretences that the Persons they run upon with such a rage are hypocrites Hypocrisy can be but in the heart when there is no contradiction in the conversation that man is no judge of But is it not possible to reconcile at least some part of the men of the World to those to whom the Lord Jesus Christ hath given such a Character Is he not a better Judge then men are Will you make your selves believe for a cloak for your rage that these men are not what they pretend to be I would ask you but one question are they not more righteous then you Are they not more in reading the Word Hearing Prayer Fasting and are not these things duties commanded in that Word which you own to be your rule and to be holy just and good are they not stricter in the observation of Sabbaths Which is so great a piece of Religion that the Prophet expresseth a great part of it under that notion Isa 56. 4 6. Into their hearts you cannot look but their Words are audible do not they fear an Oath more Do they swear and curse and Blaspheme like you or many others do they exceed Heathens Dii omnes deaeque te perdant by their Dammees do they rail and revile and lye like other men Do they drink and whore steal and murder gripe and oppress is not the contrary to this the beauty of a Soul in the Eye of humane reason You have therefore no reason to judge them none of those whom Christ calls the fairest amongst women you must own they are fairer then you or any of your converse and stamp You must find some in the World that are better then your selves or they must be the most comely and beautiful Souls Sirs I beseech you consider how much it becometh a man as a man to judge according to truth And what can be a better standard then the judgment of Christ O let not the People of
thee is to be understood 2. Why Christ hath likened his Spouse to Horses to a company of Horses and why to a company of Horses in Pharaoh 's Chariots As to the first the only question is Whether the sense be I have made thee like or I have fancied thee like the Radical word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifieth to be like or to assimilate I find it frequently in Scripture used in Pihel the very Conjugation in which it is used in this Text. From some of those Texts we may possibly gather the sense of it in this Text Numb 15. 35. I will do unto them as I thought to do unto them There it is translated I thought Isa 14. 24. As I have thought so have I brought it to pass Judg. 20. 5. The men of Gibeah thought to slay me Psal 48. 9. We have thought of thy loving kindness Hos 12. 10. I have used similitudes Lam. 2. 13. To what shall I liken thee The word is in Scripture often used to signifie the making Idea's and Representations of things in our minds No man does any action but he first makes the Idea and Platform of it in his thoughts Now this action of the mind informing the Idea or Platform of a thing is that which is expressed by this word In short the word may signifie either I have made thee like or I have in my mind fancied or conceived thee like so it either denotes a gracious act of Christ terminated in us or an action of Christ terminated in himself In the first sense it signifies Christ's induing of his Spouse with some noble and generous qualities bearing some proportion to those that are found in an Horse In the second sense it is rather expressive of some duty in the Spouse proceeding from such Endowments In the Text the latter must include the former For he who draweth the similitude is one who cannot err in his Judgment We may have Fancies that are vain and our minds may conceive of things otherwise than indeed they are He cannot conceive his Spouse like to a company of Horses if indeed she were not so He could not be deceived with a false Representation of any Object I think it no vain conjecture of some Interpreters of this Text that our Saviour addeth these words with some reference to the Spouse's Petition immediately preceding She had begg'd to to be directed how in the Noon of her afflicted state when the Sun of Tryals and Persecutions beated hot on her she might enjoy a free full Communion with him he had bidden her to go forth by the footsteps of the Flock to follow the steps of those who before had walked with God under the darker dispensations of his Providence Now lest she should shrink at the thoughts of Trials he goes on and tells her he had made her like and looked upon her as like to an Horse yea a company of Horses in Pharaoh 's Chariots But 1. Why doth our Saviour compare his Spouse to Horses We would in our Age think it a strange Complement for a man to use to the woman whom he loved But we must remember that a great deal is to be allowed in the different Dialect of several Nations in different Ages as we see is to Persons in the same Age living at an hundred years distance each from other There are many Phrases which an hundred or two years ago were good English and good sense which in our more Polite and Reformed Age we should now judge very ordinary course Language Elijah you know was called by the King of Israel The Chariots of Israel and the Horsemen thereof all that was meant was the honour and strength and defence of the Nation So Zech. 10. 3. It is said God had visited his Flock and made them like a goodly Horse in Battel And Rev. 19. 11 14. Christ is described as riding upon a white Horse and his Army on white Horses The Spouse is here compared to Horses a company of Horses only for some eminent quality or qualities in Horses Nor is our own Dialect free from such comparisons We say of a man without disparagement He is as strong as an Horse Nor is this similitude improper whether we consider 1. The generous qualities of that creature Or 2. The general repute and value which some of that Species have especially with some Persons The Hebrew Doctors reckon up seven Qualities of an Horse but they reckon good and bad Qualities together 1. It is a goodly creature 2. It is a docible creature easily to be taught several things 3. It is a martial valiant creature 4. It is a swift creature 5. It is a very laborious useful creature I do not think that all these are intended in this Text because it is not said I have likened thee to an Horse but to a company of Horses in Pharaoh 's Chariots There are two or three of them which may be intended and it is questionable which of them is principally intended 1. An Horse is a goodly creature You read of a goodly Horse Zech. 10. 3. We take a great delight to look upon some Horses whose Limbs are well proportioned and which have been well managed An Horse is very comely above a Swine or an Ox or any neat Cattel And usually Horses used in Coaches and Chariots especially Princes Chariots are of the most goodly and comely sort If we should take it in this sense it signifies Christ's high Opinion of his Church and every Believing Soul He had before called her The fairest amongst Women here he compareth her to goodly Horses This is Beza's and some other Learned Interpreters Notion of the Metaphor in the Text. The stature and talness of the Woman and just proportion of her Limbs one to another saith he addeth much unto her beauty Horses upon those accounts are very lovely beautiful creatures but besides that I have discoursed before the beauty and comeliness of the Spouse I must confess I incline with several other Interpreters rather to another sense of it in this Text. 2. An Horse is a very swift creature There are indeed other creatures in other Countries that are more swift of foot than an Horse but none of ordinary use that are swifter of foot Deodate thus interprets the Metaphor and there is a truth in it God puts into his People a Spirit of life and activity so as they are swift to hear James 1. 19. ready to every good work We read in Scripture of Horses swifter than Leopards Hab. 1. 8. But I do not think this principally intended in this place and it seemeth too much a straining of the Metaphor 3. And lastly Therefore the Horse is a strong and valiant creature God himself propoundeth the Horse as a pattern of strength Job 32. 19. Hast thou given unto the Horse his strength And it is said of God that he delighteth not in the strength of an Horse Psal 147. 10. And as the Horse is a creature of strength
many that bend their bows for lies Papists are full of courage and mettal for an idolatrous worship wicked men are full of malice courage to accuse inform against and to destroy the People of God but who is on the Lords side Who Where is the courage of Christians for the truths the waies the Ordinances of God They dare not appear for God but seek all waies to hide and cover themselves and to withdraw themselves from the Lords battels They are not like the warlike horse God speaketh of to Job that saith amongst the Trumpets Ha Ha that mocketh at fear is not affrighted and turneth not his back from the Sword It is time for some to shew themselves valiant for God for the truths and Ordinances of God We are afraid that true Religion is almost at its last Gaspe in our times Where is the Spirit of the Lord God of Elijah The Spirit of those Antient Worthies that noble Army of Martyrs that loved not their lives unto Death but witnessed a good confession they transmitted the true Religion to us sealed with their blood the Spirits of Christians do not appear as if we were like to add many such seals to it and pass it also under our Seal to the generation which is like to succeed us Let this a little move us 2. Consider how necessary a grace it is for the times in which we live The whole Life of a Christian upon the Earth is such a warfare such a warring with Principalities and Powers and the Rulers of the Darkness of this World against spiritual wickedness in high places that he had need be called to at all times to put on the whole Armour of God that he may be able to stand against the Wiles of the Devil to withstand and when he hath done all to stand But the times wherein we live seem to have a particular malignity against Religion and Godliness above the times we have seen or the daies of our Forefathers The Devil is come down with a great rage we had need of courage and of patience The Casuists trouble their Readers with many Questions in order to the Solution of this one Question When a Christian is obliged to make an explicit Confession of his Faith and to declare what he is and what he will stand to and abide by They agree generally that he is bound to do it where the glory of God is eminently concerned 2. Or where the good of others is in eminent hazard There are certainly two times when the glory of God is eminently concerned in Christians appearing for him 1. When his Truths and Ordinances are like to be trodden under foot 2. When the Name and Things of God are eminently blasphemed I beseech you consider whether these be not times of great reproach and blasphemy were ever the Truths of God more opposed was ever the holy Name of God to that degree blasphemed was there ever a greater rage against Religion and Godliness Is it not now time for Christians to buckle on their Armour to quit themselves like men to arm themselves with courage to shew themselves like a company of Horses in Pharaoh's Chariots Horses that will not be afraid like Grashoppers Horses that paw in the Valley and rejoyce in their strength and go on to meet the armed men 3. Consider That Christ hath made you like the Horses in Pharaoh 's Chariots I will open this in two things 1. He hath put of his strength into you The wise man saith The Horse is prepared for the day of Battel he is prepared by Nature by a great natural Spirit which God hath given him and he is prepared by Art and Managery God hath prepared every Christian for this Spiritual battel by giving him a New Nature We use to say That if the Horse knew its own strength it would be too hard for the Rider God in mercy to man hath hidden the Horses strength from him God in judgment hath hidden Christians strength from them in these sinful times The Church hath a strength in it such a strength as the Gates of Hell cannot prevail against Believers have a strength in and with them if they would but put it forth prisons torments fires in former times could not prevail against them How hath God in these sinful times hidden the wisdom of the wise and the prudence of the prudent and the strength of the strong men from them What a strength was there in Luther when Melancthon was afraid they should perish in their appearing for the Cause of God and he made answer Esto ruamus ruet Christus una Christus magnus ille regnator mundi mallem cum Christo ruere quam cum Caesare stare Be it so saith he Let us perish Christ must perish with us Christ that great Ruler of the World I had rather fall with Christ than stand with Caesar The Horse is not afraid of an Army of armed men he goeth on to meet the armed men he mocketh at fear he is not affrighted he turneth not his back from the Sword he feareth not the rattling of the Quiver nor the glittering of the Spear and the Shield he swalloweth up the ground with fierceness and rage neither believeth he that it is the sound of the Trumpet Christ hath made his People like to these Horses only the strength of the Horse is natural the Believers strength is spiritual Why are we afraid 2. The Horses in Pharaoh's Chariots had doubtless some Armour to protect them and preserve them However he that governed the Chariot took a care of them Thus also were the Horses prepared for the Battel by Art as well as by Nature Thus are Christians also prepared there is an Armour of God prepared for them which they are to put on And Christ who governeth his own Chariot his Church will take care of them Psal 46 5. God is in the midst of the Church therefore it shall not fall Isa 27. 3. I the Lord do keep it I will water it every moment last any hurt it I will keep it night and day Psal 125. 2. As the Mountains are round about Hierusalem so the Lord is round about his People He will create a defence upon their glory a cloud and a smoak and a flaming fire upon her Assemblies a Tabernacle a place of Refuge a cover from the storm and from Rain Isa 4. 4 5. 4. And lastly Christ expecteth this from you Thus much methinks is signified to us by the phrase I have compared thee to a company of Horses in Pharaoh 's Chariots The Prince expects that his War-horses should serve him in the day of Battel that they should not be afraid of armed men of Drums or Trumpets c. It is the service we have to do for Christ in the use of the habits of his grace bestowed upon us and in thankfulness for all the goodness he hath shewed us in more calm and quiet times That Christian ill requiteth the Lord for
of Spiritual Life so he must be led by the Spirit If God did not excite the Grace bestowed on him it would be choaked by that body of death that lust and corruption which is in the best mens hearts What can the creature do when the Holy Spirit hath quickened his habits of Grace he cannot act and exercise them and put forth spiritual acts but doth he no more need the Influence of the Holy Spirit yes without Christ he can do nothing he must still have the Grace of God with him 1 Cor. 15. 10. Not I saith Paul but the Grace of God which was with me This is now cooperative and assisting Grace He cannot make the Wheel which must carry him in the waies of God working Grace must do that when it is made he cannot set it upon motion Exciting Grace must oil it Assisting Grace must keep it up move with it or he will never come to issue any good action A Believer indeed acteth for the habits of Grace from which he acteth are inherent in him he is not moved like a Machine or dead Engine but yet he is acted that is assisted and helped in his action He is nothing but what he hath received he doth nothing but while he is receiving Let not then the Natural man glory in the power and good inclinations of his own will he neither hath nor can have any power to do that which in a spiritual sense is good until it be given him from above Let not the renewed man glory in his infused habits of Grace for as he did not merit it nor any way purchase them so of himself he cannot use or exercise them But let him who glorieth glory in this that to him Christ is all in all that he liveth he acteth and bringeth a good action to an issue but yet not he but Christ that liveth in him acteth with him and worketh in him what he accepteth from him It is Christ who layeth the foundation-stone and then layeth the corner-stone who is both the Author and Finisher of our Faith we have nothing to do but to cry Grace Grace when we see the work done In the mean time nothing hindereth but that the Soul may rejoyce and boast in the Lord while it walketh humbly with God mourning over the infirmity of its lapsed Nature for certainly man did not come out of God's hands in the day of Creation in this impotent state Let no man therefore despise those that labour under greater degrees of this impotency than he possibly doth but let him bless the Lord who hath further excited strengthened and assisted him to the operations of his Spiritual Life I shall shut up this discourse with a word or two of Exhortation to every Child of God to use his utmost diligence to keep the King sitting at his Table I mean to keep the presence of Christ as much as he can in and with his Soul that so his Spikenard may send forth the smell thereof I shall urge this by one argument and then offer you my advice in the case and so shâ—â— up this discourse 1. My argument shall be drawn from the high concerns of the Soul in its Spikenard sending forth its smell every Soul is concerned in it three ways 1. In point of duty as God thereby is glorifyed 2. In point of comfort as it will evidence its Spikenard to be such indeed 3. In point of honour as it brings the Soul to a repute in the World 1. I say first in point of duty as God is thereby glorifyed For this cause we are born for this cause is every man come into the World that he may bring honour and glory to his great Creator Herein saith our Saviour John 15. Is my Father glorifyed if you bring forth mach fruit and as the Lord is glorifyed by the vigorous exercise of its grace So is he also honoured by the predication of his grace by the sweet smell which our habits and exercises of grace have in the World That they may see your good works saith our Saviour Matth. 5. And glorify your Father which is in Heaven That they may see your good works saith the Apostle and glorify God in the day of their visitation no man so glorifyeth God as he who vigorously exerciseth his habits of grace The barren field is not that field which crediteth the husbandman the barren and unfruitful Soul is not that Soul which bringeth honour and glory to God It is the fruitful Soul whose smell is like the smell of a field which the Lord hath blessed that bringeth honour to God and so eminently serveth the great end of his Creation 2. The Soul is not only concerned in it in point of duty but also as to its peace and comfort Indeed it cannot be but that comfort should result from the Souls performance of its duty for the fruit of righteousness shall be peace but yet first as he or she that hath a box of Spikenard or any other odoriferous unguent or perfume which casteth out a sweet savour to delight or refresh others doth first partake of it him or her self so it is with the Spouses Spikenard ordinarily its fruits of righteousness do not only affect others but first affect the Soul in which they are found hereby saith St. John we know that we are traâ—slated from death to life because we love the brethren Hezâ—kiah upon a message of death sent by God to him was refreshed with the smell of his own Spikenard 2 Kings 20. 3. I beseech thee O Lord saith he remember now how I have walked before thee in truth and with a perfect heart and have done what is right in thy fight When a Christian comes to lye upon a sick bed or a death-bed it will be no grief of heart unto him but a great pleasure and Satisfaction to consider that he hath with his Spirit served God and indeavoured by holiness in all manner of conversation to shew forth the grace of God bestowed on him not to have been received in vain 3. Lastly a Christian is concerned in point of honour A true Christian is an honourable Person born of God and he is bound to consult his honour and repute in the World It is the smell of a Christians grace that giveth him a name and honour a repute before men The World taketh no notice of our habits of grace while they lye dormant in the Soul but when they shew themselves in our conversations in the exercises of faith humility patience meekness obedience then hath a Christian honour before men Thus you see how a Christian is concerned to have his Spikenard send forth the smell thereof Now seeing so much dependeth upon this that a Christian should keep this glorious King sitting at his Table it followeth that this is of high concernment to every Soul But you will say what can we do toward it is not the Spirit of Christ free as the wind which bloweth where
guilt of sin and cries out if I pine away in my iniquities how can I then live And faints at the apprehension of the wrath of God due to it for every single sin and much more for the numberless number of the sins which it hath committed It smells that of the Prophet Isa Ch. 53. v. 5 6. He was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities the Chastisement of our peace lay upon him and with his stripes we are healed v. 10. His Soul was made an offering for sin Or that of the Apostle Gal. 3. 13. Christ hath Redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a curse for us and this refresheth it I have deserved to dye saith the Soul but Christ hath died for me I have deserved to tread the wine press of my Fathers wrath but he hath trode the winepress of his Fathers wrath alone I was born a slave to lusts and corruptions but Christ by dying hath made me free Ah! what a bundle of Myrrh is a crucified Christ to the Soul Hence it smells Spiritual life even from his death for we have Remission of sins through his blood It smells Spiritual peace Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods elect it is Christ that died Ro. 8. 38. It smells an access unto God The holy of holies being Sprinkled with his blood and Heaven itself by it Sanctified and made accessible It smells Spiritual liberty For the blood of Christ saith the Apostle purgeth the Conscience from dead works to serve the living God It smells Spiritual strength For through the cross of Christ saith the Apostle my heart is crucified to the World Thus you see that in this action or suffering rather Christ is to the Soul a bundle of Myrrh 4. Look upon Christ as rising up from the dead He is a bundle of Myrrh there too the Soul from hence again smells Spiritual life Rom. 4. 25. He rose again for our justification Spiritual peace Rom. 8. 38. It is Christ that died yea rather that is risen again Spiritual strength and quickening Rom. 6. 4. 5. We shall rise with him to newness of life Col. 3. 1. If you be risen with Christ seek the things that are above It smells life from the dead This the Apostle proves 1 Cor. 15 Rom. 8. 11. He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies Nay it smells Eternal life from hence Joh. 14. 19. Because I live you shall live also 5. Look upon Christ as the men of Galilee Acts 1. 11. Ascending up to Heaven Thus he is also a bundle of Myrrh he lives and from hence Job smelt that he should see him with his Eyes the Angels that stood to wait upon his ascension told the men of Galilee so much that as they had seen him ascend so they should see him coming again Hence the believing Soul smells that he shall ascend too for where Christ is there he must be The body is there the Eagles shall flee to it one day He is lifted up and every believer shall be drawn after him Our flesh and blood shall inherit the Kingdom of God For 't is in part there already Heaven is the place whither our forerunner is entred Heaven was an open City before the fall Adam and all his Posterity might have entred presently upon the fall it's gates were lockt up the flaming sword of divine Vengeance kept it but the Captain of our Salvation hath now entred and he keeps the gates from shutting any more till every believer be come In 6. Look upon Christ as sitting one the right hand of the Majesty on high So he is a bundle of Myrrh too Is it so saith the Soul Then he hath favour with God and power with God and what need I any more then for my God my Saviour he in whom I have believed to be in favour with the King of Kings and to have power with the Almighty Nay saith the Soul then I am half in Heaven For Eph. 2. 6. We sit together in Heavenly places in Christ Jesus Christ and I are one if he sits there I sit there too For he is flesh of my flesh 7. Lastly look upon Christ as interceding for us Rom. 8. Heb. 7. He is not there Idle his work is to plead for us to sollicit our business to act our part to do our work And thus he is a bundle of Myrrh to every believing Soul When the poor Soul sinks in the thoughts of its sins renewing after justification Christ is a bundle of Myrrh to it 1 Joh. 2 1. If we sin we have an advocate with the Father even Jesus Christ the righteous When the Soul again sinks at the thoughts of its imperfect duties to think that it cannot do a duty but with so many faults that it may fear the wrath of God for it What a bundle of Myrrh it is to the Soul to think well Christ is in Heaven and he will pick out every fault out of this Prayer this duty c. And so present it in the golden censer Incensed with his merits Thus now I have shewed you how Christ is to the believing Soul a bundle of Myrrh Considered as to his actions as our Redeemer It remains further to shew you that he is so also as to his Spiritual influeuces And Lastly in his Gospel institutions and Ordinances And then I shall come to the Application Sermon LIV. Canticles 1. 13. A bundle of Myrrh is my Beloved unto me he shall lie all night betwixt my Breasts I Proceed in opening the bundle or bag or box of Myrrh which makes my Text give a fragrant smell I have shewed that it is Christ who is thus resembled and have propounded to shew you the aptness of the comparison in five things I am yet upon the 4th He is to the believing Soul a bundle of Myrrh for sweetness I proposed to open this in three particulars shewing you that Christ is so 1. In his mediatory actions 2. In his Spiritual influences 3. In his Gospel Institutions and Ordinances I have done with the first and now proceed to the second To shew you the sweetness of Christ to the believing Soul 2. In his Spiritual influences When he ascended upon high saith the Apostle Eph. 4. he gave gifts unto men he gave gifts to his Church his Ordinances Of those the Apostle speaks but he gives other gifts likewise gifts even to the Rebellious Psal 68. All these are summed up under one head The gift of the Spirit This is that which he calls the promise of the Father He was the promise of the Father of old Ezek. 36. 27. It was his promise John 14. 16. I will pray the Father and he shall give you another 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Comforter and he shall abide with you for ever Even the Spirit of truth He is sent in Christs name 26. v. he is called the Spirit of Christ hence the
own inbred enemies those of our own house our innate lusts and Corruptions I mean are as still as our grand Adversary The very waters of Marah themselves turned sweet when this Tree of life is in them Our hearts lose much of their bitterness by the presence of Christ in them it is when the Sun is down that the Frogs and Toads croak and the Dors and Bats fly It is in the night when the Thief steals The time of Christs withdrawings from the Soul is the time when Sathan molests and lusts are most busy 2. The Souls Spikenard then sends forth its pleasant smell You had it in the former verse I shewed you there what dependence the exercise of our grace hath upon Christs presence with us both in respect of his exciting and assisting influence Christ speaks it plain in that excellent parable of the vine and the branches Joh. 15. 5. He that abidath in me and I in him the same bringeth forth fruit for without me you can do nothing v. 6. The same bringeth forth much fruit Otherwise the Soul withereth v. 6. Naturalists say that in those Countries which abounded with Myrrh they were wont to bind bundles of it to the heart or to anoint it with the Gum the use of it was to strengthen the heart against what was noxious and unto a due discharge of its natural operations It is Gregories observation or similitude rather that the Soul that applies Christ to its heart and which findeth his influence will find it like a bundle or an anointing of Myrrh strengthening the Soul against the prevailings of corruptions and filling it with a Spiritual heat and fitness for Heavenly operations And thus I have shewed you just reason why the lodgings or abidings of Christ with a gracious Soul are so desirable to it Obj. But will some poor Soul say Can Christ not abide with that Soul which he hath once owned is his love mutable is he not the God that changeth not but loveth to the end whom he once loveth I answer The Love of Christ is an abiding love he is not yea and nay with the Soul upon which he hath once fixed his heart whom he loveth he loveth to the end 1. His union with the Soul abideth Christ once in us and ever in us is a truth to which we must adhere that corruption which could not at first prevent it shall never he of force to dissolve it but the sense of this union may fail The indwelling Spirit shall not be disseised but the Spirit as a comforter may fail the Souls of the Saints When wilt thou comfort me saith the man after Gods own heart Besides that our state of justification is to be maintained by the performance of our Spiritual duty and there can be no justified Soul that doth not earnestly desire its own continuance in that state 2. His necessary influences upon the Soul abide too The promise must stand good I will never leave thee nor forsake thee nor can it be imagined that so noble and vertual an head as the Lord Jesus Christ can be united to any member of his Spiritual body without a proportionable influence upon it or that the seed of God in the Soul should be wholly inactive But Spiritual desires are also the sacred means which God hath appointed for the preservation of these 3. But Gradual abidings of Christ in the Soul may fail He may not abide with the Soul in such proportions of Spiritual influence at all times Now the degrees of Spiritual influence from Christ are highly desirable to a gracious Soul But I have spake enough to the explication and confirmation of the point I come now to the Application In the first place Let us from this try our selves whether we indeed be the true Spouses of the Lord Jesus Christ and he our beloved yea or no Can we say and say it cordially he shall lodge betwixt our breasts 1. There are many that say he shall sit upon my tongue I will talk to Christ and take his name into my mouth concerning whom we may say as the Prophet sometimes said of the Jews The Lord was nigh in their mouths and far from their reins the woman dandles many a Child in her arms that never lodgeth betwixt her breasts in the night she talks of many a man in the day time whom she will not allow to lodg in her bosom at night there 's many a wretch that talks of Christ that yet will not let him come â—igh his heart 2. There are many that say they shall lodg to eternity betwixt his breasts that yet cannot will not say this going to Heaven is grown market talk and every one is a pretender to that journeys end that yet will not set one foot before another in the way Balaam wisheth vainly and many a one concludeth as vainly that he shall dye the death of the righteous and his latter end shall be like his those mentioned Mat. 7. 24. said they should lodge the long night of eternity betwixt Christs breasts but he saith unto them depart from me I know you not there are too many that build Castles in the air and houses upon the sand and dream of golden mountains but every one is not wife to another that saith she shall one day have him nor is every Soul a Spouse to Christ that promiseth to it self eternal content in him 3. A man may say Oh that Christ would come betwixt my breasts that yet is not the Spouse of Christ There 's scarce a wretch living but at one time or other wisheth Christ would speak to his Soul pardon and peace 't is one thing for a woman to desire the Physitian may make applications to her breasts when full of pain that yet will not say he shall lodge betwixt her breasts you see there may be a great many mistakes in this point but plainly let me ask you two or three questions 1. Are you willing to open the secrets of your Souls to Jesus Christ There 's many a one is willing that Christ should come so near him as his Ear but not into his heart canst thou say that thy Soul cleaveth to the Lord Jesus Christ that thou desirest he should enter into its secrets not only to tip thy tongue regulate thy Countenance but to Command in thy heart 2. Art thou willing that Christ should lodge all night with thy Soul Not serve thee only by fits to cure thy heart akings but that he should lodge and dwell with thee make an abode with thy Soul 3. Art thou willing that a perfect Christ should lodge with thee Not only Christ as an High-Priest to expiate for thee and make an atonement for thy sins but as a Prophet to guide instruct thee as a King to rule over thee and govern thee The Wife desires not an Husband only as her Companion but as her head By this O Christian I shalt thou know if indeed thou beest the Spouse
or vices of the mind so truth and falshood simplicity and craft or doubleness of mind are much discerned in the Eye There are some brute creatures that discover far more natural sagacity and craftiness than others in their looks and so there are also some men that you say of them they look as if they were false-hearted and oft-times you do not take your mark amiss But now amongst brute creatures the Dove's Eye is simple you see no deceitfulness no craft or subtâ—lty in that Matth. 10. 16. Be you wise as Serpents and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we translate it harmless as Doves but there is a doubt upon it whether 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be compounded of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a horn then it signifies without an Horn as Doves and we translate it well enough harmless or whether it be not compounded of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies to make a mixture Such should the Saints be simple without mixture Christ was so there was no guile in his mouth Phil. 1. 10. without deceit in their hearts they should not have an heart and an heart It was Paul's glorying 2 Cor. 1. 12. That he had his conversation in godly sincerity 6. Doves Eyes are clean Eyes Hence it feeds upon pure grains drinks no other than pure water delights most in houses of a pure white colour which the Poet observed of old Aspicis ut veniant ad candida tecta columbae And many other things are reported by Naturalists of the cleanliness of this Bird. The Believer is one of a pure heart Joh. 15. 3. You are clean saith our Saviour through the word I have spoken to you he is one of clean hands and a pure heart Psal 24. 4. of a clean heart Psal 73. 1. clean every whit Joh. 15. 10. his heart is purified by Faith Acts 15. 9. he hath purified his Soul in obeying the truth through the Spirit and he delights in pure company his delight is in the excellent Psal 16. 3. The wicked shall not tarry in his sight Psal 101. he hath Doves Eyes 7. Doves Eyes are fearful tender Eyes this experience teacheth and Naturalists say That it is caused by the little proportion of Gall that is in them There is not in them indeed such a shiness and fearfulness as is in some other Birds because they are many of them nursed up near to houses and made familiar to men but it is evident they are trembling creatures The Spouse of Christ hath upon this account Doves Eyes It is true he hath not the fear of a reprobate upon him he is more acquainted with God and hath been bred up in nigher communion with God yet he is very subject to fear he fears sinning against God and God cannot lay an hand upon him but he is ready to tremble he cannot cast an Eye upon any Judgment of God but he shakes at the apprehension of an angry God in it He hath Doves Eyes 8. The Dove's Eye is a mournful Eye Hence in Scripture the mourning of Doves is made use of to express sad mournings Isa 38. v. 14 I did mourn like a Dove Isa 59. 11. We mourn sore like Doves I conceive it chiefly relates to the mourning of Turtles The Saints Eyes too are mourning Eyes they are persons of sorrowful spirits broken and contrite spirits and look as it is with Turtles they never mourn so bitterly as when they have lost their Companion so it is with the Believer he never so mourneth as under the withdrawings of Divine Love It is not proper for the Children of the Bridechamber to mourn while the Bridegroom is with them but when he is gone Then they shall mourn 9. The Doves Eyes are exceeding chast Eyes I noted to you before that the uncleanness and wantonness of the heart much appears in the Eye Hence the Apostle Peter mentions Eyes full of Adultery There are large stories told of the Doves Chastity especially Turtle Doves and Stock Doves Hence possibly it was Lev. 12. 6. that a Turtle Dove was the Sacrifice which God appointed for the Woman after Child-birth The Dove keeps to its Mate and to him alone The Saint too hath Doves Eyes he cries out None but Christ None but Christ he cleaves to Christ alone for Justification for Sanctification for Salvation Christ is his all in all Isa 17. 7 8. At that day shall a man look to his Maker and his Eyes shall have respect to the holy one of Israel and he shall not look to the Altars the work of mens hands Neither shall he respect that which his fingers hath made Either the Groves or the Images No he hath Doves Eyes 10. The Doves Eyes are quick Eyes Naturalists observe that the flight of the Dove is very swift so swift that when they flie directly forward no Hawk can take it and for this quickness of flight quickness of the Eye is necessary The Spouse of Christ is quick-sighted too its Eye immediately pierceth through a mist of difficulties and dangers he believeth in hope against hope When he doth not see by the Eye of Sense yet he believeth He hath Doves Eyes 11. The Dove hath Circumspect Eyes You shall observe this in it that it seldom or never takes its flight toward the Earth but it looks this way and that way and every way and when it is alighted you shall discern it thrusting out it 's Neck first on one side then on another to see that all be safe The believer hath also circumspect Eyes He should have Eph. 5. 15. See then that you walk circumspectly Psal 39. v. 1. I said I will take heed to my waies The Child of God should be like the Dove not move a step in the World without casting its Eye of consideration upon its way first considering whether the action which it is about to do be like to bring glory to God Whether it be consonant to a Divine rule 12. In the last place The Dove hath very observing Eyes hence let its flight be never so far and remote from home yet it finds its way thither again directly Hence Historians tell us that the Romans made great use of Doves when they were absent a great way from home they would by Doves which they carried with them send home directions to their Servants for the management of their business and by the help of Doves they would in their Wars keep intelligence with their Friends in their Enemies quarters The Christian should likewise have Observing Eyes to observe his own motions and actions and to observe Divine Providences Prov. 23. v. 26. Let thine Eyes observe my waies c. But I have inlarged enough in the Explication of the Metaphor it is time that I should come to the Application and so the Proposition may be useful to us 1. By way of Discovery 2. By way of Exhortation This Notion discovers to us
the fruitfulness of the Church lies in its bringing forth many Sons unto God The more Souls are converted the more fruitful the Church is but without Christ's conjunction with it it bringeth forth none If Christ's presence be in his Church it brings forth many Souls If he be not present it brings forth no Children This will easily appear by considering how the Church of God is Instrumental to the conversion of Souls and by making it appear to you that these causes are not principally efficient sole causes nor can be so but are only instrumental causes 2. That upon experience it is made evident that where Christ doth not concur they do nothing For the first 1. The Church is to be considered as to its parts and as to its priviledges as to what God hath planted in it and what God hath betrusted to it As to its parts So it is made up of Officers and members As to its priviledges so there is committed to it the Oracles of God the Mysteries of God the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven there is none of all these but have or may have for ought I know an instrumental causation in bringing forth Children unto God or in bringing of them up but none of them have a Principal efficiency none of them have a sole efficiency nor can produce the effect without Christs conjunction let us look upon them severally 1. Look first upon the Officers of the Church these were extraordinary such as Apostles Evangelists Prophets Ordinary Pastors and Teachers That these have an instrumental causation in the conversion of Souls is plain they were set in the Church for the perfecting of the Saints Eph. 4. 12. for the perfecting their number and for the perfecting of their graces Paul calls them Fathers 1 Cor. 4. 15. and saith he begat the Corinthians He saith the same of Onesimus but alas as the Apostles of old so Ministers now have no more then an instrumentality in this production Paul planted and Apollos watered but God gave the increase 1 Cor. 3. 6. God was all he that planted nothing he that watered was nothing but God that gave the increase was all v. 7. v. 9 They are but waterers together with God workers together with him Hence though Paul Preached the same Doctrine to all yet he was to some the savour of life unto life to others the savour of death unto death And though his earnest desire was to convert his own Nation it was his hearts desire and Prayer to God that they might be saved Rom. 10. 1. yet he could not effect it And if the Officers of the Church who are under a special ordination of God for the great end of conversion could do no more it will easily be granted of private members whose indeavours in quickening others though they may be sometimes blessed of God to such an end yet doubtless are not more efficient to it then the labours of Ministers nor yet in an equal tendency with their's unto so great an end 2. As to the priviledges granted to the Church The Oracles of God are committed to the Church Rom. 3. 2. it is the pillar and ground of truth 1 Tim. 3. 15. the mysteries of God are committed to it 1 Cor. 4. 1. The keys of the Kingdom of Heaven are Committed to it Mat. 16. 19. I understand ever by the first term the Word of God and the dispensation of it in the Preaching of the Gospel by the second the Sacraments of the Gospel by the third the Censures of the Church I know the terms are more generical and not so to be restrained I only for distinction sake so restrain them at present nor do I meddle here with the disputes whether the dispensation of these or any of these belong to the whole Church or only to Officers nor yet to which of the Officers I shall only assert two things 1. That the Scripture seemeth to assign to all these some instrumentality as to the bringing forth of Children unto God this is plain 1. Concerning the Word 1 Cor. 4. 15. I have begotten you through the Gospel James 1. 18. of his own will begat he us by the word of truth As to the Sacraments for the Sacrament of Baptism we are said to be Baptized into Christ Rom. 6. 3. Gal. 3. 27. and again Acts 2. 38. to be Baptized for the Remission of sins For the Sacrament of the Lords Supper though I dare not assert it a converting Ordinance yet unquestionably it hath its instrumentality to the Salvation of Souls For Censures they have also their instrumentality 1 Cor. 5. 5. the end of their administration is for the destruction of the flesh that the Spirit may be saved in the day of Christ But now 2. It is as plain that they have but an instrumental causation and separated from the influences of Christ and his concurrence with them they do nothing hence James 2. 18. of his own will begat he us with the word of truth John 1. 13. we are born again not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man but of the will of God John 3. 5. except you be born again of water and of the Spirit you cannot enter into the Kingdom of God Thus the truth is evidenced from Scripture And Scriptural reason 2. In the second place Consider all experience where-ever the Word of God hath been Preached the Sacraments administred Church Censures duly executed so long as Christ hath granted his presence with the administrations they have been made mighty in order to the bringing home of Souls unto God Where the Lord hath withdrawn his presence either as to the generality of Persons under the external administrations or as to any particular Souls they have signified nothing Isaiah doth but make the heart of the People fat and their Ears heavy and shuts their Eyes Ch. 6. 10. he complains that he laboureth in vain and spendeth his strength for nothing and in vain Saint Pauls Gospel is to the Jews a stumbling block and to the Gentiles foolishness 3000 are converted at St. Peters Sermon while Christ is in his Bed with his Church but few or none of the Jews in their Synagogues Acts 19. they were hardened Christ was gone out of his Bed and it was now no longer green and flourished no more But this is enough to have spoken as to the proof of the Doctrine come we now to the Application The Proposition might be applied variously 1. For the confutation of the errors of those who either deny the necessity of any conjunction of Christ with the Soul as to the production of the fruits of grace or at least of such a conjunction as is unquestionably necessary and of those who think that there is a power in mans will ad bonum Spirituale to produce that which is Spiritually good and that a moral suasion is sufficient to the conversion of a Soul 2. We might from hence observe the
the word of God ariseth from two things 1. The first is that sweet joy and peace which God Ordinarily brings into the Soul from them God will speak peace to his People saith the Psalmist and he creates the fruit of the lips peace peace saith the Prophet this joy is indeed of different degrees there is the rejoicing of hope for hope growing from a true Root bringeth forth some fruit of joy in the Soul though it indeed be not so fair and pleasant a fruit as that joy which is the fruit of assurance because the Union which hope gives the Soul with its beloved object is of the lowest fort But yet even this joy hath a great deal of sweetness but Oh! How great is that sweetness which is the riper fruit of assurance that peace which passeth all understanding A sweetness which oft times overcomes the Soul and is too great for it to bear Both which the Soul reaps from the word of God and from the Ordinances of God 2. But secondly this sweetness in the Word and Ordinances of God ariseth not from this alone but from other usefulness of them to the Soul That is not only sweet but that also which is profitable David saies that the Law of the Lord doth convert the Soul makes wise the simple enlightens the Eyes that they are useful to warn us and that in keeping them there is great reward By the word and the Ordinances of God the Soul hath wherewithal to answer the tempter in that it finds arguments to help it in repelling a secret motion to sin c. This makes the Word and Ordinances of God exceeding sweet to gracious Souls as they are those things by which the Soul is profited 3. But thirdly there is a further sweetness that the Word and Ordinances of God have to a gracious Soul as they are pure and holy Psal 119. v. 140. Thy word is very pure therefore doth thy servant love it The heart of man naturally doth not love purity but the Spiritual heart that is conformed to the image of God loves it It is turned into the likeness of the word and made to love whatsoever is holy and Spiritual and pure This makes the Rafters and beams of the Church to the true Christian to be like Cedar and Fir sweet smelling because of that purity and holiness which cleaveth to them 4. A fourth thing which the Proposition predicateth of the Word and Ordinances of God is their duration they are of an incorruptible Nature as Cedar and Fir or Pine Not subject to corruption and putrefaction as other sorts of wood are Isa 40. v. 8. The grass withereth and the flower fadeth but the Word of God shall stand for ever Our Saviour speaketh to this purpose Heaven and Earth shall pass away but one jot or tittle of the Law shall not pass away until all these be fulfilled I will open this a little 1. The Ordinances of the Gospel endure for ever Herein the excellency of the Gospel dispensation appeareth above the legal dispensation The Law brought nothing to perfection faith the Apostle to the Hâ—brews the Ordinances of worship under the Law were but shadows and types which ceased when Christ who was the substance of those shadows and the Antitype to those types once appeared in the World or at least when he dyed but the Ordinances which are as the beams and Rafters of the Gospel Church are durable and do not pass away The Jewish Priesthood ceased But the Gospel Ministry continues Christ hath promised to be with them to the End of the World God hath given Apastles Prophets Evangelists Pastors and Teachers for the perfecting of the Saints until we all come in the Unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ The passover was but for a time until the Messiah who was the true paschal Lamb should he slain for the sins of his People but the Ordinance of the Lords Supper which comes instead of this is an Ordinance by which we shew the death of Christ until his coming again 1 Cor. 11. 2. The word of God in particular indureth for ever I will open this in two things 1. The Propositions of the word indure for ever They are Propositions of Eternal truth whether they be Dogmatical Propositions which assert the truth of God concerning the Nature or will of God or concerning the state of man or any thing relating to his duty or whether they be such as are promisory they are of an immortal Nature the reason is because God is a God that changeth not he is not Yea and Nay but Yea and Amen a God that cannot lye to his People nor repent of what he hath said unto them The truth of the word abideth for ever 2. The vertue of the word abideth and is immortal The same vertue which the word of God ever had in it to convince convert to enlighten quicken support comfort the same is in it still and indeed the proof of this dependeth partly upon the former for the vertue of the word whether it be the word of precept or the word of promise doth much depend upon the truth of it Now the truth of it being perpetual the vertue of it must also be so supposing the same concurrence of that holy Spirit which must be to make the Word of any use or vertue at any time I have spoken enough to the Explication of the point I come now to the Application of it which I shall dispatch by drawing some speculative and practical Inferences from what you have heard Hence in the first place you may observe a great difference betwixt the Legal and the Gospel Ministry And consequently the excellency of the latter above the former The Apostle to the Hebrews insisteth much upon this and by this argument proves the excellency of the Gospel above the Law The Beams and Rafters of the Church under the law they were not of Cedar they lasted no longer then until the timeof reformation The Evangelist St. John saith The law was given by Moses but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ Two things commend the Gospel above the law Grace came by it truth came by it The law brought wrath the Doctrine of it tended to curse men and women and to conclude all under wrath but the Doctrine of the Gospel brought grace the news of the free pardon and remission of sins through the blood of Christ the acceptance of the Soul upon the account of his merits Truth also came by Christ Whether you take Truth for Substance and Realities opposed to types and shadows that came by Christ who was the End of the Law Or whether you take Trutâ— for Certainty and that which hath in it porpetuity and durâ—bleness that also came by Christ who put an end to the Ceâ—emonial law which consisted of temporary Ordinances for worship