other fear makes the heart to have hard thoughts of God take heed for ever of that feare of God that makes you to have hard thoughts of him In times of danger many begin to feare then presently they wish they had never ingaged themselves so much in these wayes that have such ill successe they now cry out of others you would needs do thus you see what is become of it But feare of God and his goodnesse is joyned with blessing God that ever you knew his waâ—es and were ingaged in them This shall be in the latter dayes God is content to stay for his glory untill the latter dayes that which is indeed his chiefe glory for though in these former dayes God hath had glory yet hee hath had but very little God is content to stay for that which is his chief glory untill the latter dayes Let this be an argument for our patience though we have sufferings now let us wait as God waiteth But the latter dayes when are these The times of the Gospell are generally called the latter dayes but this though it referreth indeed to the whole time of the Gospel yet especially unto the latter times of those latter dayes If you would know what these latter dayes are though I will not take upon me to give you the day or 〈…〉 I will shew you that it is like these latter dayes are at hand For giving light unto this that is a good help to us that we have in Daniel concerning the four Kingdoms there we have a propheticall Chronologie from the Captivity of the Jews unto the time when the counsell of God shall be fulfilled You have a description there of four severall Monarchies the Babylonian Assyrian Grecian and Roman Now in the last of these Daniel saith Chap. 2. 44. The God of heaven shall set up a Kingdome which shall never be destroyed but it shall breake in pieces and consume all the other Kingdomes and it shall stand for ever In this latter namely the Roman hath the Kingdom of Christ begun to appear already but God telleth Daniel chap. 12. 13. Thou shalt stand in thy lot at the end of the dayes Now observe the chiefe Prophesies wee have about the time of these latter dayes when they shall be set out in that expression of time and times and halfe a time 1260. dayes or 42. months all comes to the same three years and a halfe reckoning every day in those yeares for a yeare compare these prophesies Dan. 7. 25. And they shall be given into his hand untill a time and times and dividing of time Rev. 11. 2. The holy City shall they tread under foote forty and two moneths Vers 3. The witnesses shall prophesie 1260. dayes Now 1260. days are the days of three years and a halfe so the dayes of 42. moneths Then the woman in the wildernesse Rev. 12. 6. She shall be fed there 1260. dayes still the same number the witnesses shall prophesie 1260. dayes the holy Citie that shall be trodden under foote 42. months and the woman in the wildernesse shall be there 1260. dayes And againe Dan. 12. 11. From the time of the abomination that making desolate there shall be 1290. days there are a few days more not many but about this time you see the Scripture prophesieth of some great things to be done at the end of this time are these latter dayes But all the difficulty is to know the beginning when the three years and a halfe or 42. moneths or 1260. dayes begun then we may know when these latter dayes shall be Brightman makes the beginning of the 1290. days from Julians time when he would have set up the abomination that is set up the Jewish worship again by re-edifying the Temple that is sayes he the abomination of desolation reckoning 1290. dayes for 1290. years hiâ— time by computation will come out about the year 1650. The other wee have in the Revelation and that in Daniel likewise refers to the same notes the time that the Churches shall be under the persecution of Antichrist for a thousand two hundred and sixty years so long the Beast shall prevail and the witnesses shall so long prophesie in sackcloath and the woman shall be in the wildernesse for so long a time But when did Antichrist begin to reign For that take this rule It must be at that time when the Roman Emperour was broken and when the Dragon giveth up his power to the Beast when the power of the Dragon that persecuted the Christians under the Roman Empire is given to Antichrist so that now they come to be persecuted under him here is the beginning of the 1260. dayes That the Roman Empire must be given up first appeareth 2 Thes 2. 7 For the mystery of iniquity doth already worke only he who now letteth will let untill he be taken out of the way that is as generally Expositors carry it the power of the Roman Empire when that is taken out of the way then shall that wicked one be revealed theâ—e were many Antichrists before but then that wicked one that shall exalt himselfe above all that is called God shall have power to persecure the Church Hence it is observable that the custome of the Church was to pray for the continuing the Roman Empire upon this ground because they knew when that was broken Antichrist would come Now the breaking of the Roman Empire was at the raising up of those ten severall sorts of governmens called in the Revel tenn Kings and the raising up of those Kings was 400. yeares and something more after Christ as Chronologers tell us between the 400. and 500. years It is hard to reckon to a year there is so much difference in Chronologers computations after that time there must be 1260. days that is 1260. years Make this computation and compare all these Scriptures one with another it cannot be long but in this century that is now currant these latter dayes are here meant when the people of God and the Jews shal return to Jehovah and Davidâ— heir King and fear the Lord his goodnesse The nearer the time comes the more will these things be cleared Dan. 12. 9. Goe thy way Daniel for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end and none of the wicked shall understand but the wise shall understand Take but one note and we have done why the Scripture sets â—â—is out rather by many dayes then by so many yeares The reason is because God would have his people think that time untill his goodnes should be revealed but a short time if he had said they should be 1260. years under Antichrists persecution this founds harder No saith he it shall be but so many dayes though flesh and blood may think this time long yet look upon it as dayes it is but a short time to me it will be but a short time to you within 1260. days you shall be delivered from his tyranny
Gods patience when their sins are grosse and vile afterwards upon some lesser sins they are utterly undone VVhat is the name of his son The name of this son is Lo-ammi and the word signifieth as it is interpreted here by God himselfe You are not my people and I will not be your God The people to whom Hosea prophesied they might have objected against him thus What Hosea doe you say that God will not have any more mercy upon us what will not God have mercy upon his own people Is not God our God What doe you threaten such-things as these are The Prophet answers It is true God hath been your God and you have been his people but there is an end of those dayes God now degradeth you from those glorious priviledges that formerly you had he willowne you no more to be his and you shall have no further right to own him to be yours From whence First this A people that have been once a people dear to God may be so rejected as never to become a people of God more For so these did not though afterwards wee shall bear of the promise for others in other Ages God hath no need of men God is able to raise up a people what wayes he pleases even from the very stones in the street to raise up children unto Abraham Though Rome may boast that they have been a glorious Church True there hath been heretofore a glorious Church in Rome what then Those that were his people are now no more his people VVe shall meet further with this in the next Chapter Only in this Note observe but this thing The great difference betweene the estate of a Christian in communion with Christ by grace and a Church estate Men and women may loose their Church estate and that for ever but their estate in communion with Jesus Christ by grace they can never lose that And this is a great difference and affordeth abundance of comfort True our Church state I mean in regard of an instituted Church in Congregations it is a great priviledge a great mercy but our Communion with Jesus Christ is a higher priviledge and that priviledge gan never be lost we may be cut off from the one but never cut off from the other Secondly yet it is a most heavy judgemenâ— for any to have been heretofore the people of God now to be unpeopled for God to be no more theirs and for them to be no more the Lords A heavy judgement for the Lord to say Well I will be no more a God to you whatsoever I am to others no more yours in my goodnesse in my mercy in my power or whatsoever I am in my selfe The being cast off from God First takes us off from that high honour that was before upon a people for so in Esay 4. 4. Since thou wast precious in my sight thou host beene honourable The people of God gathered together in Church Communion certainly are in an honourable condition when they are dispeopled they are cast off from this their priviledge from their honour Secondly They have not the presence of God with them as before not the care of God towards them nor the protection of God over them not the delight of God in them nor the communication of God to them What should I speake of all these particulars But among other priviledges they want this namely that great priviledge of pleading with God for mercy upon this relation which was the usuall way of the Prophets to pleade with God because they were the people of God So Esay 64. 9. Be not wroth very sore O Lord neither remember iniquity for ever upon what ground Behold see we beseech thee we are all thy people This is a good Argument Againe Jer. 14. 9. Why doest thou stand as a man astonished amongst us as a mighty man that cannot save Yet thou O Lord art in the middest of us and we are called by thy name leave us not This Text is ours this day and well may we say O Lord why doest thou stand as a man astonished Oh yet if we can but take up the second part and say We are called by thy name we may make more comfortable use of the former Why doest thou stand as a man astonished How doth a man astonished stand He stands still in a place as if he knew not which way to goe he is in a kinde of destraction first he goes one way and by and by he returns again The Lord we know knoweth his purpose from eternity but the Scriptures are pleased to expresse Gods wayes towards us in the similitude Hath not God stood amongst us as a man astonished God hath beene in a way of mercy and then stood still and then gone forward a little and afterward gone back again and yet back and back still and we have prayed and cryed and God hath stood as a man astonished as if he were not yet resolved which way to goe Let us pray earnestly to God that he would not stand as a man astonished but that the way of the Lords mercy may be made cleare before him and cleare before us But this I bring in to shew that the relation that people have to God is the ground of their encouragement to pray to God and when a people is rejected they lose this priviledge Our relations to God are very sweet things though ordinarily they are exceedingly abused yea they are glorious things As it is said of other relations Relations are of the least entity but of the greatest efficacy so it is here Our relations to God are of very great efficacy whatsoever the entity be and therefore to lose our relations to God especially this relation of Gods being ours and we being his is a sore and he avy curse Again You are not my people and I will not be your God Marke here the first is you are not my people before the second commeth I will not be your God VVe first begin with God in our apostacy before God begins with us in his rejection I would not have withdrawn my self from being your God if you had not first rejected me and would not be my people When God loveth he begins first we love not him but he loveth us first But when it comes to departing it then begins on our side wee first depart before the Lord doth and this is that which will be a dreadful aggravation to wicked men another day to think with themselves This evil is come upon us God is gone mercy is gone but who began this first where is the root and principle Thy perdition is of thy selfe I begin first and therefore all the losse of that grace and mercy which is in God I may thanke this proud this distempered this base passionate wretched heart of mine owne for it Again I will not be your God He doth not say you shall not have the fruite
people and call upon them and exhort them to turne unto him the condition of that people is not desperate Exhortations from God do argue that the condition of a people may be hopefull So long as the King is but speaking to a Traytor especially giving of him good counsel there may be hope If he turne his backe upon him and will speake no more then he looks upon himself as a gone man Many people are troubled that God doth so continue exhorting by his Ministers and others and they cannot be at quiet If thou hast such a quiet as God should leave exhorting and drawing thee from thy sinnes woe to thee thou art a lost creature Make much of exhortations and threatnings Come we now to the Exhortation it selfe Let her put away her whoredomes out of her sight and her adulteries from betweene her breasts It is in the plurall number her whoredomes and her adulteries They were many shee must put them away all If a wife that hath been naught shall be contented to forsake divers of her lovers and retain but one there is no reconciliation all her adulteries must be put away But the words are not onely in the plurall number but those that understand the Originall well know that there is somewhat in the words to extend the signification beyond the plurall number and that is the duplication of the radicall letter in the first word the second radicall letter which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is double in the second word the third radicall Letter 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is double It is the note of Tarnovius upon the place saith he the doubling of these radicall Letters shew the exceeding multitude of those whordomes and adulteries that Israel was guilty of at this time And indeed when once there is giving way to superstitious vanities there is growing to notorious whordomes and adulteries without measure without number ubi sistendum We never know where to stop if once our worship be corrupted Let her put away out of her sight The eye is the receiver of much uncleanness into the heart and by it the uncleanuess of the heart is much exprest The Scripture speakes of eies full of adulterie Let her put her adulteries out of her sight let them be abominable now in her eies those things that before were delectable let them now bee detestable Let them cast away their Idols as a filthy menstruous cloath and with indignation say get yee hence Or from before her face so it is in the Hebrew noting her impudency in her idolatry that it appeared in her very face Though men at first may be a little wary yet at length they grow to manifest outwardly their Idolatry in their very face But what we shall meet with afterward And because Israel did not according to the exhortation of those that pleaded with her put thus her whordomes out of her sight God did put Israel out of his sight for so we have it 2 King 17. 22. 23. The children of Israel walked in all the sinnes of Jeroboam which he did they departed not from them Promises could not draw them threatnings could not derer them Vntill the Lord removed Israel out of his sight They might have prevented this if they had put their whoredomes out of their sight God would never have put them out of his sight And from betweene her breasts Whores use to discover their filthyness much in their breasts either in the nakedness of their breasts or in those ornaments they hung about their breasts as they were wont to do in those Countreys for the intâ—sing of their lovers Her breasts Hypocrates sayes there are veins that goe from the belly to the breasts and that is the reason he gives of the temptation to lust that is in the breasts The whoredomes of the breasts in the nakednesse of them hath been condemned not onely in the Churches of God but amongst the heathen Terrulian in his book de habitu muliebri hath this expression Women adorne themselves immoderately with gold and silver and precious apparell this is saith hee crimen ambitionis the sin of ambition but for them to seek to adorne themselves solicitously carefull about their haire and their skin and those parts that draw the eyes this is crimen prostitutionis it is the sinnne of a prostituted whore so to doe Yea besides Tertullian in another book of his De velandis verginibus brings the Heathen rebuking Christian women in those times The very women of Arabia saith he shall judge you for they do not onely cover their faces but even their heads rather then they will have their nakedness appeare they will let the light but into one eye Now if the Heathen did so if they would not have their nakedness in any thing appeare much more should Christians cover those parts that are incitements to lusts That which is the Bedlams madness and the Beggars misery namely Nakedness that is the whores pride and the strumpets glory Let her put away her whordoms out of her sight and her adulteries from between her breasts That which is intended especially here is that they should not be content meerly with change of their hearts to say Well we will acknowledge the Lord to be the true God and our hearts shall wholly trust in him but for these externall things what great matter is there in them Oh no they must abstaine from all appearance of evill from the badges of Idolatry there must not be so much as the garbe and dresse of a whore upon them they must take away their adulteries from betweene their breasts The breasts of the Church are the Ordinances that are there for out of them do the Saints suck sweetness and spirituall nourishment So they are called in Isa 66. 11. That you may suck and be satisfied with the breasts of consolation Now certainly it is an evill thing for any thing that is whorish to be upon the breasts to be in the Ordinances of the Church to thinke to adorne them withall as whores do their breasts No the breasts are so neare the heart that it is pitty any thing should be upon them but Christ himselfe it is most fit that he should lye there Cant. 1. 13. A bundle of myrrhe is my wel-beloved unto me he shall lye all night between my breasts Myrrhe we know is a bitter thing but though Christ were as a bundle of myrrhe and brought many afflictions that adde bitternesse to the flesh yet the Church would have Christ to lye between her breasts and she would rejoyce in Christ Christ was sweet to the Church though with afflictions As a bundle of myrrhe is my wel-beloved So many faithfull Ministers of God have been contented yea joyfull to keep Christ between their breasts and in the Ordinances though as a bundle of myrrhe though hee hath brought some afflictions to them yet rather then they would endure any expression of that which is
Bolton who died not long since It is repoâ—ted that upon his death-bed he had his children come to him he speaks thus unto them I doe believe saith he there is never a one of you will dare to meet me at the tribunall of Christ in an unregenerate condition So let me say to you that are evill children of Godly parents let me in their names speak to you How dare you with what face doe you think you shall dare to meet with your godly father and gracious mother before the judgement seat of Jesus Christ at that day if your godly father stand at the right hand of Christ how dare you appeare before that face in the guilt of those horrible wickednesses that you now live in Certainly the thought of this hath power to daunt your hearts She hath done shamefully The word in the Hebrew it is in Hyphil and so it may be translated transitively signifieth She hath made ashamed as well as done shamefully and so I find it according to some thus rendered Shee hath made ashamed her husband she hath made ashamed her children shee hath made ashamed her self and all these three may be meant Yea I conceive the intent of the holy Ghost is to expresse them all Her husband first the Church is the Spouse of Jesus Christ Christ is the husband of the Church and you know the Scripture saith that the woman is the glory of the man I remember I gave the meaning of that heretofore So the Church being the Spouse of Christ should be the glory of Christ the woman should be the glory of the man but yet being wicked and filthy she makes her husband many times ashamed The evil of the wife is a shame to the husband so the evill of the Church is a shame to Iesus Christ The Church in Scripture is called the glory of Christ 2 Cor. 8. 23. If our brethren be enquired after they are the messengers of the Churches and the glory of Christ Isa 4. 5. Vpon all the glory shall be a defence It should be so but when it commeth to be defiled it shameth Christ their wickednesse reflects upon Christ Christ is said to walke in the middest of the golden Candlesticks Rev. 2. 1. Every Church is a Candle-stick and it should be a golden Candle-sticke but if it come to be a filthy rustie Candle-stick it is a dishonour unto Christ who walketh amongst them Wicked men doe not shame Christ but godly doe My brethren let us take heed of that It is an evill thing to bring shame to our selves and one to another but to bring shame upon JESUS CHRIST is the greatest evil Many of you perhaps are ashamed of Christ take heed you be not a shame to Christ They are ashamed of Christ that are ashamed to appeare in the cause of Christ but as for you that are so Christ hath more cause to be ashamed of you for you are a shame to him It is true I cannot deny it but many Churches of God and that of late have brought some shame to Jesus Christ by their dissentions and fractions and they must take shame to themselves and they have taken shame to themselves they have acknowledged it to the glory of Christ and in that regard in some measure have washed off that shame that they have brought to Christ Againe further a shame they are to their children Wicked Parents are a shame to their children when a child appeareth forward towardly and hopefull and it be said Would you not wonder to see him so forward the father of him is a beastly drâ—nkard a filthy whore-monger of a vile and malignant spirit now the child is ashamed to heare of the evil of his father and of the evil of his mother As foolish children are a shame to their Parents so wicked Parents are a shame to their children You that have gracious children take heed you be not a shame to them and so a shame to your selves And then a shame to her selfe she hath plaid the harlot she hath done shamefully Wherein had she done shamefully I will onely mention one particular Certainly that shame of hers was especially in subjecting Religion to carnall policie For what did she doe what was the great sinne of the ten Tribes It was this because they were afraid that if they did go up to Jerusalem to worship the people would then depart from the house of Jeroboam to the house of David therefore out of politicall regards they would have the worship set up at Dan and Bethel there they would have Calves they must not goe up to Jerusalem the place which God had appointed to worship in but at Dan and Bethel This was a meere politique fetch for they could not but acknowledg that God did require that they should worship at Jerusalem where the Temple was and there was no other reason why they would worship at Dan and Bethel but meerely out of State policie that they might prevent the people from going backe to the house of David and indeed they did professe so much themselves Here then they did shamfully The Observation then from hence is that for governours or any to subject Religion to policie is a shamefull thing It is shamefull to make Religion an underling and to make policie the head Perhaps they call this wisedome a prudentiall way wee must be carefull and wise to foresee inconveniences that may follow But what if God give it another name God may give it a name of base temporizing a name of folly and wickednesse to subject Religion to policie it is shamefull because it abaseth that which is the great honour of any Country it makes it an underling what is the excellency of man but Religion what is the excellency of a Country but Religion and what hath England been glorious for more then for Religion Now to put the excellency of a thing under any inferiour this is shamefull to put the Crown that is for the head under ones foot is a dishonour to it although a thing hath in it self but little excellencie if it be brought beneath it selfe under other things that have not so great an excellency in them it makes it vile And shamefull also it is because it holdeth forth this that we dare not trust God for our civill estate and for our peace therefore Religion must come under Shamefull it is again because it is grosse folly for there is no such way to breede disturbance in a politicke state no such way to undoe a State as to make Religion an underling to policie Was it not so here That very way that they tooke to uphold their policie was the way to destroy their State did destroy it at last even their corrupting of Gods worship What cause had they then to be ashamed of this that God should take that which they thought to helpe themselves by and make that the very thing that should cause their ruine And certainly it
his father and his friends But how mean and sinfull soever we are in our selves when once we are betrothed unto Christ he will not thinke it any dishonour no not before his Father that he hath such a Spouse but he will account it his glory before him and the blessed Angels that he hath betrothed her unto himself And again this communion makes the Afflictions of Christ the Churches afflictions and the afflictions of the Church the afflictions of Christ There is a communion in evill things as well as in good The very sins of the Church come to be charged upon Christ as a woman that was in debt before maryage and so subject to arrests if she be once maryed she is no more troubled with the Serjeants none can arrest her but all the debts are charged upon the man so though we be in debt owing a debt of punishment because we have not payed the debt of obedience and while we are out of Christ before this blessed marriage we may feare every moment to have some sergeant of the Lord upon us to arrest us to hale us to prison there to lye untill we have paid the uttermost farthing but when the soul is married unto Christ all debts all sinnes are all transacted upon Christ all charged upon him if the law come now and require satisfaction if justice comes you may send them unto your husband to answer all and he will not take it ill A husband perhaps may take it ill and thinke he hath brought himself to misery when arrests come upon him for his wives debts it may take off his heart from her but Christ will never love you the worse for all your debts when they are charged upon him he will willingly satisfie them and he will rejoyce in the satisfaction of them before his Father And if there be any affliction befall you Christ is afflicted with you Esay 63. 9. In all their afflictions be was afflicted So on the other side all the afflictions of Christ are the afflictions of the Church doth Christ suffer you take it unto heart as if it were your own suffering Christ takes your sufferings unto heart as if 〈…〉 his own 〈◊〉 And you take the sufferings of Christ unto heart as if they were your owne Thirdly In a married condition there is a mutuall intire love That is First loving the person more then what cometh from him True conjugall love is pitched upon the persons mutually rather then upon the estates or any thing they enjoy by the person So on Christs part his love is pitched upon the persons of the Saints Christ loves your persons more then al your actions It is true all these gracious actions you doe are lovely before Christ for they ate the fruits of his spirit but know the pitch of Christs love is upon your persons chiefly So the pitch of your love if it be a right conjugall love is upon the person of Christ rather then upon any thing that comes from him thou seest him altogether lovely in himselfe besides those riches of pardon of sin and precious promises that thou enjoyest by him his person is that which satisfies thy soule Secondly In prising the love each of other true love can be satisfied witht nothing else but love love villifies every thing that is tendered except it comes as a fruit of love and if there be love a little is highly prized if it be but a cup of cold water it is more then a kingdome without it the giving the body to be burned is nothing without it I will give you two Scriptures one wherein the Saints prize Gods love the other wherein God prizes the Saints love Psal 36. 7. How excellent is thy loving kindnesse O God Psal 91. 14. Because he hath set his love upon me therefore will I deliâ—er him I will set him on high Thirdly This intire love is a love in all conditions Christ loves his Church in their afflictions as intirely as he doth out of their afflictions Deut. 32. 10. He found him in a desart land and in the wast howling wildernesse he led him about he instructed him hee kept him as the apple of his eye Marke they were in the wildernesse in the wast howling wildernesse yet even there they were deare unto Christ they were kept as the apple of his eye The Church on the other side looks upon Christ in his afflictions as lovely still as ever Cant. 1. 12. A bundle of myrrhe is my well beloved unto me he shal lie all night betwixt my breasts Myrrhe is a bitter thing yet the Church professeth that Christ though bitter in his afflictions should lie as lovely betweene her breasts as a bundle of myrrhe I remember Herodotus reports of one Artemesia Queen of Halicarnaffus and Plinie speaks something of her too when her husband was dead she took his ashes drank it in wine out of respect to him though dead The Church loveth a crucified Christ as well as a glorified Christ A most notable example of the love of a Spouse to her husband wee have in our English Chronicle Elenor the wife of Edward the first the King having got a wound by a poysoned dagger she to shew the intire love she bare to her husband because she thought if the poyson did stay a while in the wound there would be no cure therefore with her own mouth she sucked out the poyson that was in the wound so ventured the losse of her own life to preserve her husbands Here was love in a Spouse to her husband There is the like love of the Church unto Christ if Christ be wounded with the poysonous tongues of ungodly men in reproaches and blasphemies let him be never so persecuted in the world they that are truly gracious are willing to suck in that very poyson to themselves so they may take it from him Let the reproaches of Christ fall upon me O let me suffer rather then Christ It was Ambrose his wish Oh that God would turne all the adversaries of the Church upon me that they might turne all their weapons upon me and satisfie their thirst with my blood this is the disposition of a true spouse of Christ The fourth is unspeakable delight communion hath delight the greatest communion the greatest delight the greatest delight that God hath is to communicate himselfe to his Son firstly and next in letting out himselfe to his Saints If there be delight in God in letting out himself to the Saints in reason one would thinke there must needs be delight in the Saints in letting themselves out into God in flowing into God God takes such delight in letting out his mercy to his Saints as that he was well pleased with the death of his own Son as a meanes conducing thereunto One would thinke that the death of Christ should be the most abhorring to the heart of God of any thing in the world yet the Scripture saith God was
mine And amongst other things by which God will make all the world to know that his people are his this is one in sâ—tting up the beauty of his Ordinances amongst them Ezek. 37. 27. My Tabernacle also shall be with them yea I will be their God and they shall be my people and the Heathen shall know that I the Lord doe sanctifie Israel when my Sanctuary shall be in the midst of them Thus they shall know saith God that they are my people and that I am their God when I have set my Sanctuary in the midst of them for ever Were it that the Ordinances of God might be set up in their purity amongst us in England were Reformation perfected and the Saints walked humbly peaceably as they should the whole world will be convinced that these are indeed the people of the Lord and that God is amongst them And they shall say thou art my God God must begin withus we cannot begin and say Lord thou art my God but God must begin with us first and say You are my people There are a great many who say God is their God but God never said they are his people Joh. 1. 12. it is said of those who beleeved in Christ that God gave them power to be the Sonnes of God the word signifies authority that they might with authority acknowledge themselves to be the sons of God and call God Father they had the broad Seale for it Will you call God Father where is your 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 your authority if God call you children if he say you are my people you may give the Ecchoto Gods mercy and say thou art our God Secondly When God speakes mercy to us we must answer according to it Doth God say you are my people we must answer Lord thou art our God This is a great fault amongst Christians God manifests himselfe to many a gracious heart in abundance of love and mercy they give an answer to God in a way of dispaiting and discouragement Gods ways toward thee speake thus and say thou art one of my people but thy heart works as if God were none of thy God Hath not God done much for thee thou thinkest it is all in hypocrifie that thou dost whereas the truth is it is the fruit of his love and kindnes to thee He speakes aloud in what he hath done for thee that thou art one of his people and yet thy heart thinks that he is thy enemy that he haâ—â—s thee and will cast thee off at last The wayes of God are full of mercy to thee and he hath set his stampe upon thee by his ways of love he tels thee that thou belongest unto him O unbeleeving soul answer Lord thou art my God! lay aside these discouraging sinking thoughts of thine O that thou wouldst goe away with such an answer in thy mouth Doe not answer Gods loving kindnesse and his gracious dealings towards thee with discouragement and sinking of heart this is dishonorable to him and tedious to his Spirit Thirdly God works an answerable disposition in the hearts of his people unto him This is thy duty but God will work it in time if thou belongest to him As thus doth God chuse us to be his people then the hearts of the Saints chuse him to be their God Doth God say you are my people the Saints say Lord thou art our God Doth God say I will dwell with them they answer Lord thou art our habitation Doth God say I delight in them they say Lord our delight is in thee Doth God say I will rest in them for ever the Church saith O my soule returne unto thy rest Here is a sweet answer a rebound of all Gods loving kindnes Lastly the Saints must professe God to be theirs It is not enough to beleeve with the heart but thou must confesse with the mouth professe it outwardly of this before Further This is the highest happinesse of the Saints that God is their God when they can say this they have enough If we could say this house is mine this street this Lordship this City this Kingdome this World is mine What is all this A Christian comes at length and saith this God that made all is mine As it is reported of the French Ambassador and the Spanish meeting together saith the Spanish Ambassadour my Master is King of Spaine my Master replyed the French is King of France my Master said the Spaniard againe is King of Naples and my Master said the French is King of France my Master is King of Portugal and my Master is King of France still he answered with that my Master is King of France as being enough to answer all the several Kingdomes of the Spaniard So one saith I have this house this land this stock this estate this trade yea but saith a Christian I have God God is mine Surely having him thou hast enough And if God be thy God he will be a God to thee 1 Chron. 17. 24. The Lord of hosts is God of Israel even a God to Israel So it must be with thee if thou beest a Saint of God be a Saint to God Are we a people of God then we must be a people to God Blessed are the people that are in such a case yea happy are the people whose God is the Lord. Thus we had opened the gracious manifestation of God to his Church in part fulfilled spiritually to spiritual Israel here but more sensibly to be made good at the great day of Jezreel that is when the Jews shall be called then the Spouse of Christ in a visible way shall be thus married unto him and the Lord will be their God Jerome saith upon the Text All these things that are here promised to the Church the Jewes expect it at the end of the world after the time of Antichrist And I make no question though in a spiritual sence this Scripture is made good for the present unto the Saints yet in a more visible and sensible way all this Scripture will be made good to the people of the Jews the Gentiles then joyning with them even literally the glory of the Church shall be visible and apparant More whereof in the next Chapter HOSEA CHAP. 3. The First Lecture CHAP. 3. VER 1. 2. 3. Then said the Lord unto me go yet love a woman beloved of her friend yet an adulteresse according to the love of the Lord toward the children of Israel who looke to other gods and love flaggons of wine So I bought her â—o me for fifteen pieces of silver and for an homer of barley and an halfe homer of barley And I said unto her thou shalt abide for me many dayes thou shalt not play the harlot and thou shalt not be for another man so will I also be for thee THe close of the former Chapter had much mercy in it and this Chapter containes the