sheep were not his own he might leave them as a prey to the devouring and ravening Wolf as he himself informs us in that same Similitude Joh. 10.12 The hireling flees and leaves the sheep because the sheep are not his own and cares not for the sheep and the Wolf catcheth and scattereth the sheep But Jesus Christ is not the Shepherd only but the owner of the sheep he keeps them not for wages but for love and for the property he hath in them and therefore certainly he will be careful of them to the utmost Those whom the Father gives him he will keep Indeed they are the Sons portion The Lords portion is his people Deut. 32.9 And what follows He kept them as the Apple of his Eye What do you think that Jesus Christ will lose his portion which his Father gives him That he will be so wretchless that he will not keep his own his own goods Nay more then so his own members the very apples of his Eye Will he suffer men or Devils to rent away his limbs from him to pluck his very eyes out of his head take this and take all We may be sure that Jesus Christ will keep us safe who are bestowed upon him by his Father as for his Fathers sake and for his own sake so for our sakes too And that upon a double reckoning or account For first of all we cost him dear and secondly we are very dear to him 1. We cost him dear he paid a great price for us and therefore he will know how he goes from us We cost him prayers he hath not one of us among the Gentiles without asking Ask of me and I will give thee the Heathen for thine inheritance saith the Father to the Son Psal 2.7 Otherwise I will not Christ is faign to beg for us before he gets us of the Father Nay more then so we did not cost him breath only but we cost him blood too He is the Lord that bought us as the Apostle Peter calls him and bought us not with gold and silver and such corruptible things but with his own most pretious blood 1 Pet. 1.19 And if he lose us in the end he hath a very ill bargain No my Beloved we may rest upon it that Jesus Christ will never suffer the purchase of his prayers the purchase of his blood to perish he never spent his breath and much less will he spend his blood in vain 2. And as we cost him dear so we are very dear to him His heart is infinitely set upon his Church and people he loves them out of all measure so that you may be sure he will be loth to see them perish He looks upon them as his Jewels Mal. 3.17 and as his own peculiar treasure Psal 135.4 And he will keep his Treasure and his Jewels safe take his trash who will And thus you have seen the grounds on which you may be confident that if the Father have bestowed you on the Son he will not lose you No you are safe enough depend upon it it is impossible that you should ever perish or miscarry But you will interpose and say perhaps Object This Doctrine serves to make men negligent and careless and secure For if they be preserved and kept so absolutely safe by Christ they need to take no care to keep themselves For answer let it be considered 1. Sol. That Christ doth keep men by themselves And hence saith the Apostle James This is Religion for a man to keep himself unspotted of the world James 1.27 And Paul advises Timothy to keep himself pure 1 Tim. 5.22 And 2. if any of you who belong to Christ remit your watch and grow secure and neglect to keep your selves though Christ will not lose you yet you may lose Christ as the Church did when she lay upon her bed and would not open Cant. 5.6 You may be wofully deserted by him both in regard of grace and peace And though you cannot fall away yet you may fall most fearfully to the dishonor of the Lord and of Religion and the irreparable wounding of your Names while you have a day to live Though you cannot wholly lose the inward habits of your graces yet you may lose the exercise of them And though you cannot lose the Essence yet you may lose the sense and comfort of all the graces that you have Though it be utterly impossible that you should perish in reality yet you may perish in your own conceit and apprehension you may be brought to such a sad condition that you may look upon your selves as reprobates and cast-aways and think your selves undone creatures And though Christ will not suffer you to go to hell yet he may make you cry in your heart and in your bones as David did and set you on the rack of such unutterable agonies and horrors and affrightments that you may feel a Hell in this world Now for a last use of the Point this may afford a seasonable admonition Vse 3 to all the Deputies and under-Officers of Jesus Christ If Christ who is the Fathers servant and the Fathers Shepherd do keep them safe who are committed to him by the Father you then who are the Servants and the Shepherds and the Officers of Christ should learn of him to keep them safe as far as lies in you who are committed to your custody and care by Jesus Christ 1. Ministers are Christs Shepherds in the Church as Christ is the Fathers Shepherd and as the Father commits his people to the Son to keep so Christ commits them to his under-Officers and to his Ministers to keep and therefore it concerneth them to hearken to the advice of the Apostle to the Elders of Ephesus Act. 20.28 Take heed to your selves and to all the flock over which Jesus Christ hath made you Over-seers to feed the Church of Christ which he hath purchased with his own blood yea to the admonition of Jesus Christ himself to Peter Joh. 21.15 Simon son of Jonas lovest thou me dost thou love me dost thou indeed why if thou dost Keep my Lambs feed my Sheep If you have any love to Christ your Master see that none of his be lost by your default by want of any pains you could have taken wâ—th them in heat by day and cold by night for want of any admonition or instruction that you could have given them And be assured of thâ—s that if any of them perish by your carelesness and your neglect you will have a very sad account to make when the day of reckoning comes their blood will Jesus Christ require at your hands Oh let it not be said of you that you do not Custodire gregem sed perdere non pascere sed mactare Not keep the sheep but lose them not feed the flock but feed upon it Be sure that you be faithful to your great trust that you may give up your account with joy and that when Christ shall call
me And having gotten us he seems to glory in us and to be so tender of us as if we were some rich purchase as if we were of very great use to him as you may see in this Chapter all along Sometimes he shows the Father what a high esteem he hath of those whom he hath given him how carefully he teacheth them and showeth them all his Fathers name how tenderly he keeps them how dearly he affects them and how his heart is set upon them Sometimes he beggs his Father for them to preserve them to sanctifie them to make the world know that he loveth them even as he loveth Jesus Christ himself to make them one among themselves and one with him to bring them to the same place where Christ is as if he could not live in Heaven without them Ah my beloved did we follow on this mercy as far as we could reach it in our thoughts we should at length finding no end or bottom in it cry out as the Apostle Oh the depth of the riches c. Are there a certain company of men whom God the Father gives to Jesus Vse 2 Christ then surely they that have the happiness to be of this selected company are in a very good case It is impossible that they should perish and that upon a double ground For First If God the Father give them to his Son Christ you may be sure that Christ will have them the gift of God the Father shall not be in vain to him he will not lose his end in this business If he give them to his Son he will see his Son shall have them If he bestow them upon Christ to be his members he will see they shall in his appointed time be joyned to him and nothing in the world shall keep them off from him It may be many of them who belong to Christ in the eternal Counsel and decree of God are yet without but God will surely bring them in in his season Let them be as averse from Christ and from his wayes as it is possible for men to be let them stand never so far off the Father who hath given them to Christ will certainly take care that they shall come in to him or else his gift were nothing worth And this is that which Christ himself takes notice of Iohn 6.37 all that the Father giveth to me shall come to me Let them be never so unwilling of themselves by nature let them be never so entangled in the snare of Sathan so mightily withheld by him yet however they shall come But what if Christ should not receive them when they come then they may perish notwithstanding Yes if the Father give them and cause them thereupon to come Christ will certainly receive them All that the Father giveth me shall come to me And what follows And him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out Secondly If God the Father give them to his Son Christ as you may be confident that Christ will have them so may you depend upon it that he will keep them when he hath them What do you think that Christ will lose that which his Father gives him That he will not be chary of us for his sake that bestowed us on him We would not lose the gift of a friend especially if he be dear to us and much less would we lose a Fathers gift we would keep such a thing with all care especially if he bestow it on us with this Condition that we keep it for his sake If he tells us that his will and pleasure is we should not lose it we will be very wary how we part with it Now God hath given us to Christ on these terms as he himself acknowledges Iohn 6.39 This is the Fathers will saith he That of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing And he came down into this Lower world to do the will of him that sent him as he professeth very often and therefore certainly he will be carefull of this special charge of his he will observe it very strictly He will be infinitely wary that he lose not any of his Fathers things which he hath given him to keep So that if we be given to the Lord Christ however of our selves we are apt to fall away we may resolve that he will have us and keep as unto life eternal DOCTRINE That Jesus Christ as Mediator hath power to give eternal life to such and all such as are bestowed upon him by his Father but he hath no power at all to give this life to any other The point holds forth both the extent and limitation of the authority of Jesus Christ in this respect The former is expresly mentioned the latter is apparently insinuated in my text First you have here expresly mentioned the extent of the authority of Jesus Christ as Mediator of the Church It is that he may give Eternal life to as many as God hath given him Be they as many as they will be they more or be they less he hath power to quicken them to raise them from the death of sin to the life of grace and glory This he can do de facto as he is God and this he may do de jure as he is God and man as he is Mediator to as many as are bestowed upon him by his Father And then we have apparently suggested too the limitation of the authority of Jesus Christ in this respect For when it is affirmed here that Christ hath power to give Eternal life to as many as God hath given him it is implyed that he can give it to no more There are the bounds of his authority the restraint of his Commission So far it reaches and no further I shall endeavour to evince and clear them both in order First Jesus Christ as Mediator hath power to give eternal life to such to all such as are bestowed upon him by his Father He hath received commission from his Father to forgive their sins and heal their natures and to become the Prince of Life to them by giving them the life of Justification and the life of Sanctification and the life of Glorification He came into the world for this end as you may see Joh. 10.10 I am come that they might have life They Who why his sheep as he explains it both before and after I am the door of the sheep I am come that they may have life and at the 27th verse My sheep hear my voice and I give unto them Eternal life But how comes Christ by these sheep Why by his Fathers own gift And therefore it is added in the very next words My Father which gave them me is greater then all So that it is as if our Saviour Christ had said I am come down into the world to give life to the sheep my Father hath bestowed upon me To all them and no others The Father loves the Son saith John the Baptist
hearts are always running out to God and Christ and the happiness above and feeding upon such objects They are too large to be contained within the narrow limits of this lower world no as the Psalmist speaks they are continually with God With the woman Apoc. 12.1 They tread upon the Moon this variable and inconstant world they trample with an holy scorn upon these earthly things They are aspiring still to heaven walking and acting heaven-ward Indeed they live in some respect in this world but it is but as though they lived in the world as the Apostle Pauls expression is Col. 2.20 They use the world but yet it is as though they used it not as the same Apostle speaks 1 Cor. 7.29 They lay not out the strength of their affections and endeavours upon these things But on the matters of the other world there they are intent indeed there they are in good earnest there they act with full vigor 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 their Trading their Commerce their Dealing their Negotiation is in heaven Phil. 3.20 The word there used hath very much in it and can hardly be expressed Beza assaies in many wayes The manner of our living is in Heaven or which comes nearer yet we carry and demean our selves as Citizens of Heaven As if Heaven were a City and we as being free there do walk and act according to the Manners and the Customs and the Laws and Constitutions of the City we belong to So that the Saints you see do live as if they were in Heaven already as being now no more of this world Now is it so my Brethren That there are some certain men whom God Use 1 the Father gives to Jesus Christ out of the world Are they the worlds before they come to be the Lord Christs by the donation of the Father Here then you see the reason my beloved why there is such a stir sometimes when God is giving men to Jesus Christ and why the business meets with so much heat and opposition You cannot but take notice what a fray is often made when any one is about to leave the world and to close with Jesus Christ Carnal Parents Brethren Sisters Friends Acquaintance by and by are up as it were in arms against it When the Apostles were bringing men to Jesus Christ at Ephesus you know my Brethren it occasioned such an uproar in the City and such a mutiny among the Tradesmen and Mechanicks there as you can hardly parallel in any story You shall observe in the New Testament when Christ began to gather people to himself that wheresoever there were any numbers given to him by the Father some were exceedingly disquieted out of patience at it It galled the Pharisees and cut them to the very hearts that Jesus Christ had such an harvest among the people there why say they in a great passion the whole world runs after him And so it is to this day and will be to the worlds end when God is pleased to give in souls to Jesus Christ in any place some will fret and storm at it Nor is it any wonder that they should for they are given him out of the world And the world is loth to lose that which appertains to it and which is its own possession If God did give a people to his Son to which the world had no right and to which it could pretend no title the world would like it well enough it would never be against it But this is that which vexes it and troubles it that God must give away that which is his the worlds to Jesus Christ He cannot have a man but the world must be a loser who cannot keep his own for him what hath any one to do to meddle with that which is the worlds known right to fetch away that which hath many years perhaps belonged to him This is an injury as he conceives that puts him out of all patience and this is that which makes him strive and struggle as he doth Christ enters upon every soul that is bestowed upon him by his Father by dispossessing and disseazing him so that it is no marvel though he be extreamly startled and though he labour every way by promises and by preferments on the one side and by threatning and by persecutions on the other to keep that which he hath in his possession Use 2 Are there some certain men whom God the Father gives to Jesus Christ out of the world So that however they were once the worlds now they are the worlds no longer By this let us examine and resolve whether we be given up to Christ or no It is an admirable priviledge an high prerogative for any soul to belong to Jesus Christ to be bestowed upon him by the Father It carries in it all the happiness that is attainable by any Creature Now would you know whether the Father have actually given you to Christ or no Consider whether you be out of this world whether it may be truly said of you that you were once indeed of this world you lived here builded tabernacles here your hearts and your affections and your chief delights were here But now the case is altered with you you are no longer of this world but of another Now that you may be able to discover this I shall give you marks for tryal If you be out of the world you are not fashioned and conformed to this world in the unlawful waies and practices and courses of it You fashion not your selves according to this world as the Apostle speaks Rom. 12.2 not as this world doth As Turks and Spaniards are not like to English men they have another kind of visage another garb another habit and the like So they that are given up unto Christ out of the world they differ manifestly from the world There is a clear distinction to be made between them and other men by any man that eyes them well there are none like them in the earth their wayes are of another fashion Now my Beloved is it so with you do you differ from the world do you live soberly and righteously and godlily in this present evil world In a world of wickedness are you singular in goodness so that the same may be affirmed of you that is recorded to the everlasting praise of righteous Noah that he was just and perfect in his Generations Gen. 6.9 and they were wicked and corrupt enough Of holy Lot that he was so far from joyning with the vitious Sodomites in their vile abominations that his righteous soul was vexed at their filthy conversation 2 Pet. 2.8 This is a comfortable evidence that you are given up to Jesus Christ out of this world But if you walk according to the course and custom of the world as the expression is Ephes 2.2 if you have fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness if you run out with others to the same excess of riot if you be also led away
with the error of the world and so fall from your own stedfastness if you be carried down with the swinge and with the current of the times and of the places where you live do not deceive your selves you are yet of this world I must confess it is a very strong temptation when the stream runs in a wrong course and often shakes the holiest Saints But yet in such a case they that belong to Jesus Christ must consider with themselves that they are of another world and therefore are not much to eye the fashion and the wayes of this They must behave themselves according to the fashion of their own Country They must conclude with holy Joshua 24.15 If it seem evil to other men to serve the Lord if they will forsake God and forsake his worship let them serve whom they will for me as for my own part I am at a point for that I and my house will serve the Lord. And they must say in such a case as David did Away from me ye wicked I am not for your company because I am not for your courses away from me ye wicked I will keep the Commandements of my God If you be now no longer of this world but of the other your language is not of this world but of the other You speake the language of the world and of the Country you belong to You are full of good discourse your heart boyles with good matter as the expression of the Prophet is Psal 45.1 It is like a boyling pot for that is the similitude that is alluded to it is alwayes bubling up and running over and then it speaks of good things as it is added there in that place The heart within boyles and the tongue without speakes and as the boyling Pot runs over with the self same matter which it hath within it so it fares with such an heart It bubleth up with good matter the matter which it hath conceived and meditated touching Christ this is that which is so readily and freely uttered with the tongue My heart is enditing of a good matter I speak of the things which I have made touching the King Such are the hearts and tongues of those that are of the other world their speech is gracious and either tends to glorifie their God or to edifie their Brethren this is the language of their Country What think we then of those whose language is alwayes vain and frivolous it doth not benefit the hearers it ministreth no grace for there is no grace in it or which is worse it is wicked and pernitious Their speech is rotten and corrupt there is no salt to season it and make it wholesom and hence their throat is likened to an open Sepulchre Rom. 3.13 which breathes and steames up nothing else but odious smells and loathsom exhalations or else at best their speeches and discourses are of nothing else but earth and earthly things Talk with them while you will you hear of nothing else but worldly matters from them Of what Country do you think are these men The Apostle John tells you 1 John 4.5 They are of the world and they speak of â—he world Shibboleth never descryed so many Ephraimites as this doth worldly wrerches They are of Galilee they are of this world for their speech bewrayeth them Shall I believe they are Inhabitants of the Celestial Canaan who cannot speak almost without an oath whose tongues are alwayes dipping in that blood which alone can cleanse them from all sin Shall I say that such a man or woman is of heaven whose tongue is set on fire of hell Brethren do not deceive your selves if you cannot spake the language you belong not to that Country If you be now no longer of this world but of the other you have a dear affection to your Contrymen to those that are given up to Christ out of the world as you are If travailers and strangers meet with any of their Country-men in a remote and forreign Land how lovingly do they embrace them what kindness do they shew them how are they knit together in a bond of love Just so it is with those who are of the other world If they light any time on any of that same world which they themselves belong to they are extreamly taken up with joy although they never saw them nor had acquaintance with them in their lives before and presently their hearts and their affections do wonderfully close together And therefore they are gross dissemblers who would be thought to be given up to Christ out of the world and yet their bosom friends and their Companions are all of them of this world These are the men which they converse withall and which they take delight in Nay which is worse then this they hate the men whom Jesus Christ hath called and chosen out of the world They persecute them with the hand and with the tongue and do them all the spight and all the mischief that they can Suppose thou wert in Italy or Spain or any other forreign Land and there shouldst meet an Englishman wouldest thou mock and scoff at him wouldest thou deride and jear at the fashion of his cloaths the manner of his complement his gate and carriage and the like wouldest thou procure him to be taken up imprisoned put to death thy Earthly Country would not own thee if thou shouldst be so unworthy And truly heaven will not own the men who deal thus basely and injuriously with the Inhabitants of that Country Use 3 Are there some certain men whom God the Father gives to Jesus Christ out of the world so that however they were once the worlds now they are of the world no longer You then that find you are given up to Jesus Christ think it not much if you have but ill usage and untoward entertainment in the world Truly my Brethren if you consider whence you are and to what Country you belong there can no other be expected by you if you were of the world the world would love her own but because you are not of the world but Christ hath chosen you out of the world therefore the world hates you And it shall be your wisedom to look out and to provide for such usage If Turks or Spaniards walk along the streets every one will gaze upon them they will wonder at their gate and at their habit and the like Every one will be ready to abuse them and to put them to the worst for they are friendless being in a strange Country And are not you my Brethren of another Country yea of another world are you not men of singularity are not your wayes and fashions diverse from the fashions of this world No marvel then though you be men of wonder as the Prophet speakes though you be pointed at and though you be made spectacles and gazing stocks Though every one presume to injure you and wrong you and deal unworthily and basely with you
while you remain as Sojourners in this Country Use 4 Are there some certain men whom c. so that however they were once the worlds now they are of the world no longer Then do not you regard the world nor the things of this world We see that Travailers do not use to set their hearts on any thing they meet with in a strange Country If they see stately houses orchards gardens if they hear curious musick they are not taken up with these things no they keep on their way and are not hindered or withdrawn by the most pleasing avocations Doth any stranger fall a building at his Inn or doth he plant and sow as he travails by the way And therefore seeing we are of another world let us not set our hearts on these things No let us use the world but as though we used it not for necessity alone not for delight to further us in holy duties not to stop us to help us heaven-ward not to hinder Are there some c. so that however you were once c. This fits Use 5 you then with a reply to that usual argument with which the Saints of God are often pressed to sinful practices Other men do thus and thus and why will not you too will you be singular and will you go in a way by your selves and will you do as no body doth Why what though other men do this whence are those other men they are not of the world that we are and therefore they are no examples for us We must not do as they do no we must differ from them we must come out from among them and be separate and touch no unclean thing Though they handle it we must not touch it When Shadrach Mesach and Abednego refused to bow before the Golden Image which Nebuchadnezar the King had set up they might have said to them What will you do as no body doth you see that all men universally fall down before it and they no small ones neither the Judges Councellors Princes Rulers of the people Dan. 3.3 And will you take upon you to be wiser then your betters will you stand out alone and be so stiff in your opinion yet this did not one whit move them neither must such an argument as this prevail with us No we must keep the right way though we go alone though all the world should leave us and forsake us And to this end I propound two things 1. It will be a safe course thus to reserve our selves from the pollutions of the world and the contagion of the times and places where we live The Lord most commonly vouchsafes to such a special priviledge of preservation when dangers and calamities and troubles come as he did to Lot and Noah and the Mourners in Ezechiel And as they have not shared in common corruptions so he exempteth them from Common desolations c. 2. And as it will be safe for us thus to reserve our selves so it will be honourable too The veriest wretch may keep himself from wicked acts sometimes when there are no examples no temptations to withdraw him But in a world of wickedness to be singular in goodness is Christian-like indeed It was Tullies Commendation of Muraena Laudandus Muraena non tam quod in Asia vixerit quam quod in Asia continenter vixerit And Gods of Job that there was none like him in the earth Are there some certain c. And are you of that number there is Use 6 no reason then why you should be so much distracted and disquieted to see such stirs and troubles such alterations and confusions in the world Why should you be so out of patience to see things turned upside down in such a Country where you do not live to which you do not appertain What need you care I spake of such a Care as eateth out the joy and comfort of a man how matters go what stirrs and hubbubs and combustions there are here in this world so long as all goes well at home in your world Remember still in such a case that you are not of this world but of another And why then should it startle you though the earth be removed and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the Sea Yea though the Kingdoms of this world be shaken so long as your world and the Kingdom of it is not shaken so long as that stands firm and sure you have no reason to be swallowed up with overmuch fear and overmuch sorrow But rather on the other side when you see all the world and all the Kingdoms of it in a flame to bless and magnifie the Lord that you are out of this world that you are out of Gun-shot out of the reach of these things Indeed with reference to the men of this world who have their Conversation and their portion here whose friends and means and dwellings lye in this Country we have reason to be troubled when Concussions and Confusions come upon the earth for we should pity those who are of the self same nature with us in their troubles and distresses But for our selves we may behold the greatest tribulation and distractions that come upon the world as things that do not much concern us just as we do the wars in Italy when we have peace we pitty the poor people there and rejoyce that we live not in that Country So long as all goes well at home as no ill tydings come from heaven from our own Country we are in a good Condition It may be we may suffer some outward evils and extremities we may be banished from the Country which we sojourn in but then we are but banished from a place of banishment We may be banished if I may express it so out of this world into the other that is we may lose our lives but then at worst we are but banished home They do but send us to the world that we are of and that we belong to men may deprive us of the Life by which we live in this world but this is but a seeming Life the shaddow of a Life it is but as though we lived in the world But the life by which we live in the world that we are of is an enduring and abiding life It is a lasting and an endless life it is above the reach of death and dissolution And though the natural life decay this life of grace will flourish and grow stronger still till it be perfected in that of glory JOHN 17.6 Thine they were c. thou gavest them to me ANd thus far of the description of the persons to whom our Saviour had made known his Fathers Name not by their own condition or their own action but by his Fathers act upon them or in reference to them his giving them to Jesus Christ out of the world I have manifested thy Name to the men whom thou gavest me out of the world The following words seem to be added to
anticipate a scruple that might be raised in the hearts of those who heard him praying to his Father thus or who in after-times might come to read this prayer of our Saviour as it is here recorded in the Gospel They might consider with themselves on this occasion if Iesus Christ have none belonging to him none that are indeed his own but those that are bestowed upon him by his Father why then it seems all were the Fathers in the first place For no one gives that to another which he hath not first himself Nihil dat quod non habet True saith our Saviour so it is indeed they were my Fathers and I had them all from him Thine they were and thou gavest them to me So that you see the Observation lies before you DOCTRINE That all the people of the Lord Christ were first of all belonging to the Father His they were in the first place and he gave them to the Son And indeed he could not give them if they were not first his own For he that gives a thing alters the property of that which he bestowes passes away the right he had and makes it over to another And so doth God in reference to Iesus Christ He gives him all the people that he hath Iesus Christ hath not a man but by donation from the Father and therefore they were his first And this is that which Iesus Christ acknowledges in this place thine they were and thou gavest them to me And to the same effect he speakes ver 10. of this Chapter Thine are mine and I am glorified in them They that were sometimes thine are now mine Thy interest was first and mine in the second place by donation and conveyance from thy self You see then all the People of the Lord Christ were first of all belonging to the Father Now to unfold the point a little further to you because indeed it needs not proof so much as explication We will examine and resolve a few things First who the Father is to whom the people of our Saviour Christ do first belong Secondly how and in what respect they do first belong to him Thirdly how far the Father parteth with the right he had in those whom he bestows upon our Saviour Christ Whether he makes them over to him so that he himself hath now no longer any right at all in them Or whether only so that Christ and he do share together and have a joynt and mixed right and interest in those people And lastly seeing all do first of all belong to God the Father why he doth not keep them to himself but makes them over to his Son Christ These things would be a little looked into before we come to application As for the first of these my Brethren Who the Father is to whom the people of our Saviour Christ do first belong We must be sure that we be right in this or else we miss in the foundation of the whole business I shall be brief upon the resolution of it now because you may remember I have done it largely heretofore in another case and on another occasion This I desire you to take notice of which Calvin also carefully observes that our Saviour in the Gospel especially in this of John speaking as man and not as God under the name of Father intimates and comprehends the whole Godhead Nor let this seem strange to you for Christ as man is Gods Son not God the Fathers Son alone but the Son of the whole God-head Indeed as God he is the Son of the first person only but as man he is the Son of all the persons As man he is a Creature and he is not God the Fathers Creature only for the works of the Trinity without are individed And therefore Christ is made the Son of God in the same way that Adam is Luk. 3.33 c. And it is very evident that in my Text he spakes to God the Father as a Creature and as a Man for he speakes to him in prayer and prayer is a part of worship and God doth not worship God And when as man he prayes to God you must not think he prayes to the first person only and exclusively but he prayes to all the persons And therefore when he saith to God in prayer thine they were the people which I have were sometimes thine he cannot mean that they were the first persons only for certainly one person prayes not to another but they were the whole Godheads You see then who the Father is to whom the people of our Saviour Christ do first belong Not God personally taken for the first person of the Godhead but God essentially taken for the whole essence of the Godhead as subsisting in the persons And God so taken is the Father of our Saviour Christ as he is man and so he prayes to him in this place So that now the way is open to the second Quaere how and in what respect the people of the Lord Christ were first of all belonging to his Father that is to the whole Godhead before they came to his hands as he is man and Mediator of the Church Beloved they were first of all belonging to his Father in that sense that we have said especially in two respects either as his Created ones or as his Elected ones as his Creatures or his Chosen 1. All the people of the Lord Christ were first of all belonging to his Father as his Creatures His they were for he made them It is the greatest reason in the world that he that makes a thing should own it too that it should be his that made it That he that gives a thing being should have a title to it while it hath a being unless he voluntarily and freely make it over to another And by this means God hath a primitive original and native right in all the world and all the people that are in it Jesus Christ as he is man hath not right to one person I mean originally of himself But how then shall he come to have a people to be his members and to make up a Church a body for him Why God his Father is content to furnish him out of his store Rather then he shall want a Company of men to be his members he will spare him some of his and others he will keep for other purposes to execute his wrath and manifest the glory of his Justice on There are a people for thee saith the Father thou shalt have such and such of mine All the world are mine thou knowest and such a number I will give thee out of the world So many thou shalt have among the Jews and if that be not sufficient thou shalt have as many more as thou wilt ask among the Gentiles Ask of me and I will give thee Psal 2.7 And hence our Saviour speaking of his people acknowledgeth they were his Fathers first I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou
salvation of a soul that it be chosen unless withal it be delivered up to Jesus Christ and made a real living member of his body And therefore God Electeth every soul in Christ he chooseth it in him as the Apostle speaks Eph. 1.4 That is he looks on it in Christ in the instant of Election designeth it in time to be a part of Christ And so accordingly when the appointed season comes he brings this Chosen one of his to Christ and gives it him yea puts it into him There take it to thy self saith he mine it hath been from everlasting by election and now I make it thine by actual union and incorporation I have done my part for it and now do thou do thine I have chosen it do thou save it This shall suffice for clearing of the observation I shall but add a word or two of application And is it so that all the people of the Lord Christ were first of all belonging Vse 1 to the Father then surely he will keep them for the Fathers sake Before he let them go he will consider with himself of whom he had them Brethren you may be confident that Jesus Christ will never lose his people but that he will be infinitely chary and extreamly tender of them because he had them of his Father How do we esteem a Ring a piece of Plate or some thing else that was our Fathers If any one desire it of us if he offer money for it no will such a person say I will not take an hundred times the value for it it was my Fathers and I will not part with it And do you think my Brethren that Jesus Christ doth not love his Father as well as we love ours And therefore when the Devil or the world do go about to get away his people from him when they bid fair for them when they pluck hard at them No saith our Saviour it is in vain I had these people these precious Jewels of my Father and therefore you may spare your labour His they were and he gave them to me and I will surely keep them for his sake that gave them me yea he gave them to me to this end that I should keep them So Christ himself acknowledges John 6.39 This is the Fathers will that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing His Father gave them to him bequeathed them to him by his will And this was upon the Will that he should not lose them too O what a ground of confidence is here that Christ will keep us though we be apt to fall away though the Devil and the world pluck violently at us we may depend upon it they shall not get us out of Christs hands We were his Fathers and he gave us him by Will and that with this Condition that he should not lose us And therefore let us rest upon it he will be carefull of his Fathers Will and he will keep us for his Fathers sake And thus far of the first particular whereof our Saviour minds his Father by way of preparation to the prayer which he makes for his Apostles and Disciples that which he had done for them I have manifested thy name to the men which thou gavest me out of the world thine they were and thou gavest them to me The second follows now in order to be handled that which they themselves had done in reference to God the Father they have kept thy word And here you may take notice with me of these two things which shew themselves to any one that doth but look upon the words First the act of these Apostles and Disciples of our Saviour they have kept And then the object of this act of theirs the thing which he affirmeth they have kept the word of God They have kept thy word And this our Saviour mentions as he doth the rest by way of preparation to his prayer for them to shew what cause there was why they should be remembred in his prayers what did induce him to pray and to be confident that he should speed with God in prayer for them because they had been faithfull and obedient They had kept the word of God and therefore they shall have his word to God in prayer for them he makes no doubt they shall have a word from God by way of mercifull return and gracious answer to his prayer There is the inward and essential and there is the outward and declaratory word of God The inward word the word God The outward word the word of God or the word which comes from God Though not immediately from God to us yet mediately by his Prophets and Apostles and Jesus Christ himself as he was man whom he made his Scribes and Heralds and Embassadors and Mouth God spake in times past to the Fathers by the Prophets Heb. 1.1 he spake by the mouth of the holy Prophets Luke 1.10 The Prophecy came not in old time by the will of man but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost 2 Pet. 1.21 And so for the New Testament the Apostle tell us that in these last dayes God hath spoken to us by his Son Heb. 1.2 and that which God speaks is Gods word Now it is called the word of God in my Text and elsewhere often because it manifesteth and makes known the mind and will of God For as the word of man discovers to us what the man means what he conceiveth in his mind and heart within which else we were by no means able to imagine so the word of God my brethren shews us the heart and mind of God as far as he is pleased to express it and to make it known to us it shewes us what his will and pleasure is What he will have us to do and what he means to do with us And this word the Apostles and Disciples kept that is the term our Saviour uses in my text He made it known to them he shewed them what his Fathers mind and will was and they kept it I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world and they have kept thy word What is intended by that phrase of keeping shall be fully opened when I come to explication of the point in the mean time the observation shall be this DOCTRINE They whom the Father gives to Jesus Christ do keep his word You see it is the Character he gives of those that are bestowed upon him by his Father Thine they were and thou hast given them to me and they have kept thy word And after to the same effect they have received thy word It is usually set down as the property of those who belong to Jesus Christ that they keep his sayings John 14.23 if a man love me saith our Saviour there he will keep my words and his words and the Fathers words are all one And hence there is a blessing poured out on such Luke 11.28 Blessed
thy will for thy Law is in my heart Lord we delight to pray read hear perform religious duties it is our meat and drink to do thy will for thy Law is in our hearts It is not written in our understandings only but in our hearts and our affections and this is that which makes obedience to it pleasing and delightful to us So that if you might be free from the injunctions and directions of the Word with the servant in the Law you would not value such a libertie You would not swear and be unclean and run out into all excess of ryot if you might because your spirits have by grace an inward contrariety and antipathy against it you would not cease to pray and hear and perform religious duties if you might because your spirits have an inward sweet complacencie in these things If you thus keep the Word it is a sign that you are Christs Disciples As you must keep the Word wholly and keep it cordially so you must keep it constantly you must keep it to the end as the Prophet David speaks Psal 119.33 You must hold on in keeping it you must persist in your obedience to it even to your lives end that Christ may say at last concerning you when you depart out of this world and appear before his Father Thou hast given them to me and they have kept thy word And indeed to obey it for a time and then to throw it off again is not to keep it but to lose it Alas how many such are there among us in these latter times who for a while were very diligent and Instant in the study of the Scriptures seem'd to be very cautious and exact to frame their lives in every thing according to the word of God so that they would not vary from it in the least particular Or if they found themselves at any time in any thing to swerve from the direction of the Rule they would judge themselves for it But now the Word the rule it self is laid aside as an unnecessary and a useless thing as if it were not worthy the keeping any longer there is no care at all to walk by it when there are gross and horrid deviations from it they are not looked upon as matter of Humiliation or Contrition in the least degree I wish that such would seriously consider with themselves how Christ shall own them in the latter day how he shall plead before his Father for them that they have kept his word Now my Beloved lay these things to heart and never rest till you have gotten this Character of those that are bestowed on Jesus Christ by the donation of the Father Never satisfie your selves till you keep the Word of God in your lives by obeying it till you keep it wholly and till you keep it cordially and till you keep it constantly And then there is a blessing poured out upon you by the mouth of Christ himself Blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it that is that do not hear it only but obey it And to the same effect speaks the Apostle James Jam. 1.23 If as you look into the Law the word of God and understand it so you continue in it and are doers of the work not forgetful hearers of it but doers of the work you shall be blessed in the deed And that you may attain this blessedness that follows those that are obedient to the word I shall give you some direction 1. You must seek to God to teach you though you may learn to know it as that a Castaway may do yet you can never learn to keep it any other way you shall never keep the word in the obedience of your lives unless God and Christ teach you David was very sensible of this and therefore poured out his prayer to the Lord Psal 119.33 Teach me O Lord the way of thy statutes and I will keep it to the end When thou thy self hast taught me once and not before I shall walk accordingly I shall be obedient to it It is not in the power of any in the world to teach a man to frame his life in every thing according to the word unless God himself do it But if he undertake it once if he be pleased to be our Teacher all is well And this is that which the Apostle Paul insinuates Ephes 4.20 and in the following verse ye have not so learned Christ saith he viz. to say and to profess that you are Christians and yet to live prophanely and licentiously and lewdly still If so be that you have heard him and been taught by him as the truth is in Jesus Why what doth he intend what is it to be taught by him he tells us in the following verse That you put off touching the former conversation the old man and be renewed in the spirit of your mind and put on the new man It is such a kind of teaching whereby we are transferred and brought to the obedience of it And therefore if you do indeed desire to have your lives conformed to the rule and Word of God seek to Christ himself to teach you 2. Be sure to set your selves to the obedience of it out of hand Procrastinations and delays will dash all It is observed of the Colossians that they obeyed the Word from the day they heard of it Col. 1.6 So you my Brethren do you grow practical from this day It may be you are now convinced of many things you think of this and that in which your practice is not answerable to the rule you have secret inward motions and it may be resolutions to amend all as David had I have said that I would keep thy Word saith he to God Psal 119.57 strike now while it is hot do as the same holy Prophet did I made haste and delayed not saith he to keep thy precepts Psal 119.60 Assoon as I resolved I made haste and set about it If you have holy resolutions wrought to practice any duty which you have hitherto neglected up and be doing presently do not permit such resolutions to grow cold and die within you least you never have them more I am perswaded there are many souls in hell who have purposed in many things to bring their practice to the Word to abandon such a sin and to set on such a duty they were resolved upon the thing but they could not do it yet and so the Lord hath cut them off and their delays have proved their ruine 2. If you will keep the Word of God in your lives by obeying it you must find out and mortifie the lusts that hinder you in this business or if you do not so you may resolve on this and that but surely it will come to nothing and therefore if you have within you any holy purposes of coming nearer to the Rule of leaving such a sin or setting upon such a duty think now what lust or what corruption there is
and many blemishes and spots in them and the cause of all is this the near and special interest he hath in them this makes his love without measure and without end Joh. 13.1 Having loved his own to the end he loves them 3. If they belong to God the Father he will be very tender of their wrongs and this he will discover one of those two ways either he will defend them or avenge them First if he see it fit he will defend them and protect them from the wrongs of those that seek to be abusive and injurious to them They are his own and therefore he will certainly take care of them Beloved these are times of some danger and it is good to have a sure and safe keeper And verily they that belong to God are in a very good condition what ever alterations come upon the world how ever matters go he will be careful of his own he will not be so ill a Master to abandon them to ruine when they have most need of him Or Secondly if he defend them not from wrong as he may leave his own sometimes in the hands of wicked men for causes which he best knows certainly he will avenge them The property and interest he hath in them will engage him to appear on their side to take their quarrel into his hands and to render wrath to those that are abusive and injurious to them Especially if they make complaint to him and if they cry because of the oppression they are so near and dear to him that he cannot choose but right them Will he not avenge his own when they cry day and night to him Luk. 18.7 As who should say Do you make a question of it it is impossible but he should do it 4. If they belong to God he will provide for them Will he not find his people meat and drink and clothes and other things that are expedient for them Doth he keep so ill an house to let his Family lack bread Oh do not so dishonour him to have such poor and low thoughts of him it 's that which troubles many that belong to God of the meaner sort of people they are afraid that they shall want their charge encreases and their Trade decays and poverty begins to come upon them like an armed man and now their hearts are quite down they doubt their Master will not find them bread Oh you of little faith wherefore do you doubt Why do you so distrust God The earth is the Lords and the fulness thereof You are his who is the Lord of all the Earth and all the fulness of provision that is in it He feeds his enemies and will he see his own want Truly my Brethren if you have not such provision as you would desire it is because he sees it best to dyet you and knows that fulness and plenty of external things would not in any case be best for you 5. If they belong to God he will not lose them what do you think the Lord will be so wretchless that he will not keep his own No no he bought them at so dear a rate that he will know how he forgoes them His they are and he will keep them and however sin and Satan and the world are alwayes plucking at them to get them if it might be possible away from God he will hold them fast enough that none shall pluck them out of his hand JOHN 17.10 And I am glorified in them AND thus far of the first consideration that induced our Saviour to become a Suitor for his Apostles and Disciples to his Father The joynt relation which they had to himself and to his Father Before he pass on to the next consideration he addes a consectary that depends on this and flows from this the neer relation which they had to him to Christ himself All mine are thine saith our Saviour to his Father and thine are mine And what follows Since they are mine I am glorified in them And this addes strength to the Consideration upon which it is inferred and hath something in it farther to move our Saviour to be mindful of his Apostles and Disciples in his prayers because as they were his own so he was glorified in them Many times we are dishonoured in those that are our own and that have near relation to us more then we are yea more then we can be in those that are further off from us Christ is not so in those that appertain to him no he is glorified in them The more inclinable he is to tender them in his petitions to his Father I pray for them I pray not for the world but for them whom thou hast given me for they are thine and mine are thine and thine are mine and I am glorified in them And here the phrase our Saviour uses deserves our careful and attentive observation He doth not say I am glorified by them but I am glorified in them not by them in an active way but in them in a passive way q. d. any thing that is commendable and praise worthy in them tends to advance my praise and to set forth my glory I have the honor of any worth or excellency that is in them any way and that by reason of the near relation which I have to them and the interest I have in them They are mine and I am glorified in them So that the point to be observed is this DOCTRINE That Jesus Christ is glorified in all those that belong to him If they be his he is glorified in them even as the Teacher is glorified in the Scholar as the Master is glorified in the servant or as the head is glorified in the members so Christ is glorified in his people he is the great Prophet the great Teacher of his Church and if his people learn well if they thrive and grow in knowledge it is a Commendation to their Teacher he is the Lord and Master of his people and if his servants do well it is an honour to their Master He is the head of his Church which is his body and if his members thrive well if they have any beauty in them it is a commendation to their Head Indeed my Brethren if they were the Scholars of another Master the servants of another Lord the members of another head their proficiency and tractability and beauty were nothing to the Lord Christ But seeing they belong to him he hath the honour of any thing that is commendable in them To clear the point a little more distinctly to you Jesus Christ is glorified in all those that belong to him either in the present life or in that which is to come First in the present life he is glorified in their grace Then in the life to come he is glorified in their glory 1. In the present life he is glorified in the grace of all those that belong to him Their grace is his glory When they abound in faith and
c. that in the mean time till he take us up to him to heaven personally he may draw us up to heaven virtually That till we follow him in person we may follow him in heart and in affection that may set them on the things that are above where Christ also fits on the right hand of God If Christ were still among us in the body and in a visible and fleshly way you are not able to imagine how much it would detain us here We should not care much to look higher then the place where Christ is But now he is departed from us into heaven this draws up our affections after him who is so infinitely dear pretious to us for where the treasure is there will the heart be also This makes us to desire with the Apostle to be with him to be dissolved and to be with Christ This makes us keep him company though at a distance It makes us heavenly in our discourses meditations conversations as the Apostle was Phil. 3.30 Our conversation is in heaven from whence we look for the Saviour even the Lord Jesus Christ JOHN 17.11 And now I am no more in the world IS it so that Jesus Christ as he is man is gone away out of this Vse 1 lower world c. Then let us not expect to see him here till he return again from heaven It 's true he shall so come again from heaven as the Apostles saw him going into heaven as you may see Act. 1.11 He shall come down again in a remarkable observable and visible way Behold he cometh with the clouds and every eye shall see him Apoc. 1.7 And in the mean time my Beloved the heavens must contain him or confine him as to his bodily or fleshly presence he must be comprehended there Act. 3.21 I say then as our Saviour Christ himself upon the like occasion Mat. 24.4 Take heed that no man deceive you for many shall come in my name saying I am Christ And though it seem so gross a business that there can be no danger in it yet it is added presently and they shall deceive many so that there may be need of this Caveat And therefore I beseech you my Brethren lay it up against the time of trial come if it ever come upon you For there shall arise false Christs and false Prophets as the true Christs tell us Mat. 24.24 insomuch that if it were possible they shall deceive the very Elect. And therefore if they say unto you Lo here is Christ or there believe them not If they say he is in the Desert go not forth he is in the secret chambers believe it not as Christ addes in that place If a seducing spirit tell you Christ is in such or such a place such or such a one is Christ as some have been so grossly impudent in these times believe him not If a Papist or Ubiquitary tell you Lo here is Christ lo he is corporally present in the Sacrament the bread is really and truly chang'd into his body believe him not No my Beloved do you depend on that which Christ himself affirmeth in my Text and now I am no more in the world as to my bodily and fleshly presence untill you see him come again as the Apostles saw him go away for every eye shall see him when he comes be confident he is not here in this world I say as Christ in the fore-alleadged place Take heed I have foretold you Vse 2 Is it so that Jesus Christ as he is man is gone away c. and that he hath withdrawn his corporal and fleshly presence from us Then let us make the more of the presence of his Spirit by which he is still among us If he be absent from us one way it is good reason that we should the more improve his presence with us in another The chief comfort of the soul consisteth in Communion with the Lord Christ in having fellowship with him Now Christ as he is man is ascended into heaven and so in that respect he is no more in the world We cannot yet go up to him though we would gladly die and be dissolved that we might be with Christ yet it cannot yet be But which way then shall we enjoy Communion with him Why my Beloved because we are not able to go up to him the Spirit will do so much for us that he will bring him down to us and thus though he be absent from us in the body yet he is present with us in the Spirit and will be to the worlds end according to his own promise Matth. 28.20 Lo I am with you always to the end of the world They are the last words of the Chapter and the last words of the Book and there is nothing added but Amen Let it be so and sure it is a sweet close Well then my Brethren let our work and business be to consider with our selves how we may the more enjoy him in the Spirit because we can no longer now enjoy him in the body How we may make the most of that we have And I shall give you the best advise that I am able in this great business If you desire to make the most of the presence of your Saviour in the Spirit now he is absent from you in the body you must be infinitely cautious that you do not grieve that Spirit by which he is present with you If you grieve and trouble him he will withdraw and hide himself from you and then Christ is wholly gone both in the Body and the Spirit too you do not sensibly enjoy him neither one way nor the other and so are in a very sad case Since the presence of the Spirit is all that you enjoy of Christ so that if he be gone my Brethren all is gone you must be very wary that you do not vex the Spirit and cause him to depart from you But you will ask me Which way do we vex and grieve the Spirit we would know it that so we might be careful to avoid it I might speak much of this Subject and draw out my discourse into abundance of particulars but I will say it in a word you grieve the Spirit when you deal unkindly with him any away This is the specal thing that grieves friends when one of them deals unkindely with another and so it is between the Spirit and the soul He comes to us from Christ in much love and much kindness to supply his absence from us and we are unkind to him and this grieves him out of measure Now we are unkind to him especially two ways and that is either when we slight him or resist him 1. When we slight him this is a very great unkindness and that which friends can very ill bear He makes tenders of himself and we take no notice of him he stands knocking at our doors or rather Jesus Christ by him and we let him knock still He would be
grace consider with your selves Now Jesus Christ draws nigh to me he that is above in heaven and with relation to his bodily and fleshly presence is no more in this world is in another way coming into my soul And therefore do not shut the doors against him but bid him very welcome when he comes when he offers more knowledge faith love hope patience let not these offers be refused Remember when you take in these you take in Christ with them in the presence of his Spirit So much as you enjoy of these so much you enjoy of Christ and therefore seek and value every saving grace the more and be the readier to receive and entertain it because it brings Christ with it Is it so that Jesus Christ as he is man is gone away c. Then let us Vse 3 also go away out of the world to him that we may be where he is I say as Christ to his Disciples in another case Arise let us go hence Jesus Christ is gone you hear and why then do we stay behind him why do we tarry here when Christ is gone It 's true we cannot go to him in the body but yet as Christ though he be absent from us in the body yet he is present with us by his Spirit so we upon the other side though we be absent from him in the body let us be present with him in the Spirit and as he comes from heaven to us by his Spirit though his body stay there so let us go from earth to heaven to our Saviour in our spirits though our bodies stay here But you will ask me How may this be done or how may we be present with our Saviour in our Spirits I Answer 1. We may be present with him in the thoughts and meditations of the Spirit These are the proper actings of the soul the inner man and if our thoughts be much upon him we are in this respect much with him And therefore I beseech you my Beloved let us feed our selves continually with sweet and pretious thoughts of Jesus Christ though we be here below and must continue so till Christ be pleased to take us to himself yet let our minds ascend to heaven and let our thoughts and meditations be where Christ is Oh let us think upon him in the day and in the night upon our beds when we are still and have nothing to distract us then let our hearts be filled with sweet soliloquies with ravishing and transporting thoughts of Christ that we may speak to him as David did Psal 104.34 How pretious are the thoughts of thee O Lord How great is the sum of them It passes my Arithmetique to cast them up 2. Let us be present with our Saviour in the affections of the Spirit let our spirits cleave to him though we be absent from him in the body Where Jesus Christ our treasure is there let our hearts be also That as Elisha said to Gehazi once Went not my heart with thee when at that very time he was sitting in his house and Gehazi was abroad 2 King 5.26 So we may say to Jesus Christ though in another way However we be absent from thee in the body yet is not our heart with thee as the Apostle to the Thessalonians We Brethren being taken from you in presence not in heart 1 Thes 2.17 so we to Jesus Christ Oh Lord though we be separated from thee in our bodies we are not separated from thee in our hearts They are continually with thee nor shall they be divided from thee 3. Let us be present with our Saviour in the desires and anhelations of the Spirit let them be always mounting up where he is he is gone and in the mean time till he come again to us let us long to go to him Oh let us build no Tabernacles on the Tabor of this world since our Saviour is not here But let us look upon our selves as banished men as the Apostle did knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord 2 Cor. 5.6 and so let us groan earnestly to get to Christ as he did Let us be always breathing gasping fainting after Jesus Christ and putting out our heads to see when he will come and receive us to himself that where he is there may we be also And thus far of the first particular suggested in the words the departure of our Saviour out of this lower world to the immediate presence of his Father And now I am no more in the world but I come to thee The second follows now in order to be handled and that is his Disciples stay behind him But these are in the world and are where they are like to be and where they are to tarry and remain when I am gone The world in which our Saviour Christs Apostles and Disciples were and were to stay must be conceived to be the very same which Christ himself was now about to leave and from which he was ready to depart viz. this lower world beneath heaven that from which he was to go in that were his Disciples and Apostles to remain And now I am no more in the world but these are in the world the self same world in which I am to be no more But why is this alleadged by our Saviour to his Father here that the Apostles and Disciples were to stay in this world apparently to shew what cause he had to mention them in his Petitions and to commend them to the special care and mercy and protection of his Father As in the words that are immediately annexed Holy Father keep them through thy own Name q. d. I am even now about to leave them and to leave them in the world and thou knowest what a place the world is how troublesome unpleasing and vexatious it hath continually been to my Disciples and therefore I beseech thee Father keep them have a special eye upon them who are to stay behind me in such a place as this is So that the point apparently suggested here is this DOCTRINE The world hath alwayes been and is an evil and uncomfortable place to Christs Disciples It is a sad and doleful place to live in and hence our Saviour seeemeth to bewail the case of his Apostles and Disciples in my Text These are in the world saith he as if he should have added and that is but an ill place Now that I may the better clear it and evince it to you I shall shew in what respects the world is such an evil and uncomfortable place to Christs Disciples It is in this respect an evil and uncomfortable place to Christs Disciples that it is a place of suffering In which they are continually to be exposed to many tryals and to many troubles Though they be in the world yet they are not of the world and therefore they are hated by the world as Jesus Christ himself informeth his Disciples John 15.19 If ye were of
the world the world would love its own but because ye are not of the world therefore the world hates you And hence it comes to pass that it persues them persecutes them casts them out creates them all the trouble and vexation that it can so that they are not like to have a quiet hour almost in this world Besides the evils and afflictions to which they are exposed by the necessity of nature as man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards Job 5.7 distempers and diseases in their bodies loss of their estates and friends and earthly comforts and the like ungodly men come in with their additions The Church of Christ while she is here is ill-seated she grows in an ill place as he himself affirmeth of her 2 Cant. 2. as the Lilly among thorns so is my Love among the daughters She is environed and begirt with them so that she is annoyed and hurt and pierct on every side She cannot stir but one or other of her thorny neighbours hath her by the sleeve She dwels in Mesech while she dwells in this world and hath her habitation in the Tents of Kedar in the midst of wicked men so that she is beleaguered as it were and hem'd about with those that hate her and desire her ruine This is the state and the condition of the Saints while they are here they are continually vexed and troubled So that no marvel though our Saviour tells his own Apostles In the world you shall have tribulation Iohn 16.33 That is your portion as long as you remain here The world hath alwayes been an evil and uncomfortable place to Christs Disciples in this respect that it is a place of sinning Indeed my brethren they are troubled with the sins of other men their righteous souls are vexed with their filthy conversations Rivers of waters run down their eyes because men keep not Gods Law But they are chiefly troubled with their own sins from which they are not to be wholly freed while they remain in this world As long as they continue here they are perpetually in Sathans danger who is the Prince of this world and whose authority and power is confined to this life There will never be an absolute and perfect cure of sin in any of the Saints till this corruption have put on incorruption And hence perhaps the corruptions of our natures are stiled worldly lusts Tit. 2.12 And our members that are upon the earth Col. 3.5 because we cannot possibly be rid of them while we are here upon the earth and while we live in this world The Apostle Paul compares himself and others of the Saints to earthen Vessels 2 Cor. 4.7 And earthen vessels when they were legally defiled could not be made clean again till they were broken all in pieces as you may see Lev. 11.33 So we my brethen are not to be fully cleansed till we be shivered all in pieces We are not to be wholly rescued from the bondage to corruption till death translate is to another world And then he that is dead saith the Apostle is free from sin Rom. 6.7 So that no marvel though the world be a place of such disquiet and discomfort to the Saints For how can they be fully comfortable here while they are alwayes sinning against God He that hath entred into rest indeed hath ceased from his own works as the Apostle speaks Heb. 4.10 Till then he cannot wholly cease from those that are most properly his own works but is in danger of offending God and falling into sin continually and so can have no rest here Nay my beloved no man knows how far the Lord may suffer him to fall in this world Though it be a certain truth that they that are elect can never wholly fall away from God yet they may sin exceedingly to the dishonour of the Lord the scandal of their brethren and the irreparable wounding of their name while they have a day to live And this they are in danger of I mean of falling fearfully so long as they remain here What deadly falls have many of Gods worthies taken in their latter times It is observable that Davids first wayes are commended 2 Chron. 17.3 By which the Holy Ghost insinuates that his last wayes were not answerable to them He speaking of Jehosaphat walked in the first wayes of his Father David Indeed the latter wayes of David were blemished with extremity of sin and scandal The like is also noted of Solomon 1 King 11.9 And Asa 2 Chron. 16.10 And Jehosaphat 2 Chron. 20.35 And how then can the world but but be a doleful and uncomfortable place to Christs Disciples where they are in such hazard How can they but complain as Rebecca sometimes did though in another case If I must still be troubled with my lusts and my corruptions if I must still be over-ruled by them thus what good will continuance in the world do me The world hath alwayes been and is an evil c. in this respect that it is a place of banishment from Jesus Christ from him in whom their very souls delight This makes it sad and grievous to them that they have not Christ with them And this is that at which our Saviour aimeth in my text I am no more in this world but these are in the world There is the dolefulness of their condition that they are to continue here without me Indeed we are debarred of the immediate presence of the Lord while we remain in this world And therefore it is said expresly 2 Cor. 5.6 That whilest we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. And is not this a grievous thing to be kept from the enjoyment of such a one as Christ is Especially to him that knows him and is well acquainted with him and hath tasted of his sweetness can you blame him if he be weary of the world and if it be a trouble to him to continue here if be be willing to be absent from the body that so he may be present with the Lord What holy heart can choose but find a weariness in that place let it be otherwise as pleasant as it will which keeps Christ and him asunder and hinders him from the compleat fruition of his blessed Saviour Who would not gladly leave a place in which as long as he continues Christ and he must be asunder Vse 1 Now is it so my brethren that the world hath alwayes been and is an evil c. Then let it be a Caveat to us not to cast as we are very apt to do on too much joy and comfort here Our manner is when things look a little well and when we have some present quiet and content to promise great and extraodinary matters to our selves To sing a requiem to our souls with the rich man in the Gospel take thine ease eat drink and be merry It s true the men of this world may have some content and quietness and
with God in prayer let us consider what a holy God he is and let us labour to be holy too Let us be separate from the remainder of the world as he himself advises us 2 Cor. 6 17. and touch no unclean thing and then we have his promise that he will receive us The meditation of the holiness of God as it will be very usefull to prepare us and to make us fit for prayer so it will be very helpfull to us in the parts of prayer and that both in confession and petition and thanksgiving 1. It will help to humble us in the confession of our sins While we consider that they are so filthy and unclean and God upon the other side whom we confess them to so holy This cannot choose if it be duely weighed but shame us wonderfully in the presence of the Lord that we have been and are so filthy before such an holy God Indeed we ought to be ashamed to commit iniquity being such an odious thing The Lord hath planted shame in man to be a bridle as it were to check him to curb him and to hold him in from sinfull courses But if we have not been ashamed in the commission we ought especially to be ashamed in the confession as God advises Israel Be ashamed and confounded for your own wayes Ezek. 36.2 To review our sins with shame and to cry out as Daniel doth Dan. 9.8 to us belongeth confusion c. And Ezra in his sad confession Ezra 9.6 Oh my God I blush saith he and am ashamed to lift up my face to thee We should remember our evil wayes and our doings that are not good and loath our selves for our abominations Ezek. 36.30 we should remember and be confounded and never open our mouths any more because of our shame We should cast ashes on our heads and rent our hearts and cry unclean unclean Lev. 13.45 And there is no one thing that will confound and shame us more then the consideration of the matchless purity and holiness of God whom by our sins we hâ—ve offended Oh this will make us wonder that he should endure such filthy persons in his presence 2. As it will humble us in the confession of our sins so it will encourage us in our petitions for the cure of sin As it will make us low in our confessions so it will make us high in our petitions For how is sin which is uncleanness removed and cured in any of us but by holiness And is it not a comfort to us when we are making our requests for holiness that we are praying to the Holy God who is holy in himself and who is the original of all the holiness that is communicated to the Creature who is the Sanctifier of his people Is it not comfortable that when we come to draw that we are at the Well-head If you observe it is the great petition that our Saviour hath to make in the behalf of his Apostles and Disciples verse 17. Sanctifie them with thy truth and this he prosecutes throughout And therefore he begins his prayer for them Holy Father 3. It will enlarge us in our thanksgivings to the Lord for holiness when we consider whence it came and by whom it was bestowed We shall see what cause we have to praise the Lord the Donor and Dispenser of it As David intimateth in that memorable place to this purpose Psal 97.12 Rejoice in the Lord ye righteous ye that are sanctified ye that are holy and give thanks at the remembrance of his Holiness And yet again Psal 30.4 Sing unto the Lord O ye Saints of his and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness And thus far of the Object of our Saviours Prayer as he is mentioned by his title Father and his attribute Holy Holy Father Proceed we now to enter on the parts of it There are two things especially for which our Saviour is a suitor to his Father in the behalf of his Apostles and Disciples Preservation and Sanctification To these may be reduced and referred all that he desires for them preservation in my text and onward to ver 17. Sanctification in the rest that follow First he desireth preservation Keep them through thy own name And this desire of his he backs especially with two reasons and they are weighty and of great importance First he would have his Father keep them now because he himself had kept them and kept them very safe till now While I was with them in the world saith he I kept them and none of them is lost but the Son of perdition but he who was designed to be lost And now I come to thee saith Christ I am to be no more among them and therefore I beseech thee now receive them into thy special care and tuition Here I resign them safe and whole and sound to thee I pray thee keep them henceforward as well as I have done to this time Secondly he would have his Father keep them because they were in such a dangerous place where they were in great peril every day and every hour where they were hated and maligned upon all hand and that for the truths sake I have given them thy word and the world hath hated them and so on And therefore I beseech thee Father look to them and keep them from the evil as it is added in the next verse The evil of fault and the evil of pain Some other things are interposed and touched incidentally which shall be handled in their places The thing desired is first in order to be handled before we pitch upon the Arguments and Reasons with which our Saviour presseth and enforceth this desire of his and this as we have heard is preservation And here we have to be considered two things First the means by which our Saviour here desires that his Apostles and Disciples might be kept and that is by or through his Fathers name Holy Father keep through thy own name those whom thou hast given me And Secondly the end for which he prayes they might be kept that they may be one as we are So that you see the supplication of our Saviour Christ is full he prayes both for the Means and End desireth that the end might be attained for them by the means Begin we with the means by which our Saviour here desires that his Apostles and Disciples might be kept and that is through his Fathers name Holy Father keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me The name of God is generally taken for any thing that makes him known to men as one man is distinguished from another by his name Particularly it imports sometimes the attributes of God now one and then another of them Sometimes his attribute of mercy as that is called the name of God Exod. 34.5 6. The Lord descended in a Cloud and there proclaimed the name of God And what was that The Lord the Lord God mercifull and gratious and
long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth Keeping mercy for thousands forgiving iniquity transgression and sin Sometimes his attribute of Justice as that is also called his name in the very same place who will by no means clear the guilty visiting the iniquity of the Fathers upon the children and upon the childrens children unto the third and fourth generation Sometimes his attribute of Power is intimated by his name as you may see that place for instance Psal 20.1 The Lord hear thee in the day of trouble the name of the God of Jacob defend thee that is the power of God defend thee And this is that by which our Saviour prayes that his Apostles and Disciples might be kept keep them through thy own name that is through thy own power And so accordingly the point to be observed is this DOCTRINE They that belong to Jesus Christ as long at they remain in this world are kept by the Almighty power of God himself It is the prayer of our Saviour for them in my text you see Holy Father keep them through thy own name whom thou hast given me and therefore out of question they are kept by that name the almighty power of God For Jesus Christ is alwayes heard in every thing for which he is a Suitor to his Father So that his people are as safe as the power of God can make them They are committed by him to his Fathers Custody and he is able very well to keep that which is committed to him as the Apostle Paul speaks 2 Tim. 1.12 And this is clearly intimated in our Saviours speech John 10.29 with reference to his people My Father which gave them me is greater then all Greater in what regard greater in place and dignity No my beloved greater in power and in ability And therefore it is added presently and no man is able to pluck them out of my Fathers hand Many are willing but none is able because his power is infinitely greater then theirs is So in another place he shall be holden up Rom. 14.4 he that is weak shall be held up how so For God is able to make him stand And Jude to the same purpose he is able to keep us from falling verse 24. you see our preservation and support is still ascribed to the power and ability of God by which it is apparent what guards us that we are kept and kept safe by that power That of the Apostle Peter is express and full so that we need to add no more for confirmation we are kept by the power of God saith he through faith unto salvation 1 Pet. 1.5 The point is plain They that belong c. Now to open this a little because you do not see it in the full extent of it you must conceive that such as appertain to Jesus Christ are kept by the almighty power of God Especially two wayes Either by the power of God in them or by the power of God for them Either by the power of God assisting or by the power of God protecting Either by the power of God within them strengthening or by the power of God without them guarding and defending I shall speak to these in order They that belong to Jesus Christ are kept by the Almighty power of God in them assisting them and strengthning them and fortifying them to stand and to hold out both in temptations and afflictions Man is by nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a feeble and infirm thing So weakned and enfeebled with his fail that of himself he is able to do nothing And therefore God communicates his own transcendent power to such as he intends to keep and to preserve so far as they are capable of it And thus however they be weak in themselves yet they are strong in the Lord and in the power of his might as the Apostle speaks Eph. 6.10 He stands by and strengthens them 2 Tim. 4.17 And of this inward strengthning it is that the Apostle speaks Col. 1.11 Strengthned with all might according to his glorious power that is the power of God himself which he gives in to his people and so corroborates them makes them strong as Oaks to bear the burthen that is laid upon them For if you mark it the Apostle saith not the power of God bears our afflictions resists and overcomes our temptations for us but we are strengthened by his glorious power to both these And God is able saith the same Apostle to do abundantly according to his power that worketh in us Eph. 3.20 Observe it well not his power that worketh for us but his power that worketh in us and that makes us able So that you see my brethren it is an infused thing there goes forth power and vertue from the Lord to us and becomes inherent in us Not as one friend may help another that is weak with an external succour and support bearing his heavy burthen for him but giving him ability himself to bear it Even as a man that hath been much enfeebled with along sickness and being now recovered in a measure and his malignant humours purged away encreaseth every day in strength So we my Brethren having been enfeebled by the fall God makes us sound and strong again enables us to do and suffer what he cals us to So that it is an inward and habitual power that we partake infused into the soul by God And God in this respect is strong in us His power is perfected declared to be perfect in our weakness Now my beloved to follow this a little further this glorious power of his the Lord conveyeth into a Christians soul through Jesus Christ The Father hath annointed him with the Holy Ghost and with power as the Apostle Peter speaks Acts 10.38 And upon him the spirit of power doth rest as you have it in the Prophet Isa 11.2 That so from him it might be given out to all his people He is the Conduit-pipe through which the spirit and the graces of it run obtaining them by vertue of his meritorious intercession from his Father and so conveying them to every member as he by reason of his near communion with the manhood being more deeply touched with the feeling of their wants observeth their necessities to be And so to every one of us is given grace and what is grace but power to do and power to suffer power to stand out and not to faint or yield in temptations or afflictions Habitual grace is nothing but the inward strengthening of the soul To every one of us I say is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ Eph. 4.2 that is as he is pleased to distribute And as this power proceeds originally from the Father by and through Jesus Christ so it is wrought immediatly by the Holy Ghost And hence the strength infused into a Christians soul is called the spirit of power as you may see 2 Tim. 1.7 Because indeed it is wrought in us by the
spirit That place of the Apostle Paul is cleer and full to this purpose Ephes 3.16 where he desireth God in the behalf of that people That he would grant them to be strengthened with all might in the inner man How so Why by his spirit as you may see in that place And thus you see both that and how they that belong to Jesus Christ are kept by the almighty power of God in them They that belong to Jesus Christ are also kept by the almighty power of God for them For even as God is strong in them so he is also strong for them And as he makes them strong so he shews himself strong in their behalf as the Expression is 2 Chron. 16 9. The eyes of the Lord run to and fro through the whole earth to shew himself strong in the behalf of those whose hearts are perfect with him And thus they are preserved and kept not only by the power of God strengthing and fortifying them within but also by the power of God protecting them and helping them without And therefore it is said the name of the Lord that is the power of the Lord is a strong Tower the righteous runneth to it and is safe Prov. 18.10 Now security of any person that runneth to a Tower for shelter consists not in his own strength but in the strength of the Tower he runs to A strong Tower will protect a weak man if he can get within it he is safe And such a stong Tower is the name the power of God for the safeguard of his people And thus you see he keeps us through his own name his own power according to our Saviours prayer in my text in a way of protection by giving outward help and succour when we are in great danger And this outward help he gives us two wayes First sometimes immediately by his own power he helpeth us himself by his own almighty arm without the use of second causes and then his arm is made bare He brings in succour to his people as he made the world of nothing and therefore he is said in Scripture to create it as you may see that place for instance Isa 65.18 Be ye glad and rejoice for ever in that which I create for behold I create Jerusalem a rejoycing and her people a joy And thus he kept his people in the fire and in the water and in the wilderness where there were no means at all of preservation he did it meerly by his own name Secondly Sometimes he helps and keeps his people mediately by his power communicated for that end to second causes He raises instruments of their delivery and makes them able to relieve his people as he did the Judges often And as it is observed of David when God was pleased to use him for the help of Israel in a time of great distress he furnished him with power sufficient to go through with the business which he had designed him to And therefore saith the Lord of that instrument of his Psal 89.19 20. I have laid help upon one that is mighty I have exalted one chosen out of the people I have found David my servant with my holy oil have I annointed him Mighty he is to help indeed but it is because I have made him so because I have laid help upon him And so he stirs up some continually to favour and relieve his people he makes the earth sometimes to help the woman men that have nothing else but earth in them but still the power by which they help them is from him Their power is his power and therefore when his people are preserved and kept by them they are kept by his name as you have it in my text and his name must have the glory This shall suffice for explication of the point they that belong to Jesus Christ are kept by the almighty power of God himself And there is pregnant reason for it For first of all no other power but his will keep them and his is every way sufficient And secondly his power is mightily engaged to keep them Reason 1 They that belong to Jesus Christ are kept c. because no other power but his will keep them Kept they must be and none but this alone will do it Alas the adversaries power that is against them is abundantly too strong for any power that can appear for them but that of the almighty God himself The power of all the world and all the strong temptations that are in it of pleasure profit honour which is bent against the Saints you will conceive to be a great matter Yet this is nothing in comparison this is the least part of their danger What think you of the power of all the lusts and the corruptions that are in them that are continually raging warring Who is able of himself to overpower and master these What think you of the power of Satan and his black confederates the power of darkness as it is stiled in the Scripture All the united strength of hell it self nothing but the power of heaven is able to out wrestle this and they that will struggle with it had need be strengthned by that glorious power And hence our Saviour places the security of his Disciples in this That they are kept by him that is greater then all John 10.29 That is of greater strength as I have shewed so that none can pluck them out of his hand Reason 2 They that belong to Jesus Christ are kept c. because as no other power can keep them so this is mightily engaged to be for them And that especially two wayes by the Sons prayer and the Fathers promise 1. By the Sons prayer and that must not be denyed For this we need to go no further then my text Holy Father keep them through thy own name It was one of the last requests he made when he was taking leave of this world and therefore certainly it was successfull Simon Simon saith our Saviour Satan hath desired to winnow thee as wheat But how is Peter kept now Why by our Saviours intercession I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not 2. By the Fathers promise he hath engaged himself by promise to his people many times that his power shall be for them The Covenant is a Constellation and a heap of promises and he is a God in Covenant with them So that as he himself is theirs so all his attributes are theirs too His mercy to forgive them his justice to avenge them his power to keep them The Romans were in league with many people and if those people were in danger they were obliged in point of honour to defend them And so they did with as much diligence and care as they did their own City Even thus it is between the Lord and his people he is in League and Covenant with them and he hath undertaken their protection And therefore if they be in any streight he is bound
in point of honour to set his power on work to save them And hence it is that they are kept by the almighty power of God as long as they remain in this world JOHN 17.11 Keep them through thy own name those whom thou hast given IS it so that they that belong to Jesus Christ are kept c. Then in Vse 1 the first place let it serve for information to let us see where our strength and safety lies We are in danger every day and every hour as long as we remain in this world we have mighty enemies both without us and within us we walk continually in the midst of traps and snares and gins that Satan and his instruments do lay for us How are we preserved now and where is our security Truly my brethren not in our own wisdom grace strength c. but in the name of God himself We are kept by his power and not our own Our blessed Saviour in his prayer doth not commit us to our selves or any thing that is in us but to his Fathers own name q. d. They cannot keep themselves by any grace or strength that is within them or without them and therefore I beseech thee Father keep them through thy own name Well then my brethren let none of us be strong in his own strength let us not trust to our own abilities to support us and uphold us to bear us up and to safeguard us in temptations and afflictions But let us know that grace received and infused is not sufficient of it self to keep us unless it be corroborated and supported still with new assisting grace and strength from God And therefore he is said to keep us who are sanctified that we fall not And we are kept not by inherent faith alone but by the power of God through faith unto salvation 1 Pet. 1.4 And thus the Lord hath ordered it that though we are endued with some degrees of grace and spiritual strength we might be held to a perpetual necessary firm dependance on him notwithstanding And therefore when we rely on what we have received already as if those measures which we have inherent in our selves were strong enough to cope with a temptation the Lord will let us see how weak it is by the withdrawing of his succour from us And this indeed was Peters case he was too bold and confident upon the strength of his inherent grace he thought no doubt his faith was so impregnable that no temptation could prevail so far against it to cause him to deny his Lord and Master No not the fear of death it self and therefore God deserted him in reference to his assisting grace and so he fell in the temptation let us be wary of the same error lest we find the same issue Vse 2 Is it so That they that belong to Jesus Christ are kept c. This then should teach us to be bold and resolute in all cases and not to cast away our confidence how desperate soever our condition be I say as the Prophet Who is among you that feareth the Lord that walketh in darkness and can see no light let him trust in the Name of the Lord that is the great and Almighty power of God and stay upon his God Isa 50.10 And this was that which Abraham trusted in and stayed himself upon in such a case wherein there was no likelihood no probability at all to a humane apprehension He staggered not at the promise of God but was strong in faith giving glory to God Rom. 4.20 And whereupon did he repose and rest his faith on the Almighty power of God being fully perswaded that what he had promised he was able to perform And so let us my Brethren rest on this power in all extremities and streights let us hide our selves in the Name of God and let us not be dashed or permit our hearts to sink by reason of improbabilities or want of means But let us seriously consider with our selves that Jesus Christ hath as it were resigned us up into his Fathers hands to be kept by his Name And by that name and power of his let us be confident we shall be kept what ever our distresses be And more particularly according to the Explication of the point let us be confident that if the danger be within we shall be kept by the Almighty power of God within us strengthening If our danger be without we shall be kept by the Almighty power of God without us guarding and defending If our danger be within by reason of temptations or afflictions that lye hard upon us and are about to overcome us let us take courage to our selves and resolve we shall be kept by this Almighty power of God within us strengthening and supporting And that we shall be strengthned with all might according to his glorious power Oh thy temptations or afflictions thou wilt say are a crushing burthen to thee thou art not able to sustain it Thou wilt cry out as Job perhaps Job 6.11 What is my strength that I should hope Is my strength the strength of stones or is my flesh of brass But man consider is it thy own strength that thou standest in If it were so I must confess thy case were very sad indeed But if thou be supported by the glorious power of an Almighty God why shouldst thou doubt or be discouraged Thus far perhaps although with many bitter pangs of fear thou hast past through the midst of thy temptations and afflictions thou hast been shaken fearfully but yet thou hast not utterly been overthrown and cast down thou hast not yet denyed the Holy One as Job speaks How hast thou been supported hitherto but by the Name of God himself was it not he that strengthned thee in those distresses fears and agonies of thine and cannot he uphold thee still Is Gods hand shortned that he cannot help is any thing too hard for the Almighty Suppose thy burthen shall be heavier yet as that it may be is thy great fear Is that any thing to God is not his glorious Name sufficient to keep and bear thee up as well in heavier as in higher trials that hath kept thee hitherto it must be yeilded or else thou hadst been overwhelmed in thy troubles And what now will it be too weak if thou be brought to greater exigencies and distresses Indeed if thou wer 't kept by creature-strength either within thee or without thee the difference were very great I must confess between a heavy and a light affliction But now it matters not at all it is all one to the Almighty power of God that will be sufficient for thee let the case be what it will or what it can It may be thou conceivest that if thy burthen were a little heavier if but a grain or two were added to it thou wert gone thou must be overlaid and crushed and broken instantly Oh but remember that of the Apostle Ephes 3.16 God is able to do
and keep us one among our selves All other means that we can use will be of no avail at all unless the Lord himself strike in and interpose in this business He is the donor and dispenser of this rare and pretious blessing and therefore he is called the God of peace It is a name that he delighteth in and therefore it is often used and he is stiled the God of peace not only because he is formally so if this expression be allowable for Primum bonum summae Trinitatis est indivisio but because he is effectively so because he is the Author of peace as the Apostle speaks 1 Cor. 14.33 For God is not the Author of confusion but of peace And he makes wars to cease saith David Psal 46.11 he breaks the bow and cuts the spear asunder And therefore the Apostle begs this peace of God in such a manner as if it were to be obtained no where else and our Saviour of his Father in my Text Holy Father keep them through thy own Name that they may be one as we are Well then my Brethren let us go to him for this blessing let us not only strive for peace in the use of other means which have been formerly proposed but let us pray for peace so especially for the peace of Jerusalem Oh let us pray and pray hard for Church peace for peace among Christs Disciples among Gods own people for there he uses to bestow it My peace I leave with you saith our Saviour and God will give his people the blessing of peace Oh let us beg him now in these divided distracted times to give this blessing to his own people that though Jerusalem be not at unity neither can be at unity with those that are without yet she may be at unity with those that are within that she may be at unity within her self and to this end let us desire especially two things 1. That God himself would govern all his own people that he would rule them and command them so that they may not break the peace By nature we are all of us inclined to divisions destruction and unhappiness is in our ways and the way of peace we have not known And if the Lord himself should not appease those raging and tempestuous waves that are so apt to rise and swell if he should not extinguish and put out the fire that is so apt to kindle in the hearts of men yea of the best men the world would flame with nothing else but discords and dissentions And therefore let us earnestly beseech the Lord to do the work which none but he alone is able to perform To rule and over-rule the hearts at least of his own people and by his Kingly power to master and keep down those raging passions that are so apt to rise and swell to the disturbance of the Churches peace when his houshold are together by the ears when they are in a tumult and combustion let us entreat him to come in among them and he will quickly make them still as Lambs all will be husht and quiet presently It is his own most gratious promise and therefore we may urge it with the greater confidence that he will make the Wolf and Lamb to dwell together c. That he will quiet the tempestuous hearts of men and make them tame So that how furious and how fierce soever they were formerly by nature yet they shall be so meek and gentle now that they shall yeild to any admonition or perswasion yea a little child shall lead them Isa 11.6 How weak soever he may seem to be he shall prevail and over-rule them 2. That God himself would teach all his own people and the effect of this would be a strange agreement and a sweet accord among them even beyond imagination One cause why they that are professed and are it may be real Saints agree no better and why there are such breaches and such rents among them is because they are not all of them at least in all things taught of God Some of them in some particulars at least are taught of men and not of God and other some are taught of God And they that are taught of men will not agree with them that are taught of God and they that are taught of God cannot agree with them that are taught of men and so they are continually wrangling and contending and contradicting one another they can never fadge together But now when God shall come to teach them all in every thing then they shall think and speak the same things then they shall quarrel and contest no more but they shall all of them agree and live in unity and love together And therefore let us earnestly beseech the Lord to do this to leave his children now no longer out at School but speedily to fetch them home and to teach them all himself That being all of one School under one chief Master and some Ushers under him they may be all taught one way and so may all agree together We have the promise of the Lord for this too Isa 54.13 Oh let us urge it hard upon him in such times as these are All thy children shall be taught of God and mark what follows presently great shall be the peace of thy children Here is a time for such a promise to be put in suit and therefore let us press it home let us take no nay Let the Lord have no rest till he teach all his own children and then he will have a great School and we shall have great peace JOHN 17.12 While I was with them in the world I kept them in thy Name THE words now read are part of the Lords Prayer not of the Lords Prayer which he taught us but as I shewed in the beginning of the Lords Prayer which he made for us Not that which he propounded to us as our pattern but that which he presented for us as our priviledge at least for his Apostles and Disciples and in them for us also In which have been considered two things The matter of it and the reasons of it The things which Christ desires in the behalf of his Apostles and Disciples And then the arguments with which he presseth and enforceth his desire The matter of it or the thing which he desireth in the behalf of his Apostles and Disciples is preservation Holy Father keep them through thy own Name which we have fully ended and dispatched And now we are arrived at the reasons of the prayer the arguments with which our Saviour presseth and enforceth this desire of his Whereof the first is taken from his own effectual preservation of them during the time that he had been among them and therefore he would have his Father keep them now because he himself had kept them very safe till now While I was with them in the world saith he I kept them and none of them is lost but the son of perdition And now
I am even ready to withdraw my corporal and fleshly presence from them and therefore I beseech thee Father take them into thy tuition receive them into thy especial custody and care I had them from thee and here I render and resign them up again safe and whole and sound to thee I pray thee Father keep them henceforward as well as I have done to this day This passage of our Saviour hath two considerable things in it a general profession and a particular exception First you have here a general profession that he had safely and entirely kept all those that were bestowed upon him by his Father While I was with them in the world I kept them in thy Name those that thou gavest me I kept and none of them is lost And then you have a particular exception of Judas who here is stiled 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the son of perdition An Hebrew manner of expression that is perditioni destinatus devotus as Beza reads it destinated and devoted to perdition None of them is lost but the son of perdition who was designed and appointed to destruction He is lost and he only In the general profession and assertion of our Saviour I shall desire you to take notice with me of these three things viz. whom he kept in whose behalf he kept them and how long he kept them First whom he kept those who were bestowed upon him by the donation of the Father only those and all those Those whom thou gavest me I kept and none of them is lost Secondly in whose behalf he kept them in his Fathers As he had them from the Father so he kept them as the Fathers I kept them in thy Name saith he though they were made over to him by a deed of gift he kept them notwithstanding in his Fathers Name and not in his own He keep them as his Fathers goods and as a servant in the business to his Father As if he should have told the world they are my Fathers and for him I keep them Thirdly how long he kept them while I was with them in the world saith he He speaks as if he were in heaven already because the time of his departure was at hand he was as good as gone into the bosom of the Father while I was with them in the world I kept them But did he keep them no longer then he was with them in the world No my Beloved no longer in the way that he intends No longer as God manifested in the flesh and in a visible and corporal and fleshly way and therefore in the verse before which I have finished he yeelds them up to the tuition of the God-head and addeth this immediately while I was with them conceive it corporally in the world I kept them in thy Name those whom thou gavest me I kept and none of them is lost You see my Brethren here are many weighty things if I should undertake to handle all I should over-grasp my self and let fall more then I should hold And therefore I shall fasten on the first particular observed which though it be not first in place and in the order of the words yet it is first in reason to be handled Whom our Saviour kept and they as you have heard were those that were bestowed upon him by the Father Those that thou gavest me I kept and none of them is lost and here the Observation lies before us DOCTRINE Christ hath been wont to keep them safe who are bestowed upon him by the Father Those whom the Father gives him he is sure to keep So he did when he was conversant upon the earth among them and so he doth now he is resident in heaven for he is yesterday and to day the same for ever Then indeed he kept them one way and now he keeps them in another then he was with them to preserve them in a visible and fleshly way by the presence of his body Now he is with them to preserve them in an invisible and spiritual way by the presence of his Spirit And however in the verse immediately before my Text he resigns them to the Father as if he meant to take no further charge of them that Father my Beloved is the whole God-head of which himself as God makes one Person For Jesus Christ as he is man is not the Son of the first Person of the God-head only but of all the three Persons And in my text he speaks as man for he speaks in prayer here and prayer is part of worship and God doth not worship God And therefore when as man he yeelds up his Disciples to the Father his Man-hood being now to be withdrawn he yeelds them to the whole God-head which is the Father of the Son as he is Man And consequently Jesus Christ as Man resigns them to himself as God aswell as to the other two Persons and so in that capacity he keeps them to this day and wil do so to the worlds end Still you see he keeps them safe who are bestowed upon him by the Father Now to evince and clear the point I shall dispatch these two things First I shall shew you that and how the Father gives men to the Son And then in what respects and how far forth the Son preserves and keeps them safe who are thus bestowed upon him by the Father As for the first of these that some there are some certain choice selected ones whom God the Father in a special manner gives to Jesus Christ this is apparent in the Text Those whom thou gavest me I kept Indeed originally all the world and all the people in it appertain to God his they are for he made them So that if Jesus Christ as he is Man have any people it must be by donation from the Father And therefore he is often said to give men to the Son in the Scripture especially in the New Testament according to his promise in the old Psal 2.7 Ask of me and I will give thee the Heathen for thine inheritance And yet you must not apprehend that he doth so bestow them on the Son that he doth utterly devest himself of all his interest and wholly pass away his right in them No my Beloved the Father gives men to the Son just as a great Sheep-master gives his sheep unto his Shepherd to keep them and to look to them to save them and answer them again So Jesus Christ who is the servant of the Father as he calls him Isa 42.1 Behold my servant receives men from him under that notion And therefore he is said to keep them in his Fathers Name and as his Fathers goods as a shepherd and a servant to his Father It is his own expression in my Text While I was with them in the world I kept them in thy Name those whom thou gavest me I kept and none of them is lost They are his you see to keep them not to sell them or
notwithstanding both these 1 Pet. 1.5 And thus you see the point is clear that Jesus Christ doth keep them safe who are bestowed upon him by his Father in the sense before exprest Not safe from sinning and from suffering but safe from losing whatever their afflictions whatever their trangressions be Those whom thou gavest me I kept saith he and none of them is lost Object But you will interrupt me with our Saviours own exception in the very next words but the Son of perdition none of them is lost but the Son of perdition so that one of them was lost who was bestowed upon him by the Father Sol. To this some answer that the particle But is not exceptive but adversitative and so doth not at all imply that Iudas was bestowed upon our Saviour by the Father Those whom thou gavest me I kept and none of them no not one of them is lost But as for Judas he indeed is gone being none of that number He is not given to me by election but is indeed the Son of perdition But if it be allowed to be exceptive and so that Judas was in some respect bestowed upon our Saviour by the Father it will not follow that he was so bestowed upon him as the rest were Indeed the Father gave him Judas for outward Ministration as the rest of the Apostles but not for inward union and incorporation as the rest He gave him Judas for a Servant as the rest not for a member as the rest he was not bestowed upon our Saviour by election as the rest for he was a reprobate and therefore called the Son of perdition But why then doth Christ except him Because he was in some respect bestowed upon him as the rest and for ought appeared then in all respects And therefore though our Saviour Christs exception be improper as to the Grammar of the words as Calvin very well observes upon the Text yet it is not improper as to the sence of those that heard him For any thing that they were able to discover he was as much bestowed on Christ as any of the rest of the Apostles And therefore though this but might have been spared if all things had been rightly understood yet it was very necessary with respect to them who thought far better of that hypocrite then he deserved None of them is lost saith Christ but he who though he be accounted for the present of the number yet he is indeed and will in time appear to be the Son of perdition Vse 1 Now is it so that Jesus Christ doth keep them safe who are bestowed upon him by the Father They are exceedingly mistaken then who hold and teach that Christ may and doth often lose those whom the Father gives him And that not only for outward Ministration but even for inward union and incorporation That he that is in Christ to day may be out of Christ to morrow That he that is elect to day may be reprobate to morrow that he that is to day an heir of salvation may be to morrow a child of perdition A Doctrine infinitely prejudicial to the honour of our Saviour as if he were regardless of that which is bestowed upon him by his Father and looked upon it as not worth the keeping As if he were unfaithfull to the trust that is reposed in him by the Father He commits a people to him to be kept and saved by him The Father doth it to this very end that he may give eternal life to as many as he hath given him John 17.2 And what doth Jesus Christ abandon them to ruine and destruction notwithstanding No my beloved mark what John the Baptist saith John 3.35 The Father loves the Son saith he and hath given all things into his hands you must conceive it all things of one sort he hath bestowed upon him so that he hath put them into his hand to honour them and to keep and preserve them all his elect and chosen people for all things of another sort he hath as the Apostle speaks put under his feet to tread upon them and to ruine and destroy them But what doth Jesus Christ with those his Father gives him in the former way why as his Father would he should do he keeps them and he gives eternal life to them as it is added in the next verse Yea they have everlasting life as that is the expression there they have it in the present world in regard of inchoation and are as sure of the perfection of it in the world to come as if they had it in their own possession And to affirm that such may perish and be lost for ever is to make the Son of God unfaithfull to the Father which is a horrid derogation Or if not so at least unable to preserve them from destruction Save them he would but it is not in his power Whereas the Apostle tell us that he is able to save his people to the utmost Heb. 7.25 And he himself who is the truth it self affirms that none shall pluck them out of his hand Iohn 10.28 The world would the devil would the flesh would many would but none shall He hath power to overtop them and to master and controul them so that they shall not have their will in this business And as this Doctrine that they may be lost whom God the Father gives to Jesus Christ is very prejudicial to the honour of our Saviour so to the comfort of his poor people Alas my brethren what solid and enduring comfort will the best condition that they can be in afford them if they be not sure to keep it Suppose they give all diligence to make their calling and election sure yea suppose they make it sure Though they be sure they are elect they are not sure they shall continue so by this doctrine they may be reprobates to morrow suppose they prove themselves whether they be in Christ or no Suppose they prove they be in Christ they cannot prove they shall continue so by this doctrine they may be out of Christ to morrow And is not this cold comfort Ah my beloved how will it sting the soul that is about to take her flight for another world to be at such uncertainty when all the consolation she can have is only this that for the present she belongs to Christ but the next hour before she get away out of the world he may lose her and disown her and so she is undone for ever John making mention of the Locusts that crawl out of the bottomless pit and they are Antichristian Teachers affirmeth that they shall torment men Apoc. 9.5 and that with exquisite and horrid torture it shall be like the torment of a Scorpion that striketh a man as it is added in the next words which torment they shall put men to by teaching Antichristian doctrine And truly my Beloved this doctrine of the possibility of falling quite away from Christ and being lost
by him for ever after the most sweet experience of his love and after all his dearest kisses and embraces of a poor soul is one of the most venomous and bitter stings with which these Scorpions strike men Oh my Beloved what exquisite and racking pangs and agonies of fear and horror this may cast a soul into in the sad hour of temptation desertion and dissolution no tongue of Men or Angels is sufficient to express Vse 2 Is it so that Jesus Christ doth keep them safe who are bestowed c. You then that are delivered up into the hands of Jesus Christ by the donation of the Father triumph and be exceeding glad in the security of your Condition Believe it you can never perish be your afflictions or temptations or corruptions what they will or what they can depend upon it you are safe as to the main If you belong to Jesus Christ he hath undertaken for you to the Father and he will see that you shall not miscarry Let the flesh and let the world and let the Devil pluck at you with all their power and might it is in vain they shall not get you off from Jesus Christ They may pluck you and pluck you violently in his hand but they shall never pluck you out of his hand No my Beloved he that hath received you from the Father will be sure to answer you safe and sound to him again And in the great day of account he will bring you forth and say Here am I and the people which thou hast given me Those which thou gavest me I kept and not one of them is lost Indeed my Brethren if your preservation depended on your own care strength ability you were in very great hazard But seeing this depends upon the care and power and faithfulness of Jesus Christ what can be added to your safety Now the better to assure you settle you in this particular I shall lay down a few particulars as an immoveable foundation upon which this comfortable truth is built that Christ will surely keep them safe who are bestowed upon him by the Father And they are of three sorts Either such as respect the Father who bestows a people on the Son or such as respect the Son on whom this people are bestowed or such as respect the people who by the Father are bestowed upon the Son As for the first of these you may be sure that Christ will keep you safe if you have been bestowed upon him by the Father out of love and out of duty to the Father First he will keep you out of love to God the Father What do you think that Christ will lose that which his Father gives him we would not lose the gift but of an ordinary friend especially if he be dear to us as I have noted heretofore and much less would we lose a Fathers gift we would keep such a thing with all the care and diligence we can Now Jesus Christ loves his Father better then we can love ours and therefore as he had us from the Father so he will surely keep us for the Fathers sake Secondly As he will keep us out of love so out of duty to the Father For as Man and Mediator he is a servant to the Father And as the Father hath bestowed a people on him so he hath given him an express command to keep them and he hath given him ample power that he may keep them And consequently Jesus Christ will certainly preserve them out of duty to the Father in reference to his injunction that he may not disobey him in reference to his intention and expectation that he may not disappoint to him First in reference to the injunction of the Father Christ will surely keep us that he may not disobey him For you must know my Brethren that the Father as he hath given us to Jesus Christ so he hath withall commanded him to look to us and to see we do not perish This is the Fathers will saith Christ that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing Joh. 6.39 And he came down into this lower world to do the will of him that sent him And therefore certainly he will be very careful of this special charge of his he will observe it very strictly and exactly He will be infinitely wary that he lose nothing of the Fathers goods which he hath given him to keep and required him to keep that so he may approve himself a faithful servant Secondly in reference to the intention of the Father Jesus Christ will surely keep us that he may not disappoint him For as he hath received a strict command so he hath withall received full and ample power to keep us His Father hath bestowed it on him to this very end as himself acknowledges Joh. 17.2 As thou hast given him power over all flesh that he might give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him and consequently that they might not perish So that this is the Fathers aim you see which Jesus Christ will never frustrate he hath bestowed upon him large authority and power to this purpose Power over all flesh that he may give eternal life to some flesh to as many as God hath given him Indeed if he were only vested with authority and power over that flesh which God intends that he shall keep and save it would fall short in this business For there is other flesh that would resist and hinder our salvation There is flesh within us I mean our lusts and our corruptions and there is flesh without us I mean the world and worldly men that would oppose this great work and therefore God hath qualified Jesus Christ with power sufficient to reach his end in this design of his He hath not only vested him with power over the flesh to which he means that he should give eternal life But he hath given him power over all flesh that he may give eternal life to as many as he hath given him that other flesh may not resist him and disappoint him in this great business and therefore let the flesh without us and let the flesh within struggle we may be confident that we shall have eternal life in spite of all their opposition For God hath vested Jesus Christ with full power to this end and to this purpose that he may give it and that none may hinder it As Jesus Christ will surely keep us for his Fathers sake so he will keep us for his own sake and for the property and interest which he himself hath in us For you must know my Brethren that we are not nakedly entrusted with our Saviour as a servant in which respect he is engaged to keep us out of duty but more then so we are bestowed upon him as a Son in which respect he is engaged to keep us out of property and this is that which makes us safe indeed If Jesus Christ were but an hireling and if the
that of the Apostle in the same case Rom. 9.20 Nay but O man who art thou that replyest answerest again disputest against God! All the objections that are made almost against the point in hand are against God too against his mercy justice power c. If you have any thing to say for God it is worth the hearkning to otherwise you have your answer Who art thou that disputest against God do but consider who art thou Vse 2 Is it so that God in his Eternal c. How should this make us to admire at the transcendent riches of his grace and love to us whom he hath chosen to salvation Paul makes it an especial aim of God in his Decree of Reprobation To shew the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy Rom. 9.23 And if we weigh it well we shall easily discern that it doth strangely heighten the exceeding love of God Had he ordained all men to salvation even so his mercy had been out of measure great But that he hath ordained any of us to salvation when on the contrary he hath ordained so many millions to destruction whose state in Nature was no worse then ours whose strength in nature was as great as ours to exempt them from damnation whose care to be reconciled was no less then ours till God was pleased in mercy to prevent us how should this sweeten the favour of the Lord to us in this respect and even ravish us with admiration of his free grace The Lord delights to amplifie his love by this He took not Angels but the seed of Abraham Heb. 2.16 Was not Esau Jacobs brother saith the Lord Yet I loved Jacob and I hated Esau Mal. 1.2 3. Whose soul that hath tasted of it can choose but be amazed at it Hath God preferred me before Angels before so many thousands in the world Oh the unsearchable depth of his love to me How doth it pass all knowledge JOHN 17.12 That the Scripture might be fulfilled AND thus of our Saviours general assertion that he had safely and entirely kept all those that were bestowed upon him by his Father While I was with them in the world I kept them in thy Name those thou gavest me I kept and none of them lost And likewise of his particular exception of Judas who here is called the son of perdition None of them is lost but the son of perdition Now in the following words that none might be offended at the loss of Judas or stumble at his ruine and destruction our Saviour Christ goes on to shew that as it was designed and fore-appointed in the eternal Councel and Decree of God so it was fore-told in Scripture It was not only fore-ordained but it was fore-shewed too So that in his destruction there fell out nothing otherwise then as it was expresly and apparently declared before in Scripture The Scripture was not crost and contradicted in it but verified and fulfilled None of them is lost but the son of perdition that the Scripture might be fulfilled But you will ask me what Scripture where did the Word of God foretel the ruine and destruction of this wretched man I answer David prophesied clearly and expresly of it many hundred years before Psal 109.8 Let Satan stand at his right hand When he shall be judged let him be condemned and let his prayer become sin Let his days be few and let another take his office Judas you know was self-condemned and self-executed too and so his days were few by that means And when he had destroyed himself his place and Office of Apostleship was supplyed by another But you will say perhaps Judas is not named by David in the fore-alleadged Psalm And therefore though the prophesie seem to agree to him and his condition yet how are we assured that he is aimed at in particular in that prediction Why my Beloved though the Prophet David do not name him the Apostle Peter doth apply that Scripture to him Act. 1.20 For having said in the fore-going verses This Scripture must have been fulfilled which the Holy Ghost by David spake before concerning Judas He comes at length to this in the alledged verse For it is written in the Book of Psalms Let his habitation be desolate and let no man dwell therein and his Bishoprick or Charge or Office 〈◊〉 another take so that when he was lost and fell from his Apostleship yâ—â— see that Scripture was fulfilled And yet you must not apprehend the loss of Iudas to be caused by that praediction as if the Prophesie concerning him did really contribute any thing by way of active operation and efficiencie to his destruction Though I acknowledge the expression of my Text may seem to look a little that way None of them is lost but the son of perdition And he is lost that the Scripture might be fulfilled But you must know my Brethren that he had been lost though his destruction had never been foretold in Scripture He was not lost the rather because his loss was prophesied but it was prophesied because he was before from all eternity appointed to perdition And being prophesied when the event fell out accordingly it looked as if the prophesie had been the cause of his destruction So that the particle that as a very learned man observes upon the Text Iudas was lost that the Scripture might be fulfilled denoteth not the true but the appearing cause only Yet thus much it suggests withall which shall be our observation DOCTRINE That whatsoever is foretold in Scripture shall surely be accomplished and fulfilled The issue and event shall answer the prediction every way in all respects And therefore it is often noted not in my Text alone but elsewhere frequently that such and such things came to pass that the Scripture might be fulfilled as you may see that place for instance Mat. 2.14 15. Joseph arose and took the child and departed into Egypt That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Prophet saying Out of Egypt have I called my Son And after in the following verse Herod sent forth and slew the children from two years old and under Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by the Prophet saying In Rama was a voyce heard Lamentation and weeping and great mourning Rachel weeping for her children and would not be comforted because they are not And so in many other places the Apostles very carefully observe the punctual and exact accomplishment of the antient Prophesies and speak sometimes in such a manner as if things came to pass for no other cause but this because they were foretold in Scripture and that the Scripture might be fulfilled Whereas indeed they had been done though they had never been foretold because they were fore-determined only they would have us know that whatsoever is foretold shal certainly be done in Gods time It is easier saith our Saviour for Heaven and Earth to pass away then for one title of the Word of God to
Scripture how improbable soever the Saints of old have closed with them What an unlikely promise was it that was made to Abraham that he should have a Son when he was full a hundred years of age and a seed that should be as innumerable as the stars of heaven and that by Sarah too a withered and a barren woman What strong objections might they both have brought against it And yet they did not argue but believed that it should be just as the Lord had spoken as the Apostle speaks of Abraham Rom. 4.20 21. He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief but was strong in faith giving glory to God Yea and of Sarah too though she were somewhat doubtfull and incredulous in the beginning yet even of her he saith She iudged him faithfull that had promised That great and Master promise of the resurrection of the body from the dust is far above the principles of nature and philosophy and therefore the Philosophers at Athens laughed at it Yet Job believed this seeming Paradox as he professes Job 19.26 I know saith he he uses such a word you see as intimates a full perswasion I am confident of this that though after mys kin worms destroy this body yet in my flesh I shall see God And so let us my brethren whatsoever is foretold in Scripture let us stedfastly believe that it shall surely be accomplished and fulfilled And thus of the first argument or reason with which our Saviour presseth and enforceth his petition to his Father in behalf of his Apostles and Disciples that he himself would undertake the keeping of them Holy Father keep them through thy own name Which hath been taken as you may remember from his own effectual preservation of them during the time that he had been amongst them And therefore he would have his Father keep them now because he himself had kept them and kept them very safe till now While I was with them in the world I kept them Before our Saviour adds a second reason to enforce this supplication and request of his he interposes a discovery of the end why he presents it and why he is so earnest in it Saith he I put up this Petition to thee while I am resident in this world I do it in the hearing of my Apostles and Disciples that they might have their comfort much encreased by this means And now I come to thee and these things I speak in the world that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves So that the words you see are the account our Saviour gives his Father of the Petition which he makes for his Apostles and Disciples or rather of the circumstances of the making of it Why he makes it in the world why he did not defer the making of it till he came to heaven and sate down at the right hand of his Father there to be an everlasting Intercessor for his people but rather chose to make it here before he went in the presence and the ears of his Apostles and Disciples while they were by and hearkning to him These things saith he I speak in the world that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves And here we have two things to be examined and resolved What our Saviour means by his joy which he would have fulfilled in his Apostles and Disciples why he calls it His joy and not theirs That they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves not their own joy fulfilled but my joy fulfilled in them And How this joy should be fulfilled by his presenting this Petition for them to his Father in their hearing before he left this world which way this circumstance should tend so much and be so available to the accomplishment of that joy As for the first of these our Saviour calls the joy which he would have to be fulfilled in his Disciples his ioy Not that he was the subject of it or that it was inherent in himself But either First because he was the object of it that they might have my ioy that is to say the joy which they take in me fulfilled in themselves Or Secondly as Calvin thinks because he was the author of it That they might have my ioy the joy which they have from me fulfilled in themselves But how should this presenting this Petition for them to his Father in their hearing how should this circumstance conduce so much to the fulfilling of the joy within them Truly my brethren it might be very helpfull to it many wayes Either as it manifested Christs affection to them and his care of them in which they could not but exceedingly rejoyce What he would do in their behalf when he was come to heaven was not so clearly known to them But this he did before he went in their hearing he earnestly besought his Father to take special care of them to keep them through his own name they heard it with their own ears how earnest and importunate he was which could not choose but be an extraordinary comfort to them that Jesus Christ should have such dear and singular regard to them Or else it might fulfill their joy as it assured them of their special preservation after Christ was gone from them There is no question to be made they were in many doubts and fears when he was about to leave them And had he gone without discovering any care of their safety their sorrows would have been increased If he had only prayed in secret for them to his Father and desired him to keep them this would have added to their safety but what would this have added to their joy But when they heard him being ready to depart to yield them up in such a serious solemn manner to his Father and to make this his last request to him while he was here in this world that he would keep them this could not but assure them that they should be kept and so fill them full of joy And hence our Saviour having put up that Petition for them Holy Father keep them through thy own name And that because while I was with them in the world I kept them Adds this immediately and now come I to thee and these things speak I in the world before I come I speak them here among them that my Discples being ear-witnesses to my importunate and earnest intercession for them may have the joy either which they take in me or which they receive from me the more abundantly fulfilled in themselves The words thus opened yield us out three Observations First Christ is the Author and Original of the joy of his people Secondly Jesus Christ would have his people to be full of holy joy Thirdly Their perfect knowledge of his intercession for them is one special means to fill them full of this joy DOCTRINE Christ is the Author and Original of the joy of his people If they have any true and real joy it comes from him they have it from the Lord
themselves with others more loose and vitious then themselves they rejoyce in another and not in themselves they think themselves are very good because others are more evil And even as Jerusalem justified Sodom Ezek. 16.5 so drunkards and adulterers justifie them and are occasion of their joy Others there are who finding that they have obtained a good opinion and repute with others and that they are approved by men of judgement and of conscience too are comforted in this exceedingly and here is the foundation of their Joy Oh such a godly man or such a Minister approves of them and is familiar to them and hence it comes to pass that when they once begin to lose the good opinion and conceit of men they are like persons stracken in the head their joy is blasted and their comfort gone because the ground and matter of it was without and not within O then let us endeavour my Beloved to have our comfort in our selves and if it have a spring and fountain in the heart it will not fail there will be a sufficient supply of joy and comfort there though men neglect us and cast away their good opinion of us Whereas if it proceed from that which is without us it will be like a standing Pool that is not nourished with the Spring but with a sodain fall of rain assoon as heat of Summer comes away it dryeth and is seen no more And now my Brethren having proved your joy and found it to be right the joy of Christ which he would have to be fulfilled in you preserve it as your lives and see that neither sin nor Satan steal away this jewel from you and to this end you must especially beware of sinning against Conscience which is the subject and the seat of joy As long as you do well to Conscience Conscience will say well to you but if you wound your Conscience with the guilt of sin Conscience will wound you with the horror and the sting of sin and if by sinning against light you waste your Conscience in regard of grace Conscience will waste you in regard of peace and comfort yea it may set you on the rack of such affrightments as no tongue is sufficient to express What was the cause that David cryed so often in his bones and in his heart that they were broken that it was melted in the midst of his bowels but because he sinned so grosly against the light of his own understanding and the convictions of his own conscience But if in sincerity you have your conversation in the world this will be your rejoycing And if you walk according to the rule peace shall be upon you as upon the Israel of God This joy of Christ shall be fulfilled in you and your joy shall none take from you And thus we have dispatched the first and second Observation Christ is the Author and Original of the joy of his people Jesus Christ would have his people to be full of holy joy DOCTRINE 3. Their clear and perfect knowledge of his intercession for them is one especial means to fill them full of this joy It is the means our Saviour uses in my text and certainly it is available to this end That he might cheer the hearts of his Disciples and replenish them with comfort he lets them hear him pleading for them to his Father He doth it in their presence and while they are listning to him as being very well assured that this will make their joy abound and overflow the banks And this is the account he gives his Father of the business having been very earnest with him to keep them through his own name as he himself had done as long as he had been among them and urged many things in their behalf These things saith he I speak in the world before I come away to thee I speak them here among these men for whom I am a Suitor to thee in the ears of my Apostles and Disciples who are by and listen to me that being witnesses themselves to my importunate and earnest intercession for them they may by this means have my joy fulfilled in themselves True you will say this was an extraordinary comfort to them for the present but what was this to them after Christ was gone from them Or what it this to us in these times Yes my beloved it was much to them even after Christs departure for the fulfilling of their joy For when he was ascended into heaven they could on all occasions reflect upon the prayer that they heard him make in their behalf while he was conversant upon the earth when they were in any fear or any danger when they were even ready to be overcome with grief and sorrow they could consider with themselves We perfectly remember that while our Master was among us we heard him earnestly beseech his Father for us that he would keep us and that he would Comfort us and that he would Sanctifie us and that he would save us as all those things and many more you shall observe along the Current of his prayer here and we shall surely find the fruit of it in such a time as this is Yea we have reason to believe that what he did for us in a way of intercession while he was here upon the earth he doth the same in heaven to this day and will do till we follow him to that place And why then should we not be cheerfull in the midst of these troubles And this our Saviour cleerly aims at in the words These things speak I in the world while I am yet among them that they might have my joy fulfilled in themselves That hearing what I do now while I am here they might a little guess what I am like to do hereafter when I am once sate down at the right hand of my Father to be an everlasting Intercessor or for them and therefore might be full of comfort yea though I am departing from them while they consider with themselves If he do so much now surely when he comes to heaven he will do much more And as for us who live in these times it is a means to fill us full of comfort too Christs speaking these things in the world and so giving us a taste of his future intercession For hence it comes to pass that this prayer of our Saviour being uttered in the ears of his Apostles it is pend accordingly and left upon record in Scripture And so we have a specimen a form a modell of our Saviours intercession for his people which he hath left behind him for us to look upon on all occasions and to gather comfort from What he doth in heaven for us we are not able fully and exactly to discover But this he did on earth before he went he did it openly and there is a memorial of it for ever in the Church And by this we may conjecture what he doth in heaven for his people at this day and
day As long as men make no account and reckoning of the Word as long as they profess it only but are not very zealous for it nor very careful to walk in every thing exactly by it they may live pretty quiet with their neighbors But if they come once to contend and that with earnestness for every truth that is contained in the Word if they will not in any case by any means depart in any thing from that Rule the world will be about their ears upon a sodain and shew a great deal of malignity and rage against them But why should this exasperate the world against them you will ask me I cannot tell you why it should but I will tell you why it doth For by this means they cross the world and they condemn and shame the world And this is that which sets the world so much against them By this means they cross the world and this they are not able to endure it makes their very hearts to rise against them And they cross them three ways they cross them in their judgements and they cross them in their wills and they cross them in their lives and conversations 1. First by this means they cross them in their judgements and opinions Till men receive the Word of God they can in every thing conform their judgements and opinions to the world They can think as they do and they can speak as they do they can agree and hold with them in every point and so they walk on lovingly together there grows no difference or debate between them But when they come to entertain the Word to be their rule in every thing both in opinion and in conversation now they are forced to differ from the world to clash with them in many things to contradict and oppose them and gain-say them And this breeds disaffection and dislike yea enmity and hatred against them Nay they are forced sometimes if they will keep exactly to the Word of God to cross the world in those opinions which they are most intent upon and for which they are most eager and this they can by no means bear from them As they that entertained Christ to be the Son of God and the Saviour of the world when he was conversant upon the Earth and in the times that followed next after his Incarnation Passion and Ascension they did exceedingly enrage the world against them The generality of men would not endure to heat of Christ or the Religion that embraced and worshipped him and therefore whosoever undertook to own him and profess him was sure to meet with all the violence and rage and malice that the world could pour upon him He might have crost the world in many other truths and not have found so ill measure but this drew out their rage and malice to the utmost And this is that as I conceive which our Saviour Christ aims particularly at in my text I have given them thy Word thy Gospel Word of that he speaks and they have entertained it and embraced it and therefore the world hates them And if you look into the stories of the Church you shall observe that whosoever closed with the Gospel in those early times and professed the faith of Christ from which the world was so exceedingly averse he was exposed thereby to all the misery that humane cruelty c. could devise to inflict But after when this Gospel-Truth came to be better setled and digested in the world so that they were content to hear of Christ and his Religion with a little patience then there rose up other things in which they would not be gain-said As to leap down to Luther time who ever stuck to him and to the doctrine which he taught against the Pope and his adherents got the world about his ears And so in every age there are some passages of holy Scripture and the truths delivered in them against which the world is violently bent and whosoever sticks to these the world hates him out of measure and doth him all the mischief that it can And therefore this is called the Word of Gods patience Apoc. 3.10 Thou hast kept the Word of my patience that is thou hast not only kept my Word in general but more particularly thou hast kept those portions of my Word and those parcels of my Truth which must have patience to the keeping of them A man may keep some Truths delivered in the Word without patience as being universally received by all opposed by none But there are others which if a man maintain and hold them he shall surely suffer he shall be persecuted for them And he that keeps these notwithstanding keeps the Word of Gods patience The patience which God works in his people 2. They that embrace the Word of God as they cross the wicked world in their opinions so they cross them in their wills They cannot do in every thing as the wicked world would have them they cannot yeild to every thing which they obtrude and force upon them and this is another reason why they are so exasperated and enraged against them Were it not for the Word of God to which they are resolved to yield obedience they might comply in every thing and so the world and they might be very good freinds But when the Word forbiddeth what the world requireth that most vehemently too perhaps they are forced to cross the world and and so the Word brings the world and them out These men say they are so precise and holy that they must have Scripture for every thing they say or do they will do nothing but what they have a warrant for out of the Word of God But we will make them stoop and yield and we will make them turn another leaf ere we have done and when they cannot have their wills because the other cannot bend or vary from the Word of God when they are crost in that which they are so resolved upon this heats the furnace of their wrath seven times hotter then ordinary and this the Prophet David found Psal 119.161 Princes have persecuted me without a cause but my heart standeth in awe of thy Word Either he must have them against him or the Word of God against him They threatned him if he obeyed the Word the Word upon the other side that threatned if he disobeyed it Whom did he fear most why saith the Psalmist My heart standeth in awe of thy Word I fear it more then I fear them And this was that which got him much hatred and bitter persecution too as you may see in that place 3. They that receive the Word of God as they cross the wicked world in their opinions and their wills so in their conversations too they do not live and walk as they do their ways are of another fashion and this is another reason why the world is so malitiously bent against them Were it not for the Word of God and the rules that it
prescribes there need to be no difference between them and other men and so there would be no dislike But now they are not neither can they be conformed and fashiond to the world Rom. 12.2 they cannot walk according to the course and custom of the world Ephes 2.2 The world runs out exceedingly into all licentious courses but they run not out with them They walk not as the Gentiles Ephes 4.17 they sleep not as do others 1 Thess 5.5 And this the world cannot abide them for because they are so singular and will not do as they do They that receive the Word of God as they do cross the world so they condemn and shame the world For while they walk exactly by the Rule their holy and unblemisht lives and conversations do make the vitious and licentious courses of ungodly men the more odious and bring the more contempt upon them And as the righteous is the more excellent because he dwelleth by a bad neighbour so on the other side the wicked is the more abominable because he dwelleth by a good neighbour his vile and wicked actions shew the worse because there are so good examples just by Thus we have seen the first reason of the point the wicked world hates Christs Disciples because they entertain the Word of God I have given them thy Word saith Christ c. There is a second also added in the Text It is the manner of the world Reason 2 to hate them that are Christs disciples because they are not of this world but of another Therefore the world is so envenomed and so malitiously bent against them The world hath hated them saith Christ because they are not of the world even as I am not of the world If they were of their own society and of their own Countrey they would love them well enough as Christ himself informeth his Disciples Joh. 15.19 If ye were of the world the world would love his own but because ye are not of the world but I have chosen you out of the world therefore the world hates you Use 1 Is it the manner of the wicked world c. Here then you see one especial reason why Christs Disciples are so vilified and abused in the world They dwell among a company of men that hate them and that to the very death And hence it is my brethren that they do them all the mischief that they can It is a wonder to us many times that all the world almost should be upon the skirts of the small number that belongs to Christ that they should be continually perking at them and raising scandalous reports upon them we know not what to make of it Why what 's the matter think we that they should be so ill-entreated and so unworthily and basely used on all hands Truly nothing else but this the world hates them and all these injuries and wrongs and molestations are the effects of that hatred Use 2 Is it the manner of the wicked c. the greater cause there is of admiration at the power and mercy of the Lord that keeps them and preserves them notwithstanding this hatred Though all the world be bitterly envenomed and enraged against them they cannot have their will upon them no they are safeguarded still as if a little Lamb were kept among a company of Wolves and Lions T is not for want of multitude or malice in the enemies of Christs Disciples that they have yet a being in the world but by the power and goodness of a gratious God upholding them and providing for their safety This is the Lords doing and it is marvelous in our eyes And we shall marvail at it and admire the Lord the more if we consider yet a little more distinctly but these two things 1. The disparity in number between Christs Disciples and them that bear such mortal hatred to them For Christs Disciples they are very few a little flock a small number a petty inconsiderable company of men But they that hate them and desire their ruine are the world a world of wicked and ungodly men So that you see there are enemies enough to eat up Christs people as David said they did in his time They eat up thy people as a man would eat bread to devour them and to bring them all to nothing in a moment And if you do compare them with the multitude that are against them and consider what a deadly and envenomed hatred they bear against them their preservation will appear to be a strange thing the greater and more admirable is the power that keeps them and upholds them in such a posture and condition as this is 2. And as there is a great disparity in number between Christs Disciples and them that bear such hatred to them so in disposition too which magnifies the power that keeps them yet more For Christs Disciples they are frequently compared to Sheep and Lambs poor harmless things that are so far from being able or desirous to offend hurt others that they are no wayes able to defend themselves And they that hate them on the otherside are compared to Dogs and Wolves and Bears and Lions How easie is it for such strong and cruel creatures to make a prey upon the silly Lambs So Christs Disciples are resembled to a Lilly for their tenderness and softness and they that hate them on the other side to Thorns for their injurious and offensive quality Cant. 2.2 They are sharp and rough and boistrous and these alas are sweet and harmless and how shall they subsist among them They are not like to hurt the world but the world is very like to hurt them Thorns you know are apt to prick and rent and scratch and on the other side the Lilly by reason of her tenderness is very lyable to wrong and very capable of such impressions The Greater cause there is of admiration at the power of God by which the Church of Christ is kept in such a dangerous condition and estate as this is Is it the manner of the wicked c. Then surely it concerneth Christs Use 3 Disciples to be very cautious how they walk in the midst of such men If they were among their friends there needed not such curious circumspection For friends will make the best of every thing and construe matters in the mildest and most favourable way But since they are amongst their enemies that hate them it stands them very much upon to look exactly to their words and wayes And that upon a few Considerations For First if there be any thing to be misconstrued they will be sure to make an ill interpretation of it they will mistake your words as David speaks and mistake your actions too and turn them all the wrong way Because they hate you they will lie upon the the catch that they may pick some matter of exception and reproach against you And if there be but any shew or colour for it they will glory out
present nor our future happiness 1. Our present happiness consisteth in the title that we have to Christ the interest we have in him and the Communion we have with him Can the hatred of the world put an end to this Communion No saith the Apostle Paul Rom. 3.35 Who shall separate us from the Love of Christ shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword as it is written for thy sake are we killed all the day long Nay in all these things we are more then Conquerours through him that loves as For I am verily perswaded that neither death nor life nor Angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor heigth not depth nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Nay to say truth Christ loves us most and hath most communion with us when the world is most against us Then he is specially present with us as he was with Paul Acts 18.9 and with the Martyrs in the Dungeon in the Stocks in the flames And it is certain that Christ doth then reveal himself most sweetly to his people when the world discovers most malignity and rage against them So that it is not all their hatred can keep a Christian from the love and fellowship of Jesus Christ and so by Consequence it cannot keep him from his present happiness 2. And for our happiness to come it cannot hinder that neither It doth not lie so loose my brethren that all the world can take it from us No it is in Gods keeping he openeth and no man shutteth he shutteth and no man openeth He opened Heaven upon Stephen when the world was shewing the utmost of its rage against him And verily a Christian is as near the complement and the perfection of his happiness when he suffers all the wrong and ignominy and contempt that the world can pour upon him and sometimes nearer then he is at other times for that may be the way to it And hence saith Christ in the fore-alledged text Mat. 5.11 Blessed are ye when men revile you Rejoyce and be exceeding glad And why so For great is your reward in heaven JOHN 17.15 I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the world c. AND thus far of the second Argument with which our Saviour presseth and enforceth his Petition to his Father in behalf of his Apostles and Disciples that he would keep them through his own name viz. because our Saviour for his own part was even ready to depart from them and to abandon them in such a place where they were hated universally almost the world hath hated them saith Christ Why then a man would think the only way were to remove them out of such a place where they are so ill beloved and so maligned upon all hands If the world hate them because they are not of the world what should they do there any longer the best way were to take them thence and to translate them to a place where they are likely to have more quiet No saith our Saviour I disown that that is not the intent and drift of my Petition I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world c. So that these words my brethren are an Explication of that which is delivered in the former verse that it might not be mistaken Not that our Saviour was afraid his Father would mistake his meaning but he knew they might mistake him who heard him speaking to his Father And therefore as a learned Writer notes upon the text he speaks unto his Father as a man for mens sake because he speaks in their hearing He tells them plainly and expresly what he doth not pray for I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the world And then he tels him clearly what he doth pray for but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil Begin we with the first part of the explication in which our Saviour tells his Father plainly and expresly what he doth not pray for I do not pray that thou should take them out of the world So that the point to be observed hence is this DOCTRINE Removal out of this world is not the proper subject matter of Petition You see our Saviour Christ disowns it clearly in my text he would by no means have it thought that he desires his Father to remove his Disciples hence by death to take them out of the world No saith our Saviour that is not the thing I pray for I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the world And even as he disowns it in his prayer so should we for we must walk in every imitable thing as we have him for an example And out of doubt he speaks not this for the direction of his Father that he might not be mistaken as I noted even now but on the other side for the instruction of his Apostles and Disciples who were by and heard him pray That they might learn not to exceed their bounds in their petitions And when they seriously consider how they are hated and maligned and abused in the world they might not yet desire the Lord on this account that he would take them hence but rather that he would preserve and keep them here as you have it in my Text I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the world but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil And the ground is evident Reason Removal out of this world is not the proper subject matter of Petition because it is not simply in it self a blessing Indeed by accident I must acknowledge death and departure hence is turned exceed ngly to the advantage of the Saints For by it they are freed from evils penal and from evils sinful from suffering and from sinning they are admitted to most near communion with him whom their soul loves and whom their hearts do even gasp after from whose immediate presence they are unavoidably debarred as long as they remain in this world But properly life and continuance in the body is the blessing and therefore it is properly to be desired We find it usually to be propounded in the promise as the reward of holiness and of obedience And in this form we have it in the fifth Commandment which is the first Commandment with promise the only one that hath a promise of the second Table the only one of all the ten that hath a distinct and particular promise And now you will expect I know there should be some transcendent mercy comprehended in such a singular and extraordinary promise as this is And yet it is but long life in this world that thy days may be long in the land c. That promise is a pregnant one to this effect Psal 91. ult with long life will I satisfie him and shew him my salvation First I will satisfie him with long life he
shall live so long on earth till he be full of days even as the stomack that is full of meat till he desire to live no longer till nature be spun out to the uttermost extent and after I will shew him my salvation I will bring him to the place where he shall live for evermore And hence it is because continuance here is properly and in it self a blessing as on the other side the contrary thereto the rooting out of the land of the living is properly and in it self a curse that holyest Saints have deprecated taking hence They have been so far from praying that God would take them out of the world that they have rather prayed against it Lord take me not away in the midst of my days Psal 102.24 How did they plead sometimes for their indangered lives as a prisoner at the bar and when the Lord was pleased to leave them in the world a little longer they were exceedingly affected and enlarged to thankfulness As Hezekiah was you know who penned a Psalm of praise on this occasion and this was the burthen of it The living the living they shall praise thee as I do this day Object But you will interpose and say perhaps Some of the choicest Saints of God have prayed expresly to be taken hence and therefore it should seem to be the proper subject matter of Petition Answ 1. To this I answer such as prayed aright did not make their removal hence by death the proper subject matter of their prayers They did not seek it simply and abstractly by and for it self but in relation to some other thing which they could not have without it It 's true indeed that the Apostle Paul desired to be dissolved and to be with Christ he could not be with Christ he knew unless he were dissolved first and therefore that he might injoy him he was contented to be dissolved for that end Or otherwise he would have been far enough from desiring dissolution And therefore in another place he speaks clearly We would not be unclothed saith he viz. of life and of the body 2 Cor. 5.4 that is not properly the thing that we desire But we would be clothed upon with immortality in heaven If it might be possible we would be clothed upon with that without the putting off of this Indeed he saith before in the Name of all the Saints We that are in this Tabernacle do groan being burthened But yet it was not life considered in it self that was their burthen but with its evil adjuncts and associates which do continually cleave to it and which cannot be severed from it in this world So that if you take life you must take that which comes with it In this respect indeed it is a burthen to the holyest Saints because it is accompanyed with such a burthen of corruption as makes them groan and faint under it But if it be considered simply and abstractly in it self it is not a burthen from which the Saints do groan to be delivered no it is a blessing rather of which they groan to be deprived 2. Most of the Saints who have desired God to take them hence have failed and sinned in those desires of theirs It was their weakness and infirmity they did it out of fear and despondency of Spirit out of passion and impatience And thus it seems Eliah did when he fled from Jezabel 1 King 19.4 And thus it is extreamly probable that Moses did Num. 11.10 15. For it is said he was displeased and in that angry fit he said to God Wherefore hast thou afflicted me If thou deal thus with me kill me I pray thee out of hand and do not let me see my wretchedness And thus it is apparent Jonas did who being crost in a punctilio in a point of honor out of a pettish foolish childish humour will go die forsooth God must take away his life These imperfections of the Saints are left upon record in Scripture not as marks to be aimed at but as rocks to be declined Vse Now to proceed to make some Application of the point My Brethren is it so that removal out of this world is not the proper subject matter of Petition Then let not any of us make it so when we are putting up our supplications and requests to God When we consider how the world hates us how it pours contempt upon us how it follows us with troubles persecutions and afflictions so that we see but little hope that we should ever live contentedly and quietly and freely here it may be we are weary of it and ever ready to desire the Lord that he would remove us from it To wish with Israel in a pang of discontent Numb 11.1 Would God we were dead And with Eliah It is enough Lord take away our lives 1 King 14.4 It 's that which many of us are too apt to do when we are over-loaden with the cares and troubles of this world to reach after deliverance and redress and ease by this means And therefore when we find our hearts are running out in such a way as this is let us call them in again let us correct our selves and say as our Saviour in my Text O Lord we pray not that thou wouldst take us out of the world we are far from such impatience we are content to wait thy leisure to tarry till thy time come And here to keep you from such extravagancies and irregular desires I shall present you with a few things It is a special mercy of the Lord to give us life and to continue us in this world though in a comfortless and sad condition David was in a sorry case afflicted persecuted and oppressed when he put up that prayer to the Lord Deal bountifully with thy servant or be beneficial to thy servant that I may live and keep thy Word Psal 119.17 He counted it a benefit to live how troublesome soever his condition were It 's that which even Nature teaches us to reach after Skin for skin and all that a man hath will he give for his life And yet a life with nothing else some will count worth nothing You know my Brethren all that God himself did promise to some very gratious men in times of common trouble and calamity was only this they should have their lives for a prey and that was all for great things were not to be looked for Jer. 39.38 and 45.5 And yet that was a great mercy If we be not taken hence perhaps we may enjoy the mercy to out-live troubles It is mercy to live in them but it is greater mercy to live beyond them and this if we be quiet and content and patient for ought we know may be our portion And this was that which David promised to himself when he was almost over-come and over-whelmed with his afflictions and distresses I shall not die but live saith he and declare the works of the Lord Psal 118.17 Me thinks he gathers up
his spirits when he was about to faint why yet saith he I shall not dye but live for all this as near as I am brought yea I shall live to glory and triumph in Gods works in that which he shall do for me to live in dangerous times and to get through them though but with an escape is mercy But to get through them with a conquest is far greater mercy To live in troubles though in the end they overcome us is an honor But to live in them so as in the end to overcome them to be as the Apostle was in deaths often and yet to live and to triumph this is happiness indeed Consider in the worst of times and in the midst of greatest troubles you may be serviceable to the Church of Christ Perhaps more serviceable then in better times because the Church may need you more This caused Paul who else had certainly desired dissolution to pitch upon continuance in the body For me saith he to die is gain it is best to be dissolved and to be with Christ But to abide in the flesh is more needful for you Phil. 1.24 And therefore that I shall resolve upon as David once I shall prefer the Church before my own joy yea before my chief joy And as you may be serviceable to the Church in the midst of greatest troubles so you may be instrumental to the glory of the Lord perhaps more instrumental then in better times It was the weakness of Eliah that God must take away his life when by his own confession there was none almost to stand up and appear for God and for his Truth against the great corruptions in those times but he only Then should he have desired to have lived when God had greatest need of him It 's true that death in such a case would be a benefit and ease to us yea but our life would be a glory to the Lord and this we should desire before the other This world is the proper place where we bring glory to the Lord in the world that is to come we are glorified by him Oh let us be so ingenuous to desire to be a while where we may bring God glory rather then where we may have glory from him Let us not be so eager for our wages for our rest till we have finished our work and served our generations and when we have done so then God will glorifie us with himself for ever And thus far of the first part of our Saviours Explication in which he tells his Father plainly and expresly what he doth not pray for I pray not that thou shouldst take them out of the world The second follows now in order to be handled in which he tells him what he doth pray for But that thou shouldst keep them from the evil There is no difficulty in the terms requiring any tedious Explication Some dispute indeed there is about the meaning of the word Evil from which our Saviour prays his Father to keep those that belong to him There want not some Expositors who understand this Evil here to be the world it self which indeed is very evill which lies in wickedness as the Apostle speaks 1 Joh. 5.19 As if our Saviour should have said I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world but that thou shouldst keep them from the world which is evil in it self and which will surely draw them into evil too by her temptations and her sugred baits unless thou keep a watchful eye upon them and take them into thy tuition Others take evil in the ordinary notion of it and so it comprehendeth and involveth in it all sin and all affliction according to the known distinction of it into the evil of fault and the evil of pain whereof the latter is the fruit and issue of the former So that our Saviour in their apprehension prays his Father that he would keep his Apostles and Disciples from all the evil in the world For all may be reduced to these two heads Not that he would remove them from it but that he would preserve them from the evill in it Others conceive the Evil mentioned in my Text to be the Devil For he is often called the evil one in Scripture as you may see that place for instance 1 Joh. 5.18 Beza is very resolute for this interpretation For 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as he conceives is rather taken for a person then a thing And besides the Article saith he which is adjoyned puts the matter out of question That thou wouldst keep them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is from the wicked one And so we find the same expression used by the Apostle 1 Joh. 2.13 I write unto you young men because you have overcome 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the wicked one that is the Devil As for my own part I see no reason to reject this or either of the other Expositions but to take our Saviours prayer in the largest and most comprehensive sense which will be most for the support and comfort of the Church And so accordingly the Observation shall be this DOCTRINE God can and will preserve those that belong to Jesus Christ from all evil as long as they remain in this world Whether the evil be the evil of corruption or the evil of affliction the evil of sin or the evil of punishment Whether the evil be the world as some conceive or the Devil as others think God can and will preserve those that belong to Jesus Christ from all these in such a sense as I shall open to you by and by Both these are manifest in this Petition of our Saviours here I pray saith he that thou wouldst keep them from the evil From what evil none is excepted and therefore out of doubt he means from all evil He prays that God would so preserve them that nothing that is really and truly evil not in it self and in its nature only but to them nothing that is so to them might come upon them And seeing Jesus Christ desires it of his Father it is very evident that he is able so to keep them or else it were a vain Prayer and it is as manifest that he will keep them so or else it were a fruitless and an ineffectual prayer God can and will preserve those that belong to Jesus Christ from all evil For clearing of the observation I shall shew you particularly and distinctly that God can and will preserve them from the evil of temptation and from the evil of corruption and from the evil of affliction And if he keep from these he keeps from all from the world and Devil too though neither of them be expresly mentioned for if the world or Devil hurt us it must be either by temptation or affliction God can and will preserve those that belong to Jesus Christ from the evil of temptation Whether you understand it of the temptation of the world or the temptation of the Devil
or the temptation of our own hearts God can and will preserve us from it or the evil of it as I shall shew you evidently from the Scripture Either he will preserve from the assault or from the prevalence or from the hurt of the temptation 1. Sometimes the Lord preserves those that belong to Christ from the assault of the temptation He doth not give the Tempter leave to tempt them For you must know my Brethren that the Devil cannot once inject a wicked thought or suggest a sinful motion without allowance granted him from God you may behold him bound and chained Apoc. 20.2 and that to this end that he may deceive no more untill the time and season of his chaining be expired and after loosed at the Lords appointment And he will loose him only when himself pleaseth So that the Devil cannot tempt us when he will he must confine himself within the compass of his chain Indeed if God enlarge him once he may go forth and entice us and prevail as you may see in that example 1 King â—2 22 But if he limit him he cannot move nor meddle with us any way This roaring Lyon walketh up and down saith the Apostle 1 Pet. 5.8 seeking whom he may devour Not whom he will it is not so but whom he may devour There are some whom he may assault and others whom he may not some whom he may devour and others whom he may not 2. If God preserve not those who belong to Jesus Christ from the assault he uses to preserve them from the prevalence of the temptation Perhaps he gives the tempter power to tempt them but then he doth not give them up into the tempters power And then the Devil or their own corruptions may entice them long enough before they can prevail against them unless he give them up to Sathan or their own lusts unless he leave them as it is said of Hezekiah in the same case 2 Chron. 32.31 You know that Sathan was permitted to set upon our Saviour Christ himself but though he had obtained leave to tempt him he had not leave to overcome him So at his earnest motion he procured a commission from the Lord to worry Job But he had only power to tempt him Job was not given up to his power and therefore though he did his worst he could not foll him in the combate So he desired to sift add winnow Peter and so far forth it seemeth he obtained his desire that he winnowed him indeed But though he winnowed him he could not hurt him because he had a God to keep him a Christ to intercede for him Simon Simon saith our Saviour Satan hath desired to have you that he may winnow you as Wheat Luke 22.31 But I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not We want not many sweet and pretious promises to this effect dispersed and scattered up and down the Scripture that God will either keep us from temptation or if he suffer and permit us to be tempted he will not give us up into the power of the temptation but will preserve us so that the very gates of hell shall not prevail against us Mat. 16.18 If Sathan or the world desire to set upon us the Lord will either save us and deliver us from the temptation which he knoweth how to do be the temptation what it will as the Apostle Peter speaks 1 Pet. 2.9 or else he will support us in it according to his Covenant with us for he is faithfull and will not suffer us to be tempted above measure as the Apostle shews 1 Cor. 10.13 And though he do not free us from it yet he will uphold us in it as he did the Apostle Paul 2 Cor. 12.9 who having received a thorn in the flesh the messenger of Satan to buffet him and seeking earnestly to God that he would free him from this troublesome unpleasing guest although he could not be delivered from it yet he was fortified against it and had this answer to his prayer My Grace is sufficient for thee and my strength is perfected in weakness Or 3. If the Lord preserve not those who belong to Jesus Christ neither from the assault nor from the prevalency of the temptation at least he keeps them from the hurt of the temptation He keeps them from the evil of it according to our Saviours prayer in my text I pray that thou wouldst keep them from the evil I must confess the holiest Saints in case may not be assaulted only but overcome and foiled in a temptation David a man who hath as large a testimony from the Holy Ghost himself for his uprightness as any man almost in sacred story yet he was tempted of the Devil 1 Chron. 21.1 yea and not tempted only but seduced and drawn away And that which was David case that might be the case of any other But then God suffers it for mercifull and gratious ends which himself best knows Perhaps to try them as he permitted Hezekiah to be foiled for that end God left him to try him 2 Chron. 32.31 and thus he deals with many that belong to Christ It may be they are apt to please themselves with a too good opinion of their own graces because they look upon themselves at such a time when there is no temptation to discover what they are And therefore God in such a case permits them to temptation for their good and then they see those gross corruptions in themselves which they could not have imagined Peter did little think till he was tried he had been such a Coward as he prov'd What that the question of a silly Maid should make him flatly to deny his Lord and Master and that with oaths and execrations too No it is evident he thought himself a stout and valiant man for he was resolute that death it self should never work so far upon him And therefore he was brought to the encounter that he might see how much he was mistaken of himself and how far short his real graces came of his imaginary fancies and conceits Sometimes God suffers those who belong to Jesus Christ to be foiled in a temptation to make them the more humble and the more watchfull and the more prayerfull and so by consequence the more holy even all their lives after And thus however the temptation doth them one way some hurt yet in another way it doth them much more good and so upon the whole they are better for it not the worse And thus God keeps them from the evil of temptation And as God keeps them from the evil of temptation so from the evil of corruption Indeed he doth not keep them so that they have no corruption in them for this is unattainable in this world neither doth he keep them so that this corruption doth not shew it self at all in the outward conversation No it hath both its esse and its operari in the holiest Saints But yet he can and
will preserve those that belong to Jesus Christ either from the act and guilt or hurt of corruption that is in them I shall a little touch upon them in their order In a qualified sence he keeps them from the act of their corruption so that they act it not at all as thus sometimes and in some certain things he keeps them and withholds them from or not at least as other men They also saith the Prophet David speaking of the Saints do no iniquity Psal 119.3 They sin not saith the Apostle 1 John 3.6 neither can they sin Conceive it not so freely and so remorselesly as others For the seed remaineth in them The spirit lusts against the flesh so that they cannot do the evil that they would at least not all the evil that they would Gal. 5.15 God keeps them by this means from much evil which else they would fall into as to instance in particulars He keeps them wholy from the great and unpardonable sin the sin against the Holy Ghost There is a sin to death saith the Apostle 1 John 5.16 to death not in the merit of it only for so is every sin to death if you look to the desert but in the issue and event And this God surely keeps them from that belong to Jesus Christ so that they never fall into it 2. He keeps them usually from the grosser acts of sin which the Apostle calls 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the defilements and pollutions of the world 2 Pet. 2.20 being the common mire and kennel in which the filthy Swine of this world wallow and which are termed by the Apostle Paul the works of the flesh which are manifest even to the the dimmest eye even to the light of nature it self Chap. 5.19 Such are adultery drunkenness perjury theft and such like Now from these foul and gross corruptions which cross the principles of common life and honesty in which the lewdest and prophanest wallow God usually keeps them that belong to Jesus Christ 3. He keeps them from committing any known sin resolvedly and with full consent of will Indeed there may be a velleity an incompleat and an imperfect will to sin in those that belong to Christ but a compleat and perfect will there cannot be For flesh and spirit being interwoven and commixt in every faculty and consequently in the will the will so farr as it is sanctified and renewed can never give allowance to the act of sin And whereas wicked and ungodly men are totally addicted and universaly devoted to it they act it wholly and with every part and power being nothing else but flesh It is not so with those that are renewed And hence saith Paul it is not I that do it Rom. 7.17 yet in the verse immediately before he said what I would not that do I. So that there is a double I in Paul I spiritual and I carnal I do it and I do it not Not I that am spiritual or in that part wherein I am spiritual but I that am carnal or in that part wherein I am carnal It is not I that do it but the flesh that dwelleth in me And thus God keeps them from the acts of sin Or if he do not alwayes keep them from the acts he alwayes frees them from the guilt of sin and so in that respect he keeps them from the evil of corruption and therefore he assures it to himself as his peculiar I even I am he that blotteth out thy sin It is God that justifies saith the Apostle Rom. 8.33 And with relation to this act of his he is called a deliverer Rom. 11.26 There shall come out of Zion the deliverer and he shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob. For this is my Covenant with them when I shall take away their sin God alwayes keeps them that belong to Jesus Christ from the hurt of the corruption that is in them he turns their very sins against their nature by accident to their advantage if all things then all these things work together for the best to them God doth them good even by their sins and by their falls he makes that to promote and further their salvation which seemeth most directly to hinder it and to oppose it Oh the riches of his mercy Blessings and Ordinances by accident do hurt to wicked men And even sins by accident do good to Gods people Thus we have shewed you that God can and will preserve those that belong to Jesus Christ from the evil of temptation and corruption And as God keeps those that belong to Jesus Christ from the evil of temptation and from the evil of corruption so from the evil of affliction I must confess he doth not keep them so that they are utterly exempt from all affliction They have their share and portion of it many times as well as any other men Many are the afflictions of the righteous saith the Psalmist Psal 34.19 not of the wicked only but the righteous too Yea their afflictions oftentimes are more and greater then the afflictions of the wicked are The Prophet David was too sensible of this so that his spirit fretted at it and he was envious at the foolish as himself confesseth Psal 73.3 when he saw the prosperity of wicked men Their strength is firm saith he there are no bands in their death They are not in trouble like other men nor are they plagued like other men no nor like better men Their eyes stand out with fatness they have more then heart can wish These are the wicked saith the Psalmist they prosper in the world But how fares it with David all this while why verily saith he I have cleansed my heart in vain and washed my bands in innocency for all the day long have I been plagued and chastned every morning And this is that which Christ forewarned his Disciples of that in the world they must have troubles there would be no avoiding of it But yet however God keeps them from the evil of affliction in the sence that I shall open to you in a few particulars 1. Sometimes when he sees it best he keeps them from affliction that it doth not touch them for a considerable time together He environs them with loving kindness round about so that no trouble or calamity can find a way to enter and to seize upon them according to that pretious promise Psal 5. ult For thou Lord wilt bless the righteous with favour wilt thou compass him as with a shield And thus he dealt a while with Job as Satan enviously suggested to the Lord Job 1.10 Hast thou not made a hedge about him and about all that he hath on every side thou hast blessed the work of his hands and his substance is increased in the Land So David though he were a man of many troubles and afflictions yet he had his Halcyon dayes There was a time when God had made his Mountain of prosperity so strong that he was verily perswaded he
should never be removed And there are many promises of special preservation from dangers and distresses made to those who have an interest in God and Christ I might heap up a multitude of such but there is one Psalm of David that seems to be a short Compendium and abridgement of them all viz. Psal 91. He shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler and from the noisome Pestilence He shall cover thee with his feathers his truth shall be thy shield and buckler thou shalt not be afraid for the terrour by night nor for the arrow that flyeth by day nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness nor the destruction that wasteth at noon-day A thousand shall fall at thy side and ten thousand on thy right hand but it shall not come nigh thee Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold it Thou shalt see it seize on others but for thy own part thou shalt be exempt from it There shall no evil befall thee neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling For he shall give his Angels charge over thee to keep thee Now these and such like promises the Lord makes good to his even in the very letter of them when in the infiniteness of his love and wisdom he sees it most expedient for them 2. Or if God do not keep them from affliction that it doth not touch them he keeps them that it doth not stay too long with them The rod of trouble though it strike them yet it doth not rest upon them It is on and off again in due time It s true God often suffers those who belong to Jesus Christ to be brought into affliction but then he doth not leave them there his manner is to bring them out again To deliver them from evil according to that passage in the Lords prayer And therefore he is stiled the deliverer of his people and the God of their salvation He that is our God is the God of salvation and to the Lord God belong the issues from death not from inferiour dangers only but from death it self And hence salvation is ascribed to him as his peculiar It is of the Lord sath Jonah Chap. 2.9 Salvation belongeth to the Lord saith David Psal 3.8 and his blessing upon his people It is his work to save us from distresses and afflictions the secondary means are subordinate to him they move but as he acts them And this is very usual with him if he prevent not the afflictions of his people that they do not come upon them yet he delivers them at length from those afflictions assoon as they have done their work in them yea let them be as many as they will Psal 34.19 Many are the afflictions of the righteous but the Lord delivereth them out of all 3. Or if God do not keep them who belong to Jesus Christ from the evil of affliction by way of preservation or deliverance from it he keeps them many times by way of preservation and delivery in it So that though it seize upon them it is no pain or trouble to them And thus he kept the three Confessors he did not save them from the furnace but he saved them in the furnace Dan. 3.27 The fire had no power upon their bodies nor was a hair of their head singed neither were their Coats changed nor the smell of fire did pass upon them According to that pretious promise Isa 43.2 when thou passest through the waters I will be with thee and through the rivers they shall not overwhelm thee when thou walkest through the fire thou shalt not be burned neither shall the flame kindle upon thee Or if not thus he qualifies his people so with inward peace and comfort and assurance that they feel not what they feel They are so ravished and transported to an extasie of holy joy that they are in a sort insensible even of the greatest torment that humane cruelty can devise to inflict Unto the righteous saith the Psalmist ariseth light in darkness glorious comfort even in the midst of greatest troubles Psal 112.4 Thy light shall rise in obscurity saith God Isa 58.10 And thy darkness shall be as the noon-day Such light did there arise to some of the blessed Martyrs when it was darkest with them in regard of outward comforts so that they sung in the prisons in the irons in the flames they were not able to contain themselves by reason of the sodain flash of joy that came breaking in upon them which made them to forget the miseries and torments which they suffered yea though the fire did kindle on them and consume them into ashes yet many of them warbled out melodious accents in the flames professed that they were amidst the fire as in a bed of down and spices where they felt nothing else but admirable joy and comfort These men you see did more then conquer they did triumph in the very midst of their unparalleld and matchless sufferings so that they might have taken up that comfortable speech of the Apostle Rom. 8.37 In all these things we are more then Conquerors And what were those things see at the 35. verse In tribulation and distress and persecution and famine and nakedness and peril and sword then which there are no greater outward evils in the world In all these things we are more then Conquerors through him that loved us 4. Or if God do not keep his people from the smart at least he keeps them from the hurt of their afflictions The world indeed may persecute them and that to the very death they may take away their names their estates their lives from them but though they kill them they can never hurt them God keeps them from the evil of all this from the evil in the world as you have it in my Text what ever comes upon them they are no losers in the main but gainers rather All things are for their sakes saith the Apostle 2 Cor. 4.15 for their profit and advantage Yea though the outward man perish by reason of the length or violence of the affliction the inward man is renewed day by day Their afflictions work out for them a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory They may suffer grievously their sufferings may deprive them of the life of nature but they cannot deprive them of the life of grace or glory They may be persecuted but they cannot be forsaken totally and finally they may be cast down but they cannot be destroyed 2 Cor. 4.9 They may be destroyd as men but they can never be destroyd as Saints In this respect they are like Mount Sion that can never be removed The rain descended saith our Saviour and the floods came and the wind blew and beat upon the house and it fell not for it was founded upon a rock Mat. 7.25 q.d. Nothing can hurt or overthrow him that is built on Jesus Christ he shall stand fast for evermore Nay to go a little further God doth not only
keep them that belong to Jesus Christ from the hurt of their afflictions but more then so he doth them much good by them that they may say as David doth when all is ended It is good for me that I have been afflicted I give you but a taste of this and I have done with Explication 1. Sometimes he awakens them by their afflictions they are sleepy and secure and God jogges and startles them and rouzes them by this means When men are bound in fetters saith Elihu and held fast in the cords of their afflictions so that they are not able to unlooose themselves and get away what then why then he sheweth them their works and their transgressions that they have exceeded in q.d. At such a time his manner is to represent their sins to them with all their circumstantial aggravations See an example of it in the Lords own people Gen. 42.21 when Josephs Brethren saw themselves taken for spies in Egypt and so in present danger of their lives the sin they had committed many years ago came as fresh into their minds and lay as heavy on their Consciences as if it had been newly done I know that troubles and distresses and the approach of death it self hath not always this effect on all men the Lord hath poured on some the spirit of slumber but usually they have on Gods people 2. Sometimes God abates their pride by their afflictions There is not any sin that makes a man more odious to the Lord then pride doth or is a greater bar to his salvation All that are proud in heart are an abomination to him Prov. 16.5 neither is there are any man but hath some reliques of this leaven in him which puffeth up his heart and makes him swell beyond measure Yea the choicest of the Saints have mighty inclinations to it especially if all things go on their side As it is said of Hezekiah when he was put into a prosperous estate his heart was lifted up 2 Chron. 32.25 and therefore God exposes them to sharp afflictions that he may hide the pride of man as the expression is Joh 33.17 that he may lessen and abate and wear it out till it be not to be seen 3. Sometimes God draws his people nearer to himself by their afflictions In their affliction they will seek me early saith the Lord of his people Hos 5.15 It seems they had been wofully regardless of the Lord in former times of happiness and peace and comfort but saith the Lord In their affliction they will hasten to me they will be eager after me and never rest till they have found me And this you shall observe to be the disposition of the sons men yea of the best and holyest of them they look not after God so much at any time as when they are in greatest exigencies and distresses And as the sails though they be some addition to the burthen of the ship yet they help it on the faster to the Haven So crosses and afflictions though they be a burthen to us yet they hasten us to God and draw us on the faster to the port of happiness And therefore God relating divers judgements which he was resolved to bring upon his own people by which he meant to strip them naked of all outward comforts at length concludes that this should be the issue of it Isa 17.7 At that day shall they look unto their Maker and their eyes shall have respect unto the Holy One of Israel It is a miserable thing yet so it is as long as we have any thing on earth to rest upon we enquire not after God With Noahs Dove if we can find a twig to pitch upon we are regardless of the Ark and therefore God by heavy crosses and afflictions strips us of these outward helps and strikes away the earthly things by which we stand and when we know not what to do when we are driven out of all our holes then our eyes are upon God when we look on every hand and refuge fails us every way and no man careth for our souls then we address our selves to God and say to him Thou art our refuge Psal 142.4 It seems that David though he were a holy man was very apt while he was furnished with these outward favors to rely too much upon them so far as to neglect the Lord. But when the Lord by crosses and afflictions took them from him or made him see the vanity and insufficiency of them then he cryed out And now Lord what wait I for my hope is in thee now I have tryed how fickle and how vain the creature is now I perceive by sensible experience that no help is in it Now Lord what wait I for c. And thus I think I have sufficiently cleared the point God can and will preserve c. To add a word or two for Application Vse This serves to let us see the admirable and transcendent happiness of all that have an interest in Jesus Christ in this respect that they are safe from all evil God will withhold no good from them as the Prophet David speaks and then upon the other side he will keep all evil from them as you have it in my Text. Beloved we are here in an uncomfortable place a wicked world in which we are exposed as considered in our selves to all evil We are exempt from no temptation No not the blackest and the bloodlest to the very worst of sins We are secure from no affliction no not the sharpest and the most extream If there be any worse then other which we conceive would be most bitter and intolerable to us it is going in the world and it may seise on us as well as others Yea we are always bearing with us in our bosoms that which is infinitely worse then both the other viz. the evil of corruption so that we seem to be in a very sad condition But yet this comfort waits upon us still the Lord will surely keep us absolutely free from the evil of them all The worst of them may do us good but it shall never do us hurt as long as there is any vertue in our Saviours Intercession as long as he hath any interest in God the Father And therefore when we look upon the world and see it marching out against us with bloody persecutions and afflictions when we look upon the Devil and see him ready to assault us with his fiery darts and fierce tentations when we look inward to our own hearts and see such swarms of hellish lusts and base corruptions there and are ready to cry out in the anguish of our souls Oh miserable men that we are who shall deliver us let us look up to Jesus Christ and think upon his powerful Intercession with the Father that he hath prayed him to preserve and keep us from all the evil in the world and so let us be quiet and secure Let us say as David once Though I walk in
the valley of the shadow of death among men among Devils among temptations and corruptions and afflictions of all sorts of all sizes yet I will not be afraid for Christ hath interceded for me to the Father and he will certainly preserve me from the hurt of all these He will keep me from every evil work and preserve me to his heavenly Kingdom JOHN 17.16 They are not of the world even as I am not c. AND thus far of the Second Argument with which our Saviour presseth and enforceth his Petition to his Father together with the Explication of it To this he adds a repetition of that which he delivered word for word before as you shall see if you compare them both together They are not of the world even as I am not of the world He said before I have given them thy Word and the world hath hated them because they are not of the world even as I am not of the world And here again they are not of the world even as I am not of the world So that you see my Brethren Repetition of the self same thing and in the self same words in Prayer is not to be condemned in all cases Our Saviour as he is our Mediator to pray for us so he is our Master too to instruct us how to pray Master say the Disciples to our Saviour Luk. 11.1 teach us to pray as John also taught his Disciples And he teaches us to pray not by his precept only but by example too And in the latter way he teaches us in this place to fetch over things again that have been said before in prayer yea sometimes in the very same expressions And in another place the Holy Ghost observeth of him that he prayed a second and a third time saying the very same words Matth. 26.44 He could have varied but he would not varie because his judgement and affection led him into the very same tract wherein he had gone once or twice before And so when repetitions are not of necessity but out of choise because the zeal and fervor of the speaker draws him and invites him to it they are sometimes of very good use Indeed our Saviour I acknowledge interdicteth repetitions but mark what repetitions my Beloved Battologies vain repetitions When ye pray 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 use no vain repetitions as the Heathens do and as the Papists do who use to babble over so many Pater Nosters and so many Ave Maries and think to be heard for their much speaking as it is added there in that place Mat. 6.7 Observe it well our Saviour saith not use no repetitions but use no vain repetitions And when they flow from the strength of the affection that knows not which way to get off from some considerable and important thing as you may note in David and other Saints in Scripture they are not vain but to very good purpose What was our Saviours purpose in the repetition that he uses in my Text is diversly conceived by those that write upon it Once this is evident to me there is the same occasion for the repetition that there was for the mention of the self-same thing before Before the hatred to which they were exposed in the world and here the evil which they were like to suffer from the world of both which this was the true reason because indeed they were not of this world but of another There saith our Saviour the world hath hated them how so They are not of the world even as I am not of this world Here saith our Saviour I pray thee Father keep them from the evil of the world Why are they like to suffer evil from the world how so The same again They are not of the world even as I am not of the world And he would have it to be very well observed that all the hatred and injurious dealing to which his poor Disciples were exposed in the world proceeded not from any fault of theirs but it was meerly upon this account because they were not of the world but were conformable to Christ himself in this particular The world likes them much the worse because they were in this respect like Christ I shall not now insist upon the words as considered in dependence and as they are a reason of the evil usage which Christs Disciples use to meet withal in this world For this I did when I last met with them But I shall take them absolutely as considered in themselves And so they yield us out this general Observation DOCTRINE That Christs Disciples are in this respect like Christ himself that they are of another world as he is There are two things in the point which I shall clear distinctly and in order First Christ himself is not of this world but of another Then Christs Disciples are in this respect like him They are like him many ways in many things and especially in this among the rest That they are not of the world as he is not of the world As for the first of these That Christ himself is not of this world but of another you see it is his own express assertion in my Text I am not of this world He doth not say I am not in this world for that indeed he could not say when he made this prayer Nay he saith the contrary but a verse or two before These things speak I in the world But I am not of this world this he affirmeth here and in divers others places Though he were really a man yet he was not like other men at least not like worldly men in this regard as he told the Pharisees Joh. 8.23 Ye are of this world I am not of this world Now to open this a little I shall shew you particularly and distinctly that Jesus Christ when he was here in this world yet he was not of this world but of another especially in these respects As first because he came from another world And secondly because he lived in another world And thirdly because he went to another world I shall follow these in order 1. Jesus Christ when he was here in this world yet he was not of this world but of another because he came from another world And he was more properly of the world he came from then of the world he sojourned in for a little space only And thus he argues with the Jews in the fore-alleadged Scripture Joh. 8.23 Ye are from beneath I am from above saith he And what doth he infer upon it Ye are of this world I am not of this world You see both the clauses answer one another Ye are from beneath and therefore ye are of this world I am from above and therefore I am not of this world In this respect he is called the Lord from heaven 1 Cor. 15.47 Observe it not the Lord in heaven but the Lord from heaven and that not only with relation to his second but also to
like Christ himself that they are of another world as he is No marvel then though they be made a gazing stock and a wonder in the world If Turks or Indians walk along the streets the common people use to gaze upon them and so wonder at their habit and deportment c. And are not Christs Disciples of another Countrey yea of an other world Are they not men of singularity Are not their wayes and fashions divers from the fashions of this world No marvell then though they be men of wonder as the Prophet speaks Zac. 3.8 though they be hooted at and though they be made as spectacles and gazing stocks to worldly men Use 3 Is it so that Christs Disciples c. Then let them live like men of another world shining as lights amidst a perverse and crooked generation that sit in darkness and in the shaddow of death Let Heaven appear in their discourses and their Conversation Here we may remain and must till God be pleased to call us hence but our continuance here must be accompanied with a reserved exemption of our selves from the Contagion of the times and with an earnest and unwearied striving against the stream of the corruptions of the places where we live not following a multitude to do evil We must be separated from the world my brethren not in place but in affection and in Conversation I pray not saith our Saviour ver 15. of this Chapter that thou wouldst take them out of the world but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil We must not on consideration of the notorious lewdness and prophaness of the inhabitants of this world who vex our souls with their ungodly deeds desire the Lord to carry us to Heaven in a fiery Chariot as he did Elijah to take us presently out of this world but rather to preserve us in it that we may keep our robes pure and undefiled among so many garments spotted with the flesh That against the violent and restless oppositions and temptations of the world and worldly men we may stand impregnable shewing our selves the sons of God by overcoming it and them The veriest wretch may keep himself from grosser acts when he hath no occasions nor allurements to them But in the midst of millions of enticements and commanding provocations and in a world that lies in wickedness to be singular in goodness this is indeed like Christs Disciple who himself was holy harmless separate from sinners It was Tullies commendation of Muraena Non tam laudaâ—dâ—s Muraena quod in Asia vixerit quam quod in Asia continenter vixerit Muraena deserved not so much commendations that he lived in Asia as that he lived continently there amongst such a loose and effaeminate people where his Chastity must of necessity suffer many encounters And Gods of Job that there was none like him in the earth Such must we strive to be and come as neer the pattern as we may Use 4 Is it so that Christs Disciples c. Then let them not regard this world nor the vanities thereof We see that Travellers and Strangers do not set their hearts on any thing they meet with in the way If they see stately Houses Orchards Gardens if they hear curious musick c. they are not taken up with these things No they keep on their way and are not hindred nor withdrawn by the most pleasing Avocations Doth any Traveller fall a building at his Inn a planting or a sowing by the way And therefore seeing we are of another world and consequently strangers here let us not set our hearts and our affections on the things that are beneath but on the things that are above let us use this world as though we used it not for necessity alone and not so much for profit or delight to further us in holy duties not to stop us to help heavenward not to hinder O let us not by scraping up the dung of this world disgrace our Countrey and bring it to a low esteem with worldly men Let it not be said to us as Anacharsis said to Atticus opbraiding him because he was a Scythian Mihi inquit dedecori est patria at patriae tu My Countrey is a shame to me but thou art dishonour to thy Countrey No let us honour it let carnal wretches know that it is a wealthy place that there we have a rich inheritance and large possessions and that our Father who is king thereof is well able to provide for all his children Is it so that Christs Disciples c. Then let us not desire nor fancy Use 5 to our selves my brethren any long continuance here but let us be preparing for our journey home A stranger makes no long abode or residence in any place he tarries for a night or so and passeth onward to the Countrey where he dwelleth And therefore seeing we are of another world let us alwayes be thinking of our journey home and making preparation for it every day I say as Moses Deut. 32.29 O that men were wise that they understood this that they would consider their latter end Is it so that Christs Disciples c. Why are they so unwilling then Use 6 to leave this world Why are they so averse from death and dissolution and departure hence Indeed for wicked and ungodly wretches who are the men of this world as the Psalmist calls them who have their portion in this present world no portion in the other it is no wonder that they should be loth die O death how bitter needs must thy remembrance be to him that lives at ease and rest in his possessions But unto you who are of another world I say as Christ to his Disciples Arise let us go hence Why my beloved what is the matter with you What are you loth to go home Methinks you should consider with your selves that when you die you go to your own world your own Father your own friends where you shall be as welcome as your hearts can wish God your Father will receive you Christ your brother will embrace you Triumphant Saints and Angels will rejoyce in you And after all the troubles of a tedious journey you shall sit down with Abraham Isaac and Jacob in the Kingdom of Heaven feasting it in companies feeding on the hidden Manna and drinking deeply of the pure and Christall River of Water of Life proceeding from the Throne of God and of the Lamb. And who would willingly remain abroad in an unpleasing Pilgrimage and not choose rather to come home to such sweet Company and to such blessed Entertainment as this is And thus we have at length dispatched the first part of our Saviours prayer in behalf of his Apostles and Disciples who were then about him and in it the first main thing which he desireth for them preservation The second follows now in order to be entred on and here the main thing that he seeks in their behalf is Sanctification Sanctifie them through thy
Christ one with them Why they are against God and therefore certainly God is not with them but against them and that is a sad union The peace and friendship and confederacy of such is like the tempering of iron brass and clay together that will by no means soder or unite The knot will certainly untie at last the union will dissolve if God and Christ be not engaged in it And as the Hebrews note of the name of man and wife Ish and Ishah that if you take away the letters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which make the Name of God there remains nothing else but Esh and that is fire the fire of discord and dissention So certainly if God be out of any union yea let it be as near as that of man and wife which is one of the nearest in the world there will be fire among the parties to it the fire of jealousie and rage that will devour them and destroy them in the end And it will prove like the unhappy combination between Abimelech and them of Shechem concerning which the Holy Ghost foreshewed Judg. 9.20 that fire should come out of Abimelech and devour the men of Shechem and the house of Millo And fire should come out from the men of Shechem and the house of Millo and devour Abimilech Use 2 Is it so that the perfection of the union of believers stands in this that even as they are one among themselves c. Then truly they have cause to bless the Lord that he is pleased to unite with them to be one with such worms as they are and so to make the union perfect Ah my Beloved if God did not joyn with you if he stood aloof from you what would your Union or Communion each with other profit you or comfort you what would it do without God But seeing God and Christ are in you seeing they are one with you this is indeed a perfect union all are joyned that should be joyned this is a happy and a heavenly Conjunction O my Beloved I beseech you labour so to walk that God and Christ may not withdraw from you It 's true I must confess he never really and totally and finally forsaketh those in whom he dwels but he forsakes them sensibly so that he seems to be no more with them and therefore let it be your study and endeavor to walk so humbly so holily that God and Christ may still delight to dwell with you and to dwell in you and to shew themselves to you that you may know that they are with you Be sure you never joyn in any business in which they will not joyn with you Be sure you never venture upon any action that will provoke them to withdraw from you Oh do no wicked no unclean thing that may offend the holy God Allow no evil in your hearts that may make his being in you uncomfortable and unpleasing to him Do not defile the Temple that he dwells in least you cause him to resolve as once he did in reference to Israel Hos 5. ult I will go and return to my place I will stay no longer with you And thus of the Second Argument with which our Saviour prosecutes his suit which hath been taken from the end at which he aimed in giving them the glory which he had received from God the Father And likewise of the third which hath been taken from the end of Christs inhabitation in believers and of the Fathers inhabitation in himself I in them and thou in me that they may be perfect in one A fourth is added in the following words That the world may know that thou hast sent me But that is but a repetition of the very same that hath been used in the 21. ver and in the very same words Only this difference there is in that knowing here is put for believing there For there it is that the world may believe and here it is that the world may know c. To shew that Christ intends not justifying faith in that expression but such a knowledge or acknowledgement of his being sent from God as the very world themselves who never did nor never shall believe are capable of And in that sense I handled it in that place I shall not here insist again upon it but pass to the fifth Argument with which our Saviour prosecutes the self same suit And it is taken from another fruit that it would have in worldly men It would convince them that believers are exceedingly beloved of God If they observed them to live in nearest unity and peace together they would be perswaded thence that they were very much in Gods favour That they may be perfect in one that the world may believe that thou hast sent me and that thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me So that here I might observe DOCTRINE That it is an apparent evidence of Gods love when true believers live in unity and peace together It is a sign he bears a singular regard to them when he makes and keeps them one among themselves yea it is such a sign of Gods love as worldly men who have but half an eye to see will mark and take special notice of Let them be one saith our Saviour in my Text why so That the world may know that thou hast loved them If they be knit together in holy indissoluble love the world will see and be satisfied thereby that they are much in thy affection and that thou hast a very dear regard to them And hereby you may see my Brethren Vse what a stumbling block it is to worldly men when there are such perpetual rents and breaches and discords and divisions between those who profess themselves to be believers when they observe them to be always wrangling and contending one against another Why they conclude from hence that certainly God doth not love them nor any such as they are Or if he did he would unite them and sweetly knit their hearts together he would not suffer them to live in such a bitter and uncomfortable and unquiet way No out of question saith the world this cannot be the company of men whom God loves and whom he bears such dear affection to above the rest what ever their pretences be and therefore we will never joyn with them Whereas if there were nothing else but heavenly and holy unity and peace among them the world would know that they are beloved of God and look upon them as the most desirable society of people under heaven But this I do but glance at in my passage by The thing that I intend to fasten and insist upon is the comparison our Saviour hints between his Fathers love to true believers and himself By which he intimates it to be much one For if you mark it well our Saviour saith not only That the world may know that thou hast loved them but that thou hast loved them as thou hast loved
Baptist Joh. 1.18 No man hath seen God at any time conceive it with the outward eye The Son of man who is in the bosom of the Father he hath declared him He hath discovered him in some respect to that eye because he is so very like him So that if you see the Son you shall see the Father in him the resemblance is so great that in seeing one of them you see the other And hence saith Christ to Philip once Joh. 14.9 He that hath seen me hath seen the Father also So that our Saviour both as God and Man is like the Father and so in that respect is fitted for his Fathers love And as there is Proportion so Propriety as he is like the Father so he is the Fathers own and therefore meet to be beloved of him Indeed there is an interest on both hands God is Christs God God even thy God hath anointed thee saith David Psal 45.7 And Christ is Gods Christ Psal 2.2 The Kings of the earth set themselves and the Rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his Christ Indeed he is the Fathers Chosen the Fathers servant the Fathers Son He is his Son as God by eternal generation as man by union He is his in all capacities and under all considerations take him which way you will he is the Fathers So that no marvail though the Father love him and love him dearly too We that are men are wont to love our own yea many times we dote upon them though they have little lovely in them But Christ who is his Fathers own is altogether lovely so that he hath cause to love him And this for clearing of the first branch that God the Father loveth Jesus Christ Now for the second branch that he hath loved him from everlasting This is expresly taught us also in the Text Thou hast loved me saith Christ before the foundation of the world that is before time was As the time will never be when God will not love Christ So the time never was when God did not love Christ That place is notable to this purpose Prov. 8.22 The Lord possessed me in the beginning c. I was set up from everlasting c. I was as one brought up with him and I was dayly his delight Observe it well I was dayly his delight I you will answer he was so as God But how was he so as man Object How could the Father love the Son as Man from everlasting since he was not from everlasting God is one pure act Answ he doth not that in time as to internal immanent acts which he did not from everlasting Though things are past present and to come with us yet they are not so with God All things are present with him at the same time as Jesus Christ in reference to God and his decree was slain so he was incarnate too before the foundation of the world and so he was beloved as man and as incarnate before the foundation of the world and under this consideration he speaks especially to his Father in my Text Thou hast loved me saith he viz. as Man and Mediator before the foundation of the world Now is it so That God the Father dearly loveth Jesus Christ Use then surely it is ill with them that hate him and it is well with them that love him If God love Jesus Christ so dearly certainly he hates them that hate Christ and he loves them that love Christ 1. If God love Jesus Christ so dearly he hates them that hate Christ and he will surely be avenged on them to the very utmost The love he bears to Jesus Christ will stir him up to execute his fiercest wrath and to take most severe revenge upon them Believe it brethren God will not spare them in the day of vengeance he will shew no bowels of compassion to them who hate his dear Son Christ to whom he bears such infinite affection The more he loves Christ the more he will hate them that hate him and the more sharply will he deal with them But you ask me Are there any such that hate Christ and if there be Quest which way may they be discovered Some there are that hate Christ Answ and that not in Hell only the Devil and the damned ghosts there but on earth among men yea in the very bosom of the Church it self He is not hated only of a company of men that are but forraigners and strangers to him as the Heathen are for that is no such admirable thing that they that know him not should hate him but of his Citizens who are acquainted with him and who are under his immediate Rule and Jurisdiction Luk. 19.14 He is refused not of the Heathen people only but of divers in the Church and some of them of greatest note authority and learning there to wit the builders of the Church He is the stone which they that would be counted Workmen Master-workmen stumble at and set aside Psal 118.22 There be that live in opposition and hostility against him even where his Kingdom is set up he ruleth in the midst of his enemies as his Father speaks of him Psal 110.2 Where our Saviour hath a Church there the Devil hath a Chappel yea it may be a Cathedral I know thy works and where thou dwellest saith our Saviour to the Church of Pergamus even where Satans seat is Apoc. 2.13 Observe it well where Satans seat is that is where he is Bishop where he keeps his residence where his Episcopal Cathedral and his chair is Christ can never want his enemies where Satan hath such interest and such authority as this is Indeed the greatest Enemie that Christ hath in the world conceit it among mortal men is in the Church and that is Antichrist a Bishop too who hath his name from being opposite to Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as who should say against Christ He sitteth in the Temple in the Church as the Apostle Paul speak 2 Thess 2.4 There were false brethren in the Church of the Philippians who notwithstanding all their glorious protestations were enemies to Christ as the Apostle tells them plainly Phil. 3.18 and he tells it them with tears he was so much affected with it And surely there are many everywhere and in every Congregation who pretend much worship and submission and Ceremony and respect to Christ And yet such is the damnable hypocrisie and falseness of the hearts of men they swell with inward ranck or rage and hate against him It is not every one that calls him Rabbi Master as the false Herodians did that kisses him and bows before him and salutes him with Hayl Master as deceitful Judas did that is indeed a friend to Christ No men may make a flourish and profess they love the Lord and say that he is infinitely dear unto them and yet may be as real enemies to him and to his Kingdom as Judas that betrayed him the Judge and Officers
condition the Lord notwithstanding will be mercifull to them But as you tender the salvation of your pretious souls I beseech you to observe that Gods own word is peremptory and express for this that none that know not God shall have any share in the mercy of God or in the glory of the world to come Oh continue thy loving kindness to them that know thee to them and none but them saith David Psal 36.10 It is a people of no understanding saith the Prophet of the Jews Isa 27.11 And what follows Therefore he that made them will have no mercy upon them It is the common apprehension of vulgar and ignorant people that he that made them will save them too No saith the Prophet if they be ignorant of God he that made them will not have mercy upon them They have not known my wayes saith God unto whom I sware in my wrath that they should never enter into my rest But you will ask me then Quest By what means shall we come to know God Truly there is but one way of coming to the knowledge of him Answ and that way is Jesus Christ No man hath seen God at any time 1 John 18. What then is he not to be seen or known at all by any means Yes though he be not to be seen or known immediately in himself yet mediately in and by the Son he may be known For he hath manifested and revealed him to us No man hath seen God at any time the only begotten Son that came out of the bosome of the Father he hath declared him Indeed it was the business for which our Saviour came into this lower world to bring God down to us that we might be acquainted with him And if ever you see or know God you must have light from Jesus Christ I am the light saith he John 8.12 He that follows me shall have the light of life And therefore if you would have this light follow Jesus Christ for it How you must follow him so as to fetch this light from him I have directed you before on the third verse of this Chapter Is it so that unbelievers and unsanctified persons know not God Vse 2 What cause have true believers then to admire and adore the special mercy of the Lord to them that they should be acquainted with him That he should give them the preferment in such a blessed and glorious priviledge as this is That now they can say to God as our Saviour in my text Oh Righteous Father the world hath not known thee but we have known thee O Lord whence is this to us how is it Lord that thou dost manifest thy self to us and not unto the world as the Disciples said John 14.22 How comes this to pass Lord Truly this is free-grace and free-mercy mercy to be admired and wondred at Oh let our souls and all that is within us bless the Lord Let us take up our Saviours words Father we thank thee that thou hast hid thy self from a world of wise and prudent men and hast revealed thy self to such babes as we are We bless thy name for this mercy And truly we have cause to bless him for this knowledge is our life keep it for it is thy life saith Solomon Prov. 4.13 and life is a pretious thing If we had still remained in the condition that the world is in we had never known God we must have died to all eternity we had been punished with eternal perdition we could never have enjoyed him who is the God of our life But now we know him so as to love him we shall be sure to live with him and that for ever Nay this is life yea life eternal in regard of the beginning such a life as is above the power of death and dissolution as our Saviour Christ assures us John 17.3 This is life eternal to know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent JOHN 17.25 But I have known thee and these have known c. AND thus of what our Saviour speaks against the world Oh Righteous Father the world hath not known thee Proceed we to know what he speaks for himself and true believers But I have known thee and these have known that thou hast sent me There is no difficulty in the terms requiring any tedious explication I have known thee saith our Saviour to the Father though the world be strangers to thee yet I am very well acquainted with thee I know thee inwardly And my Disciples here have known that thou hast sent me They have been throughly perswaded that I am a messenger sent forth from thee to manifest thy nature and thy will to them which I have done accordingly I have declared to them thy name So they have known thee by my means So that the special thing to be observed here my brethren is the order in which the knowledge of the Father is dispensed First Christ the Mediator knows him he is acquainted with him in the first place I know thee saith our Saviour here And then Believers are acquainted with him by the means of Christ And these have known that thou hast sent me and I have declared unto them thy name The Observation then is this DOCTRINE That Jesus Christ and he alone knows God immediately and others know him by the means of Christ All saving knowledge of the Father comes out by Jesus Christ to his people Christ knows him first and then we know him in the second place by him No man hath seen God at any time John 1.18 What then is he not to be seen or known at all by any means Yes though he be not to be seen or known by us immediately in himself yet mediately in and by the Son he may be known for he hath manifested and revealed him to us No man hath seen God at any time The only begotten Son which is in the bosome of the Father he hath declared him Indeed it was the business for which our Saviour came into this lower world to bring God down to us that we might be acquainted with him Ye neither know me nor my Father saith our Saviour to the Jews John 8.19 If ye had known me ye should have known my Father also q. d. I would have brought you to the knowledge of my Father And as the Book in Apoc. 5.9 had still remained a sealed Book unless the Lamb had opened it so God had still remained a concealed God he had never been discovered and manifested to us in a saving way unless the Son himself had done it So that the Point is plain you see That Jesus Christ and he alone knows God immediately and others know him by the means of Christ And therefore in the first place this may serve for information to let Vse 1 us see that no man can be saved by his own innate knowledge nor by the light that is naturally in him let him use it how he will or how
Will savingly declared to them have yet defects and imperfections in their knowledge of him so that they stand in need of further Declaration The Name of God was so far manifested and declared to these Apostles and Disciples as was necessary to salvation So far our Saviour had fully and compleatly made it known to them he had concealed nothing from them of his Fathers Name in the ignorance of which whosoever dies must perish For they were in the state of grace and of salvation when he spake those words I have declared unto them thy Name And yet he addeth presently you see I will declare it I will make further declarations and discoveries of thy Name to them And so accordingly he did assoon as he was risen from the dead He shewed himself alive to them being seen of them forty days together Act. 1.3 And what did he in that time Why he instructed them in things concerning God and his Kingdom as you may see in that place And when he was ascended into Heaven he was mindful of his promise which he had often made to them and so accordingly dispatched the Holy Spirit down among them to lead them further onward in the knowledge of the Father Indeed the best are Novices in this regard they have not yet attained to a perfect man in point of holy and divine knowledge as Ephes 4.13 It is true there is a great deal of variety among the Saints aswell in this as other graces according to the measure of the gift of Christ Ephes 4.7 But in the best it is a measure and no more it is not fulness and perfection He that hath most of God revealed to him yet knows him but in part and he that hath the clearest sight of him sees him but darkly in a glass as 1 Cor. 13.12 And therefore this is called the seeing of the back parts of the Lord as when we see the back parts of a man we know him but by guess only we know him not so perfectly and so distinctly as when we come to see his face Such a sight of God it is that we attain in this world And therefore the Apostle Paul who in this point of holy and divine knowledge was not behind the very chiefest Apostles who had his Raptures and his Extasies and who was taken up into the third Heaven and had such things revealed to him as were not to be uttered by the tongue of man professeth notwithstanding that he had not yet attained nor was he yet perfect But saith he I follow after that I may apprehend Phil. 3.12 So that he was Viator and not Comprehensor he was in the condition that the people were Hos 6.3 he followed on to know the Lord. The people of Coloss were eminent for grace and knowledge and yet for them it is the Apostle prays That they might increase in the knowledg of God Col. 1.10 So that the point is plain as you see They that have the Name of God his Nature and his Will savingly c. Object But you will interpose and say perhaps That it should seem by some expressions in the Scriptures that God hath been revealed fully to some certain men in this life as to Jacob for an instance Gen. 32.30 and to Moses Numb 12.8 With him will I speak saith God mouth to mouth even apparently not in dark speeches and the similitude of the Lord shall he behold Sol. But this my Brethren must be understood comparatively of the more clear and full discovery of the Lord to Jacob and to Moses then to many other men but as for the perfect sight and knowledge of him this was not imparted neither to Jacob nor to Moses and for the latter God himself affirms expresly Thou shalt not see my face saith he to Moses Exod. 33.10 that is the fulness of my glory for none shall see my face and live That is reserved to the state of glory when we shall see God face to face as the Scripture phrase is when we shall know as we are known And this is that which Schoolmen call the beatifical vision wherein consists the main of our beatitude hereafter as Matth. 5.8 Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God He doth not say they do see him but they shall see God which the Apostle makes the great ingredient in the happiness and glory prepared for the Saints at the time of Christs appearing 1 Joh. 3.2 We know that when we shall appear he shall be like him and we shall see him as he is Now we see him as we may then we shall see him as he is But why have they who have the Name of God savingly declared to them defects and imperfections in their knowledge Why doth not Jesus Christ in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge and that for the accommodation of his members furnish and supply them Why doth he not assoon as he begins to teach them declare all his Fathers Name to them but keeps back something still for further discovery There are two special reasons of it to name no more at this time Christ doth not shew them all at once because they are not capable of it A scholar is not capable of all he is to learn at first dash He cannot take in all at once even in his first lesson and hence his Master leads him onward by degrees first gives him easier and after brings him on to harder Lessons Even so doth Jesus Christ with his scholars he goes along with every one as he can learn as he is able to receive it in He doth not shew them all his Fathers glory at a clap for that he knows would dazle them and over-whelm them but le ts in now a little light upon them and then a little more as he perceives their senses to be exercised Instils into their minds and understandings the knowledge of his Father by degrees and as by learning their capacities are widened so he goes on to further discoveries This course he took with the Apostles what they were able to receive he taught them out of hand but reserved other things as you may see Joh. 16.12 I have many things to say unto you but you cannot bear them now I am to say them but you cannot bear them now and therefore I will take some other time to reveal those things to you Christ doth not shew them all at once that he may keep his Saints humble As long as there is flesh and nature in us as there will be while we remain in this world high measures and degrees of knowledge may exalt us and lift us up above our selves And therefore Jesus Christ in love and wisdom uses to bestow upon his people so much knowledge as he sees fit for them A little more it may be would undo them They would set their hearts it may be as the heart of God himself They would be as Gods knowing good and evil Shrewd fellows