unperswaded or halfe perswaded of the truth Hebâ— 2.2.3.4 Saint Paul to the Hebrewes Cap. 2. tells us if they who despised Moses Law upon two or three witnesses were condemned what shall become of them who despise so great salvation who still distrust that truth of God which was first spoken by the Lord of heaven and earth comming in the flesh Miracles serve to convince the soule of the truth sealed thereby afterward confirmed by such as heard him by miracles and the power of the word in those who were converted So may I say here this very text of Naaman shall stand up and convince all that maintaine selfe and selfe-love carnall and corrupt reason against the truth and power of the promise yea this miracle whereby the word was strengthned with all those miracles by which any truth of Christ hath since been justified shall rise up and convince all unbeleevers I meane such as live under meanes in that day For why Though they saw none of these miracles yet hearing the word beholding the seales receiving them into all our sences I say such a word as hath beene ratified by all the wonders of the Old and New Testament serving to beare down a base heart of unbeliefe about the truth power love al-sufficiency of God if they beleeve not by all these they shall be condemned justly by that authority which they have despised yea the very frame of the Scriptures and the expressions of so many strange and admirable passages serving to raise up a base and crawling spirit to heaven if we shall be found unbeleevers in that great day of Christ shall be brought forth as a witnesse against us for our horrible insensiblenesse and stupor of minde and heart Unbeleefe of Scripture and Truth of God after so many miracles very damnable For by these the Lord hath as it were striven to engraven in our spirits as with the pen of a Diamond the truthes of God and mystery of Christ If then our soules shall be found so hard and flinty that this point hath not pierced them if wee be still unconvinced and this instrument of gold hath no more left impression upon us then if a straw or rotten sticke had beene used to write in our tables of stone oh how fearefull shall our condemnation be If any man shall step in here and demand Quest Miracles how far ceased hard to say hath God so sufficiently confirmed his truth by miracles that there shall neede no more I answer I know its the opinion of many that they are wholly ceased and that because the use of them is ceased Answ For that spirit which attends the Ministry of the word carries a conviction of the truth into the mind according to all that is in the truth Now if it be so then that spirit perswades the soule of all the truth aswell in respect of the confirmation of it by miracles as otherwise but as I stagger much about this opinion so yet I am loth to affirme that the Church hath any warrant under faith to looke for the gift of miracles to be assuredly vouchsafed her although the ends thereof may seeme very weighty Who can or dare deny but that the calling of those Americans to the knowledge of the truth may seeme a weighty occasion to expect from God the gift of miracles partly by reason of their language almost impossible to be attained except by either a miraculous or at least a marveilous gift partly because there be poore inducements to draw such imperswasible and brutish spirits to cast so much as their eyes upon any meanes to induce them to beleeve In both which respects I dare not deny but that as Satan by lying wonders prevailes much with such as perish so the Lord may vouchsafe this spirit of miracles to his Church when his time is come to effect the conversion of such Only I adde that when his time is come he will grant his Church an instinct of spirit to aske it and joyne seriously in the meanes to attaine it which else he will not incline them unto his time not being come For wee must weigh the ends of our travell into remote parts whither for our owne ends or for publique If our owne respects be chiefe we have no cause to looke for miracles But I chuse rather to leave the thing in Gods dispose Vse 4 Lastly let it exhort us both generally and specially first to sue earnestly to the Lord Jesus our Prophet Exhortation the Word of the Father and the first inditer of all Scripture Spirit of acknowledgement of God in his word is to be sought by prayer the contriver of all the passages thereof the worker of all wonders and the Author of all grace and wisedome that he would vouchsafe us the spirit of revelation and acknowledgement of him as Saint Paul speakes Ephes 1.18 That we being enlightned in our mindes may conceive aright of the true scope and intent of the Spirit in the Scriptures Branch 1. generall and that he would intimate our hearts with the purpose thereof which is that our soules might be captivated under the power and authority of the speaker That we rest not in the outside of miracles wonders parables similitudes which we heare or read but considering their aime be carried downe the streame of the thing spoken yea the power To rest in the barke of the word or of miracles Parables Similitudes is dangerous soveraignty and faithfulnesse of the speaker Not only thereby conceiving more cleerely in our mindes of the Lord his Attributes and the truths revealed but much more ravished in our affections towards him for the good things whereof we have tasted Many chuse patheticall texts histories and accidents actions and speeches of speciall note to read and please themselves in some delight to read of the building of the Temple others of the passion of Christ others other parcells of Scripture to provoke admiration and discourse even as they might read any other booke of tales and wonders some also read texts of devotion and holinesse as the Psalmes or wise sentences as the Proverbs with a morrall spirit and scope only but never muse of the severall ends of such places nor the spirit of grace therein save onely to amuse their mindes and stirre up pangs of affection But by these to come neerer to know their owne base hearts or to close with the examples of such grace to feare the judgements of God the more deepely to beleeve the promises better to subject themselves more to the commands of God and in all to see his foote-steps and to adore the speaker few attaine it Therefore let us read these texts with prayer to God for sence and savor of their meaning and scope that we may attaine the spiritualnesse of them Else we shall answer heavily to God for making the solemne and reverend truths of God an occasion to nourish and maintaine that corrupt disposition
us God launches out into the deepe but we must goe by the brinke and shore The soveraigne freedome of God is not taught to dishearten any in Gods way for who knowes Gods last decree touching himselfe but to teach us to goe to worke with awe in Gods way to feare him to be humbled submitting our selves to his revealed will with readinesse and without cavilling For otherwise this soveraignty and freedome in God hinders not his freedome of grace to allure draw perswade and soften the hearts of whom he will But this will try men whether they will yeeld to the way of God or kick against it and so provoke wrath Object But how can this stand with the Ministers preaching of the promise to all sorts finding fault with the rejecters and admonishing the backward In a word why doth he yet complaine I answer The Minister is Gods instrument to reveale Gods will to the people but not his secrets Hee must nakedly doe his office and leave the effect to God who workes grace in such as submit to him He knowes not what God hath intended to any one wicked man If any will cavill at him his damnation is just to reject Gods cords and ladder As for Gods complaining threatning denouncing it is no act contrary to his secret will but onely divers from it And it is a way which he blesseth to draw home thousands to himselfe Object But others object That the grace offered is one and the same in it selfe saving But the receiving of it is diverse Some receive it more cordially then others and that 's their owne free-will Answer I answer Doe they so and what is it that causeth the one to be so cordiall the other not Is it universall grace No surely For then what hinders why all receive it not so if the reason be meere LECTVRES VPON THE Fifth Chapter of the Second Booke of the Kings from the ninth verse to the fifteenth THE TEXT 9 SO Naaman came and stood before the dore of Elisha with his horses and charets 10 And Elisha sent a messenger to him saying Go and wash thee in Iordan seven times and thy flesh shall come againe unto thee and thou shalt be cleane 11 But Naaman was wroth and went away and said Behold I thought he will surely come out to me and stand and call upon the Lord his God and strike his hand upon the place and recover the leper 12 Are not Abana and Pharfar rivers of Damascus better then all the waters of Israel may I not wash in them and be cleane So he turned and went away in a rage 13 And his servants came neer and spake unto him and said Father if the Prophet had bid thee do some great thing wouldst thou not have done it How much more then when he saith unto thee wash and be cleane 14 Then went he down and dipped himselfe seven times in Iordan according the saying of the man of God and his flesh came againe as the flesh of a little child and he was cleane 15 And he returned to the man of God c. 2 Kings THE FIRST LECTVRE VPON THE NINTH VERSE THE holy Ghost hath replenished the whole body of the Scriptures The Scriptures full of rarities and wonders with more strange and miraculous relations then any pen of an humane writer could ever conceive or comprehend In which respect he may be called truly the Father of Histories For why Scarce we shall light upon any chapter in the history of the old or new Testament yea some Prophecies wherein some notable monument of Gods extraordinary and miraculous power either the bared arme and hand or some finger of God is not discovered In some one Chapter perhaps some two or three wonders offer themselves to our view one upon another of remarkeable note Witnesse those unheard of and unparalled examples of the deluge confusion of languages Gen. 7. Gen. 11. Gen. 22. Gen. 32. Gen. 42. Exod. 6.7.8 c. Exod. 13 Iosh 7.8 Iudg. 8. framing of the Arke the birth and sacrificing of Isaak the victory of Iacob wrestling with God the preservation of the Church in the famine the ten plagues of Egypt the wonderfull passage through the red sea and wildernesse to the holy land the victories of Ioshua even by Rams horns and potsherds Gedeons fleece the conquest of Sifera the Suns standing still and returning ten degrees Ionahs rescue from the Whale and the Prophet Daniel from the Lions And for the new Testament what is it save a continued tenor of divine and miraculous operations of the Lord Jesus and his Apostles So that we may perceive the holy Ghost to reigne in this kinde and to take a kinde of felicity to get out from naked and common discourse to some rare and wonderfull expression of the workes of God his Revelations visions and strange acts in and for his Church The cause why And surely if we shall enquire into the reason hereof we shall finde that the Lord hath in wisdome chosen this course as well knowing the mould and frame of them he had then 1 Our lumpish earthy mould and hath now to deale withall I meane both those Jewes and us Gentiles all the fonnes of Adam and the flesh That is with cloddy carnall dead and sensuall creatures stiffnecked and rebellious ones wits and affections savouring nothing but the creature or at least promises of meer temporall kinde but as for matters of divinity and spirituall nature utterly savourlesse Contraries are cured by contraries and if there be any thing able to raise and elevate muddy and loggish spirits from the dunghill and from creeping heer below it must be a divine streame of strange and unheard of accidents administrations and atcheivements whereby the base heart of man as the Angel in the smoke of the sacrifice may rise up to heavenly and holy thoughts and affections Hereby the dull and blunt sences the dead hearts of sinfull men are whetted up farre more then by ravishing musique to Gods matters and are taken off from the earth Moreover the Lord hath bin faine to take the advantage of our base frame 2 By sensible things God takes us at advantage which is much amused and astonisht at the sight and hearsay of uncouth and strange matters to drive in thereby holy things which else would be but flat notions vanishing and comming to nothing the tree which hath long lien sodding in the ditch if it be once unsettled may be carried home Much harder is it to stir the sence and quicken the affection lying dead and in cool bloud then to work a further and superior impression in it being once raised The spirit of a man though it be corrupt and dead yet being immortall cannot so far forget it selfe if once God quicken it as to lay aside her nature altogether Therefore the Lord mainly aimes at stirring of it up from her dead frame No other reason can be given why Iohn Baptist came
upon her so the streame and course of the world doth so inchant them that it is death to them to stirre an inch Men will to conclude run and ride till they tire themselves 7. Partiality to conferre with such as they thinke of their owne judgement such as will smooth and sow pillowes under their elbowes But if they might converse with others at the next doore who are of another judgement they shun them purposely And so to conclude wee all looke to buy by the largest Bushell from God but when we come to sell wee get the most scanty one that we can come by 8. Basenesse Looke among Papists and tell me what cost what extremities will they not endure rather then their Catholicke cause should goe down But among us where is there one of a thousand that cares for the cause of God the sinceriâ—y of truth or such as professe or suffer for it Oh! most unthankfull people Hath God taken all this paines to make his will familiar unto us to reveale himselfe to us in his narrowest truths to make his yoke sweet and his burden light and goe wee about to cast it off more desperately now then when our light was small Doe we thus requite the Lord like an unthankfull Nation Wee who should have been the closest and narrowest toward God and walked most uprightly and closely Deut. 32.13 doe wee kicke up the heele and plucke backe the shoulder Doe wee revolt and play the fugitives with Demas 2 Tim. 4.10 from the Banner and Colours of our Lord and Master Oh! that this day our sinnes might come to our remembrance The Lord shame us for it Brethren especially such of us as have buried our care and closenesse under a clod of carnall wisedome earthly affections feare of men love of our selves custome of the time examples of our betters The Lord I say gaster us off these Idols and teach us to leave off our correspondencies with hypocrites and to bee transformed in the spirits of our minds that we may approve what is that good acceptable and pretious will of his not onely in judgement but in power and life of obedience And so much for this Use Now I hasten to the last Vse 7 And that is Exhortation standing of sundry branches The first whereof is Exhortation Branches of â—t three 1. Mourne for them who have forsaken their closenessâ— of obedience That we mourne unfeignedly for the desperatenesse of others in this kinde Oh! If we be as ready to forgoe our Jewell and Câ—owne of close walking as this world is willing to robbe us thereof we are not like long to hold it Oh then if the world be so resolute to hold her own how should we learne to hold our owne by their example What a shame is it that the children of this world should in their generation be wiser then the children of light Should we then dare to prostitute our consciences to such If wee might have all the glory of this world for our worshipping this Idoll should we not abhor it Is it now a season to flye to stagger to betray Gods Commands No rather let us cleave the closer by their warping and as a chaste Matrone beholding a debauched strumpet closes more with sobernes then ever so let us doe with the obedience of Commands when we come before God in our most speciall devotions and praâ—ers let us not with those hypocrites feel a pleasure of our owne tickling us Esay 58. let not us seem to disavow the declining loosenesse hollownesse of others and in the meane time keepe false weights and measures within our selves let not us have a traitors heart to keepe our breadths in Gods narrow but come to the oath and covenant to come under the authority of God loathing all our slightnesse ease basenesse bondage bringing him so much the more close obedience by how much we seeme to detest the contrary And having so done learne we with David to prise the purity of Truths never the worse because others embase them when he had in the former part of the Psalme mourned for the manners of others he addes Psal 12.6 Gods word is as silver purged by fire from the drosse So should we be so farre from quailing of judgement or weakning in affection towards the commands of God because others vilifie them that rather that should provoke us to adore and admire the purity of them And not onely so but to cry out with him Helpe Lord for the godly men decay and hypocrites encrease Verse 1. Arise therefore quite thy cause deliver thy people set them at liberty that sticke to thy Name and bring forth their light out of darkenesse Psal 37.6 as the morning and their righteousnesse as the noone day Send forth O Lord raine downe grace and goodnesse and let it beare downe this streame of carnall liberty as the sea beares downe a brooke Bring thy Commands againe into honour and make all such as teach dispensations against them as odious as Monkes and Friars This is the first Another branch is 2. Branch Much more for our owne loosenesse in that kinde That all Gods people doe mourne and humble themselves for their owne playing fast and loose with Gods Commands What godly heart is there in the world that could not beteam God whole dayes nights in this lamentation Who should so poorly know his owne spirit in this kinde if he attend it at all but this work should be pretious Either to rid his soule of her base slightnesse or to fasten upon it the cords and chaines of God with more closenesse and delight Say thus to the Lord Oh I feel no power no girding of loines A forme of such a mournfull complaint no awe nor feare to lye upon my soule by thy commands I sit loose to prayer to watching to hearing to meditation I feele this day slipt from me without redeeming it to the best use in all my solitarinesse company liberties duties I have been as one in a dead sleep no vertue hath gone out of me this day either of living by faith in the promises or of compassion to the distressed of love to the Saints mourning for the afflictions of Ioseph I have met with objects of the world of impatience of uncharitablenesse and yet no chaines of thine have been upon my spirit but I have walked as one at his owne tearms Surely the cords of Gods Law have not bound my lusts as a sacrifice to his altar nor the loadstone of his love hath not sweetly drawne my soule to obey him with delight but I have beene mine owne man in all these My will hath not beene subject and as it were bound up in thine Matth. 8. I have not beene my selfe under thy authority as that Centurion was I looke that my will should bee done by all that are under me yea I looke that they should walke in all wel-pleasing toward a
to shift for my selfe it s I who have broken covenant with thee O breake my heart for it let it not be all one with me whether I feele thy presence or want it It s the death of my soule to be without thee I walke desolately mine heart melts in my bosome as wax I am consumed for thine anger as with a moth and I have no rest in all my flesh for thee Oh Lord let it exercise mee throughly and use any meanes rather then my disease should rankle and grow incurable in me 1 Sam. 20.1 2 3. When David saw that Sauls countenance was changed to him in what a pickle was he How did he bemoane it to Ionathan And yet his favour had beene deare of the price and shalt not thou mourne for the losse of presence and performance of promises from God Oh take heed goe not on adde not drunkennesse to thirst grow not from one or two falls to a falling sicknesse What is the life of most men but a sinning and repenting repenting and sinning againe Yea though the Lord be angry and smite them what doe they save go on still in the frowardnesse of their heart as Esay 57.16 Oh take heed Commune with God and thine heart consider the sad steps of thy revolt undoe thy worke get the Lord Jesus to be thy Mediator better then Ionathan for he was like to have beene slaine for his labour but Christ shall be accepted and the Lord shall restore thee againe and thou shalt bee as in time past unto him returne by a promise and by renewing thy faith as by thy unbeleefe thou didst revolt the Lord is willing that thou doe so and he will heale all thy backslidings and marry thee after thy harlots tricks and divorce Jer. 2. and 3. read the places Soder not up thy errors by duties weigh not good against bad but by a promise And so doing thy flesh shall returne like the flesh of a childe and thou shalt bee cleane and then thy title to the performance of promises shall bee restored And as the daughter of the Priest having buried her husband Levit. 22.13 might returne and eat bread in her fathers house as when she was a virgin so shalt thou returne to thy former demensum at the Lords board and thy charter of promises shall be restored and the performance of them If thou belong to God thus it shall be with thee some crosse or other God will send thee home by he will cause thy wounds to stinke and thy reines to burne within thee but hee will set home his truth in thee yea rather then faile he will set the Divell upon thee though he pull him off againe in mercy rather then he will lose thee But if thou be a revolting hypocrite and a server of the time thou maist goe where thou shalt God will not owne thee Thus much for this third Use Now it is time that we hasten to other Uses of the Doctrine A fourth Use therefore is instruction with caveat If God performe all his promises let us learne so to carry our selves as becomes them that beleeve Vse 4 this truth let not us joine purchasers with God in performances Instruction Caveat God must bee left to himself to performe promises without mixing of our wits and wills therewith Ruth 3.18 but stand still looke on and behold the faithfulnesse of God let us give faire way to his providence in this kinde and leave the businesse to himselfe as onely concerning himselfe As Naomi said to Ruth Rest and be still for the man will not be quiet in himselfe till he bring the matter about leave it to him so let us doe God needs not our negotiousnesse or double diligence to bring his matters to passe he can doe them best himselfe And yet so it is that as in all other lawfull actions we must come in and chop our gourds in the pottage to defile it so especially in the performing of promises Our mixtures must be added our humors and extremities or else all is marred The Disciples must needs crave fire from heaven to destroy the Samaritans Luke 9.54 Matth. 16.21 or else their affection to their Master cannot subsist So Peter cannot love his Master except he disswade him from death Just so is it in this businesse with most men From the chiefe promise of salvation to the least and lowest we must have a finger in the worke and promises must passe through our dispatch To give God the honour of fulfilling as well as promising is too difficult for us And thence it is that we so hardly obtaine the promises they sticke betweene our fingers our hastnings our feares our dallying our presumption causeth so much sorrow betwixt the making and performing of promises If God were nakedly beleeved without our owne selfe-love the worke would soon be at an end Gen. 27.6 God promised Rebecca that the elder of the twinnes should serve the younger She could not rest content with that but she must devise how as if God needed her sinne shifting and lying to bring it to passe and in doing so she being taxed by Iacob tels him Indeed God foretold it to Abraham and alledged the sinnes of Amorites were not full yet why might not this come in as an externall motive to God his execution Gen. 15.16 Thy curse bee upon me my sonne But she could not so easily latch the blow For what might be the cause why Isaac fetcht over the blessing the second time save onely to reprove the indirect course that Rebecca had taken It s true that the spirituall birthright tooke effect from the present But the temporall was delayed six or seven hundred yeares till David brought Edom under bondage I submit my judgement to wiser men and I doubt not but other causes may be alledged but why might not the promise have taken effect sooner if shee had suffered the Lord to take his course We see Esau and his posterity were Dukes and Princes when poore Iacob was faine to bee a servant a pilgrim and his children to be slaves foure hundred and thirty yeares ere they went into Canaan Who doubts but that God guided all Yet I see not but we may suspect God to have had an hand of punishment for this prevention of his performances As the midwives subtilty spake of the Israelitish women to Pharaoh Exod. 2.19 That they were lively and needed not them So I may say Gods promises are lively and need no midwifery of ours they are not so weake that our wisdome need bring them to the birth Yet brethren we cannot be kept from venturing God hath promised to be alsufficient yet as if he could not be so without us we must step forth and bestirre us with using some indirect meane or other to purchase a performance God hath promised to blesse us in all we put forth our hand to but if wee marry a childe or purchase a commodity
now we enjoy in the season of the yeare How many have fretted the soule of God all this Summer 1631. by their wofull unthankfulnesse because that wee have had sad wets and not without cause for our drunkards sakes therefore many of us say Wee shall lose our Harvest to yeare What Canst thou not trust God in that promise of seed-time harvest which is absolute and depends not upon thy faith Well Gen. 8.22 now at the last God hath heard us when he had us at the vantage and this might occasion the recording of many former deliverances What hath been the cause of Gods detecting so many traytors to our Prince State and giving us their necks save the faith of Gods people which hath noted his mercies Thankfull and comforted by the faithful performing of promises Why should he else just in the nick of our enemies insulting pride in 88. and since in this hellish treason of the Powder step in stop that fatall hand Since how many droughts famines rumors of wars pestilence bad seasons hath the Lord turned away from us Should we confine our thanks to one day in the yeare And put case that still many Popish enemies lie at our root to kill it and to endanger our liberties say that many sorrowes are still upon us is it not because we have made wash-way of all sorts of performances and made them common things How hath God magnified his arme in those publick fasts of ours lately solemnized besides our private extraordinary praiers by our selves When met we but the Lord gave us in some answer more or lesse And how have we requited him for it Were it not just with him to give us quite over as them Judg. 10.13 for our Idols our covetousnesse I meane formality and hypocrisie Might he not as Ps 80.4 be angry with our prayers Might he not laugh at our misery and leave us to cruell enemies and forraine invasions who have been so weary of his own yoke Also humbled for their provokings of God to the contrary Oh! let us humble our souls to the very dust that we have requited him so basely and deserved that he should change his performances into revenges and penalties you poor heare who ere now said you could not chuse but starve this deer year how fare you now the danger is overpast God hath performed as much corn as can stand on the ground to rid you of fears will you now forget him as formerly Remember your covenants Oh that our powder were not danke and our hearts unfit to take fire and to burne out with praises nay hath not God betrusted many of us here with more then ever we looked for such wives such children such patience in our revolts such addition of life when we lookt to have beene cut off by violent feavers consumptions yet restored to live 7. 10. 20. years after with unlooked for liberty in our Ministery and Profession may we not say with David 1 Chr. 29.14 It was little to thee to build me a sure house but thou wouldst also take in my posterity to covenant for two or three generations If a Gentleman should give his poor friend a ring of 20 s. and put it into a pearl of 20 li. that friend would thanke him though he saw nothing but the gold only but when he sees the jewell too doth he not stand and wonder Shouldest thou do lesse to the Lord for those unexpected favours given thee as an overplus to his Christ What shouldst thou do but take up the cup of salvation praise him thy worst day is better then the best of such Psal 116.10 as I say not want these blessings but such as have them cast in upon them as common casualties not as performances I had rather be the scullion in a great house with poor blessings from a fountaine from faith in a promise then the Noble man himself without the favour of the giver had not Obadiah a better portion then his Master let thine estate be never so mean 1 Kings 18.3 yet if the Lord have granted thee this entercourse and intelligence with heaven thou hast great cause of thankfulnesse And to conclude Psal 122 ult let us all say as David did at the foot of his song Our trust standeth in the name of the Lord. For time to come shal I ever cavill against thee O Lord who hast beene so faithfull Shall I call thee to my tribunall if at any time thou shouldst try me with some darknes of promises am I not bound for ever to wait both in mine own behalf and the behalf of the whole Church to trust thee as a God that keepst touch nay who hast oftimes performed promises whenas I have but poorly concurr'd with them by faith put case thou shouldst do as Iacob did to Iosephs brethren lay thine hands a crosse the right upon Ephraim Gen. 48.18 the left upon Manasse say thou shouldst in particular crosse my own contents delay my praiers and estrange thy selfe for a while from me in wonted performances is it not enough for the cleering of thy faithfulnesse that thou hast so long bin faithfull Is not my experience sufficient to binde me to thy faithfulnes for ever So much shall serve also for this last Use so for the whole Doctrine and for this time THE TWO AND TWENTIETH LECTVRE Continued upon this VERSE VERSE XIV Then Naaman went downe and washed himselfe seven times in Iordan and behold his flesh came againe as the flesh of a little child and he was cleane THe last day Beloved as you may remember I made an end of the former Doctrine issuing out of the successe of Naamans washing To wit that Gods performances are alway as good as his promises if not better Now the last point of the whole verse and so of the third generall part of this text remaineth to be handled And that is grounded upon this That now after Naamans faith and fruition of the promised cure wee heare no more of his old distempers his cavils his rage and turning from the Prophet All is now quite changed with him as for sorrow and former trouble all is blowne away as if it had never been The point is of singular consequence and it is this The soule that can cast her selfe nakedly upon the bare promise of God may be sure thereby to lose all her distempers which under her unbeliefe assaulted her and to drowne them in the promise And this point I will first ground upon Scripture and reason Secondly answer a question or doubt Then come to some use For the ground of the text it is cleere For we see that according to the promise of Elisha so it came to passe After his washing himselfe we heare of no more distempers all are gone wee heare of the returne of his flesh as a childs we heare not of the remainder of his passions For other texts Take that place
Jesus lying at the stake with thy guilt as thy surety for whose sake the deadly enmity of God is abated toward thee And doth this cause thee to take more thought for thy soule then to dispute with God Well then feed thine heart with this thought that the Lord will save some and whom save those whom its provided for even those who can beleeve that free mercy is as well worth the embracing as soveraignty is worth the fearing and therefore determine with themselves rather with a trembling foot to goe towards the former then with a blasphemous mouth to goe to hel Leave Gods secrets and try him in his revealed will and way he hath professed that none who chuse life shall dye none shall endure the disadvantage of their sin who come to Christ as having discharged them from it by bearing it for them Chuse then to live 1 King 20.33 Ahab had Benhadad at a great advantage If his power had driven Benhadad to be stout and desperate there had beene no remedy but he must have dyed upon his owne sword But he left the sharpe point of his advantage and be thought himselfe that the Kings of Israel were mercifull His servants put him in hope that he might possibly fall into mercifull hands This drew him to give over despaire and to chuse hope and therefore with trembling acknowledgement of the advantage and with ropes about their necks he sends to this King for release and pardon and sped of it Do thou so and prosper chuse the hope and renounce the despaire All Gods people having two things set before them by the one whereof they cannot chuse but perish by the other they may possibly escape they being led by the spirit of hope grace forsake bondage terror and despaire and light upon the other And that conducts them by a doore of hope to the Pallace of pardon When those lepers who were shut out from all company and reliefe laid together the sad spectacle of the assured dying in the city with the possible though perilous hope of life in the campe of Aram 2 Kings 7.3.4 Adventure upon the promise what did they They put their lives in their bosomes they counted them no more worth then a straw under their feet if they save us we shall live say they if they kill us we are but dead men better is it for us to die with adventuring for life then to die here in coole bloud and so they were saved Doe thou so Know it there is no poore soule who was ever freed from Gods advantage and wrath save they who gave finall free sentence against themselves as making full account to perish if mercy did not save them at a narrow and a dead lift even a hundred to one Hast thou ever passed this narrow adventure Then though in respect of thy selfe its an hundred to one but thou perish yet in respect of God and his promise upon which as a sure bottome thou venturest thou canst not but be saved All the difficulty is in the adventure Loth are men to carry their lives so loose skin for skin and all they have they will give for life Job 1. But they whom God hath brought to be at his uttermost advantage will give over all their owne props hopes helpes duties devotions and performances and carry their lives in their bosome if they perish by venturing upon the promise they perish but to be sure by not beleeving they must perish He that is brought to this point may say truely if I had not perished I had perished indeed my perishing was my happinesse In thus doing thou hast hope but otherwise none Ninthly yet so venture thy selfe as a forlorne wretch upon the Lord Venture not at hap-hazard but upon a sure stay Branch 9 and as one that goes not to worke at a meere hap-hazard but as one else lost venture upon a promise as a sure stay and refuge which cannot faile thee If thou be under this condition the Lord puts thee not upon a meer adventure which may prove well or ill but upon the promise of the sure mercies of David whereof nothing can defeate thee Esay 5 5.3 Unbeleefe may hold thee some while at the staves end but such a one as thou art called to know that thy feares are taken away and turned to an hope which shall not be ashamed Take no thought for the advantage which Justice had thee at the Lord will see to that and hath seene already to it in casting it upon his sonne If thou object Object but he hath onely so done for the Elect. I answer Still goe thou to the markes of his revealed will Answ If thou confesse the advantage to thee belongs the redresse which Christ hath merited by satisfying the claime of justice Esay 53. The Lord hath laid this penalty upon one whom he loved more deerely then ever he hated thy sinne feare not therefore but he is appeased If thou canst humbly come in and plead it for thy selfe thou art one upon whom the Lord will not serve himselfe by condemning thee having already in the flesh of his owne Sonne served himselfe to the uttermost that thou mightst goe free Now the Lord hath ceased his plea and turned it to a desire that thou wouldest be reconciled which if thou art content to be it s no rash venture but it s a taking hold upon his strength to make peace and thou shalt have peace Esay 27.5 If thou wilt not esteem of this strength of offred reconciliation already wrought for thee without thy cost to be far more precious then the former advantage of wrath is terrible Thou shalt be found to ascribe more to the guilt of a finite creature then to the satisfaction of an infinite God and the offer of an infinite reconciliation Come in then and lay hold upon this refuge with strong consolation Heb. 5. end Take no more thought what becomes of the plea of justice then the Lord himselfe doth if he will have free mercy rejoyce above soveraigne justice why then shouldst thou shrug at it and why should thou grudge thy selfe that which God can beteamed thee and so destroy thy selfe rather then set thy seale to his offer to be happy True it is thou hast beene so soaked under the former anguish of the Lords justice and advantage that thou canst not so easily forget it and the newes of this mercy seemes an incredible thing unto thee but remember that the Lord is willing thou out-grow thy feares by degres though it be not suddenly done yet be not sullen and wilfull and time shall work it mercy shall in time subdue thy suspicious heart Incline onely have a comming soule to this offer and the Lord who suffred thee long in thy rebellions Esay 55.4 shall much more be patient toward thee in thy timorous and weake approaches toward his grace he shall spare thee as a father spares his child that
with what an humble sober heart he used life it selfe and much more all inferior comforts whose tenant at will he confessed himselfe to be and with what an heart he commended his spirit into the hands of him that gave it as oft as he lay downe to his rest And sure it is the little acknowledging of this Soveraignty and salvation of God is the cause why many of us are compelled to learne it by sad experience who else might enjoy it with more freedome Gods not being tyed to us in grace urges Prayer for daily assisting grace as very necessary The like I might speake touching Gods spirituall safeguard of our soules and the salvation of his Church The Lord is not absolutely tyed to us in these respects We should humble our soules for these also and say thou canst Lord if thou wilt vouchafe me such a measure of comfort by beleeving peace in my conscience admiration at thy love burning zeale for thy glory compassion and brokennesse of heart for my breaches of covenant and daily failings Thou hast the key of the wombe of heaven of the deepes the grave and of mine heart Lord the restraints or enlargements thereof are from thee Thou hast promised thy grace shall be sufficient 2 Cor. 12.7 Esai 63.13 but my wretched proud defiled soule may provoke thee to shrinke in thy graces thy rolling of bowels and opennesse of spirit But yet thou art the soveraigne Lord of thine owne good things thou canst if thou wilt remoove my tickling heart after the world mine envy pride hypocrisie Thou canst if thou wilt purge out my sloth deadnesse hardnesse of heart security unthankefulnesse and the like Oh Lord these cause me to walke sadly and to grone daily for ease Oh that thy good pleasure were to perfect thy first grace with this second assistance and efficacy and to cast in all those promises to the first which concerne mortification and a new creature Oh that I might not provoke thee by my wilfulnesse and unbeliefe to restraine the influence of heaven from mee and to make thy clowdes as brasse and mine heart as iron Lord thou mayst in thy soveraigne free grace enlarge thy selfe let not my base rebellious distempers dry up the welspring of thy promises God gives not account of all his matters And to conclude the Lord is a soveraigne God also in respect of his administration of his whole militant Church Although she be his spouse and hath a right to all his goodnesse yet God gives not an account of all his matters nay oftentimes she incurres a premunire with God and by her former lazy Laodicean temper of a fulsome carelesse surfeted spirit deserves that the Lord should use his soveraignty and prerogative of discipline over her for her correction and amendment Therefore although he take not his loving kindnesse from her yet Sins of the Church the cause of Gods hiding himselfe her Lethargy and Palsey frame her wearinesse and contempt of his ordinances and their power may cause him to chasten her with the rods of men Now we are in such cases of wanting the meanes of injury and violence of times encroaching of enemies inundation of errors and profanenesse and decay of love and zeale in the better sort very prone to taxe Gods wisedome and call him to our barre as if we would teach him more wisedome See Jer. 12.1.2 But alas the Lord is a soveraigne God and knowes what physicke our maladies require he knowes our rust will not be filed off without much rubbing and scowring He lookes at the generall ends of his providence which are to punish severely the declensions and revolts of such as professe his Name let us not wonder that our praiers sticke in their ascent and prevaile little we looke still at meanes and ordinances to be still as we have beene but the Lord lookes at the melting and purging out our drosse and trying us whether we be reprobate silver or no. In this case what shall we doe call for our prayers backe againe and give the Lord over No surely let us know we can goe no whither to speed better if we leave him but confesse his soveraigne power might force him to a decree against us lie low licking the dust of his feet John 6.68 2 King 23.2.3 c. Jer. 45.5 Psalm 119. Mica 7.9 with Iosia and his people striving as much against the streame as we can and craving our owne lives may be given us as a prey if we can speed for no more but however not forsaking our covenant nor giving him over through a sullen discontented heart till either he plead our cause and bring forth our light or else make our poore lives tolerable in the midst of our sorrowes and teach us wisely and faithfully to serve our time So much for the second Use Thirdly this doctrine is confutation and reproofe of the enemies of Vse 3 Gods soveraignty or the cavillers and abusers of it First Confutation of all Cavellers against the Soveraignty of God all such as take away the ground of this soveraignty of God For if it be so as many dreame that man is only in a darke dungeon yet still hath his eyes in his head to see and apprehend light if it be offred and a liberty of will by Sort. 1 the benefit of light to embrace and receive it sure it is God hath not man at such a deepe advantage as we speake of ye must marke all the grace of such men is the will of the flesh upon generall enlightning Secondly Sort. 2 all that fight against the royall freedome of Gods dispensation of grace by the meanes to some and not to others both being every way alike I say equally distant from it or from any propension and accommodation toward it either within or without Oh! it frets them to the very heart to heare that there should be any such liberty ascribed to God! They confesse that on mans part there may be some barres to hinder grace But they cannot endure it that when the object lyes indifferently disposed then soveraignty should reject or receive upon meere will no reason at all appearing this cuts them to the heart that they may not bind the hands of God behind him to carry himselfe alike to all who lye in equall and faire correspondence to it But O ye wretches goe learne what this meanes not of the willer or the runner but of mercy Not our making toward grace but graces making towards us saves us Rom. 9. Thirdly it reproves our carnall vanity who in our thoughts will be bold Sort. 3 to prefer such to Gods grace as please us well for their gifts hearings repeatings of sermons doing duties and forwardnesse without teaching them to humble their soules and cast out their Pharisaicall spirit which hinders more then all their gifts further them Oh! Matth. 8. as those Jewes spake of that Ruler that he deserved he should doe him the
our hearts to sensuality ease Sabbath-breaking lusts excesse of pleasures riot gaming and stretching of our selves upon beds of Ivory that the clamours of the oppressed the afflicted people of God might not be taken to heart or regarded Who considers how the hearts of the fathers have been estranged from the children Malac. 4. and the childrens from them who trembles at it and feares lest by a common enemy the Lord should smite the earth with cursing who hath humbled his soule under our moth-eatings and seekes to prevent the Lions tearing of us in peeces But all of us abhorre to acknowledge any pressures please our selves with such contents as we enjoy in private that we might oppresse sense and conscience Hee that could bring us newes of all well hopes of good welfare and prosperity should bee a welcome man to us but as for sadder times to search the sound from the hollow we are loath to heare of them because wee are loath to prepare for them The effects of those things cannot please us the causes whereof we are loath to bestow the cost to remove In the meane time how is the Lord frustrate of his expectation for hee pinches and yokes us that hee might heare of us that our beloved pretious lusts might bee divorced from us We pray and fast but the Lord tels us wee cannot speed because we still keep a breadth in his narrow Esay 58.5.6 and in our afflictions are light-hearted our hearts are not broke enough our speciall lusts wee have pleasure in when heaven is falling upon our heads wee can beleeve nothing ere we feele it lest it should cost us labour to cast it out Our Babylonish garment secret plague of heart pretious sin wee dare nourish in the midst of all terrours and crosses thundring about us So mad wee are that wee cry peace in the midst of ill tidings ruines of other Churches troubles in our owne dearth unseasonable weather losses of our estate and evils both suffered and feared Surely God hath us down now Joel 2.12 common stuffe will not serve us I might speak as much of our abusing of personall streights The like complaint in respect of personall pressures How many of us are privie in our places and dwellings to sundry who in the extremities of horrour and guilt of conscience upon their sick beds have sent for the Minister whom they have scorned before and there vomited up all their gorge accused and condemned themselves for their pride malice drunkennesse contempt of religion have shed salt teares in abundance wrung the Minister by the hands cried him mercie for all wrongs covenanted and taken witnesse if they lived they would be new men They have been neare to death and had reconciliation offered them But no sooner hath the hiew and cry been over but they have returned to their vomit their bowing like Bull-rushes hath turned to stand bolt upright and they have growne more base and wicked after 1 King 13.6.7 then before As Ieroboam while his dried hand lasted was tame and penitent but when restored fell to his Idols double and treble What was there not such a deep pressure upon them as spent and consumed their flesh and marrow and brought them to the graves brinke Yes But yet it was not deep enough it pierced not to the inner man the heart was the old one still so that wee Ministers had not need to bee over confident of them for if that had been pierced then the thoughts of their heart the affections and lusts had been galled and purged As the Philosopher being beaten with Clubs Men not to be trusted on their sicke beds said You beat my Tun meaning his skin and flesh but you beat not me so may these say to God Thou layest me upon my bed breakest my bones takest away my stomack abasest humblest my flesh and terrifiest my sense but my heart is whole my stoutnesse unbelief hollownesse and prophanenesse remaine my soul was never flayted who would ever have thought it Surely if the Lord then mean thee good hee must put more drammes and drugges into the Physicke else they will never worke Note Take heed Ieroboam had a command first that hee broke then a Prophet him he scorned then a threat that he out-grew and at last was left so hardened that meanes ceased because God meant to destroy him Beware this be not your lot Vse 3 Thirdly this should teach us not to wonder that men are so loath to take any notice of streights Wonder not that men so little joy in hearing of streights either generall or personall Surely they see that they are searching humbling taming things sent to pull the heart low and lay it open before God this they flye from as Moses from a serpent therefore as Pharaoh by his Sorcerers and Ieroboam by the death of the Prophet hardned themselves against the streights that befell them so do these with fool-hardy courage flye against the returning waters lest they should be stopt in their course All the wits that men have are mostly spent upon these two objects either dispensing with the strictnesse of commands Or when judgements come avoiding the dint and pressure of them Mens shifts agâ—inst their streights Men shuffle them off thus either they concerne not themselves or they befell by chance or may be bought off with money or shunned by policie or worne out with time or lessened by comparison But to take note thereof to lay sin to heart and repent of it they are utterly opposite to it David was not more resolved to lye in his filth and when Vriahs death was told him 1 Sam. 13. hee did not more equivocate with his conscience saying Tush the sword kills all sorts what 's his death to me then these professe to goe on blind-folded with sweet inchantments or fool hardily with rebellion and to give no way at all to divine yokes and pressures to pinch them What argues this but a desperate heart to fight it out with God 1 King 7. end with him that said This comes from the Lord shall I attend him any longer Such a cursed hard heart doth but keep all to the last heaping up wrath and when long-suffering hath spent it selfe in pulling them to repentance then shall they bee left to conflict nakedly with hell and vengeance till it carry them away quicke and there be none to deliver Oh! be admonished take note in season rather of Gods meaning and fight not against God What doe yee thinke that God hampers you either by word or workes to destroy you If his meaning were so he could doe it without warning And as for shifting off Gods yokes bee sure of it there is no counsell against him if you balke him one way he can match you ten wayes Better stoop betimes No râ—sisting of God 1. 2 King 16. and come in freely for he can make thy whole life a pressure fill thee with
and no wisedome would charme his folly So Hezekiah 2 Chron 32.25 after the like recovery of the plague and promise of humble carriage yet instantly bubbles up againe upon the comming of the Embassadours If this be done by the greene tree what is to be looked for in the dry What wonder then if Naaman may so ill be trusted with a cure at first under hope of humbling afterward No the Lord will hold him while he hath him and treads upon his heele still with new affronts to keep him at that bay till hee have throughly cast out his scurfe God makes cleare way before him It is the Lords course to doe his worke substantially and throughly hee will not sustaine any dishonour in his owne that he hath built them by halfes As for hypocrites they flye before they are halfe feathered and can doe him no discredit Hence it is that the Lord hath been faine to prolong affliction and abasement upon his servants that others beholding them might suspect themselves It might seeme else a superfluous thing to adde water to the sea and so long crosses to Iob a man already truly humble and fearing God But Job 1.1 1 Tim. 1.16 as Paul speakes of Gods grace towards him that it was for the example of more then himselfe so was Iobs humbling a paterne for all men to behold their owne base heart in this kinde and what an hidden depth of scurfe is in the chinkes and corners of it Verily in these dayes he or she may be as wonders and strange sights who walk duly in the sense of past and present corruption before God with humblenesse and privitie to themselves As the sive holds water while it is in the water Simile and no longer so doth our proud heart stoop while the yoke is upon us But few subdue their hearts to this safe demeanure daily That if another man should come and tell them Friend me thinkes your spirit is very light and inconstant not swayed to humblenesse 2 Kings 2. he might answere with Elisha I know it hold your peace for I blesse God I am under the aw of Gods greatnesse and my base heart is ever before me Psal 51. I walke continually in a jealousie of my proud and fickle spirit in this kinde Word workes little without afflictions in our times How few are there now-a-dayes cast downe by the Word alone without some powerfull addition of afflictions to set the Word on working When the Lord hath cut the veines and let out some ranke bloud by the Law how is he faine to set men in an hot bath of some other crosse to keep these veines in bleeding So that except God keep us very low and bare so ranke we are that we fall into a Pleurifie againe instantly Use of the point The use we should make of this branch is briefly this First that wee walke heavily under this body of death in us Counting the same our heavie burden mourning bitterly that our base spirits should be so weary of Gods yoke so light so frothy and inconstant Oh should wee say who hath more cause to walke humbly before God every houre then I being guilty of so many rebellions so deep-died of so long continuance hardly washt out so canker-fretted and yet Lord help me my teares are as the morning dew my spirit more fethery and giddy then any mans So prone to relapse to my old humours and to forget the sorrow which my sinnes cost me and all the vowes of humblesse and a broken hearted carriage Walke heavily under the misery of a slight giddy heart Truely this disease causeth a good soule to walke uncomfortably and the very best graces of God to affoord lesse savour and comfort And secondly it should teach us all especially Gods Ministers not to be over-forward to rest secure of our childrens estate or of others who at first gave good hope of true humiliation under the Law Charity is good let us charitably hope the best of all But yet let us eate some salt with them and wait some time to see what fruits will come of it whether they wax not weary Heb. 12.7 1 Tim. 5.11 Heb. 12. of Gods chastening and like those widowes who waxed wanton against Christ and weary of Church-service returning to their old vanities But yet too much credulity not meet for Gods people being dead while they were alive Particularly observe whether the Law be as welcome to them still as at first how they brook the discipline of such a School-master that they might get downe their base hearts and keep them under Mark them whether the pride of their spirit opinion of themselves jollity of the world warmth of their owne feathers and pride of life cause them not to forget their former humblings as if now they had learned a new lesson to bee lesse precise and more wise If we see such stuffe in them wee shall have little cause to repent that we suspected their beginnings And lastly for our selves count we it the onely safe estate that which promiseth soundest comfort most peace best safety and sweetest feelings of Christ when our hearts are kept within the bounds of feare and humility and awfulnesse And desire the Lord not to trust us over farre nor leave us long without some wholesome Items and buffetings rather then we should wax loose and run out of his blessing into our owne warme Sunne Blessed is hee that feareth alway and if God crosseth him not crosseth himselfe And so much also for this third branch and this first observation Now I come to the second the Message is Wash seven times in Iordan The second â—bservation out of this tenth verse and thou shalâ— be cleane Touching these words as they contain a charge and a promise annexed I shall speake more at large when I come to handle Naamans obedience in the verses following Here I onely touch a point or two generally flowing from the words and first the meane which God appointed him to use for his cure to wit the washing seven times in Jordan Ere I come to this point a Papist or Master of superstition would here make a stop as a traveller at a crosse in the high way and pick out a mystery out of the number of seven Why seven times saith a Papist Quest and not twice or five times There is surely some religion in this period and some mystery to be observed in it I answer Answ I know none except perhaps the Lord would have Naaman acquainted with the ceremonies of the lepers clensings Levit. 14.8 c. which yet I dare not affirm for then he might have sent him rather to the Priest at Jerusalem then to an extraordinary Prophet raised up in the absence of the ordinary Priest which now was expelled from the ten Tribes Therefore rather I answer That so it pleased the Lord to have it See 2 Cro. 16.3.4
washing in Jorden The third gerall The third and last point out of this verse I will propound by answering a question briefly Object arising out of the former doctrine For it may bee demanded seeing that not the waters themselves were the cause of effecting this cure upon Naaman but the power of God onely in and by them To what end did the Prophet so presse upon him the washing in Jorden and why had it been so heynous a contempt for him to have neglected this charge Answ Why God useth outward means to convey grace viz. To stop mans devices The answer is double First in respect of the necessary concurrence of the water to the instrumentalnes of Gods working Secondly in respect of a signe or ratification of the promise in the heart of Naaman To open both these in a word For the former it is alway the course of God to worke by meanes and instruments sensible and bodily when hee hath to doe with us men of a bodily and sensible nature As in the duty of prayer though the worke thereof is properly spirituall and holy and the Lord can tell our hearts as well as our tongues yet it is his will that we offer it up by the instrument of outward speech orderly set sensible Take unto you words say Hosea 13.2 receive us graciously So though the power of regeneration stand not in speech but in the Holy Ghost yet the Lord will not so worke immediately but by the ministery of man to man hee hath ordained to convey his spirit into the heart And the reason is plain for else what a door should be set open to the fantasticall spirit of man to vent his owne speculations and conceits without any warrant from God Who would not frame to himselfe revelations of the Spirit and devise new inventions of serving God How doe Anabaptists boast of their owne fancies How doe they despise the ordinary calling of Ministers and preaching and thrust forth themselves by the instinct of their owne spirit as if they were some great persons How do Papists devise new worships as that Masse of theirs which is nothing else save a masse of many ingredients added by sundry of their Popes or masters of ceremonies and those many Sacraments of theirs whereof not one print of Gods appointing appeares in all the Scriptures If this be done by them against the expresse will of God what would they have attempted if they had been left unto themselves How infinite would they then have been Therfore the Lord wil have all that look for any worke of his Spirit to attend the means closely and reverently and only by through them to expect for blessing If God please to unite his grace only to them ordinarily may it not well beseeme us to tye our attendance and observation of his power in and by them This is one cause why the Lord would not extraordinarily convey himselfe to the Eunuch to Cornelius Acts 8. Acts 10. Acts 9. to Saul at Damascus save by the intermediall instruments of Peter Philip and Ananias our spirit is alway in our extremities for either wee runne to our fancies conceits sloath and ease contemning the meanes or else when meanes must be used we fall to idolize them both which the holy Ghost abhorres Another reason is in respect of Naaman himselfe who was a novice Reason 2 It was the will of God to heale him by faith in a promise Why are signes sacraments used by the Lord for the effecting of spirituall things viz. to assure our weak faith Now because that was a difficult object for him to settle upon the Lord appoints him this outward and reall signe of the waters to prop up his faith by and to settle his inner spirit by the externall sense As if he should say Goe thy wayes I will heale thy leprosie beleeve me and if that be unlikely to thee loe I give thee a signe even the waters of Jorden that as verily as thou shalt drench thy selfe therein so verily will I by my spirit heale thee Occupy thy selfe in obeying of me and loe I will be present with thee to put thy weake heart out of doubt concerning thy cure This was alway the course which the Lord tooke with his old Church whensoever he promised any blessing or deliverance unto them Judg. 6. 7. 8. Thus Gedeâ—n a man inexpert in warre was faine to be strengthned by the fleece both dry and wet and by the dreame of a barley loafe by one of the Midianites yea the Lord never revealed any purpose of his to the Prophets concerning either the publique or any special person but he strengthned it by some outward signe suting the thing and affecting the sense Thus when the Lord meant to rend tenne Tribes from Rehoboam and give them to Ieroboam 2 King 12. Ahijah the Prophet is sent to teare his garment into twelve pieces and to give him tenne and keepe two A very reall resemblance And that young Prophet to strengthen his denunciation against the same Ieroboam Cap. 13. and his idoll at Bethel told him two signes one present viz. the falling out of the ashes from the broken Altar of sacrifice the other to come Iosiahs poluting those high places by burning the bones of the Priests upon them So Esay strengthens Hezekia in the newes of his recovery Esay 37. by that famous signe of the Sunnes going backe tenne degrees And so when Ahaz refused the signe Esay 8. the Prophet gave the Church one touching the deliverance from Rezin to wit the conceiving of a Virgin some two or three hundreds of yeares after even with a sonne whoâ—e name should be Emanuel Infinite it were to speake of Ezekiels bricke pourtraying the siege of Jerusalem the hole in the wall by which he convayed away his stuffe Ieremies basket of figges the best and worst that could be eaten to describe the difference betweene the Jewes in Babel and the rebels at Jerusalem The like was Agabus his taking Pauls girdle and the very false Prophets Zidkijah and Hananiah affected the like course in their hornes and yokes Even so the Lord did teach his people by many bodily ceremonies cleansing of leprosie by the Priest and washing by outward sacrifices and the like And by those many resemblances of the blood of the Paschall Lamb sprinkled and the flesh of it eaten as also by Manna the Rocke gushing forth with water Also by the cutting off the foreskin of the male he made the Lord Jesus and the power of his death and crosse to bee knowne sacramentally although but darkly in his Church And now under the New Testament although the worship be more spirituall Sacraments excell common signes yet the course is the same True it is Sacraments exceed signes in their efficacy yet agree with them in this generall kinde of outward signifying or strengthning the soule by signes For what else doth the Lord
casting up mire and dirt in them and in the face of the truth and this irksomnes abides long if God see good to enlarge Satan according to his malice Others are discouraged through want of Ministry to follow on that little seed of grace which is cast into them which is ready to dye for lacke of quickning and advice and so living in desolate places and destitute of powerfull meanes are long ere they come to any setling and strength in a promise not knowing that where ordinary meanes faile God himselfe will not bee wanting to perfect what hee hath begunne Others meet with discouragements from such as should encourage them and so they fall the more sadly upon them When the Spouse had dallyed with her beloved through ease and carnalll tendernesse security and selfe-love lo in following after him she was met by the Watchmen Cant. 5.6.7 who buffetted her These should have encouraged her Even Ministers are oft great affronts in the way of poore soules rating and scorning them for their singularity especially when they through errour light upon such as thinking better of them So doe Parents Guardians Masters lay offences in the way of their children orphans servants some threatning to dis-inherit them or to disgrace them others by their snibbing and chiding or over-bearing them doe blast that bud which else would blossome and beare Others also hoping to see examples of many others as zealous as themselves to encourage them and finding that the Gospel prevails little in these dayes the Spirit growes straitned people wax dead and sottish and all their devotion stands in hearing Sermons Alas they quaile and pull in their horns like snails and are afraid they have been too forward and therfore wax as lazie and loose as others except God rouze them up by some sad crosse and make them to see that there must be more resolution in them if they look after salvation each tub must stand upon his own bottome Others resting upon their good duties and performances and thinking religion to consist therein chiefly when they feele small inward life from thence but ebbings and flowings grow at last to suspect their bottome but alas how long is it ere they can reforme their error and take a right course So that by these few instances it may appeare that the difficulties of many who begin fairly are very tedious so that they finde not the worke of conversion so easie as they expected Conclusion of all with admonition I conclude therefore as before let not such be dismaid nor give over the work of God but remember God is now trying them whether there bee soundnesse or no in them to continue and if they will wait meekly his leasure after hee hath taught them to deny themselves he will be found of them as here of Naaman and reveale himselfe to them at last more then at first Vses 2 Secondly this should also teach those who have obtained mercie already Instruction Christians must looke for difficulties as well in their progresse as in their entrance much lesse to wonder if they meet with sundry affronts in their course of Christianity For if this be done in the green tree how much more in the dry If novices who are so unfit for trials meet with so many rubs to keep them from faith how much more must they looke for them whose strength is greater Therefore consider I pray you and know God will try all upon whom he hath bestowed any speciall favours and blessings One way or other sooner or later the Lord will lay stops and blockes in your way to try what is in you and whether all that hee hath done for you can prevaile so farre with you as to think him worth the cleaving and clinging unto with faith and confidence Gen. 22.2 Esay 38. Job 1. Gen. 39.7 2 Sam. 16.5 25. Matth. 26.69 Abraham must be tried by Isaac Hezekiah by the Embassadours Iob by losse of all hee hath Ionah by the errand to Ninivee Ioseph by Putefâ—rs wife David by Shemei by Nabal by Mephibosheth Peter by the Damosell and others of the Saints by other trialls whether God be above their carnall delights whether their hearts be lowly whether they can deny their wealth their will whether they be that in secret which they are openly what meeknesse patience equality of heart is in them Professors in their novicery looke not to meet with many troubles whether they bee sound and resolved to stick to God or no. None shall want their trials Alas many a poore soule entring upon profession lookes but from hand to mouth how he may hold fast the promise and live according to knowledge but lo in a short time after troubles arise in the married estate sicknesse losses enemies pursuits wrongs such as hee expected not On the other side A none of them the Lord perhaps armes some strong corruption to pinch and gall him which he knowes not how to be rid of or stings him by unthankfulnesse of such as owe most love by unfaithfulnesse and aloofnesse of such as have been greatest friends by the sad revolts and scandals of such as for their owne ease and private ends renounce that love to Gods cause and that zeale to the truth which they have testified Sometimes by false aspersions and reports staining them and unjustly depraving them behind their backes otherwhiles by bad times frowning upon them and turning their prosperity into affliction Againe perhaps the Lord tries others by some hard duty beset with great difficulties so that either they must forfeit conscience or else some desirable thing which they are loth to forgoe Oft-times the Lord tries some by company pleasure liberty occasions of sudden wrath distemper worldlinesse and infinite it were to mention all By these he would let men see all that is in their heart he will either discover their grace that he may trust them for ever after or else their halting self-ends hollownesse pride love of themselves strong poysons of heart breach of covenant and so humble them subdue their sinnes for them in due season that they may not deceive and destroy their owne soules And what wonder Doe wee thinke that God is willing to lose his cost or to harbour such under his roofe as he knowes not what to make of Such as under colour of Religion maintaine a great deale of loose scurfe within them Is it for the glory of God to owne such No surely he will put them to it one time or other that hee may by this meane separate the pretious from the vile and their owne hay and stubble from his owne Pearles and Jewels I grant we thinke otherwise and hope to escape in a mist and to carry our course even and faire God will try his to separate the pretious from the vile without any great trials or affronts and the rather because perhaps wee have long made a shift to goe on smoothly with praying in
it to see an insufficiency in a thing which is the price of every thing Mony and wealth can build Churches pulpits buy all ornaments of a Church Bibles and Tables and Chalices and hire Preachers and maintaine the Gospel now why then should it not buy Christ too especially if alms good deeds and workes of charity accompany a profession of Christ and his religion and a verball depending upon him and his merits alone not any Popish works or Idolls for salvation Alas such profession of word and holding Christ in judgement may easily stand with living upon the creature and building the soules nest of joy content and sufficiency in the holes of this rocke How hardly then should such a rich man or such a selfe in the creature enter into heaven What an enemy it is to Christ It is easier for a Camell to goe through a needles eie The Lord Jesus the truth it selfe spake it of a yong man who thought himselfe past danger Matth. 19.23 who yet hearing of this sufficiency of Christ if he would sell all went away sorrowâ—ull and why he had great possessions that is great possessions had him and filled him top full with another sufficiency which made Christ unsavory and the same I may say of these who were in the chase to get them when the sufficiency of Christ and all his dainties and fulnesse even a feast was offered them lo their answer was I am to goe see a farme I have bought oxen Luke 14. I am to marry a wife have us excused we have that which we like better we cannot come Farmes and oxen are joyned with wives to shew that selfe in any creature and carnall content sets the heart at rest and gives it a common wealth within so that it need not seeke out Matth. 13. So the third and last bad ground which had both some roote and some depth within yet without was so cumbred with these thorns of mony and pleasures living preferment great dependances favor and repute in the world that like a canker they fretted out the marrow and vigor of Christ and faith or neede of his sufficiency First How the creature forestalls Christ 1. It swells the soule with imagination that God loveth it 2. Prides it selfe in the ease and welfare which it feeles the fulnesse of the creature swells the soule up with a conceit that God loves it deerely that hee will entertaine it so richly thinking him to be as busie in heaven to make it a mansion as hee hath beene liberall in giving it one here not dreaming that the body may be full when the soule is leane and that riches are given for a snare of the owners as Micoll to betray David Secondly it prides the soule to thinke of her selfe according to the outward appearance and glee of wealth and welfare and that the soule is in as good case to God as worldward and though there bee infinite much in the world against it yet such is the bribing property of selfe in the creature that it perverts sound judgement not suffering the soule to thinke a thought against her owne worth conceiving that all should think her as she doth her selfe very good and in a safe condition Not remembring that for all the creature it may be blinde miserable and naked and go from a Paradise here to an hell hereafter as Dives did Thirdly it stiffens and hardens the heart against the words both of Law and Gospel 3. Stiffens the heart against the word preached the one including all the richest within wrath and driving them to a losse within themselves the other offering the eie-salve gold and robe of the Lord Jesus to supply that losse How shall that soul hearken to either which feeles no neede when the eare and heart is so bedulled and ingrossed with fulnesse and fatnesse of the creature that none of the Redeemers sufficiency can enter Now if it stumble at these two in the porch how should it ever enter into the secret the holy of holies in faith and regeneration This may be enough for the purpose of this discourse to open the truth save that this one reason may be added That selfe in welfare and wealth hath in it the spirit of scorning the Ministery of Christ With disdaine it bewrayed it selfe even when Christ himself preached for it is said That some who heard him scorned him for they were rich Luke 5. and the like humor possesses their successors And this property agrees well with them who make the creature their strong hold as I have heard of a City besieged which cast out loaves and victualls to the enemy in scorne and telling them that they were farre from starving As he said soule take thine ease thou hast laid up for many yeares Even for so many that the need of Christ will hardly be felt Therefore to conclude this branch also let mee admonish these persons that if ever the Lord will settle the alsufficiency of Christ upon them Admonitions to this sort he will first captivate this selfe in the creature and sub-ordaine it to himselfe he will cause the image of it to be despised yea cause the soule to cry out of her selfe and say what a foole yea a beast am I in thy sight Psal 73. the soule I say shall bee full of the creature even in a contrary sense that is stomacke sicke of it as a surfet The Lord shall rectifie the soules judgement about this selfe then the ranknesse of this pleurisie to be let out of the soule 1. See the vanity of the creature First by shewing it the vanity and insufficiency of it to helpe in the day of wrath how poore a fort it will prove in the day of affliction and feare It cannot rid the owner of an ague of the tooth ache of the least affront it hath no bloud in it to satisfie 2. Behold the image and face of God in the promise Secondly the Lord shall set the soule in a serious posture and meditation of that presence of his which shall make all the earth and the glory of it to vanish and melt and those who have beene formost in this creature-happinesse to come hindmost stand a far off from them who have chosen Christ to be their sufficiency then shall the glory of the one bee turned to confusion and the disdaine of the other to admiration Then shall all their worldly proppes become as broken staves the splinters of which shall pierce them much more then ever the care to get them could pierce them with sorrow 3. Behold the curse stamped upon the creature yea despaire The Lord will cause them to looke into the creature and to behold it as branded with a curse by sinne but doubly cursed when in stead of serving Christ it resists him and fights against him and makes Christ and the soule servants to it which is to renounce him who is blessed for ever
so the people let them bee exhorted also to exalt free grace and meere Christ in the promise not muttering that they find not that fruit of their selfe-deniall that they expect but counting it their chiefe work to wait at the posts of grace not as foolish pilgrimes doe at the gate of the Popes entrance knocking with a golden hammer till he bring them his Jubilee blessing but with patience attending the promise till the Lord shall stirre the dead poole of their hearts and quicken them with hope confessing that it is mercy they may live and breathe in Gods aire much more by the aire of a promise although not yet so established in their hearts as they could desire yet sufficient to keep them from grudging to make them lay their hand upon their mouth and to bee dumb Malac. 3. till the Lord bring healing in his wings and put an end to their waiting But as for esteeming themselves for their common gifts of knowledge or zeale to be ever the neerer to God for which thousands are in hell abhorring it and chusing to be the poorest doore-keeper in Gods house then the highest Pharisees in the Church who need no righteousnesse of another because they boast of their owne Therfore in all matters of God deny thy self cleave to God God is the first cause and therefore the true end of our being actions service All Rivers runne into the Sea For us to make our selves our owne ends were to make our selves God independent and to make God an Idoll To deny our selves is to distinguish our selves from the ungodly who make themselves and the creature their happinesse Wee looke to better our selves by our selfe-love but indeed we destroy our selves Selfe is our disease selfe-deniall is our cure Whether is it better for us to yeeld to but we infinitely better our selves by denying our selves even an hundred fold as Christ tells us Object But who ever hated his owne flesh Doth not God himselfe perswade us by selfe-loving arguments As by profit pleasure peace I answer yes Selfe is a plant of Gods planting in our nature But it is one thing to destroy an horses good mettall another to rectifie and subdue it so it is one thing to destroy Selfe and affections with Stoicks another to regulate and direct them Love thy selfe and spare not so the Lord by his word may order thee in it and take off thine exorbitant Selfe as in the love of thy wife seeking of learning wealth honour favour c. For the better perswading of thee hereto take some motives and some meanes First for motives Till Selfe be denied thou dost in vaine enterprise to be religious thou opposest a desire of thine owne against an whole body of death for Selfe is overspread in all the lims and faculties of thy body and soule as the forme is over the matter and the Call over the inwards Thou wilt be tried with selfe resistance except the principle be first removed Flesh will so dog thee with her askings that thou wilt be weary with refusings Till the soule be thus prepared there can be nothing done The first husband must be dead ere thou canst marry a new at least in the rectified intention and preparation of thy soule The flesh of the Virgin had beene a clogge to the second person except first separated and purified by the holy Ghost Else Demas might have clave to Paul as well as Silas the ten spies to God as well as Caleb and Iosue But they were of two spirits No agreement betweene two crosse principles Secondly God will never stoope to thee his will is not to be bowed to thine nor ever will while the world standeth For his will is the rule thine the string out of tune What should order a crooked thing but a streight Neither can they both stand together take whether you will both you cannot have you cannot have your will and swinge in your contents of world lust and liberties and Christ too no man can serve two Masters nor drive two such trades at once as a Fullers and a Colliers the one sullyes as fast as the other whitens nay of the two there is more to be made of following Selfe alone without Christ then Selfe and Christ by the former a man may at least get himselfe a worldly happinesse though he lose heaven after But by the latter a man makes him wretched and distracted so that he can neither enjoy the one nor the other Skin for skin and all that a man hath he will give for his life The heart of a Christian is single in respect of his object onely God and his favour no mixtures with it Either deny nature in her inordinatenesse or else give God over for both cannot consent in one degree of eminency who cares for a wavering minded man either to make him our chapman or friend or husband For still hee seekes not us but himselfe Let no sweet morsell be kept in our palate to cause God to be out of rellish with us Better key-cold then lukewarme Thirdly it is equall that Christ and God be chiefe because they have bought us with a price to bee theirs Wee should doe him great wrong who hath bought a Captive if hee should doe his owne worke God hath not onely bought our service but our selves Except then wee never made such a bargaine with God wee must bee for him who hath so dearly bought us To be sure God will bee revenged of us as well for not making that bargaine as for not keeping it 2 Pet. 2. Some hypocrites are said to deny Christ who bought them A servant is his Masters mony Fourthly The soule feeles a heaven in selfe-deniall What inward content thinke we had Abraham when he had denied Isaacs life And Moses and Paul when they could preferre God and his Church before their salvation to suffer afflictions with Israel rather then to be a Prince in Pharaohs Court Contrariewise what an hell carrieth that man in his soule who for base ends denies God and conscience Let but a man deny one base lust of revenge wrath and what an heavenly heart doth he carry with him to prayer Fifthly Think what an emptinesse there is in thy self thine own aimes and bents of heart and in those creatures and objects which thou judgest so sweet Wells wanting water and cloulds without raine As one saith of the Pagan Gods why did men chuse so many save that each one was emptinesse When the eie of Selfe falls downe from one cleere Sunne it thinkes it sees three or foure but they are all but fancies The fullest creature is but a brittle glasse full of water give it but as a cracke and it is gone If we were convinced hereof who would seeke vanity Who would deceive himselfe in eating ashes Esay 44. and hold a lie in his right hand It is meere inconsideratenesse and want of weighing things as hee saith there of the Idolater Sixtly Either be armed strongly
But humblenesse stands not in confessing there is no cause of it but in casting it out So much for the first Branch A second respect wherein Grace resists Selfe is this 2. Maâ—â—e she subordinaâ—es all to Grace I say all Selfe and her branches carnall Selfe hypocriticall Selfe mixt Selfe all now are quasht and the soule dare seeke no other credit respect commodity ease to her selfe then the Spirit of Grace will allow her Grace in a poore soule is as the power of Reason is to the inferior faculties when once the soule is infused into the Infant this supreame one of Reason subordaines the other faculties of vegetation and sense to her selfe all come under her authority and name Looke whatsoever Selfe hath formerly aimed at above Grace the Spirit fetches it all under it selfe As Peters trade of fishing and nets were vile in his eies when hee saw the glory of Christ upon mount Thabor Even all Selfe and folly comes behinde the Spirit of Grace Oh! what a blessed liberty is this to bee rid of the bondage of Selfe what cause of rejoycing Oh brethren to love the Lord Jesus for himselfe and all other things for his sake what a checke is it to Selfe Good brethren note it and trie your selves by it if those contents which were unlawfull be cut off wholly and the lawfull seasoned and sweetned by Christ if those delights which formerly were either savored for themselves or without Christ now we cannot relish but in and through Christ it is some signe that Selfe is brought under the subjection of the Spirit of Grace And to this may be added which differs not much in substance that the truth as it is in Jesus and the Spirit of Grace is the supply and furniture of the soule in all the wants and difficulties of it so that it need take no further thought it takes off the soule from all those proppes which shee formerly trusted unto and makes a rich supply of them in Christ really Excellent is that speech which Ioseph bid his brethren utter to Iacob when he sent for him into Egypt Take no thought saith he for your houshold stuffe and implements which ye use for lo all the fulnesse of the land of Egypt is before you count all your furniture not worth the carrying Gen. 45.20 for ye shall find in Egypt such store of all necessaries that you shall not repent you of the leaving of them behinde Surely if the promise of Ioseph were so well worth the trusting to what is the promise of Christ worth And if the store of Canaan were so superfluous in Egypt what is the supply of Selfe worth to one that is in Christ If this were thought of beforehand how lythe and cheerfull would the soule be in going to Zoar out of Sodome How farre would shee be from looking backe with Lots wife as loth to depart from her old treasure The heart called to Christ hankers and hangs off here catching up one rag of Selfe there another loath to goe naked fearing lest there should not be enough for all uses and turnes in Christ but when shee heares Take no thought for any of these Christ shall afford all meet ease credit content and worldly conveniency Oh it is well content to leave it for who so will let them take it that know no Christ As the lame man hearing Christ calling him threw away his cloke and crutches saying If Christ will give me my limbs I take no thought for these either I shall need none or have them better supplied from a fountaine Brethren weigh this marke well Selfe cannot digest it All the whole sea of Christ is no content to her except shee can eike him out with somewhat of her owne she hangs in the aire without a bottome like a stone till it be upon her center But Christ is a sufficient store to a poore soule in the vacuity of other things Though there were no calfe in the stall or bullock in the flock Heb. 2. yet Christ were enough Trie your selves you may as easily judge by this marke as what meate your stomack stands to If onely you can bee satisfied with Christ while your ease credit health and welfare last then upon point Christ is not these but these are Christ When Iacob saw the charets he had enough if you cannot say so when you behold the promise all is not well Onely an insufficient Christ causeth such patching A good new garment needs no shreds to peece it Christ is to a poore child of God as Elkana told discontented Hanna more then tenne sonnes 1 Sam. 1. Till there be enough felt and tasted in Christ who will forgoe his other proppes Who will flit out of his dwelling to lie in the street The true mother cried let her have all the child rather then divide it So the soule that is guided aright 1 King 3. loathes to divide Christ he had as leave have none Beg of the Lord to reach you out the Lord Jesus in his full supply of all wants and seasoning of all mercies that your soule having this boote in beame may be indifferent for other things as knowing they shall either not bee needed or else cast in The third branch of the Spirit of grace in opposing Selfe is the subduing and subjecting of the soule with equalnesse and contentednesse of minde to all those termes and conditions upon which grace may bee obtained The third Marke It subjects the soule to Christ upon his owne tearmes and conditions refusing no difficulties neither use of meanes nor forsaking her old contents but thinking grace a rich pennyworth whatsoever she cost There is a basenesse and closenesse in Selfe whereby she causeth the soul to shrug at the conditions of Grace as wearisome and costly this humor the Spirit of Grace removes causes such a cheerfull willingnes in the soule to stoop to any tearms of Gods imposing that she thinkes her selfe well if she may so speed When a man lies sicke of a disease without danger of death he will send his state to the Physitian and give him a slight fee but he is loath to charge himselfe deeply for the matter but if sicknesse encrease and danger of life appeare then the desire after health and the fear of danger concurring make him devoure all charges then he will have the Physitian come to him and give him any recompence being glad of health upon any conditions So it is here Coy and queazie Selfe that feeles no danger and reaches at Grace as a good thing in generall can beteame no great paines nor deny her selfe any wonted liberty nor submit to any great abasement of her selfe for the matter if it come easily she is content But if once the Spirit of Grace shew her the danger of forgoing it of delaying to get if of an indifferent remisse heart lazy carnall and willing to goe to heaven with all her will and liberties if once she present
naturall and beloved object The truth hath not made them free for if it had they would forsake all for it and buy it whatsoever it cost them but not sell it whatsoever they might have for it Besides they know not what spirit they are of while peace lasteth and the Gospel runnes in the streame of their liberties gifts services commodities and advantages who but they An humble and zealous Christian would almost tremble to heare their protestations their engagements for God and truth the cause of Christ and Religion who but they in their fastings and prayers deepe detestation of the sinnes of the times and mourning for the sorrowes of such as suffer But let the winde turne to another coast so that they see the enemies of truth lay hard to their free hold and they must either sadly suffer indeed for that they have professed or else bewray themselves to be hypocrites Then they shew upon what hinges their doore hanges and turnes even upon Selfe and selfe-love Then they wax stiffe for themselves then they cleave to the creature their ease and welfares their liberties and worldly contents Why this Alas They understood not their owâ— spirit and therefore it laid them in the suds ere they were aware Now their great declaiming against the sinnes of timeservers and selfe-loving hypocrites is turned to apologize for their inconstancy selfe-love and ends of their owne Moreover another cause is they sought not Christ simply and honestly for himselfe but for somewhat which might bee gotten from him to serve their owne turne by his meanes They know not how to licke themselves whole upon the Lord Jesus for any thing they lose for him and therefore they are loath to venture any more then they must quite make forfeit of If they knew whom to trust for amends or could beleeve that hundred fold requitall for God and his Gospel which is promised to all that lose any thing for him Oh! it would lithe their hearts exceedingly to suffer any thing for him To conclude they consider not what a poore bargaine they make of it when they sell the honour and glory of the Lord Jesus for the redeeming of a poore transitory content here below they consider not that they fish with a golden hooke for minums if they lose their hooke upon a shrag of triall and temptation they can never make amends againe for it by all they catch though the fish were fairer Conscience is no commodity to weigh in the balance against ease and carnall profits and pleasures as Elisha asked Gehazi Is this a season to purchase olives and vineyards and menservants or maidservants They consider not what poor and silly figleaves they sow together to cover their nakednesse when they pretend a necessity of serving God their owne way that way which will hold best agreement with their own ends to shun serving him his way of suffering which contradicts their self-love In all these respects and in many more let us not wonder at the wofull declension of these revolting times which leave the Lord Jesus himselfe to sinke or swim Nay further let us not be offended overmuch at such as at their first entry and onset upon Religion seemed so zealous as to chalenge all enemies of Christ and began to suffer for him But having born the brunt a while and felt the triall too hot and too heavy for them have with more shame and reproach revolted from him then ever they began to suffer with honour and commendation And sithence it fareth thus let all whom it concerneth Counsells to helpe this Exhortation to approve their faith and fidelity to the Lord Jesus as it doth concerne all who will not prove hypocrites now in these wofull daies strive for the holding up and preserving the entire honour and esteem of Christ his Grace his truth profession and Gospel both in their owne soules with sincerity and before men without shame or cowardize Consider poore soule by whose strength thou standest do not look too wisely upon next hand examples of staggerers and timeservers though perhaps thou hast admired them for their zeale and gifts know them by their fruits stagger not at their revolts But looke to Jesus the author and finisher of thy faith Heb. 12.2 who for the hope set before him and the love to thy soule and salvation despised the shame and endured the crosse Behold if examples do so much affect thee the patternes of those faithfull ones who in all ages have borne witnesse to Jesus and not esteemed their credits or goods or lives so that they might vindicate the glory of Christ and discharge the trust which in baptisme and much more in their conversion to God was committed to them to be faithfull souldiers and to contend for the truth against Divell and his instruments the world and their own fleshly selfe-love The Lord hath had in all ages some who have though it a businesse of importance to sticke to Christ and his honour whatsoever it cost them although thy strength be small the trialls of the malicious sharpe and fiery as darts yet if thou canst deny thine owne selfe humble thy soule be little in thine owne eies be above thine owne ends and sensuality Then that God who hath suffered thousands of subtill selfe-loving hypocrites to fall on thy right hand and thy left shall keepe thee safe in the midst under the covert of the wings and shadow of his Almighty power Psal 92.7 Counsells And to this end and purpose first get faith in Trialls more pretious then gold and looke not to suffer for Christ by thine owne strength but get strength from him whom thou sufferest for Get thee his innocency be sure thy cause be good joyne with it a good conscience two excellent banners to fight under and then by prayer beg from Christ that strength courage meeknesse simplicity selfe-deniall unashamednesse to confesse him and to suffer for him which becommeth one who hath received thy being of grace and the hope of welbeing of glory for ever from him Beleeve that hee who nayled all enmity of Satan and the gates of hell to his crosse hath risen by the might of his Godhead and is at his right hand will so provide that the remnant of their conquered and captivated malignity and malice shall never prevaile against thee If ever thou tookest hold of his strength to save thee from hell and from perishing trust him for strength to overcome all earthly enemies he can and will subdue them unto thee divert them disarme them disable them and give thee full redemption from them If ever hee built thee soundly upon his rocke feare not neither stormes nor sands nor tempests nor any assaults shall ever cause thy building to ruinate but thou shalt stand because built upon a rock Secondly be not heedlesse and carelesse of trouble but be well settled and informed in thy judgement concerning the weight and the importance of the truth of God Let
he urgeth nothing at our hands but himselfe promiseth strength to performe he can and will subdue the hardnesse of an unwilling heart by an irrestible prayer he promises to rebuke Satans subtilty and malice to doe all our workes It is his owne glory which he seekes why should he lose it And why should he doe that which he hath done except he meant to perfect it I say thus to argue in truth is not every ones measure but theirs onely to whom it is given to answer strong doubts and to quench fiery darts To say with Mano ' as wife we shall not dye Judg. 13.23 if the Lord had meant to slay us he would never have so farre have declared himselfe to us as he hath done To say with that rare patterne yet Lord the dogges may eate crummes c. so answering the objections of her Saviour against her Matth. 15. To say with Iob though thou kill me yet will I trust in thee against all the terrors with which thou affrightest me I say it is the Lord who only can turn the heart to be wise to salvation And to be sure as it should humble all such cavillers who are alway proudest of that wit which damps them most as feele this nature unsubdued in them so it should raise up a speciall spirit of thankefulnesse in all them whom God hath pluckt out of all such snares causing them to turne their Satyrs into songs and their invectives into admirations and to blesse him who hath put their soules out of those questions which if they were now to resolve the greatest question would be whether ever they would be resolved This I have briefly said of this point generally whereof much more might have been said save that my text pitches my thoughts upon the speciall cavill of Naamans carnall reason unto which I hasten hoping that in this instance I shall satisfie them who are desirous to heare more of the generall The second point then out of this answer of Naaman is this Carnall reason a great enemy to faith That carnall Doct. 2 reason is a great enemy to the soule in point of assenting and cleaving to the truths of the word So it was here to Naaman and so it is to all who leane thereto For the better conceiving of which point first in a word I will shew what I meane by carnall reason what sorts of men and in how many respects and instances it resists the word Secondly I will prove the point by Scripture and sundry reasons And lastly come to the uses and therein answer one maine question how farre forth mans wisedome may be admitted to have any thing to doe in the matters of God Carnall reason what For the first by carnall reason I meane not the power of reasoning according to rationall and sensible grounds nor yet the exercise of that power in such things as are objects of reason I meane humane matters which sense can judge of For to deny such things were to make men meere idiots and to disable them from capablenesse of Religion But I mean that carnallity of reason which judges and disputes according to sinfull corrupt and depraved reason and calls Gods holy and mysticall truthes which are onely judged of by a superior power of spirituall reason and understanding to the barre or ballance of an unregenerate See 1 Cor. 2.15 that is an inferior and disabled reason and judgement which hath lost the the gift of discerning truthes by the error and corruption of old Adam Three steppes of carnall reason Now this erroneous judgement hath three steppes and degrees For first carnall reason buyes and sells God and his actions according to the meere proportion and scantling of outward appearance and weighes him so just in her ballances that she will abate him no one dramme of weight in the reckning but he must be just the same not one haires bredth under or over Psal 78.19 then she allowes him Thus the Israelites when they were in the wildernesse because they saw no reall second causes or meanes of a supply of meate and drinke deny it possible that they should be furnished at all concluding that they must of necessity perish Can the Lord say they spread a table in the wildernesse They would allow the Lord no more power then the meere possible or probable meanes would afford This is carnall reason in grosse somewhat like the grosse condignity of Popish merit This was Naamans reason here in the Text. A second steppe is when although light out of the word and common convincing experience dare not confine God so close nor girt up his power so narrowly but hee must have a power beyond any thing which appeares yet for all that in secret she thinkes it very meet that God should tye himselfe and yeeld of himselfe to worke by rationall and likely means and when he doth so shee is best satisfied and stumbles when it is not so Luke 7.4.5 Thus the Jewes thought it a very meete congruity that Christ should heale his servant who had built them a Synagogue and loved their nation as if Christ were tyed in doing miracles to gratifie his benefactors and so his mother herselfe Ioh. 2.4 when she saw they wanted wine would needs forestall him saying Sonne thou canst doe a miracle and thou canst not doe it at a better season then now to supply their want of wine as if our Saviour served onely to attend mens opportunities by the power of his Godhead indeed hee did the miracle but not upon either the ground or end which she framed This is a dreg of the former The third steepe is when we confesse God and his will and power above all and confesse it must be hee onely which must worke all of himselfe and is above the meanes but yet in the use of meanes we expect God should not frustrate us but worke by and through them not remembring that as in the first the Lord is tyed to no meanes and in the second he is a free agent and is above all meanes so in this third he can worke aswell without the meanes and against them as with them and useth meanes onely for other causes not for his but our better helpe and convenience So that this base carnality plaies her prises one way or other and dares act her part upon Gods stage so that no one mystery administration worke or ordinance of his can passe her fingers without some verduit or other of her owne she will have an oare in every boate In this first branch I would further have it considered What subject carnall reason dwels in in what subjects or persons I conceive this carnall reason to reside when I say it is an ill judge and a great enemy to the matters of God I doe not here intend Atheisticall reason such as that of the Epicurean sect was who thought the world to be eternall both before and after because there could
remaines both of this and the other uses to the next Sermon if God will Let us pray c. THE EIGHT LECTVRE still continued upon this twelfth VERSE VERSE XII VERSE 12. Are not Abana and Pharfar rivers of Damascus better then all the waters of Israel May I not wash in them and be cleane So he went away in a rage VERSE 13. Then his servants came neere unto him and said Father if the Prophet had sayd some great thing c. I Could not beloved in our Lord Jesus finish in the former exercise 2 Kings that which I intended concerning the doctrine of carnall reason I repeat nothing but call to your minde that in the fourth branch of admonition I first spake by way of watch-word to the severall conditions of my hearers And first I entred upon caveat to Gods Ministers and so proceeded to the people Let me now come to Parents and Object 3 Governours Bee carefull to what Tutors and Teachers Parents and governours beware of it Masters and Guardians ye commit the education of your children Carnall reason lookes at carnall ends where children may not be backe and belly beaten where they may learne their bookes and trades and have their stocks restored at their yeares end and this I dislike not so be it that ye neglect not their soules which else will crie out against you and leave them to themselves so be it you plant them not under Masters which are content so they doe their worke to give them their liberty upon the Lords day to drinke to game and to keepe company with them by whom they may soone be carried into the depth of Satan and grow debaucht in their manners all their life after Worldlings make but a mock of this I grant and say so they may have their children taught to behave themselves civilly and learne their occupation they care not greatly for precisenesse or to have them more Religious then themselves but when they see this narrow scantling will not be kept but irreligion teacheth them to grow drunkards uncleane swearers and the like Oh! then they wish they had beene brought up with Puritans Oh ye husbands Object 4 and parents looke to it let not carnall conversing with your wives and training up your children and servants Husbands and wives humoring them in their vices for peace and ease teach them the common religion of the times swearing cogging deceiving breaking Sabbaths geering and squibbing at those that are better then their selves I tell you look what Characters are in your seale will soon be seen by your wax they shall have cause to curse the day that ever they saw your faces nay perhaps one day your owne consciences shall rend you in peeces for that you see the fruit of your government appeare so fearfully and shall say it was I that nipt this blossome on the head I corrupted my wife I tainted my children in their youth I shall pay the shot of their soules ruine Object 5 So ye Physitians Physitians take heed of the disease incident to your profession even to be haife Atheists and that by ascribing so much to naturall and second causes and too little to God Philosophy and Physicke will reveale no better except Divinity teach you to ascribe all to the supreame cause and be content to stoop and be at a set in your cures when providence will have it so Teach your selves your patients who is that great Physitian that rules your Art and take not upon you to keep that key of successe those issues of life or death which are under divine custody who can kill by a disease not mortall All sorts and can save when the disease is deadly Object 6 Likewise you Magistrates Magistrates boast not of your skill in the law but feare God say it is the Lord who subdueth the people unto us you schollers Object 7 and Sudents beware of that prophane tradition that ye cannot be religious and learned Sâ—holars and students set up the Bible above your other library and prayer above your studies and the Lord above your wits tye your boates to his ship to be led according to his motion follow the star till you have found out the babe Jesus and doe homage to him with the first and best Object 8 of your treasures Ye tradesmen shopkeepers and labourers sacrifice not to your nets Tradesmen say not to your hands you have made us rich ye rich men Object 9 say not to the wedge of gold thou art my stay this were as Iob saith to Object 10 deny the Almighty ye poore folke now in this deare time despaire not of releefe Rich and poore Job 32.16 because you see few friends say not God give me health or else I starve for more then I worke for I looke not for use industry but set up God above adore his providence who all this yeare hitherto hath so provided that yet ye are not starven make him your God alsufficient Object 11 Ye midwives teach not women in their travel to call upon our Lady Midwives Jona 3.9 but bid them say salvation is of the Lord. And thus would I speake to all sorts if they were present cast out that carnal reason whereby ye feele your selves most tempted to distrust God 2. Branch of this fourth Admonition 1. Prejudice an abettor of carnall reason And to these former let me adde also other caveats in a word against those evills which nourish this carnall reason in you As first one prop of this sinne is prejudice and forestallednesse Such as those Jewes Acts 28. bewraied who when Paul made his defence told him This sect of Nazarens is every where ill spoken of and from this carnall ground they renounced his apology and cause A second is scandall at the power of Religion Oh! it is a pinch and a checke to their carnall liberties men cannot endure such chaines Psal 2. and will have no Lord to curbe their lusts A third is offence and stumbling at the meanes of Christ and Religion Doe any of the Pharisees follow him 2. Scandall at Religion and her meannesse 3. Base feare of man Luke 1. Tradition None save these people who are accursed embrace him A fourth is base feare of man more then God My grandfather father friends favour not this way I see it breeds losse danger trouble and pursuit A fifth is the tradition of men As Zachary disliked to name his sonne Iohn because none of his family were so named rather they chuse to be irreligious still then to change the custome of their forefathers And the threats of parents to their children doe deterre others saying if I thought thou wouldest be one of these zealous ones thou shouldest not have a foote of my land A sixth is lewd counsell Lewd counsell of such as egge away the yonger sort and tell them it is the next way to reproach and beggery A seventh is base
or musitian himself if the one be nought or the other unskilfull But I cease reasons Instance 1 Some instances let me adde And lest I should goe too farre from my text Matth. 16.25 In not denying our selves the first shall be in that rule of our Saviour which I have so much beaten upon He that will be my Disciple let him take up his crosse and follow me If a man begin aright with this rule what a sweet easie trade doth he finde Religion to be But let a man goe to worke with a contrary principle as most men doe and what a wofull pudder doe they mâ—ke of it How doe they wish they had never begunne at all They bury all their labours and mony in the grave of emptinesse and vanity Esay 55.2 Their pride and selfe-love so overtakes them in whatsoever they goe about that alas they are discouraged They cry out upon God with those hypocrites Esay 58. that they have heard fasted and worshipped God day by day time out of minde but still they come to nothing they want peace and comfort And why Because they carry that within themselves which takes up the roome of Christ and mercy they will not feele themselves orphans and fatherlesse but trust to their owne bottomes and lusts or vanities or at least supposed goodnesse they will put water into Gods well and then with this bucket they will draw up some grace Hence it comes to passe if they meet with deepe conviction out of the word that tries them to the quicke they are faine to shake it off with all violence to save their skin whole hee that will not have a good conceit of them but reproves them is counted their enemy Nay those that used all meanes and cost to get in a Minister into their pulpit let him but once touch their free-hold must never after looke to have him their friend once out and ever out Oh wofull plague and yet marke it who so will Beloved there are some among us who live under our Ministry and will not keepe one day from Church and yet have the Minister of God in so deep a prejudice that he loves them not for no other cause save that he touches their tender plat when hee little thinkes of it that from seven yeare to seven they live at secret oddes with him Pritch against the Minister they are ready openly to cry out of him that he is their enemy and cannot looke too rights upon him Alas it is from a roote of Selfe which will not out in that they have not cast downe their crowne at the feet of the word as content to be smitten and to count it balme Thus they beare often laying heapes upon heapes and dye of thirst All they doe Judg. 15.16.18 they aime at themselves in it to get themselves some good opinion by their zeale bounty good deeds and why The running sore of Selfe will not be healed and that causeth all to become impure The encrease of the spleene is not more apparently the decay of the body then their error the cause of their not profiting and so by custome they wax hardned in it so that when they doe perceive it is past cure as they say of some diseases as that of the lungs that while they are curable it is hard to discerne them and when they come to be discerned they are past cure And to conclude all the life of such is but as the stopping of a water course which costs great toile and yet the streame will have her course when all is done Surely he that will thus hold a lye in his right hand shall to his cost finde that Gods rules are no idle things and an error committed in the ground is helplesse in the building Let a second instance be in the point of marriage The Apostles rule Instance 2 is marry in the Lord. A rule too hot and heavy for most beginners In point of marriage not wisely forbeare each other Judg. 14. Tush say they must we live single till wee finde a godly husband or wife Then wee may sit long enough Why Doe you thinke this rule so slight and needlesse Yes verily they are of Sampsons minde Give me her for she pleaseth me well And how doe they fare Doth it goe well with them Surely for the most part as it did with him After a short skeaming off a little of the sweet of their will the Lord so plagues them with the fruit of their error and so vexes each veine in their heart with the prophanenesse disloyall carriage contentiousnesse wastefulnesse and other distempers of their companions that some are ready to poison each other others to run away into other Countries never returning others to filch and steale to maintaine themselves in their beggery and a thousand other sorrowes attend their error Duties of Gods worship and family are neglected children for ever spoiled by lewd example callings either forsaken or used for necessity communion with the godly cast off and in a word there is no end of their misery And at last they cry out Now we see it is to some purpose to cleave to a rule and one error in the ground growes to bee remedilesse in the consequence Oh! that we had married in the Lord. Instance 3 So thirdly another rule He that keepeth his tongue keepeth his life This rule is thought to bee no weighty one for the most part Proverb till men have tried the experience of the contrary and then Oh! what a peece of wisdome it is to keepe their tongue When they see that the giving reine to a slanderous censorious and uncharitable tongue costs them repentance at leasure sets their betters against them creates sutes of law against them shrigs their purse brings them to shame to recant their rash words subjects them to the curtesie of their imbittered adversaries so that both they and theirs feele the smart of it then they cry out too late would they had beene wiser Behold how safe it is to stoppe evill in the beginning and to rule our tongues It never hurts us to have beene silent but to have spoken at randon hath undone many I know well that there is no remedy against the mischevously and maliciously minded let a man rule himselfe never so well the best use of his tongue may bring forth sorrow enough but in such a case a man may suffer with quietnesse and commit himselfe to God in his innocency in the other he brings a needlesse crosse upon himselfe I might be endlesse but the Lion may be easily guessed at by his paw Object But here an objection may arise Why then fall there out so many turn againes in the lives of the best One should thinke rather it were the easiest life to trouble our selves about no grounds at all but carry our course by guesse conjecture the customes of men our owne will For they that goe to worke most warily and desire to be
is thus which yet cannot be avoided till the love of God come in stead of love of Selfe to enforce the soule as by a principle of powerfull perswasion to a sweet frame of spirit well appaid by the promise and abhoring such extremities Vse 4 In which respect lastly be exhorted to be humble in Gods way Be humble in that aâ—d spare not Be humble in Gods way Esay 55.2 there is no feare of excesse in the way which God hath chalked out Be earnest in prayer for this wisdome to spend thy labour to purpose and thy silver in that which can profit thee Ascribe this prerogative to the Lord that he onely must teach the soule both how and wherein to expresse humility and account all other a device of Selfe serving to no other end save to barre the Lord out of the soule in the maine point of selfe-deniall and to nouzle up it selfe in pride and ease the Lord onely who knowes the heart knowes the secret basenesse and pride that lurkes therein and by what meanes it may be best searched out and purged For us to affect other waies and to be humble where God requires it not is to set our selves on worke and to be wiser then God and therefore let no such looke for requitall at his hands Jam. 4. God resists all proud ones and none more then those who are proud under a maske of devotion and humblenesse Let us hearken what God saith and abase our selves in his way and then our hearts as well as our habits shall be so and we shall not lose our reward For so saith Saint Peter he giveth grace to the humble And he who denieth any thing for me wealth credit wife child having first denied himselfe shall have an hundred fold here and hereafter eternall life Let this use then be a spur to quicken our pace in the use of the former doctrine of selfe deniall of which I will now speake no more having handled it at large Thus much for this doctrine 1. Part of his distemper Rage The other point and last of this verse is Naamans rage It may seem as strange as the former For why What cause was given him to carry himselfe thus If Elisha had dealt by him as by Iehoram handled him roughly at the doore and chased him away with disdaine If hee had answered his request with a scorne as our Saviours did the womans Matth. 15. Away thou dogge what hast thou to doe with childrens bread Thy disease is past cure I will not meddle with such a nasty one as thou an enemy and Champion against the Church of God then indeed had he a just cause of wrath and rage The ground of the point opened But now he hath an answer of mercy and love and hope from one that sent for him for the nonce when he was at a set and lo because onely he crosses him in a circumstance that is that he concurres not with his humour for the manner of curing but sends him word of another way for this alone hee findes enough in his heart to picke a quarrell and to depart in a rage Ah poore wretch If thou hadst now seene thy waywardnesse and foolish strugling against mercy thou wouldest have abhorred this curst humor of thine and wondred that mercy could so have enclosed such a rebell in her armes as to heale him against his will For why Had it beene but a Physitian should have prescribed a medicine one of seven which he could thinke of wouldest thou have taught him how to cure thee Would not a Physitian have said If thou be wiser then I what dost thou here Goe heale thy selfe How is it then that in a desperate case onely in Gods power to heale thou art so carelesse of his counsell that thou railest at the messenger and art ready to goe away in a rage Oh! this is surely for our example brethren to learne by doe not cast off the point ere it come at you say not that he was an heathen a Noble man of great spirit and they will beare no affronts True it is so hee was But this was neither the fruit of ignorance properly nor yet of greatnesse although of both in part but of that disease which all of us carry in our bosomes that is Selfe and selfe-love be wee never so enlightned to know the truth or never so meane for poore ones without grace can be as proud as rich we may bewray this tetch and distemper as well as he well beloved now you have the ground lay aside descants and come with meekenesse to heare this point that you may bee rid of this disease which though all condemne in Naaman yet few see in themselves The doctrine is plaine Selfe if she be defeated of her hopes rageth Doctrine Selfe defeated rageth Naaman whiles he had hopes is at ease and a good point he waites and is patient now comes this crosse errand that turnes him over as drinke doth a drunkard now he can hold no longer his patience turnes wearinesse and waxes madnesse I doubt not but you see the bottome yet I doubt not but you would be glad to see it cleared marke then a little those texts and reasons which serve for it and so lead to the application of it to your selves Take that behaviour of the yong man for one proofe who comming in a deepe forestallednesse of conceit to our Saviour that his case to Godward was good and yet thinking so highly of Christ that he could enforme him thought it not amisse to aske Good Master what shall I doe to be saved Matth. 19.22 Our Saviour to beat downe his courage sends him to the Law saying Keep the commandments He being prepared and hoping to be riveted into his course by the mouth of truth as men if they can get but halfe a word from a Preacher of comfort they are safe ever after answers All these have I kept from my youth Our Saviour not to establish any rule as Papists dream but to quash his selfe-love replies then thou hast need of an eleventh command to be doing with seeing thou hast kept the tenne Goe sell all and thou shalt have heaven what a pickle is hee in upon this Oh thought he this is yrkesome this is to beat me off quite surely if it bee thus I am wrong and have beene long defeated my wealth I am loath to foregoe and therefore he went away sorrowfull What is that Secretly vexing at his lot out of love with Christ sad and discontent fretting and distempered at the counsell Another example for the ground of all rests upon a fact may be their practice of whom we read Esay 58. who fasted and sought the Lord from selfe-love as appeares by the context that they might under pretence please and flatter themselves the more in their oppression and stoppe conscience from biting and stinging them Now when they perceived this was no way to speed and themselves would
costes and be as nothing an unprofitable one when thou hast done all cast not God in teeth with them call not for them backe againe nor bring him his owne in a napking For these qualities poyson all thy labours Gods hearers will be at Gods dispose for blessing and drive the Lord further off rather then draw him nearer And when thou hast turned all thy selfe-defeated discontent into selfe-deniall and art willing that the Lord should doe with thee as he list then see how he will dispose of thee A little barley or an handfull of meale with a little oile shall make a more accepted meat offering to him with an heart willing to be at his dispose then all thy plenty of costly sacrifices without it Joel 2.13 Lastly it reproves all such as yet goe beyond these also and are content Branch 3 to submit humbly to all such waies as the Lord prescribes for the attaining of mercy but yet it mightily troubles them that God doth so delay his season and lets them goe so long without giving them their desire To whom I answer All yee have done hitherto is well Adde one thing more give all your humblenesse your labours your endeavours to God Waiting upon God necessary for such as looke to speed of grace and when you have waited upon him therein give him your waiting too for it is not too good for him perhaps there may be a Selfe in that also and sure it is the finer Selfe is spunne the more she will take pritch if she be defeated But be thou as Paul was 2 Cor. 12.9 who feeling no bottome in himselfe yet was content to be under that weaknesse and all to try what mercy could doe doubtlesse in such a case thou shalt finde that grace shall at least bee sufficient for thee if the Lord doe not also magnifie his power beyond expectation in thy infirmity And poore soule what gainest thou in the mean while by thy carking plodding and casting about with thy selfe If thou doe thy duty shall it not be well with thee And hast thou not a great recompence in this that thou art accepted and thy successe is with God Is it not much that a sinfull wretch who cannot lay claime to the aire earth water to breath in to tread upon and the like maist yet come and looke up to heaven with hope and come to the Lord as bound by his promise Alas his pay may be leasurely but it is sure the gaines may seeme small but still they are comming and will make a heavy purse at last And what Is there not some scurffe which the Lord must purge out thinke you Hath not a long course in evill hardned thee And may not a speedy course of thine owne hurt the more another way What if the Lord should leave thee to such corruption of thine owne as should cause thee to wax wanton were it not better prevented by longer delay And speake the truth to shame the Divell and thy slavish heart is it not better with thee at sometimes then at other If it be noâ— suspect thy selfe if it be suspend thy cavils cease thine enmity thine hard thoughts thine unbeteaming heart the Lord loves to be as freely thought of for his love as he deserves And for thy selfe if it be thy lot to lye longer under hope then others and to want the cheerings which some have yet sure it is if thou abide waiting in thine innocency not being tainted with shrewd dregs of thine owne stale and base heart the Lord will at length breake out so much the more in pitty to thy fainting soule by how much his delay hath made thee waite so long and it shall not then trouble thee that thou hast thus indured Mercy at last shall be sweetest to thee Esay 57.16 that thou faile not wholly Singularity of delay sometimes argueth an heart tainted with Selfe in more then a common manner And so much for the use of reproofe Vse 3 Lastly to finish this point and so draw to an end Let this be Admonition both speciall and generall Great men must submit their great spirits to God First speciall to such as are Naamans great ones in place renowne authority birth or any other worth above others viz. That their great stomacks rise not up in arms against God to quarrell with him when they are crossed in their owne hopes and expectations The truth is the streame of Selfe is ranke enough of it selfe though there be no oile added to the flame The poorest wretch could say though I am not so rich as thou yet I have as proud an heart as thou But yet when one streame meets another the flood is the greater Great men who thinke it a peece of their Noblenesse to take no affronts at any mans hand what ever it cost them had need deny themselves farre to get a subject heart even to God himselfe Their great bloud the repute of their owne eminency and parts exempts them in their owne opinion from the common lot as we read of him 2 King 6. who having first raged at Elisha as the supposed cause of the famine saying God doe so and so if his head stand on him this day after being greeted by him more discurteously then he looked for flew in Gods face too and said shall I attend on the Lord any longer Ver. ult As once a great Prince being crossed of his pastime by the weather told God swearingly he was a King too and he offered him ill measure so to defeat him Abner the pillar of Sauls house being but reproved by weake King Ishbosheth set up by himselfe for medling with his fathers concubines 2 Sam. 3.6 tooke it so hainously that he forth with revenges himselfe and betraies the Crowne to David Great men therefore swell easily if defeated and indeed these two were as bad as great but the best in this kinde take defeats heavily Let such consider that which Naaman if he had had the knowledge which they have would soone have noted viz. How desperate a thing it is to fight against God and to crosse him when he serves not our turne If God resist all proud ones especially great ones how much more proud resisters Pride being of it self a resistance Although your spirits rise up soon against men which yet I allow not beware ye be not found fighters against God Act. 5. Know that though men accept your persons yet God puts no difference especially in matter of salvation It is counted a great humility in a great one to be never so little humble But oh worme for what is the greatest flesh else if thou thinke it equall that a poore beggar should stoop to thee what shouldest thou do to God to whose eminency thine is as the drop of a bucket Take not upon thee though thou be the chiefe of the Parish the Lord of the Towne and Patron of the Minister to yoke him to any other
Exhortation but to bee faithfull not to have such and such parts but to have one worth them all subjection and faithfulnesse Learne here of Naamans servants What a shame is it that such poore heathens should come forth so suddenly under the anvile of this one present occasion formed and moulded and thou under all Gods discipline shouldest be no better Oh! you servants remember what a long race of unfaithfulnesse riot falshood stealth stomacke disobedience Bad servants must not think it too late for them to repent rebellion you have runne hitherto Oh! that I could but see one Onesimus here this day one fugitive one lewd and slothfull or wilfull wretch whom this my doctrine might convince and convert to God But truly brethren I see so few broken in peeces for their errors so few penitent and tender for their old pranks that I am afraid to put new wine of Exhortation into such old bottells for fear all should break be spilt I have met with some I thank God I see no cause why the Lord should not take some of ye napping in your service and the sins thereof as others in the way of their bad government marriage or childhood What have ye gone from service to service have ye left your rags behinde you and scattered your scurffe so in the places where yee have become that you think it now too late to repent Are you so sapped soked in your way that you begin to thinke there is no hope Beware of being so desperate Say thus Is it not enough Lord that I have beene so lazy so false fingered so bold so answering againe drunke at times loose in liberties not for my Masters ends but mine owne but now I must fulfill my measure adde drunkennesse to thirst and an hard heart to my other prankes No Lord this were not to bee an unfaithfull servant to a man which is bad but a desperate one and impenitent to thee which is cursed If Onesimus had not robbed his Master he had never met with Paul nor beene converted his perishing was his happinesse Thou hadst grace for him O Lord thou madest him faithfull to thy selfe purgest him of his basenesse as deeply seated in him for ought I know as mine is in me that thou mightest have the honour Thou madest him faithfull puttest him into thine own worke settest thy marke on him sendest him backe of a wretch good for naught good for all thinges Ah Lord This day my sinfull service comes to my remembrance Lord batter me breake and thaw mine heart put me in hope pardon my sin put me in to the Lord Jesus his Schoole cleanse me of all my cheats and prankes and make me a true Onesimus fit for thine use according to thine heart and I doubt not but out of thy forge mine heart shall bee framed and moulded to all subjection and faithfulnesse to man Beg it hard Lord teach me to adore thy wisdome in ordaining servants to their places and Masters to be their governours Lord discover thy soveraignty to me and shine thy selfe with thine authority upon my Master and Mistresse that I may see God in their government either because they are holy or else because they are governours If I see not such a Master as I would let me see mastership from thee and bee awed under it Lord take my will out of my bosome and put in thine Speak Lord thy servant heareth give me a will to be subject and bee as thou wilt and then command and spare not I will doe not onely what thy selfe but what man under thee commandeth And it shall be my heaven and happinesse to be under for conscience sake Give me also faith Lord to create all serviceable qualities in me to lythe to forme and to accommodate my spirit and members to all welpleasing without flattery and obedience Let me under a good Master bee subject and faithfull with thankefulnesse to a bad one for conscience not compulsion as serving the Lord Christ Sundry charges Lord thou givest by thine Apostles Paul and Peter Servants be subject to your Masters in all feare 1 Pet. 2.28 not onely to the good but also to the froward for this is thankeworthy if a man for conscience sake endure griefe wrongfully Coloss 3.22 Servants obey in all things your Masters not with eye-service as men pleasers but with singlenesse of heart fearing God Doing it heartily as unto God not unto men knowing that of him ye shall receive the inheritance for yee serve the Lord Christ And so in other places Lord write this Law of thine in mine inward parts Thou hast also in thy word not onely scattered the examples of vile servants Ziba Gehazi Iudas and others to tremble at and abhorre but also of faithfull ones Lord to follow and imitate Thou hast set forth Eliezers example that old trusty servant Gen. 24.10 1 Sam. 25. Mâ—tth 25. Acts 10.22 Texts alledged above to the good of his Masters sonne Those servants of Abigail to the life of her and her husband that of Ioseph to the chastity of his Mistresse that of Cornelius his servants to the soule of their Master those of the servants that occupied talents to the outward advantage of their Master that of Davids for the succour and reliefe of their Master in straits the Centurions to the content and businesse of their Master Rhode faithfull to Gods Ministers and so of others No one object of faithfulnesse but some patterne of it or other thou hast added to sweeten it to assure me of the possiblenesse of obeying it Oh! give to thy servant somewhat of all these that I may be all in one a cast peece without cracke or flaw in respect of unfaithfulnesse and the rest cover O Lord accept and pardon Be earnest I say with the Lord beg of him an understanding heart put not all over to thy Master say not looke you Master what you command for that concernes not me I must doe all you bid me No examine thy Masters commands ere thou obey them But if they be according to God scruple them not yea although they be not yet if but negatives onely forbeare for a time and provoke not by rebellion say not I will not forgoe such a Sermon such a duty of Gods worship But if it bee positively bad abhorre it Beg also the spirit and life of this faithfulnesse Put thy selfe forth by occasion for a good servant is never tried till he be put to it throughly be in one as another service wholly your Masters watch and bee upon wing for faithfulnesse picke out duties be ready for duties be unwearied Let the honour of thy Master the trust of thy Master absent or present the good of children whether abroad in fields at home working thy selfe overseeing others among fellow-servants at praier in family about a journey and message of weight about thy lawfull liberties Still let this soule of faithfulnesse be wholly in all and each
part to guide thee aright The instinct of subjection and faithfulnesse will teach thee to speake and doe that which thy Master himselfe cannot teach thee Occasions of providence will teach thee how to answer perswade prevent when thy Master is farre off Eliezer and Cornelius his servants might be trusted to say what they saw meete the one to Laban and Rebecca the other to Peter And when thou hast done all let thy conclusion be Remember me O Lord not for my goodnesse but in thy goodnesse and according to my faithfulnesse I shall account pardon my best reward because at the best I have but been an unprofitable servant This for the fifth use Vse 6 To which I adde Consolation to all faithfull servants Alas poore wretches Faithfull servants may be comforted Heb. 6.10 you thinke you tread a maze of confusion and worke and are cast into a corner to play the drudges As those Eunuches in Ieremy yee thinke your selves cut off from name memory or reward But God overlookes not the labour of your love Oh! It would not grieve you I say if you might have a good word countenance or acceptance Encour 1 But consider I pray you whom serve you A Nabal or the Lord Christ Therefore be cheerefull Your businesse is not the thing God lookes at be it never so poore in kitching or in a ditch the subjection and faithfulnesse of heart is all which God lookes at Thy scouring spits or ditching or dunging the fields with such an heart shall be more to the Lord then the worke of a Justice of peace carried by oppression and injustice And the Lord can plead thy wronged cause in due time against thy bad Master Be thou faithfull though borne downe by flatterers God will bring forth thy light in due time and thy vertue the whiles shall be thy exceeding reward God shall send thee a good Master to requite thee for all the wrong which a bad hath done thee Againe know it the Lord prises subjection above all qualities more Encour 2 then any man can And yet Philip the King of Spaine if he might be beleeved when he heard that his under generall of his fleet in eighty eight I mean the Duke of Medina should say had it not been for obedience to his Lord the great Duke of Parma who charged him to attend his comming he could have put England hard to it Answered it now grieves me not that I have lost that Kingdome I see I have one servant who knowes how to be subject whom I prise above it whatsoever he did the Lord prises thy obedience above a world of rebellious servants Encour 3 And againe be not drawne by feare or man pleasing to dishonour God For there shall bee no acceptance of persons It shall not boote Absalons servants in that day to alledge wee were dogged to it by our wicked Master The Lord most justly plagues base servants by their lot to bee so as those of Ahazia who came to fetch downe Elija from the toppe of the mount The Lord destroied them in their service King 7.8 Coloss 3.25 their mends was in their owne hand So saith Paul There shall bee no respect of persons with God but a punishment to him that hath done badly Gods eie shall not pitty him as a poore servant that did as he was bidden but smite him for an unfaithfull one who did that which was unlawfull as to breake the Sabbath or the like to please a wretched Master Even so I say on the other side If thou hast beene faithfull to God against a wofull Masters commands although hee can heere beare thee downe with person and greatnesse yet thou shalt be heard where person is not accepted but the cause and the Lord shall quit an innocent servant against an injurious Master Moses had a Law that no Judge should favour a poore bad man in a case of evill for his poverty but then much more he had another which forbad to accept the person of the mighty against the meane in case of unrighteousnesse Lastly the Lord will blesse thy righteousnesse of a servant with fidelity in thy servants when thou shalt governe And as Adonibezek said Judg. 1. the Lord had justly required him for his cruelty so many Masters ill servanted may say the Lord justly plagues them with lewd servants for since they were rude and unfaithfull they never repented Well is that sweet coherence of the Centurions speech to bee noted Matth. 8. I my selfe am under authority and am subject and what of that God hath blessed me with such as are obedient come goe doe as I bid them and are at my becke I might be endlesse there were comfort enough in this if there were no more that at the last day of reckning when all servants shall be called coram then shall that blessed and finall sentence be pronounced upon thee Come thou good and faithfull servant thou hast beene faithfull in a little be ruler over much enter into thy Masters joy God gives no lesse then a Kingdome for the poorest the least duty of the meanest of his servants Let thus much suffice for this use also and so for this whole Doctrine Now ere I come to the next point in the text Addition to the former doctrine I must not passe by the relation of Naaman to them having said somewhat of the servants towards him Relatives goe together in nature and therefore in handling Masters must be fathers to their servants And as these servants performed the faithfulnesse of sonnes So Naaman by their owne confession was a father to them rather then a Master Servants will be glad to heare me say somewhat of the fatherhood of Masters as well as of their faithfulnesse and it would not grieve any servant to be faithfull to a Master who is as a father I will bring things to as narrow a point as I may Masters then must be fathers to their servants Not onely so in point of superiority and reverence to procure honour to themselves but in point of tender respect care and love to the good of their servants both souls and bodies Eph. 6.9 The Apostle having given servants their charge lest their Masters should beginne to overcrow them presently comes in And ye Masters doe the same things uâ—to them forbearing threatning knowing that your Master is also in heaven and there is no respect of persons with him For why First they are under thy roofe and have betaken themselves under the Reason 1 covert and shrowd of thy wings they have left their parents under whose protection they lived that they might bee wholly under God for thee reason therefore that thou shouldest be as a patrone protector and father unto them A servant may in a sort say to his Master I am thine save me for all things looke for support from them to whom they belong Againe thy servants are children to thee their close fidelity and denying themselves for thy
it is lofty and proud So saith Salomon Prov. 21.24 Proud and hauty is his name c. For the while that a distemper lasteth the veriest underling thinkes himselfe somebody when as in truth he is lesse then himselfe How much more then when state is joyned with it as here Distemper of spirit lookes at no reason arguments carriage for the present Elisha himselfe in a lawfull distemper yet being transported 2 King 3.15 was faine to call for a minstrell by the harmony of whose musicke his sicke spirit was a little brought to it selfe This for the Text. But now for the generall much more may be said for the proofe and explication thereof Proofes Take some Scriptures first and then some Reasons See Act. 9. Paul then Saul was in a deadly distresse of spirit after his casting downe the Lord bids Ananias arise and go to counsell him But what saith Ananias Oh Lord I have heard say of this man hee hath beene such and such a one a persecutor blasphemer q.d. If he now be to be dealt with it exceeds my ability I know not but he may doe me hurt for my love No faith the Lord he is a chosen vessell to beare my name goe and be not afraid Well he went and how doth he encounter him Very mercifully and respectively Even as Naamans servants here doe alleniates his distemper grates not upon his sad heart addes not sorrow to sorrow opposes him not upbraids him not for his former cruelties qualifies his feares eases him of those aggravations of horror which had sunke him brought him to the cleare sight of the promise and mercifully reaches him out the hand Brother Saul receive thy sight both of soule and body Was there not some difficulty in the harping upon the right string if God had not guided his hand So Paul in the case of the excommunicate Corinthian how wisely tenderly and seasonably is he faine to carry himselfe 1 Cor. 6. with 2 Cor 6 7. 2 Cor. 11.29.30 He was at first very violent with him After seeing how he humbled himselfe how wary he is lest he overdrive and so put him into an extremity Oh! saith Paul he hath beene cast downe sufficiently I dare not use mine office to destroy but to save Therefore rather comfort and encourage such a one then adde sorrow to sorrow See Esay 50.4 The Lord Jesus was annointed by God his father as with the oile of gladnesse beyond measure so in speciall of Prophesie The Lord God saith he hath given me the tongue of the learned that I might speake a word in season to him that is weary So saith Iob or rather Elihu Job 33. If an interpreter one of a thousand be sent unto him c. The worke of a man who is one of a thousand is no common work Read also Elihu his breaking in upon Iob an ancient man himselfe being yong he comes in with his preface to avoid envy confesses his youth and unfitnesse of himselfe to deale in the matter But seeing God had set him on what doth he He tells him that he will not be as his three friends had beene an accuser and censurer of him nor yet an excuser of his errors and misbehaviour but he would be to him an equall and impartiall judge and as his owne soule and as in the sight of God hee would wish him to bee No easie matter it is then to bee an Elihu to an afflicted Iob. Paul speaking to Timothy how a Minister of God ought to carry himselfe toward the distempered 2 Tim. 2. saith He must not be prejudicate and rash but patient and long suffering towards sinners waiting if at any time the Lord will give them repentance to life Esay 42.3 It is said of the Lord Jesus that hee was the beloved of God in whom he delighted and whom he qualified for the nonce to preach glad tidings to relieve the poore prisoners and captives c. And what did hee Surely he would not breake the brused reed nor quench the smoking flax His voice was not heard he cried not in the streets he was a lambe dumbe before the shearer That is a most compassionate and tender helper who by his owne afflictions had learned to be full of sympathy and to be afflicted in all the afflictions of the people But I hasten to Reasons The first is this It is no easie thing to carry Reason 1 our selves wisely toward them who are but naturally distempered as with wrath discontent and passion in common and outward respects not onely if the parties be meerely carnall but also although Religious For anger is a madnesse and who should deale with mad men Doe they not thinke that their rage becomes them Doth not the foole cast arrowes and deadly darts and say he is in sport That is doth hee feele or understand himselfe to be as hee is Who should deale with a mad man who is so wise in his owne opinion that for the time present he thinkes he can bee mad with reason Thus was David 1 Sam. 25. in the case of Nabal he was so enraged thinking he had some cause of it that without any more adoe hee would needs command all his men to gird on their swords and to dispatch him and all his house both guilty and innocent And had not the Lord encountred him by a rare person how hardly had he beene disswaded from his attempt Well then if meere naturall distemper of wrath be so hardly cured how much more spirituall distempers which lye farre deeplier seated in the spirit and are of a farre more intricate nature Such was Naamans here with Elisha though the disease were bodily Secondly it appeares to be a difficult worke because it hath posed Reason 2 the wisest men to performe it well Even one part of it is hard and how much more all I meane to discerne of the cause of the distemper We see it in Iobs three friends very wise men and full of very sage and profound divinity yet in Iobs case meerely mistaken and tooke a false cause for a true esteemed him to suffer for his sinne when yet he suffered in his innocency So we see that Peter discerned not the state of Simon Magus but thought him a beleever as others did till afterward he discovered himselfe What shall we say of Pauls not seeing the state of Alexander Demas and others If when the spirit of discerning flourished in the Church it were a thing of such difficulty how hard is it like to be in these times Thirdly this is much more true in spirituall cases of conscience and Reason 3 that in two respects First of the counselling party Secondly the party counselled For the first such as are to counsell others doe rarely exercise themselves in such things as concerne this cure Both in respect of 1. Them who give counsell They doe not judge it an equall object to their endeavours thinking that it is sufficient to study
seeking it they are not afraid to deceive the Minister about their condition and so deceive themselves But a dead comfort they are content withall and if any call it into question they stoppe his mouth with this the Minister of God comforted mee with such and such texts But oh thou beast It appeares since by thy base and common course that the Minister of God was deceived in thee thy glosing and semblance of sorrow thy selfe-loving complaints and desires and thirstings deceived him and thy selfe also Were that Minister to conferre againe with thee upon due knowledge of thee he would professe thou deceivedst him and thine owne soule much more for hee never comforted thee otherwise then upon such conditions as thou never hadst But I digresse too much In all these respects I say Conclusion who ever thou art who canst unfainedly speak it that God by the Minister hath met with thy sinne humbled thee for it let in some glimpse of mercy to stay thee for a time not suffered thee to rest there while thou couldest see how that light encreased as the day and how it bred in thee such affections as brought thee to settle upon the free and eternall satisfaction of Christ for pardon and peace I say in what poore measure soever these have beene wrought yet thou hast felt scales to fall from thine eyes deadnesse from thy heart and grace to enter by degrees till thou sawest cause to rest in some sort upon the naked love of the promiser Thou hast infinite cause to blesse God all daies of thy life I will not now bid thee beware of forgetting the Minister of God and passing him by as a stranger as hypocrites do for thou shalt prise him above the parents of thy flesh doe otherwise if thou canst Gal. 2. he shall bee so deare to thee that thou shalt pull out thine eies to doe him good yea esteeme him as one of a thousand and there shall be a perpetuall ascent of praises to God from thine altar it shall smoke continually and although thine edge may blunt yet thy metall of admiration and thankes shall abide for ever Consider tenne miscarry to one that prospers by counsell they returne to their old sloth ease and distempers they relapse to their worldlinesse selfe love and lie under a clod If then thou hast beheld the wisdome and savoured the good of the ordinance try thy selfe throughly as touching the fruit it hath wrought in thee take not glasse for gold and pebbles for pearles be sure the Lord have thee in a cord surely bound to him for playing the starter and time server as most doe and I say give over the Lord if thou canst But surely while these coales are in thy bosome thou shalt be burnt and as long as thou hast this treasure about thee thou canst not wilt not chuse but bee exceedingly thankefull and cheerefull So much for this Vse 2 Secondly let it bee a speciall caveat to Gods Ministers is it so choice a peece of worke Admonition 1. Branch M nisters must not count this a slâ—ght worke 2 Cor. 1. Esay 50.4 to speake a word in season to a heavy heart Doe not imagine the art of that to bee so easie as most Ministers doe the worke whereof is so difficult and the fruit whereof is so pretious Thinke it not a small thing to be a Minister of reconciliation Paul saith God hath made him meet for it hee had comforted him that by his consolation hee might comfort others A tongue of the learned is no easie matter to come by M.R.G. Once an holy man in this Church after long labours in the Ministery though contrary to some mens judgement thought it meet to leave his charge to betake himselfe to the worke of speaking a word to the weary as seeing it to be a full work great use of it finding himself fitted I would not advise any to do so whom God holdes in but I would have none of what parts soever to thinke this an easie gift such an one as will flow from the meere habit of his understanding studies of Divinity or paines in preaching alone Discerning of leprosie was a peculiar skill of the high Priest Read Levit. from the 12. to the 15. So this is a speciall gift by it selfe obtained by study of thine owne heart acquaintance with the infinite windings and subtilties of it by much selfe-deniall much strife in applying the promise Also much experience is required to judge aright of the states of the distressed much reading and through acquaintance with the Scriptures much meditation and conference much praier both ordinary and extraordinary must prevaile with God for it Helpes to enable a Minister to it yea commonly it is the gift of such as have beene much buffeted with temptations humbled and tozed under Satan and their owne corruptions such as have wrastled much with the Lord for a blessing and halted upon it that they might not be puffed up but learne to be willingly under infirmity I say it is the gift for the most part of such as have laboured to destroy their sense and reason in and by faith and the promise holding the realnesse of it from the truth of the promiser whatsoever flesh say to the contrary Yea it requires great love a meeke and tender heart burning with the weake to be all in all for Gods ends losing our owne in his and cleaving to the worke for Gods cause unweariedly against discouragements whatsoever I exclude no other learning arts tongues for a Divine but for this part of Ministry I say there is another course to be taken for it Alas who should wonder that there should be few counsellors under the Lord Jesus whose office it is Esay 8. of distressed ones Nay that in stead of comforters there should bee so many discouragers and miserable comforters Alas there are few that taste the method which I have spoken of If it were but this one thing alone it might easily resolve us of this wonder even to think how few there be who discerne aright of soul diseases or the estate of the poore as the Psalmist speaks How easie is it to be cheated by the cunning tricks of base hypocrites who come onely to serve their owne turnes How had blinde Ahija been deceived by Ieroboams wife but for God 1 King 4.4.5 I professe of late there came to my selfe a drunken companion for comfort and if God had not specially armed me beforehand and discovered his spirit I might have beene deceived in him and when he was gone hee reported me to be uncharitable But all that knew him knew that he slandred me Who is sufficient for these things If God keepe the state of a poore soule from us as Elisha said of the Shunamites dead child how shall we speake to the purpose but patter 2 King 4.27 How many worthy and wise ones have beene mistaken for I speake not of such as
withall And lastly shew it that there is no way for her to returne to God againe by repenting till first upon humiliation for her revolt shee come to God in Christ by a promise viz. to wit that he bids backesliding Idolaters and harlots divorced to come backe againe and he will marry himselfe to them and acknowledge them for his owne 9. Rule In deadnesse of heart c. Psal 42. If the distemper arise from the deadnes of heart strength of some prevailing corruption decay of faith ove zeal tendernes of heart the party is to be encouraged by the examples of the Saints whom the Lord hath raised up in the like eclipses wanzings of spirit and that by the recovering of the ground of comfort viz. the free promise of God who although his people doe withdraw from him by unbeleefe yet doth not change as we change but rather abides one without any shadow of change and cannot deny himselfe though we beleeve not but rather will revive us againe by his word that we may live in his sight and goe in and out with him as in time past especially if wee can prove that our ebbings and decaies doe not proceed from wilfull withdrawing our selves If trouble arise from particular feares or staggerings which touch not a Christians freehold 10. Rule Speciall feares c. but onely his welfare and welbeeing as namely from some straits whereinto he is fallen or temptations of Satan which he cannot answer or melancholy or the darkenesse of Gods administration of his Church suffering his cause and people to goe to the walles and his enemies to prosper with sundry such like which befall a man in the course of Christianity the answer must lie according as the trouble lyes As that God is not tied to one course with his Church in outward things his best servants have had greatest straits That we must not so much looke at the troubles we meetwith as the promises which we have to support us That the wicked have prolonged their malice and the righteous have perished in their innocency and yet the whiles God hath beene most righteous And so much for a draught of these instances according to which others which are innumerable may be conceived And therefore to finish the use let the Minister of God wisely apply himselfe to this worke as knowing it to be most pretious necessary and honourable unto the which not onely is annexed speciall encouragement here but also hereafter Here a savoury report and the loines of many poore soules blessing God for us herereafter blessednesse it selfe and shining in glory and that so much the more brightly by how much we have converted many as Daniel speakes And as for the difficulty of it the Lord is able to make it sweete and easie by custome and experience to such as desire to bee faithfull And so much for this second qualification of these servants to wit their milde and wise carriage to their Master in this his distempered condition Now according to my former method I proceed from the persons attempting to the attempt it selfe Wherein I considered in the servants a secret taxation of their Master which I call so because it lyes onely couched and conveied closely as became inferiours in the manner of utterance for it is an expostulatory question intimating their dislike of the distemper which he was in and that Selfe and carnall reason whereby he was carried against the Prophet As if they had in plaine tearmes said Master this thy descanting against the Prophet by thy cavills and carnall reason is not comely for a man in thy case If the Prophet had said some great thing thou seemedst forward to obey why then dost thou so cavill and contradict him in this his message The point is Selfe with carnall reason Doctrine Selfe and carnall reason are justly reproveable and such like scurfe in rejecting the word are justly reprovable evills Touching this point of carnall reason I have said much of it already here I repeat nothing If the variety of the doctrine will adde any other things worth observation I will onely insist thereupon and that very shortly to shunne tediousnesse First some proofes of Scripture and then some reasons will bee needfull to strengthen the point For texts first Proofes Num. 11.22.23 when Moses objected against the Lords power to send he murmuring Israelites meate in abundance saying this people is six hundred thousand foot men and thou hast said I will give them food a whole month shall the flocks or the heards bee slaine to suffice them Or shall all the fish of the sea bee gathered together for them What doth the Lord answer Doth he put up this carnall speech No Hee cuts him up for it Is the arme of the Lord saith he shortened Thou shalt see whether my word shall come to passe or not Another Scripture like it Numb 20.10.11 is that where the people murmured for water not at Rephidim Exod. 17. but at Kadesh whereupon the Lord commanding Moses to satisfie them by smiting the rocke But they in an indignation at their basenesse outshot them in their owne carnall reason saying come onye rebells hath God nothing to do save to give you water out of the rocke And he smote the rocke twice first doubtingly what came of this The Lord was extreame angry for this carnall opposing the word and causing those rebells to distrust God double Therefore saith hee because ye beleeved me not to sanctifie me in the eies of this congregation therefore shall you not bring the children of Israel into the land which I have given them Marke here seemed to be a lesser sinne and a greater punishment For might Moses have said Are not rebells to be children Yes in due season but not then when the Lord was working a miracle among them Therefore together with a checke hee incloses them with those rebells both in the marke of their sinne calling the place Massa and Meriba for their cavilling with the people as he called that of Rephidim by the like name for their murmuring against God And as he told the rebells that all their carcasses should fall in the wildernesse so he told them that they should dye there too A sad penalty and reall reproofe of their carnality John 6.42 Another place is that of our Saviour to those Jewes who following him for the loaves were by him perswaded to behold himselfe the true bread and manna and water of life This seemed to their grosse carnall sense senslesse and therefore they aske how shall he give us his flesh to eat Our Saviour answers Murmure not within your selves you doe not well you are but carnall in thus speaking for you can doe no other then as you are till my father teach you wisdome it is not your reason can compasse my matters you were as good hold your tongues as patter about them So when Martha who yet before had said that shee knew Christ
and set a price upon the promise as a pearle above price 2. In divers points Secondly the Lord makes it an easie worke by setling the promise upon the soule and that by sundry workes For first it doth pull up all hedges and fences which stopt the soules course standing between the soule and her harmes he puts her out of feare and sets her out of danger removes Lions of supposed difficulty out of her way as malice of Satan dismaying error of the wicked deterring and selfe distempers which disquiet her with doubtings wee know if a man would goe the next way to a place and avoid dirt and bad way hee must have a guide to lead him by the fields to pull up gaps barres and stops which done the traveller hath great ease So the Lord deales for his he suffers them not to travell tediously to heaven that is the portion of hypocrites who undoe as fast as they doe and are ever new to beginne but to his owne he gives sweet ease in his way If a man should hold our enemy for us and binde him by strength it were as we say five of the seven we might easily beat him Thus our Lord Jesus bindes Satan and difficulties that the soule might get the better of him and goe forward without awcknesse Luke 12. selfe-love or hypocrisie Secondly the Lord makes the promise easie by presenting to her all the good things of it as Canaan was seene easily by Moses when the Lord shewed it unto him and so sets the soule in a sweet course Deut 34.1 2 3 4. Wee know by experience when once a man gets the savour and smack of an object he goes roundly A Tradesman having tasted the reall sweet of his returne and a scholar of his booke take small thought to goe through stitch Paul in that place to the Corinths tells us that the Lord hath diffused the savour of his truth into him and by him to others An hypocrite is puzling after it all his life time 2 Cor. 2.14 but is so poisoned with the more welcome savours of his pleasures gaine and lusts that he falls short of the grace of God and as it is Heb. 12. Esau came short of the blessing Iaacob came just in the way of it and failed not And this savour differs from the decaying and wanzing taste of temporaries it abides in the soule and causes it to be restlesse till it possesse what it savours It is as leven sowres the whole lumpe of minde will affections Thirdly and lastly it doth authorise enable and carry the soule as under a safe convoy into the promise So that without the toile of the wicked it holds on cheerfully in all those meanes which she must use as prayer meditation conference hearing so that she uses not these at had I wist hit they or misse they but as ordinances under the blessing of God which shall not returne in vaine As Esay speakes Esay 55.9.10 The snow and the raine returne not in vaine to him that sent them but cause the earth to bring forth corne to the eater and seed to the sower So shall my word saith the Lord not faile of its scope but to doe that for which I sent it And sithence the Lord Jesus speakes no words in vain but with the promise addes the performance therefore the soule heares it so takes and findes it so even as the command of Christ to the sicke of the palsey Be thou cleane clensed him forthwith So then if the Lord will have it so sweet and easie a worke who shall let it Who shall disanull it So much for the Reasons I proceed to the Use Vses Let this first teach us to put a difference between persons who professe to seeke heaven Whatsoever the world thinkes Instruct 1 that all are alike the matter is nothing so I may say of them as the holy Branch 2 Ghost speakes of the Jewes in Esters Ester 9.14 time when Hamans plot was broken Grace is easie to them that are bred for it that to the Jewes was a day of gladnesse and rest from all their troubles feasting and ease but to their enemies the contrary So I say to all plodding ones and hypocrites the Lord gives as much toile and more for hell as the godly for heaven it is their lot Eccles 2.26 and the portion of their cup They would never come within the condition or suburbes of mercy but the others lot is fallen into a goodly heritage Psal 16. It is with them Simil. as it is with two men carried into a field wherein there lies an hidden treasure The one is left to seeke to dig to harpe upon the place by conjecture and so findes it a bootlesse worke Matth. 13.44 The other is carried to the placâ— pointed by the finger and there he digges and findes it A Scholar in the University that hath a generall wit for learning will thrive and get it although but poorely maintained when another kept there upon costy tearmes wanting such a spirit shall plod in vaine Matth. 13.11 It is only theirs to whom it is given to whom by covenant it belongs even such as renouncing themselves wholly resigne up themselves to him who can only make it easie and sweet The elder brother was as near his fathers elbow as could be and alwaies with him yet it was the lot of the yonger a prodigall turned to his father to eat of the fat calfe to have the ring robe and shooes put on him it was easie for him to be happy when his father would beteame it him as his lot Judg. 14. When Sampsons friends are kept from the riddle how hard is it in seven daies to hit upon it But when they plowed with his heifer how easily they finde it out and come to him saying What is more sweet then hony And what more strong then a Lion When the two Apostles Peter and Paul preached to the Jewes how they pressed upon them the offer of salvation because by vertue of the covenant they were to have the first refusall Read two places Act. 2. Peter tells them To you and to your children out of Gods free love the promise belongs and the powrings out of the spirit and to as many as the Lord our God shall call And so in the 13. of Acts To you brethren the Jewes at Antioch is preached by this man forgivenesse of sinnes It was a great honour though they had not the grace to see it And so much more to all under the condition of faith the promise belongs although to such as are under the condition of their own strength it shall be a meer toile and bondage So much for the first instruction Instruct 2 A second serves to untie a knot in the seeming contradiction of Scriptures Quest Grace is called by name of a yoake how then easie Some presenting unto us a marveilous ease in the yoke of
As the loadstone holds iron to it selfe so I have felt thy promise to draw me so that I cannot give it over nor forsake the meanes but they are daily sweeter and sweeter to me I have not felt such temptations to hideous thoughts lusts as some have done I am not disquieted so much about the measure of my preparations as some have been from my youth up thou hast by steps and degrees wrought that which thou art faine to worke in others by violence and with difficulties Nothing but excesse of clemency and mercy hath beene my portion and yet in all I have held some good testimony in my owne heart of sincere and plaine intentions although feeble yet faithfull Oh blesse the Lord Pitty such as get to heaven with difficulties As for others whose birth costs more travell and paines pitty them the rather and confesse thou owest them so much the more compassion by how much they come harder to heaven then thou dost We see an heire toiles not so much for all his inheritance as a poore labourer for a groat a day Doth the poore man murmure at him No but puts himselfe under providence which hath made some owners some tenants some to live at more ease others with more toile The Lord is the maker of both and perhaps foresees that if the poore had as the rich he would beare it worse and therefore his rough spirit must bee basked and held downe from pride and rebellion Let not such as meet with more hardship in their conversion accuse God for changing ease into toile Let them not murmure at Lydia at Zachee and such as have beene easily brought home but blesse God that he would trouble himselfe with such peeces as they rather then burne them as knotty logs scarce worth the hewing and bestow any cost upon them for his owne names sake rather then they should perish But let them be farre from cavilling at God that they have abode the heate of the day and others comming in at the eleventh houre have fared as well Matth. 20.15 Is thy penny the worse silver for theirs Or is thine eie evill because Gods is good wonder rather that ever that penny should come in thy purse then that others fare as well or that thou farest not better So much for this Branch Branch 2 Secondly let this be an admonition unto thee for the time to come that this ease of the first mercy Beware lest the ease of the first mercy cause thee after to slight it become not a snare unto thee afterward to cause thee to slight it and forget it Doe not as wanton heires who spend it as lightly and basely as it came easily Lest the Lord make your hearts ake for it and set you on the racke teaching you to repent and to keep within bounds Oh! abuse not this goodnesse slight it not walke not slackly sit not loose upon easie mercy devote thy selfe rather to God for so free sweet easie mercy with the most close faithfull heart thinking nothing too deare for him David could breake forth Psal 43. ult into great triumphs after a tedious conflict and combat with his fears doubts depth of heavines and say I will still praise him who is the health of my countenance and my God And shalt not thou say so much more who hast escaped many such scourings Doe not now thinke thou art safe thou maist heare pray receive the sacraments as loosely and formally as thou wilt because grace came easily No make the more precious account of it else thou art a slave and no Sonne An heire seeing himselfe stockt by his father with sweet dwelling rich grounds great revenues so that he needs not to carke and toile for a living What doth he Surely as the Lord bids the Israelites who came into a land flowing with milke and hony and that at the best vantage even in the harvest of all commodities But rather knit the heart to God Joshua 5.11 Beware lest now yee forget the Lord that hath thus endowed and furnished you Walke humbly and feare the Lord that it may goe well with you So should we doe we should say now all other things are done to mine hand there is but one thing to doe Lord teach me to do it well If I can be full and yet remember the Lord that made me and highly esteem the rocke of my salvation he will thinke them well bestowed Deut. 32.14 and confirme them to me else they shall be a snare Fall not to Adams and Eves sinne who in the abundance of all things being set in a Paradise could not digest their happinesse but fell to revolt and so were cast out Say not Soule eat drinke be merry cry not peace peace but let the ease of mercy keepe thy soul from all presuming and sensuall security John 5. Remember that bitter pill given by our Lord Jesus to a loose one whose cure cost him nothing so he began to play his parts Thou art healed now sin no more lest a worse thing befall thee and then thou wilt wish would I had lien lame by the poole still We are scarce able brethren to beare the ease of mercy but we wax wanton and that is the cause why so few finde it and so many complaine of such difficulties It is just with God to make us weare the chaine for it to teach us to walke before the Lord more humbly and soberly And so much for the second Branch of the Exhortation I should now have concluded the Use with the third and last Branch that we walke in the experience of this blessed ease to trust God forth on for the like goodnesse But the time is spent Let us cut off here and call upon God c. THE FOVRTEENTH LECTVRE Still continued upon this thirteenth VERSE VERSE XIII And his servants came neere and said unto him Father if the Prophet had bid thee doe some great thing wouldest thou not have done it How much more then when he saith unto thee Wash and be clean VERSE 14. So he went downe and dipped himselfe in Iorden seven times c. 2 Kings I Gave you an hint briefly beloved in our Saviour when I last ended the former Sermon what I would have proceeded with if time had permitted I have shewed you That the beleeving of Gods promise to such as are in case is an easie thing Sundry grounds and Scriptures I cleered the truth by and sundry Uses of Instruction of Terror of Reproofe and of Exhortation I have added And to this last wherein two branches were urged Branch 3 then belongs a third that is That all who have found this handfull of ease The ease of mercy should make Gods yoake light for ever after in beleeving pardon should be earnest with God for the ease and sweetnesse of an holy course that the yoake of God may become easie and his burthen light Say thus unto the Lord Hitherto
more deadly then by an ill conceit of him and his method of beleeving For wisdome is easie to him that loveth understanding if God will make it so why shouldest thou gainsay it A lowring sullen heart causeth this slavery in us wee are willing to beleeve that which we wish but looke what we have small list unto that we naturally frame to our selves very difficult Counsells against this disease Strive first to get a true judgement of the way of conversion that the Lord hath said its easie It s that which Naamans servants here labour to beat into their Master and by it prevailed with him for the obeying of the promise Next strive to get under the condition of it for all such are at next door to it To this end instead of studying thy selfe and thine owne abilities study the promise and let that draw thee to be in love with him who hath so freely offered it that will winne thy affections to it and when thy heart is taken with it thou shalt soone be on thornes to enjoy it The ease of beleeving issues from the soules getting under the condition of the promise Touching which point because it will offer it selfe in the next verse more fully I say the lesse here That which in a word I will presse here and so finish is this Resist faiths enemy which is bondage an ill opinion of God a conceit that he love our toile and vexation and nourish faiths friend which is Gods ease and that he is no hard Master no tyrant no taske-master but one that delights in a cheerfull obeyer and faith will follow sweetly God loves one that will not bee scared away with Lions and Beares but come to God for ease with assurance that its easie for him to give The cause why there is such difficulty in beleeving comes not from God but it comes from our false opinion and a strange conceit that all pretious things must bee difficult It costs the Lord exceeding paines to banish out this error which if it were once overcome it s not to be said what incredible ease would appeare Therefore let thy course poore soule be to beg of God the benefit of this ease pray to him and say If the way to heaven be of thy meer inventing if the Lord Jesus himself be thy free gift if the offer of him to a loaden heart be free and voluntary if the gift of faith it self be thine and thou hast bound thy self both to give feet to come and to give ease to the soule that commeth where lies the difficulty Surely in the slavish heart which feares where no feare is which judges of God according to her owne sense Now to sense and flesh who dare say or when did ever God say faith was easie Come to him then and importune him for this ease Lord take away my slavish heart I have wofull experience what my moyling and toyling wit and course is able to doe At the first I liked it well as mine owne strength but now I am tired with it I see it s thy plague thou givest toyle to the wicked but to the good and pleasing in thy sight ease and rest To hunt and to rost that they have got in hunting to labour moderately and to eat of the fruit thereof Oh this blessing I want Lord all the fish in the sea are at thy call thou canst in a moment gather them all together into one place Luke 5. Joh. ult Gen. 18.14 Thou canst bid Peter spread his net just where they are and enclose multitudes in it after he had fished all night and catcht nothing Alas he cast out his net on the wrong side all the while but when the Lord Jesus came then he cast on the right side and catcht abundance At thy command Lord a dead heart shall be quickned a dead wombe shall conceive a creeple of thirty eight yeares shall be healed and what hard thing hath not turned easie at thy command What was easier then to goe through the red sea first and then Jorden dryshod when thou causedst the windes to keep up the waters like two walls on both sides and to dry up the mud in the midst What is hard save because of lets And what is not easie if barres be removed Oh therefore Lord thou who by that miracle madest Peter a Preacher and gavest him a signe that he should be a fisher of men and enclose three thousand at one Sermon teach me this blessed gift make me such a Preacher of reconciliation by thy skill and ease Act. 2. And thou who broughtest all fishes under the net bee not discouraged by my shinesse feare and loathnesse to bee driven in Say but the word and I shall come under it and thy Minister shall cast out on the right side and enclose me Oh happy soule if after all my tricks and wiles to shunne thee thou shalt at the last make my will willing and cause me to come under the sweet and yet authority of thy promise I crave not Lydia's ease Zachees ease I know now thy course is more leasurely I doe not so much seeke shortnesse of labour as sweetnesse of spirit and meekenesse of heart and surenesse of successe and riddance of my basenesse and contradictions The wildernesse shall be as welcome to me as the way of the Philistins if thou wilt tame my rebellions and give me a pledge of Canaan at last The Lord will not stop his eare to such a prayer mercy pleaseth him and the ease of mercy pleaseth him what should hinder him from giving that which pleaseth him Onely our owne ease set up against his makes the way to heaven tedious if that be removed heaven will bee as easie as this cure was by washing in Jorden So much for this last Branch as also for the whole Use Vse 5 I proceed now to the fifth Use which is Admonition and Caveat viz. Admonition Wisdome is needfull to judge of the ease of grace That notwithstanding all which hath beene said about this point yet that we be wise and discreet in our judgements both concerning Gods diversity of dispensation and concerning the estates of men For the first although I have said nothing but the truth of God hitherto yet this must not breed ill bloud in us when we consider his casting off thousands yea millions of people both such as are without the pale of the Church and such as are visible members by Baptisme It may arise in the mindes of some to thinke that if the way of God were easie why should the Lord hide it from so many generations from the beginning till now for ought we know among Pagans and Infidels And why should so many among our selves after their long knowledge and use of meanes yet finde it so hard a taske and come short of it when all is done The answer whereto is That the secret waies of God are not for us to descant upon If he will
conceale this way of his from many for speciall cause we must say Knowne unto the Lord are all his wayes and workes from the beginning Act. 15.18 Hebrew Greeke and Latine are things easie and familiar to some children but they who never had training Judge not rashly either of Gods publicke never come to know them they are theirs whose lot it was to have good education It s the lot of some Countries to have plentifull Mines of gold and silver and it s no hard matter for such to dig it out of the earth Act. 17.38 But they whose lot it is to have no such priviledge know not what the ease thereof meanes Therefore the wofull forsaking of them and passing by those times of ignorance must not make us thinke that those to whom the Lord reveales it finde it to be a difficulty It s easie onely to such as the Lord makes it so Whom he will he shewes mercy unto and whom he will he hardneth Such secrets as these must be trembled at and adored not descanted rather those whose portion it is to bee so mildly and easily drawne home to God should applaud and magnifie his goodnesse to them as a peculiar priviledge and say He hath not done thus to every Nation neither have all knowne his wayes That which hath beene impossible for some to reach unto we have beene borne unto as free men and have found it easie and sweet unto us Secondly let not us judge the estates of such Or private administrations as whom the Lord hath exercised with long difficulties in this point of beleeving I need not instance It s well knowne to all that observe Gods government how different it is in this kinde how sweetly and safely the Lord hath drawne and carryed on the course of some of his servants with ease and comfort And yet how many others not inferior in grace unto them have beene brought through a thicket to heaven Paradise and Purgatory are not more contrary notions then the estates of these two How many holy men Preachers and others have led wearisome dayes nights and yeares in their conflict and continuall combat of their unbeleefe How intricate hath Satan and Melancholy made their conditions that they have thought it as impossible for them to beleeve as to climbe up to the clouds The Lord knowes why he suffers such holy humble and hungry soules to be so long tozed and disquieted without ease some to see sinne more bitter in the crosse and curse of Christ then in all legall terrors and some to dye so Phil. 3. not to teach us to judge them for no doubt they are comprehended of him whom they comprehend not but to tremble and adore the Soveraignty of God who will as it were step out of his course when he pleaseth and is bound to none and hath it in his owne hands how and by what way hee will bring his to heaven So much for this fifth Use Lastly this should be Encouragement and Comfort That although the helpes and meanes under which they live are poore their wits silly Vse 6 their memories weake their courage small their feares great Comfort and encouragement to poore soules by this ease the Divell mighty to beat them off their friends ready to discourage and above all their own hearts most ready to dismay and give them the slip yet the Lord having drawn them truly to seek him he can make the way easie and can fight as well with few as with many He can make a way through Euphrates for his remnant to returne by as Esay saith His bare word speaking causeth the light to appeare 2 Cor. 4.6 and one word of his mouth will cause the light of grace to shine in the heart and scatter all darkenesse at once Oh! how shalt thou hold up thine head before the Lord when he hath made thy way easie if thou by thy base sloth and presumption or stoutnesse and rebellion or by the minding of other trash shalt make thy selfe uncapable of it When the Lord promises to carry thine Arke above all rocks and mountaines and to set it downe at length in safety upon dry land that yet thou wilt not betrust thy selfe to it nor resigne up thy feares unto him Oh thou shalt be speechlesse when the Lord comes against thee Therefore to finish the point beare thy selfe upon this sweet priviledge of ease and enjoy it was not Ruth willing to enjoy the favour of easie gleaning Did she reject the ease which Boaz his favour allowed her Ruth 2.16 3.13 in suffering the eares of corne to be scattered before her by handfulls No surely she and her mother both tooke it as from God Say thus I thinke it was thy good will and pleasure Lord to have it thus else it should never have beene thou meantest love to me else I should have made no such earnings of it But seeing thou wilt have it so shall I reject it No but rather draw others by thine experience to seeke the like 2 King 7. Ease makes men very ready to talke The two lepers having found such an easie booty could not bee quiet till they had declared it to the Kings house declare it thou to thy wife to thy poore children let it be as a loadstone to pull their hearts to the promise Come my child I see thou fearest thou shalt never get any thing but looke not thou at thine owne awcknesse looke at the Lords ease I looked to have met with as hard a bargaine of it as ever did any but no sooner had the Lord tired me with mine owne wrastlings and humbled me under the hope of his sweet ease but my chiefe worke was over Even so get downe thy heart subdue it to Gods promise and all shall be sweet and easie If a Lady being sued too by a King to be his wife should answer were I a Queene I would soone hearken but alas I am a poore Lady Would the King affect her No surely the marrying of a King will make a Queen of it selfe 1 Sam. 25. Abigail hearing that David had sent for her to be his wife made a great matter of it but seeing he would needs have it so rejected it not though she was not meet to wash the feet of his servants 1 Sam. 18.23 And David though he said Seems it an easie thing unto you to be the Kings sonne in law Yet refused not finally to bee so when it was put upon but accepted it with gladnesse No man willingly stands in the light of his owne lawfull preferment save a foole And so much for this last Use and for the whole Doctrine grounded upon this first Argument of the Servants The second argument of the servants Naamans love and respect to Elisha Now I proceed to the second And that is the love esteeme and repute wherein their Master formerly had had the Prophet They saw it now to bee weakened through
uncharitable affections revenge of such as we distaste too good conceit of such as we affect or adde some bitter gourd or other of our owne to mar the pottage Numb 20.11 Thus did Moses being willed to speake to the rocke he would adde of his owne and smote it that the people might see their sinne but it cost him deare and did no good So hard a taske it is for flesh to trade in Gods mâ—tters with Gods minde entirely and sincerely if the meekest man was so what are we prone unto And yet how may this dreg of ours hurt the receit even as if we made no conscience at all Brethren every mans temptations lye within his owne element Perhaps we are faithfull and diligent preachers but our livings are not to our mindes we thinke our selves not regarded to our deserts here steps in our owne spirit and mixes it selfe unlawfully with a thing lawfull It s meet we were well requited But say we come short we are never knowne while we be tryed where then is our sincerity in doing our worke for the workes sake and trusting our Master for wages who hath set us on worke How doe mutterings and murmurings break in upon us with complaints discontents and unwillingnesse to proceed How doth the unthankfulnesse of people encroach upon our spirits to breed distrust and impatience which rather should excite and improve our faith to the uttermost And this is so farre from healing our sore that it rather incenses it more and weakens both the opinion of our labours and the supply of our wants in the mindes and practices of our hearers who thinke thus of us to be not as we are but as we should be men void of self-love and full of sincerity for the true ends of God and their soules Now brethren what peace can we have within while we are carnall in ministring of the spirituall things of God or vend his wares upon our owne stall fleecing the Lord of his dearest jewell his glory and making him a stalking horse for our owne game The base ends of other professions as Physitians Lawyers Tradesmen is not of so deep a dye as ours because the ground we stand on and the Trade we drive is holy and divine theirs only civill and worldly But how will some say may this Quest grace be gotten I will give two or three Answ directions and two or three motives and finish the Use First addict we our selves with delight to attend upon reading 1. Rules for sincerity in Ministery and Counsell study converse with one another imparting our needs and aides in the ordinances each to other as immediately serving to breed and feed this grace and to weane us from the contrary refusing not onely the usuall pleasures profits and vanities of the world except meet and private recreations but even denying our owne curiosity in studies and abuse of gifts to ostentation or to vent our owne way of quotations and conceits Doe not shew your tooles but your workemanship and that you are workemen that need not be ashamed dividing the word aright not seeking your selves but the end of your labours men thinke if they have once got them a name they are made for ever But let us not looke at the carnall custome of the times but at that which may breed sincerity in us God may be served with the best of our gifts so that we first resigne up our selves and them to him so take them back againe refined and purged washed and pared and shaven for his owne service When God hath stampt them with his owne Image and Spirit there is use of them all If ordinary meanes will not serve let extraordinary be used observe what speciall tang of selfe-love doth most assault us every man is not alike tempted some itch after one impure end some another sloth and ease bearing sway pride of life gaine pleasures or as the humour lyes Doe but consider what excellent lights have waxen dimme yea gone out as a snuffe by one of these Demas Diotrephes Alexander many in our owne experience If there be not sincerity in our preaching-scope it is a shrewd presumption there is but little in any respect and then what may not befall us I have noted some in this kinde who by degrees have wanzed and betraied themselves to be but unfaithfull in the maine and for their ends have forsaken the cause of Christ altogether Consider how little good is done at the best 1. Some motives to sincerity in Counsell when we are most sincere But as for the other how little or no good appeares to be done in the places where they reside Who knowes in such a world as this so full of timeservers so full of temptations baites feares how great need we have of prayer of armour and watching lest he that thinks he stands yet fall before he be aware How many are our snares on every side either by the flattery of such as applaud us or the unthankefulnesse of such as forsake us or the ignorance of such as will not acknowledge us or the wrongs of such as provoke us the unprofitablenesse of our hearers the cousenage of Satan or the falshood of our owne hearts How many in discontent have turned Papists Pelagians Anabaptists Socinians and never come to a pitch till death have ended their ambitious dayes How will hard times the multitude of expences the example of others our inferiours exceeding us in preferments tickle us to forsake sincerity exept God have put a sweetnesse into us of working for himselfe and conscience and trusting him for successe It must be our whole worke even to locke our selves wives and posterity into the arke of providence and the promise of alsufficiency knowing that except we be such as can swallow any gobbets we shall not by all our carking adde one cubit or make one haire white or blacke one promise beleeved will prove a surer stocke then all our selfe-love and selfe-seeking will profit us not to speake of an ill conscience besides Let us beare this minde that whatsoever our meanes be for our labours yet rather then we would not honour God in them if we might and the case so required we would trust him for support and supply To conclude oft muse of the price of soules It is Peters argument when he urges Ministers to preach of a ready minde not for gaine because the flocke of Christ is bought with his bloud And to conclude with that which he there addeth That hundred fold which wee shall reap for all our losses in and for the cause of God and sincerity will fully requite us if here we lose our skinne and fleece by wolves and dogs which pursue and teare us the great Shepheard of the flocke our Lord Jesus shall come we shall have a Crowne of glory that fades not better then all that we can expect or men can gratifie us with Thus much also for Exhortation may serve the turne Vse 5
speakes most directly to his heart As for pleasing himselfe in being in the element of any truth whereof he sees no use it is irkesome to a wise heart although he reverence all And these may serve for a taste of many more lets which differ as men differ and for answer to the first question I come to the second Since it is thus what reason may be given to Quest 2 satisfie men in this way of good for many would thinke it better if God tooke a more short and speedy way But I answer Answ for many causes God permits it To summe them up breefly One is 1. Cause because the Lord herein lookes at some grosse sins which ruled and reigned in the former part of mens life and in youth which are as iron moles and will hardly be worne out of the flesh being bred in the bone save by tozing and searching the heart throughly Secondly that he might breed some restraint in youth and curbe them from such offences as after must cost a great deale of purging plowing and harrowing ere the soule will affoard good mould for the word For sure it is the more rebellion the Lord meets with the more irons he loades the soule with Esay 28. Thirdly that he might exercise each soule in finding out her owne speciall let and not goe to worke in a fulsome generalnesse Fourthly to breed in the soule a solemne and sad thought concerning the way of God and roote out that giddinesse and vanity which puffes up the soule in a vaine presumption and ease Fifthly to occupy the minde of the Minister in right and carefull dividing the word and studying to approve himselfe as a workeman not to be ashamed striving to be faithfull both in the gift of discerning spirits that he may speake to the purpose not at randon as also to be painfull in catechizing which containes the wise and leasurely way of God to scrue and dive into the hearts of men by degrees and to soke the heart in the principles of faith which they that want may be long enough in hearing Sermons ere they conceive the order of the mystery of faith and how the soul comes to claspe with the promise Sixtly the Lord hereby corrects those most wicked evills which have carried the soule in and under the Ministry of the Gospel especially the dallying with the seasons of grace 7. That by this mean the Lord might clense the heart from Selfe in every kinde and twitch up every roote and rinde of selfe-love which would dangerously mix it selfe with the promise Lastly that the Lord as I toucht before might prepare way for himselfe in the honour of the soul when it shall finde by experience that all her salvation is of him and he could bring it out of nothing nay worse then nothing when as the soule lay strugling with herselfe without hope or remedy So much for answer to the second question The third and last question is how the soule may finde by markes Quest 3 that the Lord is following on with the work of grace That so it may be comforted in this that she is no hypocrite and so shall not wanze and moulder away as wax before the Sunne but obtaine the fruit of the promise in Gods due time For answer whereto this I say it may bee knowne by the contrary to those markes which bewray hypocrites Answ Marke 1 The first shall be this A soule truly under the condition of grace is very vigilant stirring and observant of the seasons which affoord grace not only generally to hearken after the word but specially to observe the Angels moving of the water The Lord doth not alway stir alike The Minister is not moved nor the heart of the hearer affected alike It s rare when the Lord and the soule close throughly one with the other when the word is preacht so savourly and lively and carryes the vertue of the speaker with it into the hearer and when the hearer meets it with a discerning of a season from God But when the soule meets with such Oh it abhors to dally and trifle with God to greeve him with slightnesse either for the present or after But confesses it to be a rare occasion presses hard with the Lord for blessing and followes on as Gedeon did those enemies Judg. 7. while the sent was hot lest he should be defeated Thus doth a good heart watch her time alway being upon wing for her prey and loaths carelessenesse of the watchwords of God No sin stings her more then former dallyings with the Lord nothing brings her upon her knees in secret more then this sinne and the sad fruit of it nothing puts her in more feare lest God should forsake her and suffer his Spirit to give over all saving strife with her nothing more is desired then that the Lord would forget her many provokings this way and stir her up with threefold alacrity to redeeme such seasons for time to come Whereas an hypocrite sees not such mercy from God or else vanishes in the fruit of them le ts all goe and nouzles himselfe in a blinde hope all shall be well whiles yet old sinnes and dallyings are upon the score unrepented of and unforgiven and the soule hardning more and more and waxing daily more and more crazy and unfit to be wrought upon Marke 2 Secondly a thriving soule God and promise-ward above all things nourishes life in herselfe not onely in ordinances but in the course and way of conversation Where ever she become the Spirit of life leaves her not wholy but more or lesse accompanies her spirit to preserve it from deadnesse flatnesse remissenes and suffering the worke of God to lye by in her And howsoever she feels a very body of death in this kinde fighting against the law of life in her yet knowing which is the stronger she gives not place No although the more she strives to be lively and savoury upon the promise and by faith the more the death of corruption resists her and discourages her yet even in this darke belly of the whale she casts her eie towards the Temple Jonah 2.8 and dares not yeeld when yet she is almost foiled but discernes a base body of death from the desire of her owne heart and because she feeles a dying she judges herselfe not wholly dead but to have some life under the embers which she makes much of and nourishes as one would hatch up one coale of fire upon dry straw lest it should goe quite out Such a soule abhors a daily deadish and sad heart more then death it selfe labours to revive it selfe by all hot waters from swowning and dying rejoyces when she recovers exercises her selfe with others as well as in secret to whet up that dull and weake edge of life and faith which remaines and is glad to feele that it is not alway alike with her in this kinde Whereas an hypocrite who never attaind to this sweet life
persons disdained not to learne of so poore a counsellour what should such as wee doe who are yet as much more stout then they as they were wiser then wee are And so much for this poynt Doct. Another poynt offers it selfe from hence also and that from the order of his obeying The Text telles us Then hee went and dipped himselfe When I pray you Surely when his stomack was brought down and sunk in him then hee went dipped himselfe in Jorden when that which all this while letted was removed then did he obey believe and doe as he was bidden and that in a moment The poynt is very speciall to prepare us to the poynt following for it acquaints us with a main barre and stop which lies in the Preachers way and the Spirits way to wit a rebellious and selfe-conceited heart and with that which makes easie and sweet that is an heart convinced and yeelding to the Word No man I suppose will expect me to be large in much opening of this disease for I have spent many Sermons in the handling of Self Self-love carnall Reason Rebellion and coy Pride in Naaman when I went over the 11. verse Now I take all that for granted and from the issue of the Lords working thus long upon Naaman his humbling of him to the command Humility alway goes before grace compared with the effect of his obeying I would present unto your eye this poynt That alway when the Lord means to create faith in the soule he doth immediatly put an end to all that stoutnesse of spirit that hindred the same The poynt is cleare No sooner had the Lord emptied Naaman here of his opposing heart but immediatly followes his obeying the charge So true is that golden speech of Ieremy Jer. 31.18.19 I heard Ephraim bemoaning himselfe Thou hast chastised me and I was chastised as an Heyfer unaccustomed to the yoke Surely after that I was turned I repented and after I was instructed I smote upon my thigh I was ashamed and confounded because I did beare the shame of my youth The summe of the words is That all the while that Ephraim was proud and wilfull no grace would enter into him But as soone as the Lord thawed his spirit and made him humble lo hee presently submitted and bare Gods yoke with meeknesse and obedience Prophets there were before who did beat upon him and tozed him with rebukes and terrors but alas they were but as the blowes of the Smith upon his Anvill which is the more hardned But at last God cast into his heart a secret thought of his long rebellion and how little good it had done him then by and by hee listned and smote upon his thigh and repented Even so all the day long sayth the Lord by Esay Chap. 52. ult have I stretched out mine arme to a people in vaine None hath beleeved my report the word of God is revealed to none Why Hee addes because it is a stiff-necked and a gain-saying people q. d. But for this they had beleeved long agoe This is that which elsewhere the Prophet foretels under the Gospell that such as should bee converted unto God Esay 2.4 Esay 2.12.17 should turne their Swords into Mattockes and their Speares into Sythes that is of warlicke and turbulent ones become peaceable Husband-men and Inhabitants The Aspe shall suffer the young childe to play at the hole of the Aspe and the Lyon shall feed with the Lamb and the Beare with the Bullocke meaning the savage and wilde dispositions of men should turn meek and tractable Iob in one place brings in the Lord asking this question Job 39.5 Wilt thou tye the Unicorne to the furrow or wilt thou make the wilde Asse feed at thy Crib q. d. No their nature is unbroken thy Oxe and thy Horse are fittest for that whom thou hast tamed to the worke Even so assure thy selfe the Divell and Christ Light and Darknesse may as soon comply as a stout rebellious heart and grace Rebellion and Unbeliefe yoke together so doe Selfe-deniall and meeknesse of Spirit with faith and obedience As while the sinewes of mans heart is of Iron the Lords heaven is Brasse so when the soul begins to melt the Lord begins to turne and convert it It is with the soule in this kinde contrary to that it was with them in Acts 27. If these goe out of the ship it must needs miscarry But if pride and rebellion abide in the heart no grace will grow the man must perish Ottomans horse they sayd wheresoever he became made the grasse that it could not grow so doth a stout heart keep grace from the heart There is a secret intelligence between hell and a proud spirit And contrarily there is an entercourse between an humble heart and heaven Hosee in one place tells us Hos 2.21 That the Lord would speake to the heavens and they should heare the earth with rains and then the earth should heare man with fruits So first heaven must grant the heart tendernesse and relenting and then that will heare the Lord commanding and promising The windes being very loud the aire is dry but if they be downe then presently we have store of raine See that 1. King 19.12 So is it here when the tempests and stormes of the heart bee up whether in morall sinnes against the Law or spirituall rebellion against the Gospell there is no obedience but if they be downe never so little the clouds will follow after raine that is faith and obedience will ensue Prov. 15. ult The feare of the Lord is instruction and wisedome And before honour goeth humility Whom shall I teach Doctrine Esay 28.7.8 Even him that is weaned from the Milke and drawne from the Breasts The sweet milke of the breasts of Selfe and carnall Wisedome are alway opposite to the wisedome of God Sacrifices thou wouldest not but an eare thou hast boared Why That I might doe thy will O God who before did mine owne Vse 1 For briefe use First it is instruction to put us out of question why an heart of unbeliefe hath so long pestered the most of our hearers Instruction Why the most hearers are pestered with unbeliefe Because the heart was never brought down and why the Lords perswasions have so little prevailed to make us believe Surely if you doubt as I feare few need to doe the enemy is this wicked Haman of a rebellious heart Perhaps some of you are of another minde because you can so colour and crust over this sore with courtesie and good words but the truth of it is There is an heart within big and high and stout This is the Camell which suffers not the soule to goe through the needles eye Somewhat is the cause why the felon upon the hand swells it is an humor which is not yet let out if that were out the felnesse would cease Enquire and consult either a cursed heart will keep some base lust
which God will have out and there the Lord and it are upon debate or there is a cursed naturall antipathy between the Lord and the way of salvation or the soule is full of teches and pritches against reproofe or it hatcheth some false conceit that it hath obeyd when it hath not which it will not see or puffes and snuffes against some other thing the Minister the Ordinance the difficulty of Religion the uncertainty of the promise Whatsoever it be it is a distastfulnesse of heart and a resistance against God which if it were not the soule would nakedly come in and obediently submit to the Gospel But this disease hath this misery that the more dangerous it is the lesse it will bee convinced of such a thing and this nourishes the heart in her wretchednesse it is not time alone which will heale it rather it causes it to rankle and wax worse and worse Men ascribe it to other matters being willing to gull themselves because they have no will to be rid of it They say they have weake memories little capacity and the Minister is too high for them But in very deeds their hearts are too high for him till the Word come neerer 2 Cor. 10.4 and worke inward to cast downe all imaginations and high things no submission will follow to the obedience of Christ The effect every one dare confesse but the cause they will not see it is not unprofitablenesse or an ill memory that hath caused your hearts to be so surly and perverse but it is a proud and gainsaying heart Acts 28.27 which hath so long made you unprofitable Doe not lin till you are convinced hereof for till the cause be seene it cannot bee removed Doe not lay the fault where it is not doe not blanch over the cause with fine words mitigate not the extremity of the sin with gentlenesse Perhaps you doe not live in wrath and rage with your wives family neighbours you make a shift to comply with men courteously so long as no body hurts you but truly if you beleeve not in all this while there is a pad in the straw your spirits are not inwardly brought to that tender softnesse and selfe-deniall to thinke equall thoughts of God and his way something stickes in your base stomackes which will not suffer the word of God to goe downe and pierce into you to perswade you If you would but bethinke you what a great let this is which hitherto you have not seene or if you could thinke how the case would bee changed with you if once a tractable comming and inclining heart were in you how the Ministers of God the Angels â—ea the Spirit of grace it selfe which you have so long grieved and resisted would rejoyce in the change Oh! you would never lin with your owne soules till you had cast it out and having shaken it off you would thinke it a greater ease then ever that Martyr of Christ did B. Hooper when he had cast off all his Popish trash and furniture from his shoulders Secondly it is reproofe Reproofe to many Professors who in hope are of Vse 2 the better sort who although by this sinne have not perhaps wholly stopped and choked the passages of the grace of conversion Christians of crabbed peevish stubborne hearts lose the grace of faith yet by the dregges thereof remaining in them and nourished dampe that obedience of heart that life of faith and selfe-deniall yea that peace joy and open heart to God and goodnesse which else they might attaine It is strange how some Christians dare give place to their corruption in this kinde yea grow to thinke it their praise Some are sowre and crabbed as it were steeped in vinegar so censorious and uncharitable that none can escape their censure some so suspitious jealous that none can live by them some so sullen that no estate can content them some so selfe-loving that none can please them save they who humour them in all their passions and pangs some so implacable that if once offended they can scarce looke a man in the face to rights some so eager in revenge that nothing else will content them some alwayes stirring up debate betweene neighbours so busie in Law and in matters of contention as if they were Salamanders alway living in the fire others so eager in spirit so lowring and sad that though they breake not out with others yet they never agree with themselves nor walke with a cheerfull countenance Why Save that the sweet oyle of gladnesse hath not suppled them nor the peace of God which passeth understanding hath possessed and stablished them Oh friends How dare you dally and venture to abide thus How sad a reflex will this bee upon your death-beds You will say It doth oft trouble you and you are grieved for your waspishnesse and anger But what then Is that an amends to God to vomit up that at an odde time which afterward you doe returne to and licke up ugaine without sense or feeling Oh! it were meet for you to be so heart-sick of it that you might for ever abhor it Christians should mark the secret creepings of such poyson how it dogges them chokes humblenesse and cheerfulnesse in them and makes them walke unfruitfully and unsetledly from time to time And say that sometimes you fast and pray and vow and covenant against them yet if the corruption and your soules are so incorporated together that when it steales in upon you with the old sweetnesse it inchants you and disables you from resistance what cause of boasting have you None surely nor shall till the Lord come between you and home with the spirit of true remorce and sorrow for it unto repentance never to be repented of and till your beloved lust become your bane See and apply that in James 4.1.2.3 till the Lord in secret chasten your spirits that you can sit and bemoane your selves with Ephraim and say O Lord what is the cause that I am so enthralled to this stout and unbroken heart Alas No word of thine no patience of thine can enter while this sin harden me I am not fit to bee wrought upon by any crosse blessing meditation or ordinance All washes away as it comes Oh! shall I never be rid of this misery this chaine When Lord will it once be Who shall breake off the slavish custome of my heart this way and set me at liberty Oh! if once it may bee I shall even account it as a second resurrection from the dead Oh! set such a guard over mee that I may never be surprized any more with it Let mee thinke the Divell not farre off when I see this messenger of his at my heeles so to dogge and buffet me Let thy Spirit from above which is pure peaceable Jam. 3 i5 long-suffering mercifull and patient humble and loving deliver me from this spirit of envie sullennesse Selfe and her fruits most earthly sensuall
of Ivory or Gold But the Lord onely exalts himselfe in the spirit and conscience there he sits as Soveraigne and causes it to become his owne Recorder witnesse and Judge against the person himselfe so that the greatest selfe-love in the world cannot bribe the conscience to side with the sinner against him who is the Lord of conscience and can condemne both the one the other 1 John 3.20 Matth. 10.28 Feare not him who can kill the body onely but him who can cast body and soule into hell fire I say unto you feare him So then the Soveraignty of the commands of God stands much in the intents of God and that meaning of his to rule the spirits of his subjects and in all their obedience either negative or affirmative either in doing or suffering to cast a secret chaine upon the conscience to obey cheerfully equally uprightly wisely constantly For instance in the worship of a Sabbath the abhorring of oppression the suffering for the cause and truth of God the Lord lookes not at the externall act but the intent of the soule and the pure carriage of the heart towards himselfe as with what delight it keepes a Sabbath how cordially it preserves the spirit chaste and cleane for what ends it suffers the crosse whether for Gods or it owne Thus much for the former Quest 2. What is meant by the extent of a command The latter is what is meant by the extent of a command I answer The full reach of the command As for instance First the unlimitednesse of the command The Lord makes not some Lawes for great ones and some for small ones as if the great flye might get through the cobweb but the little ones must be taken but his nets as they are small enough to catch the small fish so they are strong enough to hold Whales and the mightest They reach to all sorts without limit rich and poore noble and simple high and low one and another Secondly their extent stands in their influence to all The Princes law reaches to all his Subjects as well as to his Chamber of London but yet the law-giver reacheth no further then his presence in absence and behinde his backe his Lawes are slighted But this Law-giver is omnipresent and assists his Lawes with immediate influence causing them to convince in secret as well as in publicke and is able to execute his owne Lawes to the uttermost so that for lacke of strength and reach of arme no sinner can goe unpunished Thirdly this breadth reaches in the affirmative command to the negative and in the negative to the affirmative as directly as if they had both been expressed In the narrow Lawes of men the sense and scope of the Law must bee limited to the words of the Statute which as the common speech is have no meaning in them beyond the tearmes thereof But the power of Gods commands stands in their insinuations and imply somewhat by necessity which they expresse not Fourthly their extent stands in the coherence thereof to wit that whatsoever maine good or evill the Lord commands or forbids by the same power hee forbids or commands whatsoever concernes that command the means tending thereto the occasions leading all circumstances attending whatsoever possibly the soule of man can apprehend directly or indirectly to make for that Law or to thwart or crosse that Law Fifthly it reaches to the quantity and measure of the duty urging not only sin to be shunned in the greatest degree but also in the smallest and so duty to be done not only in the main peeces but in the pettiest all proceeding from the same goodnesse and justice Sixthly it reaches to the measure of the principle of obeying urging it to obey not coldly deadly slackly formally but to put forth the uttermost affection strength wisdome will courage zeale reach and largenesse fruitfulnesse and extension of the inward and outward man to concurre with the meaning of the Commander which the Holy Ghost calls all welpleasing Col. 1.7 Seventhly it reacheth to an universality of time place occasions not to be limited straitened and circumscribed at our narrow will and pleasure but tyes us alway yesterday to day and ever to one obedience Heb. 13.8 not to vary with the time with the multitude by occasion of dangers feares losses enmity power of man not to be cast off in private in secret but to be enlarged according to it selfe generally to all circumstances This is a field of matter but I have already elsewhere walked in it in some sort as the reader hereof may perceive by that I have written in my practicall Catechisme part 3. in the article of the directive rule of our obedience the Law of God where I treat fully of the point So much for this second To these two questions a third may be added Object and answered ere we goe any further and that is that it may seem harsh to presse this point under the Gospell since that the liberty thereof takes off this strictnesse and limits commands from the old extent of them to the ease of the Gospell To the which I answer That the Gospell is so farre from that loosenesse that rather it establishes Answ extends and corroborates them then otherwise A great part of our Saviours Sermon upon the Mount is spent in confuting this conceit Matth. 5.6.7 not onely of Pharisaicall but of Antinomian abuse and dissolutenesse Paul also tells us Ro. 2. ult that faith setles the Law stronger upon her bottome then ever So that he is as well accursed now as ever who shall adde or detract Rev. 22. True it is that the terror rigor and the impossiblenesse of the Law is removed by our Lord Jesus The Law how far it s strengthened or weakned by the Gospell 1 Tim. 1.5.6 but looke what is taken off in that kinde is supplied in another for the spiritualnesse and purity of obeying is enlarged now rather then diminished only it is true that even in this enlargement the Lord Jesus hath made his yoke most sweet and easie to them who out of faith love and a good conscience seeke the end of the commandement as Paul speakes of which more shall be occasioned to speake after if God will in the use of Exhortation It s enough here to say That as the Lord Jesus hath removed that burdensomenesse tyranny and irkesome rigor of Lawes which was intollerable so he hath put another yoke upon the soule instead thereof which although love make sweet yet justice will not abate nor cut off Love made Iacobs labour welcome but still the frost was tedious and the heat wearisome Gen. 29.20 and the conditions hard enough to flesh and bloud So much for this and for the ground of the point Now in the third place I come to the use of the Doctrine And Vse 1 first let it be Instruction and Caveat to all superiours and men in dignity and authority as to acknowledge
faithfull will withdraw himselfe for feare as loth to be noted afraid of his betters willing to sleep in a whole skin Try our selves by this If wee obey closely wee will not strive to quench but to quicken up our selves to pick out the best services we can for God in our places As a good Justice will straine his authority and improve the Statute to the uttermost against Sabbath-breakers drunkards and glad that hee can thus expresse his heart Another will bite it in and conceale himselfe So Parents so Officers so rich ones doe that which others cannot not else alas what singular thing doe you Triall 15 To conclude an honest heart will not weare the Divels Irons nor bee dispensed with It is well principled shee hath a sound principle and is not like to hypocrites I may compare these to Children set to Schoole some onely to read write and cast account so farre onely as will serve them to keep their Shop-booke or make their reckonings straight Others to be Grammarians and so University Scholers to learne the Arts and Tongues that afterward their learning may principle and furnish them for all studies So is it with these The formall Professor if he can pray and tip his tongue with generall religion is at a point and lookes no further hee hath enough for the attaining of his owne ends and is never troubled about his course But the sound hearted Christian who strives to bring his whole heart and life under the Rule hath never done with himselfe but workes his generall principles into an infinite bredth of particulars How shall I delight in the Sabbath How shall I hold in my heart from giddinesse and loosnesse How shall I watch to God in my thoughts affections and conscience How shall I get strength against this secret lust and that defect in duty praying hearing How shall I use the world as if not or deny my selfe God sees these errours although man doth not Oh! the principle of grace exceeds the shifting skill of an hypocrite as much as heaven doth earth These are some among many others which may serve to try our hearts brethren about this waighty businesse Set we upon this work therefore and cease not till by all or by some of these trials thou canst although but weakly yet soundly judge thy selfe to be one that endeavours closely to obey And as thou shalt by these markes discover thy selfe to be so either bee comforted or admonished To the which ends the two uses following shall pertaine Thus much for the use of Examination Vse 4 Fourthly then let all such as can prove that they receive the word of Commands according thereto with all closenesse and faithfulnesse comfort Comfort themselves in their condition I have pressed the use in part before to wit in one of the Reasons To apply my selfe more particularly this I adde That thou who closest with Gods Commands maist be doubly encouraged In 2 respects The first First in respect of thy speciall serving of thy time Thou bearest witnesse to God and to his truths when thou seest the power of godlinesse borne downe in this base world know it that as the Lord will be slight with the slight so he will bee close with the close 1 Sam. 3. It is his promise That who honour him he will honour those that esteeme preciously of Commands and walke narrowly with him in their obedience he will esteem preciously of them they shall be of his Cabinet counsell they shall be privy to his secrets he will make knowne to them his waies Joh. 7.17 So that when he is aloofe to others they shall have familiar accesse yea if he give an account to any of his administrations they shall be sure to understand it Abraham was for no other cause called the friend of God If ye doe my will you shall be my friends more then my servants for friends know secrets Gen. 18.17.18 Read that Ezek 9. Where the Lord causes them that obeyed him but in one of his charges to mourne for the iniquity of the age to be marked with a penne and inke that he might know them for his jewells for his beloved ones And againe he tells that Church in Rev. 3.19 because she had kept the word of his patience that is clave to his truths in the times of danger Therefore he would save her from the temptation which should come upon the whole earth Close obeyers of God in loose times shall have close comfort in trouble They that stand out for God and will not oppose his glory to publicke sale and reproach hee will shrowd them in the day of trouble when others shall goe from chamber to chamber with terror to cover their heads from wrath A strange promise which we can hardly see how God should performe but yet God will doe it for such as preserve themselves unspotted in conscience and cleane from the infection of others In the meane time he will be found of them in their prayers close walkers with God shall have close audience close peace close comfort inward refreshings as Esay cap. 50. speakes read the 10. vers Who is he that feareth the Lord and obeyeth his voice Let him stay himself upon his God And therefore fearing God feare nothing else Although thou be scorned and pursued for this thy closenesse as a vile person yet let not this dismay thee for thou sufferest for God and as Saint Peter saith if for a good cause and cleaving to a word 1 Pet. 3.14 thou art faine to suffer take no thought in that behalfe let them who suffer for their misdeeds looke about them but as for thy part the Spirit of glory rests upon thee and although thy face shine not as an Angells like Stephens yet thou shalt as much convince thine enemies Act. 6. ult as hee did the same Spirit of courage and patience which upheld him shall sustaine thee till thou be redeemed fully from all adversity Heb. 10.37 Beare a while and he that commeth will come not tarry in the meane time side not with them who breake Commands and would have thee follow their examples But rather if this be to be vile be thou yet more vile and the more thou avilest thy selfe for God the more honourable he shall esteeme thee The like I may say of thy obeying commands in the generall practice of Christianity take comfort in this also Canst thou say The second Branch Rom. 7.22 that thou delightest in the law of God in thy spirit and inner man I tell thee thy estate is better then to be a Prince without it The Lord hath done great things for thee if it be thus and as Paul speakes even made thee for the very nonce 2 Cor. 5. Consider the dayes past Hath it alway beene thus with thee Couldest thou alway desire to be unclothed and clothed upon Couldest thou alway desire to dye daily through the rejoycing
in our Lord Jesus Was thy soule alway under the authority of the commands both of Law and Gospell with sweetnesse and delight Was it not rather bitternesse and gall Who then hath made his yoake easie Surely hee who deserves unspeakable thankes at thy hands for it And therefore bee also truly joyfull in thy portion The time was when such a liberty of going in and out with the Lord would have made thee leape and shalt thou now carry it about thee Delight in obeying the sad commands of God affords solid comfort without savour or sensiblenesse Perhaps thou wilt say I have my load another way a deale of base corruption hanging upon me to coole my courage Oh! but the Lord hath onely tryed thee thereby whether thou wilt forsake his yoke or no for thine owne ease he doth but put a back-bias upon thee that he might weigh thy motion to himselfe thou art not hereby hurt one whit but much bettered kept in awe and humblenesse before God whereas else thou wouldst be puffed up But is this or ought this to be any cause of thy discontent ought it not rather to encrease thy comfort when thou seest the Lord hath provided against the vanishing of it to make it durable Oh! bestow but a few houres in a weeke to thinke what a priviledge it is for dust and ashes nay a dunghill of rebellion a depth of treachery to be so changed as to come under the line of God and to be under his authority with a willing heart to make the love of Christ thy banner and to bee subject to God thine heaven Oh! to have thy will captived to his and to desire to know feare love close with nothing save his will what is it but the suburbs of heaven to feele a veine of sweetnesse to overrule thy soule and to cure that light giddy and frothy emptinesse of it to sadden and settle it under this power and kingdome of the Command To cast out the law of the members the law of a proud a stout self-loving and self-seeking heart to bee above these above corruption so that as they stincke in thy nostrills so shouldest thou in theirs Oh doe not count this a common priviledge rather nourish it hugge it in thy bosome beware lest any steale away thy Crowne And rather then thou shouldest live to see that day wherein the commands of Faith and Love should wax stale and unsavoury chuse to be taken out of this world that thine eyes may never see the evill of a revolting heart Heb. 3.12 to depart away from the living God Vse 5 Fifthly if we feele by due examining that our hearts warpe from Gods Commands Admonition Le ts of close walking with God must be abhorred then let us be admonished to amend it betimes and to search and cast out all such lets as do hinder and forestall in us this closing with God As it fares with hypocrites of whom I have spake that they have an habituall contrariety so it often falls out with the people of God that they meet with many actuall rubbes which oppose this subjection of spirit Not onely that old Adam which is ever present and when they would doe good still suggests evill and when they would shake off evill still hinders good as Rom. 7.14 But also they meet with one or other actuall affront in whatsoever command the Lord tenders unto them which dogges and disquiets them from the entry upon the worke What they are to the upshot thereof There bee as many Let. 1 subtilties of heart or stops of incumbrance as there are commands one tricke or other still is put upon us If the command be to bee unspotted of the world then the Divell comes in with the necessity of following my calling of close attending our worke and trades he tells us the world is hard and he that labours not must not looke for meat we must have no more then we toile for we must therefore do as others doe and sell as the market wee must make the most of our commodities and spare for a hard time and yet perhaps we be rich have not a childe or kinsman to bestow it on and so under this cloake breakes in abundance of worldlinesse not only to keep us from unspottednesse but even to drowne us in the world So let the Lord but Let. 2 presse us to suffer for a truth rather then betray it perhaps we answer we would faine doe it but then throng in such a number of feares how shall we endure persecution How shall we beare reproach Insulting of enemies imprisoment threats fines hard handlings How shall I beare the losse of my gifts credit favour of the world company contents How shall wife children be maintained family and charges supported defraied in this unthankfull world Thus while the meer outside of things is looked at the crosse is terrible all suffering is tedious and thus is it in all other commands carnall reason ease remissenesse and slacknes of spirit vanity infidelity and such other scurfe breaks in and then comes in a marveilous wearinesse of resistance of our lets and so a willingnesse to be foiled to give up our weapons and to resist no more as if we despaired secretly in our base spirits of ever recovering and therefore must give our selves some intermission and ease Sutable hereto is a third let when we think our strength not yet Let. 3 growne to such maturity as to digest so strong and beare so weighty commands as Gods puts upon us and so assume the whiles a kinde of exemption and liberty to our selves for the present So also when we Let. 4 nourish not the Promise with the Command without the which who doubts but it is burthensome But are carried by the present sense of our spirit how that welcomes or distastes it and goe no further and so marre the worke by ill handling Otherwhiles defiling and abusing Let. 5 our selves by some truths which serve us not to hatch us up to lasinesse and ease but to encourage us in weakenesse As that God passes by the transgressions of his people our perfection here is the sight of our infirmities No perfection is here to bee looked for Againe Let. 6 looking at the common guise of the world their formall loose religion and yet how they carry it out God suffering them and men admiring them or at least looking at the looser sort of Christians what largenesse and breadth they allow themselves Sometimes also by ill custome in lesser evils not espying how the Let. 7 heart waxes degenerate and unsavoury losing ground of close obedience daily And this is not the least let of all that men will not give Let. 8 themselves leasure of thoughts to meditate and so to equal their hearts to the sadnesse and closenesse of Gods Commands but goe on in their course and run their round as blinde Sampson in his mill not considering what wash way they make of Gods Commands
thee The third examples Psal 16.2 Psal 119.4 Thirdly its excellent for us to turn our eyes off from all slighters and paltrers with God abhorring their declinings Psal 101. But to bend the eye of the soule towards them that are singular in grace and close obeying So David tells us That he set such before his eyes till hee was ravisht with them Doubtlesse saith he they goe not astray from any commands As if he should say oh that I were such an one With the base and formall a man should soon learne that trade But the watchfull the wakefull the close the conscionable will soone teach us their practise so that it will be a shame unto us to be otherwise and it will fixe the naile of commands deep into our hearts as with an hammer Eccles ult The fourth prayer Psal 119.27 The fourth is Prayer which is the constant helpe which Gods people have alway used to ease themselves by at this pinch David prayes God to teach him his Law graciously marke graciously that is in the sweetnesse ease delight and reward of it not in the toile and difficulty thereof Psal 119. So againe Oh that mine heart were directed to keepe thy commands They that feele the true weight of them will groane under their owne weaknesse and pray for strength Hence that holy prayer of Saint Augustine Give strength to doe what thou biddest and bid what thou wilt Turne all Gods promises and covenants into prayers for there is no one command urged upon the soule but it hath a promise annexed Oh Lord thou hast said thou wilt encline me to keep thy Law Thou hast promised to write it and engrave it in my fleshly tables to cause me to walke in all thy Statutes Oh doe it Lord Open mine eyes that I may see the wonders of thy Lawes their perfection and excellency then take the stone out of my heart and make it tender they may pierce into it with feare and awe Helpe Lord my fruit is come to the birth and there is no strength to bring forth Fifthly get humblenesse of spirit and that will equall Gods righteousnesse Murmure not fret not at the closenesse of them for that satisfies not God But be as a worme before him The fifth rule Humility and tremble at his voice as we see the poore wormes come shaking and trembling out of the earth when they feele the feet of any treading the earth Esay hath this speech in one place You have made me to serve by your rebellions A proud heart makes God serve base flesh An humble heart which knowes it selfe serves God and is glad that it may be accepted In Psal 2.12 we see how base men take upon them But whence is it Oh pride makes them cast away all the cords of God from them Pride makes them to say Our tongues are our owne what Lord shall controll us A swelling proud heart will not endure any pinch of Law more then it selfe likes But the humble wil take Law at Gods hands gladly and concurre with him Hast thou O Lord bidden me deny my selfe Abstaine from fleshly lusts Possesse my soule with patience my vessell in holinesse and honour It s just Lord thy will is a rule I desire not to see beyond it Proud servants love a faire Livery and great wages better then close commands But the humble will take any worke upon them and say it s their object Beware then of a sullen queazy coy and proud heart Sixtly marke closely the threats of God against each rebellion The sixt rule Observe Gods Judgments and the verifying thereof in experience both in Scripture and daily This will cut the combe of presumption For who have offended God and prospered It s a maxime lot upon it whether thou see it so or not be sure it will be so As that old Prophet told his sonnes 1 Kings 13. Bury me in the grave of the man of God for all which hee hath said against this place shall surely come to passe To get a weighty heart under threats giving them a being in the soule through faith is the onely way for Commands to take effect For God hath fortified the one with the other if the fence be broken down the corne lieth open to the stroyance of all beasts Observe closely how God plagues drunkards swearers adulterers Sunday breakers and the like and adde the patternes of the Scripture oft pressed by Peter and Iude that wee may not thinke their damnation sleepes else we will bee Atheists 2 Pet. 3. Epist Jude Psal 50. and frame God like our selves But this will awe us Such and such ventured so and so but they paid sweetly for it if we be content to share with them wee may side with them but not else For Gods wrath will not rot in the sky Eccles 7. Deferring of judgement sets the heart of a sinner yea hardens it to rebellion but beleeving it workes feare and prevention as in Noah Heb. 11. Heb. 11. Seventhly deny thy selfe The seventh rule Selfe-deniall Selfe and God will runne in a stream a while as filthy dung and pure apples in a river till the one be scattered from the other So our own ends and Gods make a poor shift to go together a while till trouble and losses reproach and pursuit divide them but then they sever Sure it is That man who hath no other obedience for God save that which will goe in his owne streame of ease safety content quiet and welfare will abandon God when he is tried Therefore he that meanes to walk closely with God let him shake off such weights as these The like I may say of such Heb. 12. as dare adventure to suffer in Gods cause upon hope to lick themselves whole by carnall supplies No no All such build upon the sands of their owne false hopes the Lord will scatter them I deny not but that God is all-sufficient to all his and hath promised not to faile them yea to give them an hundred fold requitall But this is to them that walke uprightly Mal. 3. Gen. 17.1 not to hirelings who obtrude their service and know no requitals but carnall Such it is just with God to leave to their owne shifts 1. Pet. 3. even to cry a confederacy to feare the feares of the wicked and to put forth their hand unto evill because of their afflictions They will buy out the aire of a prison but their owne aire shall choke them onely they who can trust God in his promise and are content to take his pay in good worth what ever it bee such God will not forsake And such onely are meet persons to obey because they are armed 8. Rewards Lastly digest truly the reward of close obeying not onely in heaven when it shall be knowne to men and Angels who they are though unknowne to the world But even here alas Gods peoples right hand knowes not what
And except there bee speciall cause of the contrary I mean that promises are proper to some and incompetible to others The Lord will have us search each corner of his Word to fetch out those promises which lye there as gold in veins for the comfort of his people Promises made to the head to the body to any member belong to the members to any part to the whole body except a limitation bee made All promises made to the head belong to the whole body all that concerne the Church concerne also the members and such as concerne one member doth also reach to another circumstances being wisely observed So that looke what a poore soule would have from God whether grace to heare and receive aright to pray or worship God spiritually to endure patiently and take up her crosse or to mortifie any lust to get a soft heart to be setled and stablished in faith to be kept from this present evill world or whatsoever else one place or other of Scripture will help thee to a promise for the nonce by which if thou have a gift to goe to the right Box thou shalt much more clearly and fully rest thy selfe upon God for a supply then if only thou shouldst consult with general promises which though they containe the particular yet are lesse evident and expresse not peculiar good things with such accommodation as the particular doe Our base spirits are content to generalize with God so we have any promise it serves our turne And why Because wee use promises for fashion and make our selves thinke wee doe that wee doe not whereas beleevers of promises search out their owne Legacies in special as if one should search a Will of a deceased friend as the Angels pry into the Mercy-seat 1 Pet. 1. and look a far off to see what God hath promised As common folke think they have stopt Gods mouth sufficiently if they worship him any way by singing a Psalme or reading a Prayer halfe asleepe and halfe awake so deale they with promises If they can catch any by the end it is enough for them As for culling out marking or singling those promises from the rest which might specially stay comfort and speake to their owne hearts from God they have no skill and accordingly is their gaine generall promises generall comfort But I say peculiar application of mine own promises is according to a promise Each promise will not suit to every necessitie Speciall wisedome and paines is required to get them distinguish understand and apply them as the plaisters which serve for speciall sores 6. When it is beleeved according to the scope and bent of them Sixthly and lastly he that beleeves a promise according to it beleeves it according to the scope and bent of it This is that which I said in the proofes All promises as they are Yea and Amen in Jesus so they must be beleeved as they are in Jesus Most men scumme off the fat and sweet of promises for their owne ends leaving the lean and sowre for whoso will But marke Pauls words there Ephes 4.21 That yee put off the old Man and put on the New This is the pad in straw which few men see in a promise They thinke promises sound nothing save good newes and that they catch at greedily But the scope of a promise is another thing as it cost blood to purchase So it must cost us our lusts and base evils to forgoe And there must be an harmony betwixt the purchase and the fruit Christ proclaimes no man ease and liberty to live as he list hee catches the soule by an holy craft of Promises that hee may winne and subdue it wholly to himselfe who redeemed it That every knee may bow and call Jesus the Lord not boast onely of his salvation but submit minde wit senses will affections passions purposes lusts yea the streame and bent of the whole man unto him And in truth hee who doth not deceive himselfe in Jesus will not onely boast of him as Papists doe Sweet Jesus sweet Saviour sweet Christ but will say Joh. 21. Matth. 11.29 my Lord and my God my King and my Prince A promise under the sweet name of it carries a sad instinct with it into the spirit of a beleever 2 Cor. 5.16 bringing in the truth as it is in Jesus new Lord and new lawes All old things are passed away and are become new This alarme no base hypocrite can endure And therefore smoke doth not more scare Beâ—s then promises doe them For why They know there is such an intimation in all promises as they are in Jesus that whomsoever Jesus eases of his yoke him he puts another yoke upon even of obedience and selfe-deniall which to flesh is irksome except hee who puts it on doe also in the putting on make it sweet and easie as hee will doe to all beleevers And these few may serve for a taste to the rest for the due conceiving of this What it is to beleeve a promise according to it Now briefly two or three reasons of the Doctrine one may be this Reason 1 because there is the same reason of promises in particular as of the Word in generall But wee know the heavie denunciation of God Revel 22. end against whosoever should dare to adde or diminish from or to the Word defacing it by either making it a monster consisting of more parts or of lesser then it consists of properly How then should any dare to offer it to the promises which are as it were the veines of gold in this mountaine and the most pretious parts of all the Scripture if any be more pretious then other Secondly except the promises be taken according to that no more Reason 2 nor lesse then they beare and import what a world of prejudice must needs accrue unto the promiser How shall Gods honour bee maintained if the soule enlarge promises beyond their extent or to that which never came into the heart of God to intend in them For then must the erroneous soule needs bee sadly defeated of her expectation and so be ready to mutter and cavill against God and make him a liar On the other side if the soule limit and shorten God in his promises what doth she save impute that to him which that unprofitable servant did injustly lay to his charge That hee was an hard Master Matth. 25. reaping where he sowed not What can bee fouler reproach to God then both these whereas by esteeming a promise duly God is vindicated and saved from dishonour in both respects as neither being larger nor straiter then his Word Thirdly what a snare would it prove to the soule her selfe to bee Reason 3 alway in darknesse doubting and demurring about the promises for lacke of due understanding what the promises import For why The pith and marrow of the promises lies not in the words and outside but in the sense and meaning of them which who
handle him in this We look rather at our little sins in our beleeving then his great promises Oh saith one if my sinnes had not been so deep died so odious and long lien in I should hope well Rather thou shouldest say if mine heart were not so hardned that I am past all feeling and faith I should doe well If thy sinnes have not driven thee to be desperate in rebellion and contempt they are not surely too great for mercy to pardon Looke upon Manasse and Paul 1 Tim. 1.13 Though I were a persecutor a blasphemer and injurious Chron. 33.12 yet mercy and truth abounded in Christ Jesus He saith not sinne abounded beyond mercy Oh saith another But I have sinned since my first enlightning sin'd against the remedy adding drunkennesse to thirst What Dost thou so still and nourish a rotten peace and a secure heart still against the promise No but thou doubtest that thy abusing the meanes and hardning of heart will not be pardoned But know that the Lord Jesus his sufferings are of a deeper nature to merit then thy sinnes to destroy He was made all sinne 2 Cor. 5.21 satisfied for all sinne he was a nature of sinners not a sinfull person onely and therefore can pardon even them that murthered him and not in vain is that example set down in Acts 2.30 to prevent that feare They who come to Christ must come to him not as the greatest sinners onely but as to the greatest Saviour able perfectly to save all who come unto him The strongest eye must bee cast upon his strength Heb. 7.25 Esay 27.5 not upon thy deservings The mystery of mercy is to save to the uttermost that so the soul may break and God may be honoured to the uttermost Well but yet he pardons none save such as have faith and how shall I know that he will give it me I answer the promise that offers pardon workes faith to beleeve it and therefore it s said that it creates the fruit of the lips Esay 57.16 Matth. 11.29 which is peace it offers ease to him that is loaden if it offer the effect it must needs worke the cause But saith a poore soule this might be if mine affections would rise to it with some earnestnesse but I am dead and under infirmity Nay even then also can the Lord create this hand of faith in thee 2 Cor. 12.9 by the seed of the word how did Paul lie under sad buffetings yet this grace was sufficient for him In a word what ever the sense of thy weaknesse be yet its Gods strength which thou must take hold on to make peace and that comprehends thy weaknesse when thou canst not comprehend that strength So much for this Fifthly this reproves such as runne to promises without wisdome Branch 5 aptnesse Unapt appliers of promises or other parts of the word reproved and the particular necessities under which they live When they should runne to the promise for comfort they rather please themselves in running to the threats of the word for deeper humbling that pleases them better because they thinke it may better be felt but this course sutes not with the truth as it is in Jesus which requires that each malady apply it selfe to her proper remedy This causes the wound to rankle not to heale When men are called to doe some speciall service and duty they forsake that and rush themselves upon suffering promising to themselves that God will sustaine them and so provoke needlesse sorrow like Ionah to themselves and all by their rashnesse Others being called to suffer Jona 1.6 shunne that and promise to themselves strength in doing But this is to misapply promises for they alway attend upon commands and while we be in Gods way not our owne God payes no man wages for doing his own work Others promise themselves great blessings upon attempting difficult workes above their strength unto which they have no calling leaving their Ministery ere God knocke them off or thrusting themselves into trades in which they want skill leaving their owne and the like But the wiser way for them were to apply themselves unto promises which concerne those speciall callings conditions and waies unto which God calles them Branch 6 Sixtly and lastly those are here to be reproved who doe in any kinde goe to worke preposterously with the promises Preposterous appliers of promises reproved contrary to their nature and use or scope who separate them from their end which is to mortifie purifie and better the soule as well as to comfort and pacifie it Also all such as mistake discover darken stretch dis-joint the promises who take not such a due measure of the promises as they ought putting them on as they may best fit them and so never come to the kindly use and fruit thereof as the Lord offers them Of which I say no more this shall serve for this whole Use of reproofe Thirdly this point serves for Exhortation Exhortation to incite and draw all who Vse 3 would beleeve aright to beleeve according to the uttermost extent and purpose of a promise and not to defraud the soule of that due which the Lord allowes her This is the way to engage the soule in God to walke most comfortaly in the life and practice of faith God requires no small service and cost at his peoples hands which will hardly be except the soule be deep in Gods bookes and that cannot be till she come to beleeve promises according to their full extent To this end two things would be knowne First 2. Questions 1. How a promise beleeved what should the soule doe that she might beleeve a promise according to the reach of it Secondly how should she practise and set this grace on worke For the former of these three things would be done First 1. A promise must be sounded the soule must fathom and comprehend a promise truly Eph. 3.15.16 That you may comprehend with all Saints what is the length c. That which the woman John 4. tells our Saviour I may say of this The Well is deepe and there is nothing to draw with There is depth in a promise but few are men of understanding to fetch it out There may be enough in it for ought most men looke after their shallownesse discourages them from attempting it Vertue is gone out of the Lord Jesus into it both for life and godlinesse this and a better life in crosses and blessings for all turnes so that each idle cavill of a base heart ought not to elude it Hath God set it open for his whole Church to be filled with the fulnesse thereof and shall it not be sufficient for a poore members supply Accustome thy selfe to deal with a promise as the marriner doth with the sea whose depth he is ever and anon sounding lest his ship should runne a ground and be swallowed up Thy misunderstanding may eclipse the beauty of it
the next verse The cure then of Naaman is that which in these latter words is to be considered and first of the holy Ghost his expression 1. The expression His flesh came againe as the flesh of a little childe for of this I will say somewhat ere I come to the main point Many words had been used to expresse Naaman his obedience how punctuall it was and now as many are used to expresse the cure how entire and perfect it was as if God would not come short of him but be as punctuall in full curing of him as hee had been in close obeying God Who doubts of the perfect cure of such a Leper as was made of a scurvie loathsome nasty skin like the skin of a little childe that is as whole as he was borne So that it notes a perfect restitution of Naaman to his former integrity of soundnesse Gods remedies are perfect ones But mens are lame and crazie Mens remedies are alway lame ones if they heale one way they hurt another We use to say of Physicall courses purgings bleedings as they helpe in point of present cure and remove present death and danger so yet they leave a touch upon the body afterward and leave either some other aile behinde or else take away strength abate the spirits or other like and all to shew us that mans medicines are like himselfe and that is crazie doubtfull and dangerous so that not long after the same or worse maladies and diseases follow but to bee sure death Hence arose that proverbe Many Remedies are worse then the diseases themselves And all commodities in this life carry inconveniencies after them Perhaps they are one way beneficiall and two wayes prejudiciall But Gods cures are like himselfe perfect intire and absolute No more leprosie is heard of to grow upon Naamans skin after God had done with him he came no more into the hands of other Physitians through relapse into the old distemper Eccles 7.14 No man can finde out any thing after God But hee can finde out sundry failings after men when they have done their best I will not insist upon it onely it may briefly teach us these two Items First to turne our doting eyes from the perfection of any creature here by reason of those crackes and flawes which are in the best of them We must turn our doting eye from the perfection of the creature What petty Deities and Idols are Physitians esteemed among carnall people for their skill in curing diseases especially if their gift be any more then ordinary Say it be but in any one kinde or disease as a Consumption Feaver Dropsie or the like especially if when others have given over the cure as desperate they take it in hand and effect it What money what honour is thought enough to requite a man Nay as Patients teach them so how doe Physitians learne to dote upon themselves And how will they boast themselves like petty Kings of their supposed skill Oh! if this medicine saith one wil not heale him nothing in the world will doe him good And another I healed him saith he when no other could turne his hand to it And I will pawne all I have upon my skill that I heale him Could God himselfe speake any more Let me not bee thought to speake disdainfully against the persons of any learned or religious Physitians much lesse their profession both which I honour and am bound to doe while I live for the good received from them through Providence And I know many there are in this kinde eminently religious and well deserving But onely by so just occasion one Item I would give to Physitians Physitians must know themselves only instruments of Providence for such as God will heal and another to Patients To the former this That as they are conversant most what about searching out naturall causes symptomes and cures of diseases So no profession is more subject to Atheisme and prophanenesse then such except the Lord subdue and captivate their spirits and skill under his Providence making them servants to attend it for the good of such as to whom God hath appointed life by meanes and no otherwise For why Who knowes not but many recover of diseases in the judgement of Physitians incurable And how many there are in whom nothing save safety appears who yet in the midst of the Physitians security dye instantly All to shew that the passages of life and death are not in mans hand but in the Lords who oft-times delights to blind-fold the wise and prudent in their own sense and to doe good by those who are of meaner parts Not but that the parts of learned Physitians are to bee esteemed who cannot be too well parted since they deale in so pretious a subject as the life of the most excellent creature man but that with parts they joyne a God adore him and set him up in their souls as supreame and chiefe treading themselves under feet in point of that Royall prerogative of saving life Alas how doth the Lord humble our confidence daily when hee crosseth our conjectures and betrayes our folly both in our hopes of recovery when there is none and in our despaires when there is no cause What mortall man whose breath is in his nostrils would not here submit and lay downe his weapons at the feet of the Lord of life and death confessing himselfe a foole and that both in his owne case and others the Lord may and doth often conceale from him the reall cause and truth of Diseases 2 Kings 4.27 The holy Prophet Elisha led by a Divine and miraculous Spirit humbly professed it to Gehazi in the womans case who came for her dead childe The Lord saith hee hath hidden it from me And shall not we say so who are poore silly ones to him even as a base ignorant empiricke is to us and much more So for people how insolent are they in this kinde People very fond in magnifying the outward cause and neglecting God Robbing God of his honour and setting up base man in his throne Oh saith one such a Physitian let me have or let such a sickeman have and upon my life he will heale him Let the upper milstone runne upon the nether and I warrant your corne betweene will be grown What Is there no more in it then so Is there no God Oh cry you mercy saith one I forgot that now I speake as a man Nay rather like an Atheist and so let a Physitian whom they like visit them his comming is to them as good a medicine as the physicke he brings If Physitians would abhorre and tremble at such Patients and Patients such Physitians mules scratching each others itch they would learne more humility and divinity Honour the Physitian and spare not so thou give him no more then is due to an instrument Let him and thou sanctifie both physicke and receits by prayer and faith and behold it as
beleeving of his promises Fourthly the Lord doth thus for the continuall strengthening of his Reason 4 poore servants in better and closer clasping to his promises For the strengthning of his servants 2 Tim. 1.12 and that by daily experience growing in the soule hereby it might come to this pitch to say I know in whose lappe or bosome I have put my pledge I know in whom I have beleeved I goe not upon had I wist but upon undeceivable grounds Thus as the wicked through unbeleefe withdraw themselves more and more to perdition so the faithfull follow faith to the preserving of the soule Heb. 10.38 they grow more and more rooted therein by such triall of faith they grow from faith to faith Rom. 1.17 Eph. 3.16.17 Matth. 11.29 rooted and established and not easily puft off by every winde of error feare temptation they grow from beleeving one to beleeve more from generall promises to speciall from spirituall to temporall from promises in peace to promises in and under crosses darke ones deep ones long ones so that no estate service occasion triall waxes strange to them but familiar and at last the yoke of God waxes easie and his burthen light Fifthly because the Lords performances or purposes at least to Reason 5 performe are the causes in a sort of his promises It s not so with men Because his promises come from purpose of doing good They promise apace but their spirit being backward in love and entire wel-wishing to the good of others come short of their owne promises Now the Lord in his intention or purpose to doe good to his Church and People doth thereby draw his heart to make promises that so the good things which he wisheth them may be presented to them before hand they may know that in meer faithfulnes he binds himself to them not to strengthen himselfe but their weaknesse rather in beleeving Now because the Lord out of an Idea and foresight of his owne free grace purposing to doe good to his doth breake into promises thence it is that promises are easie to performe with him Men are rashly drawne either by their owne suddaine pangs or by others motion to make promises not knowing their owne spirits and scantlings of affection and so in coole bloud they undoe that which in hot they made But because Gods purposes strong and firme caused him to promise therefore the same Spirit moves him also to performe Againe though men meane well in promising yet inability oftentimes causes them to breake against their wills whereas in God purpose of love and power of hand to performe are alway equall so that nothing can come between barke and tree nothing can set his promises and performances together by the eares Let the reader looke back into the point of Faith where I have mentioned abundance of excellent Attributes in God every of which are objects of Faith and means to strengthen it and especially his faithfulnesse Reason 6 Sixtly and lastly the Lord sometimes performes his promises rather with the better then otherwise Because he lookes not at us but his owne bounty because he promiseth not according to what the narrow necke or vessell of the soule is capable of but what his bountifull heart can beteame it Promises would prove but barren and bare matters if so be our bucket could reach their bottome But since the Lord promises according to the extent of his owne bounty therefore he performes so also whether the soule conceive so or not What heart can conceive the unspeakable good things prepared by God for such as love him Eye hath not seene eare hath not heard nor hath it entred into mans heart to contain them 1 Cor. 2.9 yet all these are inclosed in the promise and though the soule at first obtaining of pardon see not what God includes in it to be in time accomplished but is glad of a present supply of her need yet the Lord who gives his Christ the knot of promises all at once is content to keepe touch with the soule and in due time to reach her out all sorts of them according as her need calls for in duties in wants in temptation in conflict with her lusts 1 Cor. 1.30 or in affliction Then he makes Christ Righteousnesse to be Christ Wisdome Sanctification and Redemption The lesse the soule looked for it the welcommer it is when it comes It s not so with base men If the party promised unto conceive not the extent of the promiser the promiser thinkes he hath quit himselfe well in concurring with the expectation of the other although he shorten his owne intents But this base falshood of restraint is farre off from God and therefore he performes that which often is unexpected as well as what is And so much shall serve for Reasons Now to the Limitations Limitations of the point And they are sundry These three following may give a taste of the rest which because they availe much for the due qualifying of the Doctrine therefore I will mention them and the proper uses flowing from them and so proceed to the other uses belonging to the Doctrine The first limitation is That God though he alway performe his promise yet not alway in that very kinde which the soule perhaps seekes and claimes The soule lookes at one kinde the Lord lookes at another It is enough with him God performs promises alway yet not in that very kinde which the soule expects And why that he alway keeps touch in one kinde or other though he doe not fulfill it as the soule would And good reason since the scope of fulfilling a promise being the speciall good of the soule that beleeves it and the Lord himselfe being fitter to judge of that then the soule it selfe can Therefore it is meet that we leave it to him in what kinde he will heare and performe We in the meane time cannot be losers because the Lord doth not neglect to heare us in our kinde for lacke of love but through â—bundance of wisedome If wee can beleeve that the kinde which hee answeres us bee questionlesse best for the present condition in which the soule stands then may shee bee as well satisfied in Gods way as her owne For example There is a promise Psal 50.15 that if wee call upon God in the day of affliction he will heare us and we shall praise him Upon this the soule under any yoke of body or minde sues to God upon his promise to ease that yoke that she may praise him But the Lord being wiser then she holds on the yoke still howbeit he doth it not as forgetfull of his promise but because he sees there be other graces to be set on worke in the poore soule as breaking of heart patience further faith selfe-deniall which would not worke kindly if the yoke were off If he meant onely to exercise thankfulnesse in the soule he would deliver it but he judgeth the other
to be more usefull for the present and therefore chuses a performance in his owne kinde which shall bee an hundred fold more gaine to the soule then the other 2 Cor. 12.3 4. Paul being sorely buffeted not for sinne but to prevent it prayes instantly to God to remove it The Lord seeing that performance not to be proper for the end of his buffeting continues it yet hee breakes not promise for he ministers grace sufficient to uphold him under it Verse 9. By this meanes he attaines his end to humble Paul and moreover teaches him to desire to live under desertion and infirmity sometimes that so he might get that experience of Gods strange upholding of him in the want of feeling which before hee had found under feeling By this meane though irksome to the flesh to want the use of graces and gifts the Lord traines him to a sober use of his revelations and to renounce himselfe so farre under buffetings as to chuse rather to bee as the Lord would have him then as himselfe chose to be The use of this qualification is this The use of this limitation Both to coole our spirit of selfe-love which is ready to appoint God his way of performance as also to teach us wisedome to apply our selves to the best good of a performance rather then to the performance it selfe Gods people looke more at the good of a performance then the bâ—re performance of a promise to ascribe this honour to God that he better knows how to make good a promise to us then wee can chuse And therefore not by and by to cry out against God for not performing it because our turnes are not served But rather by our defeat to search into the cause and to see whether God and we looke the same way or no If we doe not we may bee long enough ere we be satisfied or honour God in his faithfulnesse If we will tie God to performe one promise and the Lord meanes to performe another we shall be farre to seeke Say we therefore thus Lord teach me to looke out what the promise is which thou aimest to make good Faithfull I am resolved thou art but that stands not in serving my turne but in serving thy selfe upon me Since thou doest all things well I doe but wait to see thy way for it is best and shall curb my spirit and give me best content because it tends to make mee more experienced more humble and at last thankfull to thee for that good which thy selfe meantst me which is infinitely better then that which I fancied So much for the first Limitation the second In generall promises to the Church the time of performance must be left to God and why The second limitation may be this In promises concerning the welfare of the Church in generall except the Lord tye himselfe punctually to a time of redresse or deliverance we must conceive of Gods performances indefinitely without prefixing a time or period of our own For in such it is enough for the quitting of Gods faithfulnesse that he performes really although he leave the time when to his owne wisedome We look that Gods love in hearing us for such performances should trench upon his wise providence but that ought not to be In such cases it behoves us to distinguish upon promises In such as touch the soule and life of a beleever usually except some speciall thing hinder the soules beleeving and the promises performance goe together as for the strength against a lust for quickning up of any grace or gift for sanctifying of any ordinance But not so in the publicke promises The reason is because the Lord may have a predominant way of his owne to barre present performance He doth neglect the speciall good of them who pray for a more universall good of his owne either because the sinnes of his enemies by whom hee uses to scourge his Church See Gen. 15.16 are not come to the highest pitch and so it will not bee most for his glory to punish or suppresse them yet or because the provocations of his Church and the sins thereof are not yet purged throughly nor brought to the lowest point These respects may hinder speciall reliefe of some present miseries restraints and persecutions of his people There is wee say in the motion of every planet a straight motion comming from the Planet herself and a backward motion of the first mover So is it here the motion of a promise is retrograded and retarded by the wisedome of the first mover The grand promise of the Lord Jesus his incarnation was indefinite and in the bosome of God when to fulfill it one thousand two or three thousand might have brought it forth as well as foure yet providence reserved it to the end of the fourth thousand Gal. 4.4 And when that fulnesse was come nothing could stop the fulfilling of that which yet before that time no prayers no expectation of the Church could hasten Then and not till then Instances of the point he that would come came and tarried not So also wee that live in this age conceive our selves to be pitcht under the fourth viall under which wee are warranted to wait for the revealing of Gods wrath and the ruine of the Beast But for us hereupon to limit God to owne time and period seaven or ten or fifteene yeares whatsoever we may suppose by probabilities and to determine God to our own season is most bold and presumptuous For God hath as well a way of his revenge and scourging of particular Churches for their infidelity and unfruitfulnesse as he hath of fulfilling his maine promise Sure we are his Word will prove true within the Terme of this Viall But to bound the space and duration of it we may not That the Jew shall be called and the Gospel generally preached ere the end come and that the Lord Jesus shall even in this world expresse himselfe to be the Lord and King of his Church and set up his Throne visibly upon their reall ruines who not waning braines can or dare deny it And yet who if he have braines dare punctually determine it within so or so many yeares The use of this qualification is most pretious and weighty viz. The use of this second limit Wee must not taxe Gods administrations That in our prayers and services of the time be they ordinary or extraordinary wee lash not out through our ungrounded zeale and passions to presse the Lord to our time in redressing the miseries of his Church in punishing his enemies reforming abuses or restoring comforts to her mourners Slacken no whit of thy zeale but let it still be carried within bounds and goe eaven pace with Gods time and be limited by that condition And moreover let it curb our querulous and discontented spirits which being full of griefe for the upbraiding and insulting Peninna's 1 Sam. 1. over the perplexed Hanna's and
as you know And so I say to us Levit. 26.21 If wee walke contrary toward the Lord hee will walke contrary to us trust to it And that not onely in case of foule revolts if wee should play the Adulterers Oppressors Blasphemers c. Such sinnes wee dare not meddle with haply for the lowd cry and inward wasting of conscience Heb. 10.37 But yet perhaps we dare withdraw our selves from God by unbeliefe fall out of love with his promises wee dare forgoe our joy and delight which we have had in his presence Jer. 2.13 and runne to pits which will hold no water as if the fountaine were unpleasant Wee dare suffer that pretious seed of Life to dye if it may dye in us and walke deadly coldly basely in our course We dare allay and forsake our first love to God and zeale to his truth wee dare run to the course of this declining formall saplesse and powerlesse world and shake off all spirituall closenesse and communion with God and yet wee thinke to doe well But know it this is the great quarrell of all Levit. 26.25 I meane the quarrell of Gods covenant God will avenge it sadly his soule shall have no pleasure in such Lay it to your hearts brethren and know the performance of promises is the immediate way whereby the Spirit of Grace conveyes the presence of God to his servants Wee have no voice to heare nor sights to see save the voyce and light of the promises If we can cleave to them we hold the Lord and hee is present in our soules as he was to Paul in that sad darknesse Acts 27.23 But if wee shake off the life of faith where is our title to the performing of promises or where is our right to the presence of God I remember what the Lord tells those Israelites in the Wildernesse I will send my Angell before you Exod. 23.20 and he shall carry you forth in your journey But take heed you grieve him not for he will not spare you but withdraw his presence from you So say I We would claime Gods presence and God must bee our God and performe all promises as fast as we gape after them But in the meane season we leave the condition at large Some of us have formerly been zealous yea suffered for God and lost our credit our goods our liberties for him Here was life and power but now wee hold but a carkasse of the old temper a meere name that we live wee are growne Polititians civilians close professors wise in our way rest in the fagge end of formality and common worship And what thinke we May we be as bold upon performance of promises as formerly May we chalenge the presence of God in his Word as formerly No no others of us dare be forward with God as Iona was nourish our spirits in anger Jona 1. 4. let the Sunne goe downe upon it rage and raile like mad men in our moods And if we be told of it wee will defend it we will be so for we say our wrong was reall and flesh and bloud cannot beare it What Will you flye from God and looke that hee should follow you up and downe Judg. 19.3 as the foolish Levite did his whorish Concubine Others of us dare abuse the Sabbath or else have no delight in it speaking our owne words Others cannot be rated off from the creature but run after our profits wills vanities pleasures fashions and cocker our children therein without checke Others will take the uttermost of our liberties and goe upon the brinke Others regard not our families set not up the worship of God there or pray for fashion Others are growne just to the frame of the times and give God so much and no more then the common sort doe and yet passe well And so I might be endlesse But know it Brethren Gods promises are like himselfe and are faithfully performed on his part howbeit if this be our frame we shall finde a change and hee will take in his Sun-shine we shall not finde his presence as in former times to us Job 6. and throughout Did the Lord withdraw himselfe from holy Iob while he walked in uprightnesse and eclipse his presence and promises from him write bitter things against him compasse him about with terrors hide his face and all justly even to humble him more deeply and prevent that which else prosperity might have bred in him Wonder not then brethren if the Lord withdraw himselfe from us and turne away his performing of promises into breach of covenant when hee meets with such scurfe as this in our hearts and lives And let the use of the point in Gods name be this which I pray us all to oberve that henceforth we cease to wonder if wee finde the Lord otherwise towards us then formerly so long as the quarrell of his Covenant depends I grant that there were never any dayes such as ours in point of complaint of Gods absence darknesse and not performing of promises But withall consider when were there such wofull dayes of Revolts Apostasies from God and the power of his truth as now Each face is pale and each hand is upon the pained side But it is rather because men may not have their will of God and keep him close in performance of promises when yet their lives swarme with all abominations Should I not be avenged of such time-servers and hypocrites as these saith the Lord in the Prophet doe you wonder if hee have hidden himselfe Esay 1. and doth count you as you are refusing to performe promises No no wonder not wonder rather if he should looke not for it till you repent If he darken himselfe in the chiefe promise of pardon of peace and comfort in conscience or in point of his Spirit of presence and the graces of it as humblenesse and patience love and mercy if he shorten you in the beauty of your conversation that your lives are not so sweet Spirituall penalties attend spirituall sins your light not so cleare as in time past if hee absent himselfe from you in his Ordinances restraining the influence of them suffering them to be dark and fruitlesse if he leave you in your companies to bee unprofitable in your liberties to bee carnall in your solitarinesse to be dead hearted if he harden your hearts and cause you to erre from his waies so that all your praiers fastings sacraments covenants should come forth at your nostrils as irkesome as those Quales did I say wonder not it s but righteous Make this use of it Vse Breakers of covenant with God shall finde God breake with them to abhorre boldnesse with God in challenging promises to be performed when you breake the condition Rather enter into your soules and search out the cause of the Lords absence saying it was not wont to be thus that thou shouldest breake promise thus Lord and leave me
if you have beleeved the Word of God indeed whence are those privie nips of your conscience which do so continually assault you Whence are those terrours of heart with which many of you are met with when you would faine be at peace When you are in the middest of your ease and jollity your liberties your sports and pleasures whence come those cold qualmes over your base spirits barring you out from peace and fastning terrours upon you stronger then you can resist Dare you pretend your selves beleevers when you feele still your old distempers to tosse and turmoile you and to hold you downe with strong hand in secret Joh. 8.30 If they whom the Sonne hath freed are free indeed whence is your slavery No no you do but set a good face on it you make faire weather outwardly but hatch inwardly such a viper as will fret your bowels and destroy you it is one thing to smother and choake your feares and beare downe your distempers another to drowne them in the sea of the promise you have other delights to fill your hearts withall the Lord would have set on the worke of the law more throughly and made you more to stinke in your owne nostrils and to prize the Word of God and the promise of ease if ever you had beene truly loaden But sithence you would have both your lusts and the promise too holding a wolfe by the eares which you are loath to forgoe and yet cannot well keep know that you deceive your selves in boasting that you hold close to the promise for they that do so may lose their distempers therein which you keepe still It is true That the Lord would have all his as Esay saith count it their strength to sit still But how not in a chaire of ease pretending a freedome which you never had and favouring your selves in any forbidden vanities of your owne envie lust pride revenge and the like But the strength of a poore soule is to sit still in respect of her cavillings and fightings against the truth of the promise Perhaps you will say you do so and feele no such matter in your selves but are quiet and secure But I answer your peace is not sound there is a crack in it as appeares by this That you walke not as Gods free-men do you are as close to God in your love in your tendernesse in your humble carriage as you would pretend to be in your beleeving No man can palpably discerne the Devils chaines upon the Lords free-men Wherefore to conclude I say to you as he to that messenger What hast thou to do with peace turne thee behind mee Oh these are the daies wherein the most vile and presumptuous hypocrites catch at a promise and beare downe their consciences But be not thou O Christian friend like to them for their disease wound is but healed deceitfully and shall breake out againe most deadly when they shall not be able to resist it except it please the Lord to send them upon better conditions to claime the promise So much shall serve for this Use Fifthly this bitter reproofe of all such who in the judgement Use 5 of Charity do beleeve and cleave to the Word yet will not be drawne from the bad custome of their former doubts conceits and distempers but suffer Beelzebub still to light upon their sore and to molest them and gall them still Oh! what a dishonour is this to the promise of God still to hold a secret correspondence with Satan and to nourish our old picking of knots and answering of feares by our owne blanching wit and devises yea spending houres and daies wearisomely in setting our owne wit and invention on worke to beat off our objections and thinking they have done themselves good service in the meane while Whence comes this surely by your weaknesse and relapsing from your former hold of the promise This self-wit and will is so naturall that we are prone and propense to revolt and roll backe unto it as fast as the Lord seems to settle us by his Word it is an inbred evill alway fighting against the law of faith as it is easie for a woman to go to a pond or pulke standing neere to her doore though the water be not so good rather then to goe to a fountaine of living water further off Ease and ill custome are inchanting enemies But remember that onely that blood of sprinkling hath in it a sure bottome of staying feares so that the soule may be quiet from the destroying Angell and the out-cries of Egypt Could they who never had the experience of such a thing before yet so confidently venture their lives upon the Word and shall such as have in likelihood approved this promise of God by experience and ventured themselves upon it and felt it a soveraigne remedy against their distempers returne to tread the maze of their old confused thoughts the second time As if the Word had suddenly lost her strength and virtue to sustaine them as formerly Shall forgetfulnesse melancholy temptation corruption ill custome be able to pull them from an assured hold of rest to assured vexation and distemper I speake it brethren upon knowledge It hath beene thus and is thus with many through a wearisomenesse of this spirituall trade of beleeving that men grow into a very falling sicknesse in this kind that is such a custome of wofull doubtfulnesse and distempers that they seem to delight in it Alas poore soule dost thou thinke that to be presumption in thee which the Lord himselfe calls confidence or because perhaps thou feelest the dregs of a bold heart still abiding in thee hast thou no other way to avoid a shallow save by running into a gulfe If the Lord be willing thou shouldst hold thy peace upon the naked termes of his offer and promise seemes it too good for thee or if it be must thou needes undervalue his grace by thy basenesse as if it were too great for him to bestow because it is too good for thee to enjoy Know it from the ground of this doctrine the Lord delights as little in this practise of thine as thou seemest to delight much in it And although I deny not but in respect of thy weaknesse there may be some place for pity yet there is more cause of sharpe reproofe For why Didst thou never beleeve the Word deceive thy selfe no longer and put away thy distrust from thee But hast thou beleeved for so thou didst pretend then trust the Lord still and say with him Why dost thou thus fret O my soule in my breast and recoyle against that which hath formerly satisfied thee Turne rather thy vexation into prayer and say Remove these unpleasing chaines Lord at last and set mee at liberty shew me this wisedome from above not onely barely to cling to it but also to improve it so as to feele the power of it to shut out my base distempers out of doores and there to hold
yea to runne into some morall evills which yet were damnable then thus to play the hangbies upon Religion Prayer for healing of our times of this numbe palsie of spirit necessary Ier. 2.2 and to eate out the very heart and entralls of her by our wofull unsavorinesse and declension Oh that God would heale our back-slidings cancell our Bill of devorce and make new love to us as in old times As those Martyrs so pray we Once againe Lord the power and life of thy Gospell give unto us the skinne and bones of an empty profession to be fill'd up and beautified with flesh and colour with countenance and savour of grace Oh Lord thou who madest the spirit of man breath a second spirit of thy Word to inspire our dead Carcasses with a second and better life Thou who causedst that Sunne of the Heavens to go backe ten degrees Esay 38. cause this Sunne of Grace to goe forward tenne degrees for it is gone backward too many already Thou who by that happie wind of thine scattered upon the surface of the earth didst hazle and drie up the forlorne dregges and slime of Noahs deluge Gen. 8.13 cause a new face of zeale and grace to appeare upon our age drunken and soaked in ease and sensuality Lord help us to cast our Eagles bill Psal 103.5 pluck off our Snake skin and renue us as the flesh of Naaman after Jordan Oh command an heart spirit of first love courage thanks joy and esteem of thy pretious Truth and Christ to return into us let it be as new blood in our veines and marrow to our bones count those daies of our decay declinings death distemper as if they had never bin Impute not unto us our unfruitfull Ministry unprofitable hearings returning to our vomit lingring after Popery and her defilements contempt and disdaine of powerfull ordinances which have deserved that we should be stript and wasted of all meanes Malach. 4.2 and left to utter woe and ruine Come and bring healing in thy wings at last and pardon the sins of all sorts that might hasten further wrath for what can be such a marke and symptome of misery comming spuing out of thy mouth Revel 3.18 as this decay of our temper So many of us as cleave to God let us not give him over for this mercy for surely many of us here especially of the richer sort whose gaines come in merrily and live at ease in Sion do shrewdly leane to this disease of luke-warmenesse Amos 6.1 begge it I say of the Lord that he leave us not quite here in this corner and make us not an hissing to all our neighbours for our barrennesse and desolation of the meanes who have hitherto abounded and caused the borders of our Towne to be wetted with those streames which have overflowed among us So much for this Branch 3 Thirdly so many of us as hitherto have lurked in our dens of ease and unprofitablenesse looke up at last and endeavour after this spirit of Naamans clensing and cure Exhort Gen. 18.12 Exhortation to get the spirit of true conversion Alas perhaps we laugh as Sara did when she heard she could give suck to heare of this that such dead blockes and lowring louts as many of us have beene to this day surviving our owne hopes and outbidding all threats and feares of the Word by a carnall stupor of our owne savouring nothing save our lusts and humours I say we thinke it impossible that ever wee should become any other Should such as wee ever be healed of our ignorance hard hearts and senselesnesse Should we ever come to be quickned by the hope of the Gospell to be forgiven and saved Should we ever become savory humble tender and zealous ones Truly I must tell you considering how some of us in this place have snorted out seven times seven yeares of Sermons or well nigh and fatted our selves under the Gospell with nothing but sottishnesse and security me thinkes I am halfe afraid of it Now am I leaving of you but how many shall I leave as I found them if not farre worse and what is like to be their end if they should live under no meanes or unfruitfull who knowes if a good day have not mended them must not a bad needs paire them The Lord flaite many of you this day out of your holes and corners me thinkes I behold your face with horrour and feare of any good Esay 55.8 but seeing the long sufferings of God are bottomlesse and his love as farre above our thoughts as the heavens above earth therefore I leave Gods secrets unto himselfe and spread before you still even at this last farewell the cords of the Lord and beseech you to come in and be converted and get this spirit of grace into you ere you goe hence and be seene no more Psal 39.3 Gal. 1. ult Oh it would make the Angels rejoyce and the world to wonder as Paul saith Gal. 1. Those that having knowne mee a persecutor heard that I was become a Preacher of the Gospell they magnified God for mee so should praises be offered up by many for you if it should be thus Who can tell brethren long hath the Gospell been laid in three pecks of meale in some of you Mat. 13.33 if now it might at last breake out as leaven and season you throughout what a blessed parting should it be to you and mee As you are I grant most of you no other is to be looked for then hath beene earth at first earth still and earth hereafter But if earth earth earth will heare the Word of the Lord it shall be otherwise Naaman was as far off as you till hee washed in Jordan but afterward what a spirit of healing and conversion came he forth withall How doth he come backe to Elisha Who can stay him How is his lowring heart enlarged to the Prophet What is too deare for him hee loves the ground hee stands upon and would carry it away upon mules his heart is ravisht with God and his worship and much water cannot quench love Such might you bee if the Lord would send Elisha to you Elisha is gone and the comming and going death and departure of many both Elija's and Elishaes you have seene and now of mee a poore Minister of Christ What shall no fruit come of all I am now going to tell my Master what fruit of all these sixe yeares worke here and many more in other places and by other my Predecessours hath beene reaped What shall I be able to say nothing to comfort the heart of God and his people Oh sad thing Well I leave it to your thoughts it is as much as I can say That if God perswade you nothing was done upon Naaman but might be done upon you Many of your own number out of the stools wherin you sit some of your wives in your bosomes children and servants under your