assuredly be found to be the beginning of the preaching of the everlasting Gospel of Jesus Christ that is to say of the Gospel preached by that trumpet that gives the certain second and makes manifest the Sons of God in an immutable everlasting state of righteousnes and glory here upon earth in a Kingdom that cannot be shaken which is to succeed all other Kingdoms shewing itself to be the stone cut out of the mountains that will fill the whole earth This everlasting Gospel we are told Revel 14.6 7. is to be preached by an angel flying in the midst of heaven that must with a loud voice say unto them that dwell on the earth and to every nation kindred tongue and people fear God and give glory to him for the houre of his judgment is come This is the houre or the day of that great judgment wherein God will judg the world by that man which he hath ordeined Jesus Christ This houre and day is to have continuance in the course of its execution on the earth for the space of a thousand years During this time the Kingdoms of this world shal become the Kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ as holding of him their universall head and exercising all their authority under him Revel 11.15 So then in effect Christ alone shall reigne and be exalted in that day one Lord and his name one over all the earth This day is to begin as hath bin said with the second comming of Eliah and is described in the Scriptures of truth as to the severall particulars thereof The seventh angel sounds by reason whereof it comes to passe that there are great voices to be heard in heaven appointed by Christ as he is the bright morning star and head of all Principalities and powers the true Michael and Archangel to seize upon all scepters and governments of this world to take the Rule and visible power out of the hands of all the Potentates of the earth and reassume it in such a wonderfull manner into the hands of the holy and elect angels who under Christ are appointed the highest and cheif Rulers of the visible world that by the astonishing dispensations of Gods providence in that season it will appear and be acknowledged that Christ hath begun and entered upon the taking to himself his great power in order to exercise his visible Rule as the great only and universall King over all the earth This he will do to the intent that the living may know that the most high ruleth in the Kingdom of men giving it to whomsoever he will Yea it shal be acknowledged and seen that under the most high the heavens do rule Dan. 4.26 All matters shall at that time be carried on in the earth visibly by the decree of the watchers v. 17. the supream counsell and senate of judicature wherein the holy angels shall sit and exercise jurisdiction under Christ for the good of his church on earth They are ministring spirits in this very respect sent forth and authorized for this employment even to minister for them who shal be heirs of salvation as it is written all things are yours and ye are Christs and Christ is Gods In that day saith Christ for brasse I will bring gold and for yron I will bring silver for wood brasse and for stones yron so glorious will then the restoration of al things be and I will also make thine officers peace and thine exactours righteousnes Violence shall no more be heard in thy land wasting not destruction within thy borders but thou shalt call thy walls of defence salvation and thy gates of justice prayse Then the haughtines of man shal be layd low and his lofty lookes brought downe and the worshippers of idols shall goe into the holes of the rocks and caves of the earth for fear of the Lord and of the glory of his majesty when he shall thus arise most terribly to shake the earth Esay 2. The same thing is promised Haggai 2 6 7. Yet once it is a little while and I will shake the heavens and the earth the sea and the dry land And I will shake all nations and the desire of all nations shall come that is to say after the terrible forerunning dispensation ministred by Eliah that went up to heaven in a fiery chariot to take his seat amongst this heavenly colledge of angels and be in that glory with other the spirits of just men made perfect shall the desire of all nations Christ himself come to perfect and consummate what is left wanting in the operation of the former ministry and fill his owne house with glory in the sight of the whole world during the space of a thousand years 2. But 2dly although at the sounding of the seventh trumpet it do come to passe that there be great voices in heaven what is that to the inhabitants that are on earth those that are at home in the body absent from the Lord whose spirits are fast asleep in the earth to wit in the organicall life and exercise of bodily senses Will not they be out of the hearing of the sound of these heavenly voices At least will they be able to understand their meaning unlesse what is uttered by the angelicall tongues be in words easy to be understood by the spirit of their minds who live and dwell in mortall clay and that an easy understanding thereof also be communicable to the sensuall part of the soule which is as the door to take in and give out againe what shal be heard by the sound of such a heavenly Trumpet By what is recorded for our instruction we may be assured this is not impossible nor unpracticable It hapned thus to the Apostle John before his change by death even whilst he was a prisoner and a banished man in the I le of Patmos for the Word of God and testimony of Jesus Christ He looked and behold a door was opened in heaven By the opening of that door he came to be made able to hear the voices in heaven the first and second voice of the angel Revel 4.1 10 8. as it were of a trumpet talking with him which sayd come up hither and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter By the power of that voice calling him he was immediatly in the spirit that is as Paul absent from the body He had such an awakening of his inward senses wrought in him such an opening and making of them meet to heare and receave what by the tongue of the angel was to be delivered that he was in the spirit or in the exercise of the same kind of life and manner of conversing with spirits that they are in one with another or that the spirits of just men made perfect do use with the holy angels when in the state of soules seperate from the body made equall to angels and children of the resurrection in the first degree or step of it which is called Revel 20
mouth These two powers in him are reteined in most absolute agrement and usefulnes each unto the other Answerable to this patern in great is man made in little as to his Spirit and soule with this only difference that the work of mans mind in reference to Gods law and his word and outward action in reference to his mind have not immutability in them but may disagree and chāge from their first harmony and primitive patern set them in God The powerfull impression of this patern on the spirit and soule of man was such as in respect thereof it is said God made man upright or perfect formed his mind in perfect agrement and likenes of operation with his owne mind and in full consent and liking of his law as that which is holy righteous Spiritual and good given for man to obey as his duty He disposed him also by a natural bent and inclination of mind to doe good resist evil love righteousnes and hate iniquity This was the state of mans Spirit or soule as yet seperate from his body and not partaker of that flesh and blood which was afterwards formed out of the dust of the earth The second thing therefore noted concerning mans building or creation is that he also became a living sensual or animalish soule actually clothed with bodily organs that God formed for him out of the dust of the ground Gen. 2.7 And he breathed into his nostrills the breath of life or sent mans soule that was before created in Gods image into that body so appointed and given to it by God as the earth wherein the seed of mans Spirit was planted and the feild in which it was made to grow by reason whereof man became a living soule that is to say by the most intimate union and inhabitation thus wrought by God between the spirit and body of man there was an awakening and bringing into actual exercise the sensual and bodily nature of his mind by sitting to it these meet organs Neverthelesse that which was before in the state of a soule separate an equal and associate to angels comes by this means to be abased and made of little reputation being brought to a kind of equality with the beasts that perish And in like manner as thus the spirit of man was after its first creation embodied and made flesh as a dark shadow of what is done to him t is said to have bin so with the heavens and earth when created yea even every plant of the feild had a state of being before it was put in the earth and every herb of the feild before it grew Gen. 2.4 5 Now through the intimate union and conjunction that mans body is taken into with his soule it is made a living acting speaking creature participant with his rational and intellectual spirit and in fellowship there with meet to have and exercise dominion as God appointed over every living creature that moves upon the face of the earth Thus the bodily life of man became in itself as an Eden the garden of God and the feild that he had blessed and made fruitful unto every good word and work in subserviency and subjection of desire to mans intellectual and angelical part which by the very order and law of nature as having not only priority but eminency of being was given to it both as Lord and husband a superiour and yet a kind of equal joyned with it in such a harmonious consistency that the actings of both natures made up but the compleat and entire Act of mans judgement and will Thus was man created male and female in the spirit and person of Adam before Eve was created as Gen. 1.27 and 2.28.25 do shew And he receaved a charg from God to keep this body in subjection to the dictates of his mind and not suffer it to usurp authority over that part in him which is most the man to wit the angelical or intellectual part When God had thus planted the garden of Eden or pleasure and delight in this spirituall sense as wel as in an outward and literall he puts mans spirit into it giving him the keeping dressing and Rule of it with this expresse command saying of every tree of the garden thou mayst freely eat but of the tree of knowledg of good and evil thou shalt not eat of it for in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die For out of the ground the Lord God had made to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food the tree of life also in the midst of the garden and the tree of knowledg of good and evil Thus was there a paradise without man and within him a garden of pleasant fruit which he might take delight and pleasure in and which he was appointed to dresse and keep in the order wherein God had delivered it over to him and to improve it to the end for which he was brought into it by God And for his instruction herein he was commanded and allowed the use of the outward as wel as the inward senses of his mind with this only caution and Restriction that he should by no means nor upon any pretēce whatsoever hearkē to or obey the voice of his sensual and bruitish nature how rational so ever the judgment of it which is but flesh might seeme to be considered as in its owne single operation tempting and drawing off the cōsent and love of the intellectual part from the streight rule of its duty required in Gods law For the spirit of the mind which is the stronger and better part in man as that which is immortall remains under the morall and perpetuall convictiō of as wel as obligation to the righteousnes required in the law of God the light of which although it may be smoothered for a time cā never be wholly extinguished but is that work of the law in the heart that is and wil be unalterably either excusing and encouraging or accusing and tormēting the mind as cause is give by every mās works It is therefore called the conscience that servs in stead of a thousand witnesses and whē it is awake does alwayes consent to the goodnes and righteousnes that is in the law By this rule therefore sin could not make its approaches but warning would be given and to know evil barely in the abstract without consenting to it or becomming one with it in approbation and delight was not the thing which God forbade him but the feeding on it with consent and delight upon the beholding of its desireablenes in the judgment of the outward senses and as it gratified the bruitish lust and desire of the flesh so as thereupon to be drawn into a compliance and induced to make it the Act of the whole man suffering sin thereby not only to conceave but to be perfected Hence is it said 1 Tim. 2.13 14. that Adam was first formed then eve And Adam or the intellectual and superiour part in man
for some as it is written I wil give ye the sure mercies of David absolute irrevocable gifts Those that after this manner find favour in his eyes have the remission of their sins confirmed with an oath that their iniquities shal never be remembred any more and that his mercy towards them shal never faile he will not leave nor forsake them My mercy wil I keep for him for ever more my Covenant shal stand fast with him His seed also wil I make to endure for ever and his throne as the dayes of heaven Their transgressions shal not hinder the good I have purposed to them For notwithstanding their unworthines for which I will chastize them with the rod and with stripes yet my loving kindnes wil I not utterly take from them nor suffer my faithfulnes to faile My Covenant wil I not break nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips Once have I sworn by my holines that I wil not lie unto David the man that is after my owne heart nor to his seed after him that walk in the steps of his Spirit and faith Psalm 89. I will build him a house and establish it for ever by an everlasting Covenant ordered in all things and sure In this most gracious promise David acknowledges al his salvation to be and all his desire 2 Sam 23.5 Mercies of both these kinds are with God who is rich and plentiful in goodnes having none like him He is a God that pardoneth iniquity and passeth by the trangressions of the remnant of his heritage He reteineth not his anger for ever because he delighteth in mercy He will turn againe he wil have compassion upon the remnant of his heritage subdue their iniquities and cast al their sins into the midst of the sea But as to the rest of mankind that prove disobedient or have receaved the grace of God the former sort of mercies in vaine that word shal be made good upon them which the Lord spake concerning the Sons of Eli 1 Sam. 2. 30 I sayd indeed thy house and the house of thy father should walk before me for ever but now be it far from me for them that honour me I wil honour and they that despise me shal be lightly esteemed This shews what condition was implied upon which God made that promise Since then by man came death by man also is come life and resurrection from the dead And this is revealed to fallen man in the good tydings of the promised seed who as hath bin sayd declares himself the saviour of al men but especially of those that beleeve He hath a common stock and Treasury of goods and spiritual gifts wherewith the whole world more or lesse is watered fed and enriched by him For he causes his rain to descend and sun to shine on the unjust as wel as on the just But over and besides all these whether natural or spiritual gifts he hath an inheritance incorruptible and undesiled that fadeth not away the heavenly and true Treasure which he gives and commits to those who are by him found or rather made faithful in the little that at first is trusted to their use and management Luk 16. And he causes them to possesse it in an hereditary right as coheirs with the only begotten Son children of the promised Spirit either in the single or double portion thereof This is he that is appointed by the father to turn men back againe to God out of their fallen sinful state by a repentance not to be repented of By his name and faith in his name whoever calls upon him shal be saved from his sins and be ledd on in the way to life eternal He was made a sacrifice or sin-offring for us that we might become the righteousnes of God in him Thus God found it consistent with his justice as wel as his goodnes to grant remission of sins to al that should seek unto him for it by the mediation of his Son who is the righteousnes of God that without the law is manifested being witnessed unto by the law and the Prophets to and upon all that beleeve without respect of persons Him hath God set forth and made manifest to be a propitiation through faith in his blood declaring his righteousnes to be that which procures remission of sins and Gods passing over al that is past in the way of his forbearance and reprieve til farther trial and proof had of the whole world as wel as to be absolutly and immutably the justifier of al that beleeve in Jesus with the faith that abides trial and by which the world is overcome The difficulty which yet remains is that which the Apostle Paul was sensible of Rom. 10. where he affirm's that whosoever beleevs in Jesus shal not be ashamed and that there is no difference between the jew and the Greek because the same Lord over al is rich unto all that cal upon him Whosoever therefore being sensible of his lack of wisdom shal cal upon his name he shal not be upbraided nor sent away empty but have the means revealed to him whereby to make him wise unto salvation But how shal they cal on him saith the Apostle in whom they have not beleeved and how shal they beleeve in him of whom they have not heard and how shal they hear without a preacher and how shal they preach except they be sent and who are they that God sends with these his glad tydings the very feet of whom ought to be beautiful in our eyes and the report they make and witnesse they beare most acceptable to us The answer there to these and the like questions is very short So then faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God not by that word whose sound goes forth into al the earth and into the ends of the world When the Lord gives forth this general word or command he hath a great army of preachers ready to be sent on his message Great is the company of those who are ready willing and have an aptitude in them to publish it This David wel knew when be gave a description of three sorts of preachers within his observation The first sort he mentions Psal 19. The heavens declare the glory of God and the Firmament sheweth his handy work even in the mediatour as in them he made a tabernacle for the sun which as a bridegroom comming out of his chamber shines more and more unto a perfect day His going forth is from one part of heaven and his circuit unto the ends of it so that there is nothing hid from the heat and light thereof Thus also God brought forth Abraham shewed him the stars of heaven and sayd so shal thy seed be preaching Christ to him in and by the sight of those heavenly bodies And Abraham beleeved and it was accounted to him for righteousnes In like manner were the wise men of the east brought to the knowledg of Christ in his kingly
the first Resurrection The Apostle does there speak of the time when this way of heavenly converse between the saincts that are on earth and the holy angels shal be frequent and usuall and no such wonder or strang thing as yet by most it is accounted This will be brought to passe by the opening of the door in heaven interpreted by Christ himself Jo. 1.51 in his answer to Nathaniel Because I said unto thee I saw thee under the fig-tree beleevest thou Thou shalt se greater things then these What greater things A door open in heaven as a means of easy and familiar entercourse between the inhabitants of heaven and dwellers on earth The angels are to be employed as messengers of intelligence between Christ and his Saincts before the time of his owne personall converse with them on earth For saith Christ verily verily I say unto you Hereafter you shall se heaven open or the gate and door that is made into it and kept open by me for the ascent and descent of my holy angels between me and my Saincts on earth At that day Christ wil be glorified in his Saincts and honour them in the sight of them that hate them God will answer them before they pray whilst they are yet speaking he will heare and speedily avenge them of their adversaries He will grant them the desire of their hearts But when will this day be that these great and wonderfull things shal be seen The text is plain and expresse Revel 11. T is evidently to begin at the rising of the witnesses who shall immediatly upon their rising be thus in the spirit as John was on the Lords day in the I le of Patmos This wil be the proper and usuall dispensation in that day of the Lord that is to begin at the sounding of the seventh trumpet The spirit of life from God shall then enter into the witnesses set them upon their feet and immediatly qualify them to be in the spirit or have their inward senses awakened and fitted to hear and receave messages from heaven and the knowledg of the mind of their Lord by the immediate impression and inspiration of angels employed by him for that purpose We know this was frequently the case with Daniel and most of the other dear servants and prophets of the Lord. Unto Jacob this great mystery and truth was most particularly and distinctly foretold in the ladder which he saw the feet whereof touched the earth and the top of it reached to heaven and behold the angels ascending and descending upon it and the Lord himself standing above and speaking by that means unto Jacob acquainting him thereby with his mind and giving to him most rich and precious promises The interpretation of this ladder was not only made by our saviour to Nathaniel as we have opened but it was at the same time given to Iacob with the vision itself as appears by the Result that came into his mind thereupon when he sayd How dreadfull is this place It is the very house of God where his throne is It is the very gate of heaven through which by the ministry of angels in the hand of Christ as he is the son of man and hath the use and exercise of all kinds of humane sense in perfection in his glorified manhood the inward and outward man of the saincts shal be so affected changed and transformed as to give them a kind of entrance into and a being in heaven even whilst they are yet here in the body This Christ wrought and obteined the power of when he ascended up above all heavens and as man did come to have a more excellent name then the angels Now that he ascended what is it but that he who was in the forme of God and counted it not robbery to be equall with God did first descend lower then the angels into the fashion of an earthly man the lowermost part of his habitable earth Prov 8 31. even the animalish and sensuall nature of man using and exercising as well the bodily as spirituall senses appertaining to the very naturall man When he had done this by laying hold on the seed of Abraham and receaving it into personall union with himself he set up that ladder in his owne person the feet whereof stand on the earth whilst the top of it enters into the highest heaven For he that descended is the same also that ascended far above all heavens that he might fill and fulfill all things That therefore which Jacob pronounced in the spirituall interpretation of his vision is most undeniable This is none other sayes he then the house of God the building not made with hands whose builder and maker is God the fathers house wherein are many mansions built by the eternall WORD and wisdom of the father in the person of the mediatour considered as he is the first borne of every creature and the beginning or first begotten from the dead Col. 1. in whom is that life that is the light of men who was before all things and by whom all things consist The way for God that is the high and lofty one inhabiting eternity to descend and come to dwell in the humble broken and contrite spirit as the place of his rest and the way for the humble poor and broken spirit to ascend into the persence and sight of God all this was wrought out in our nature by the WORD that made himself flesh and in that body died rose again and ascended where he was before as in the volume of Gods book it is written of him This he told his owne disciples Jo. 14. In my fathers house are many mansions If it were not so I would have told you Behold I go to prepare a place for you to set the ladder by which the ascent and descent is contrived into my fathers house for such as you are And if I goe and prepare a place for you you may be sure I will come againe and gather you unto my self that where J am ye may be also At his comming again the same Apostle John finds the thing to be true that his Lord had promised For Revel 11.12 19. it appears that upon the rising of the witnesses and sounding of the seventh trumpet the temple of God wil be opened in heaven which is the same opening of the heavens before-mentioned Jo. 1.51 and there wil be seen in his temple the arke of his Testament the law of the two tables written in the heart of Christ the Son of Man from whose presence the fiery law is to be dispensed by the ministry of angels at which there wil be lightnings voices thunderings an earth quake and great haile The door into heaven being thus set open the risen witnesses are spoken to v. 12. saying come up hither or be with me in the spirit in a mind fitted to enterteine converse with me by the ministry of the holy angels And for such a blessing and benefit be not unwilling
as often as there shal be occasion to be absent from the body that you may be present with the Lord. For if herein you should appear vile in the eyes of wordly men as men beside yourselvs as David did in dancing naked before the arke yet is it to God And when you change againe from that inwardnes of life with God to be more in outward converse with men and more sober in their thoughts it is for their sakes and for their great benefit rather then yours that thereby you may be able to turn many of thē to righteousnes In this sence not excluding the literall it will be found true that the saincts shal be called to be and live in the spirit with Christ and to walk with God on earth before their translation as Enoch did Answerable to this it is said Dan. 12.2 compared with 1 Cor. 15.51 52. And many of thē that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake some to everlasting life and some to shame and everlasting contempt The spirit of our mind which sleepes in the dust of the earth wil be wrought off from that love and delight it is apt to take in making the body its home and exerting itself in such kind of operations as are in and by the use of our bodily organs and wil be gathered and carried up by the ministry of the holy angels forming a meetnes in the senses of the inward man of the heart into a converse with them and with Christ himself in spirit as a better home and city of habitation then that of the dust of the earth wherein it hath bin so long an inhabitant In order to this the soule will be endued or clothed upon with a hearing eare and a speaking tongue like to that of the angels in their immutable state And for this self same thing we are wrought by God who hath given us the earnest of his spirit already insome degree but will give it in the highest degree and measure it is atteinable before the change that comes upon us by death when this body is to be layd downe and brought into a state of actuall separation from the soule This change by death unto those that have partaken first of this awakening shal be very easy like unto the translation of Enoch who saw not death or had no sense of it in a way of pain or horrour His passage was sudden and in a moment very easy and desireable The Apostle Paul therefore speaking of this kind of change that should happen at the sounding of the seventh trumpet even in the beginning of it as we have opened does say behold I shew you a mystery that which as yet is a great secret but hereafter shal be very commonly experienced we shall not all sleepe but we shall all be changed in a moment in the twinckling of an eye at the last trump For the trumpet shall sound and the dead shal be raysed incorruptible Those whose spirits were before as 't were asleepe in the dust of the earth and dead in respect of the spirituality and heavenlines they are now awaken'd into wil be acknowledged as in that kind and degree of resurrection which wil be made knowne at the rising of the witnesses They shall not die that is leave the body with any painfull sense of death but in a moment shal be changed and translated into glory This awakned risen state is not that which shal be peculiar only to the saincts but wicked men the children of perdition in way of everlasting contempt shall also partake of it with a like way of operation upon the spirit of their minds by wicked angels transforming themselvs into angels of light and hoping by this means to gaine credit to their ministers as ministers of righteousnes also which in a way of counterfeit resemblance the father of deceit wil be preparing during this ministry of Eliah till he be bound up by Christ from any more deceaving of the nations in this kind or any other This the Apostle Paul does very cleerly intimate 1 Cor 13.7 where he admits there may be those that may speake not only with tongues of men but also of angels who yet not having or living in the spirit of love there described will be found to be but as sounding brasse and tinckling cymballs vessels of great contempt compared with those that make the right and true musick Revel 14. those harpers that are taught how to sing the song of Moses and of the lamb in sweet harmony and consortship together and thereby turne many to righteousnes who shall shine like bright morning stars 3. The third particular then that shal be an eminent effect of Eliahs second comming is the raysing up in the world a more excellent way of preaching hearing and obeying the gospel then ever yet hath bin knowne upon the face of the earth even that which Rom. 11.15 is deservedly called life from the dead and is to be the means of bringing in the fullnes both of jew and gentile This is darkly pointed out by Dives in the parable Luk. 16.30 when in his answer to Abraham he sayes that if one went to his brethren from the dead they would repent hereby glancing as 't were at such a kind of excellent and powerfull ministry as was intended by God to be set up in the world whereby to bring men to repentence or as Luk. 14.23 to compel them to come in that Gods house may be filled with the fullnes both of jew and gentile This kind of ministry is that wherein both for cleernes and certainty of the matter preached and the power of that spirit in which it is ministred shal be beyond all that hath yet bin seen or experienced in the church For in this day the heavens shal be commanded to drop downe from above and the skies to poure downe righteousnes and the earth to open and bring forth salvation that righteousnes from heaven and in the earth may spring up together and this by the Lords owne most powerfull forming and creation Esay 45.8 So Psal 50.1 6. The Lord the mighty God hath spoken and called the earth from the rising of the Son to the going downe thereof Out of Sion the perfection of beauty God hath shined Our God shall come and shall keepe no longer silence A fire shall devoure before him and it shal be very tempestous round about him He shall call to the heavens from above or make use of the angelicall ministry in the judging of his peoples cause for them as those that he will first employ to go before him and declare his righteousnes and then afterwards will he come in his owne personall appearance and shew that he is judge himself Christ will give the angels a call nay a command and commission to prepare the hearts and mouthes of the saincts as trumpets through which they may give a certain sound to the making manifest the knowledg and vision of God and of
last and most glorious trump of God Christs humanity as head of the elect Angels all principalities and powers being subjected unto him who as he is the Son of man is made the cheif of the aÌ„gels and the prime minister of the WORD of life for food unto them This beginning of the sounding of the seventh Trumpet is that which as hath bin said is the ministry of Eliah and goes before the ministry that shal be immediately exercised by the Son himself in his owne person By Christs revealing himself from heaven the head of angels he employes them as his reapers in the end of the world or in the last times to sever the wicked from among the just and gather out of his Kingdom all things that offend He will send a quickning Spirit of life from his presence that will breath the breath of prophecy into the holy angels those voices that are to be heard in heaveÌ„ saying The Kingdoms of this world are become the Kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ These voices wil be heard as it were the voice of a Trumpet talking with the Saincts on earth and calling them up into the same heavenly converse with themselvs causing them immediatly thereupon to be in the spirit beholding the throne that is in heaven and him that sits thereon as the head of those holy and blessed spirits who are all desirous to do him homage and worship refusing to take that to themselvs which is due only to their head and which the saints themselvs on earth would be but too forward to give them as was the case of John Revel 22.8 9. Under this ministry and dispensation the church and every particular member thereof do become the children that are all taught of God inwardly by this heavenly breath or angelical inspiration For this qualifies and enables them by the sight of the just one to know the mind and will of God and to do and fulfill it after Christ as they se he hath done it before them with a heart and spirit like unto his as he is the son of man And as so considered he is head of the holy angels by them speaking to and inspiring the church on earth He is also the head of that church in God the father that is above the angels so as unto principalities and powers the very elect angels by the church in this sence even the generall assembly of the first borne whose names are written in heaven the manifold wisdom of God shal be made knowne By these divine men who are the bride the lambs wife he will shew himself speaking and inspiring the good angels in heaven to all eternity and judging the evill and wicked ones into the flames of eternall fire The first of these attainments is that wherein the lower and common ranke of beleevers called in scripture the fulnes of the gentiles compared with the true Jews Gods first borne sons are gathered into society with the holy angels into a copartnership with them in an immutability of righteousnes and glory and so into Christ their head as into their proper element and sphere in which they are raysed up to live in his sight and to eat and drink with him at his table in his fathers Kingdom to all eternity Over these the second death never hath power And this is called the first resurrection which the other sort of beleevers those that are the fulnes of the Jews do enjoy in common with them during the thousand years reigne of Christ on earth And after that they have a farther ascent into the life and glory of the second resurrection which is not to be revealed in the power of it untill Christ have resigned up the Kingdom unto his father that God may be all in all But during the thousand years reigne of Christ on earth both these houses of Israel shal be gathered as sheep under one head and shepheard into one sheepfold and shine forth only in the life and glory of the first resurrection witnessing to the headship of Christ which he exerciseth over the angels and by them over the very church itself whilst the Kingdom of the son is unresigned by him into the hands of the father The life and glory of both these resurrections whether as they respect the mind or body of the true saincts and children of God or both is that immortality which is brought to light by Jesus Christ the life from the dead which will shew itself in the times appointed thereunto and translate us at length into eternity where time shal be no more And we are begotten even while here in our mortall bodies through fellowship with Christ in his resurrection unto a lively hope of this inheritance incorruptible and undefiled which fades not away ready to be revealed in these last times Untill then it is in faith only and the seed of it does beget and produce the two sorts of beleevers so frequently mentioned who now by this ministry of Eliah are beginning to be made manifest and shal be distinguished as the true Israel of God from all strangers and deceitfull workers whatsoever that either love or make a lie The first of these are in their principles said to be of the common faith and to have â—â—teined the common salvation Thus Paul writes to Titus as his son after the common faith Tit. 1 4. And Jude v. 3. sayes I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation to the fulfilling of the scripture Rom. 4 17. Gen. 17.5 speaking of Abraham I have made thee the father of many nations as wel as of one nation peculiar above and besides all the rest For so Abrahams seed was to be a seed made up of many nations and a seed of one more peculiarly beloved nation also that were to be seperated to him to dwell by themselvs and not be reckon'd amongst the nations that are the fulnes of the Gentiles Abraham is but the typicall father Christ is the father in spirit and truth to this twofold seed In Gen. 13. and 15. chapters God promised Abraham to make of him a great people numberlesse as the dust of the earth or the stars of heaven which he makes good in the fulnes of the true Jews But chap. 17.5 he gives an additional seed also which he there promises him besides what he promised before saying behold my Covenant is with thee and thou shalt be a high father of a multitude of nations Neither shall thy name any more be called Abram that is high father but Abraham high father of multitudes Hence is it that in Gods everlasting Covenant there comes to be found salvation for a multitude of nations common as it were to all mankind if the fault be not in themselvs and not salvation only for one great nation the Israel that is Gods first borne God hath therefore an everlasting love and salvation which comparatively spoken of is that which is common and extensive to a numberlesse
the purity of his Ordinances amongst us a very small remnant a seed of hidden ones we had bin as Sodom in the height of sinning and bin made like unto Gomorrha in the extraordinarines of our punishment These are they that God accounts his jewels the people that are of price and value with him whatever reproach and disesteeme they are in from the world in all times These have that faith in the seed of it by which they are possest with an ability to do all things for the truth and nothing against it and this through Christ the power of God inwardly strengthening and bringing them forth into a likenes of ability with himself to do all things by his quickning of them as he himself hath done by the fathers quickning of him that they may live by him as he himself according to his manhood lives by the father who does in him all the works God hath now for neer these six thousand years kept these his jewels by him as a reserved hidden treasure that he resolvs in a fit season to bring to light and make a shew of openly in the sight of the whole world In the mean time he calls them into the secret chambers of his love and is encreasing their faith and patience under the great and various trialls wherein they are with God strangers and soiourners in and to the world and to the delights and comforts of it as all their fathers were This time of hardship and suffring from the world must not alwayes be their lot There is a day approaching wherein the time of their ill usage from the world shal be no longer God will have his season to shew kindnes and love to them and to do them honour in the sight of the whole creation a day in which his purpose and determined resolution is to make up his jewels and bring them all together from all parts where he hath kept them hid and concealed In this day he will spare them and shew favour to them as the father spares his owne son that serveth him and in serving pleaseth him And so visible a distinction in this day will God put in the way of the dispensations of his providences even to the eye of the world between them that serve him and them that serve him not between the righteous and the wicked that every eye shall take notice of it And it shall have such a powerfull effect upon the beholders that there shall come people the inhabitants of many cities yea the inhabitants of one city shall goe to another saying let us goe speedily and continually to pray before the Lord of hosts I will goe also Yea many people and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem and to pray before the Lord. Ten man shall take hold out of all languages of the nations on the skirt of him that is a jew saying we will goe with you for we have heard that God is with you The jews that they will thus take hold of wil be such as are so indeed having the faith that failes not but makes them the receavers of that anointing which teacheth all things and is truth and no lie By this heavenly anointing they are in their very principles distinguished I. From those whose faith is so far from being of the same precious kind with theirs that it is sure to faile in the most needfull time in the day of temptation and triall when the winds blow and the rain deseends and the floods come and beat upon them Such faith is of little or no price Secondly The true Jew by his faith and anointing wil be likewise distinguish'd from those that have no faith but are unreasonable persecutours of those that have being void of all right discerning in matters of faith These true Jews and Israelits indeed are as we have shewed the two families in Jacobs house children of the same Jacob but not by the same Rachel of whom were only Joseph and Benjamin This distinction in Jacobs family seems to be taken notice of by the holy Ghost Ezek. 37.16 where the twelve Tribes are compared to two sticks or stems springing out of the same root as two houses nations or families of the same Israel Upon the one stick the Prophet was commanded to write for Judah and for the children of Israel his companions to whom as we know the Kingdom and scepter was assigned and out of whom Christ according to the flesh came Upon the other stick there was to be written for Joseph the stick of Ephraim and for all the house of Israel his companions For the seperated one from his brethren the exalted one above his brethren the dreamer to whose sheafe all the other sheaves yea the sun moon and stars were to do obeysance To him in a word was assigned the first birthright in the double portion of it the upper and the nether springs the blessings of heaven above of the deep that lieth under of the breasts and of the womb the blessings of the father that have prevailed above the blessings of his progenitours in an extent to the utmost bounds of the everlasting hills that are appointed to be on the head of Ioseph and on the crowne of the head of him that was separate from his brethren These are the blessings written for Ioseph and for all the house of Israel his companiōs or of his faith spirit and principles Both these sticks the two houses or churches of beleevers and Israelits in deed are to be made up into one new Ierusalem in Christs hand Both flocks are to be gathered into one sheepfold and visible universall church-state of the revealed sons of God distinguished from all people on the face of the earth besides And they shal be gathered into one universall Kingdom and civil state that shall beare rule over the whole world For thus saith the Lord behold I will take the children of Israel the scattered sheep belonging to this fold from among the heathen whither they be gone and will gather them on every side and will bring them into their owne land even into the promised new Ierusalem state the new heavens and new earth wherein dwells righteousnes figured out by the land of Canaan And I will make them one nation or seed of my blessing in the land upon the mountains of Israel and one King shal be King to them all And though Iudah shall be there with his companions and Ioseph with his under distinct writings and enrollings assigning unto each their lot yet both shall make but one church and Kingdom one spirituall seed or nation of Abraham They shall no more be two so as to be divided into two Kingdoms either in church or state They shall neither envy nor vex one another any more They shall be fully agreed and live in peace as inhabitants of the same city the new Ierusalem uppet and lower as the hebrew word imports Ps 51. or heavenly and earthly consisting
To the word of this Eliahs ministry in the hearts of beleevers the whole creation shal be obedient The heavens at their prayers will shut or open They shall do greater things on earth then ever yet have bin done by the power that Christ hath with the father which in this day he will begin visibly to set on work and exercise for the good of his people But the great question is when shall these things be Answer The signe of Christs comming is already spoken to in this ministry of Eliah which does immediatly goe before it And when this ministry comes and reveales itself in power as it must in the hearts of all the true Israel of God it will untie all the knots and difficulties that do yet remaine to be resolved concerning Christs second appearance and things to come But when may this second comming of Eliah be expected 1. After that Christ in spirit hath as signally bin rejected by the generation of Jews under the gospel which were surrogated and engraffed in the room of Abrahams naturall seed as he was by that Jewish nation which crucified him at Jerusalem And when accordingly they shall have openly declared it by the like severe proceedings against the true spirit of prophecy manifesting itself in Christs witnesses who by humane laws and bodily punishments wil be suppressed kept under and put to death as much as lies in man to do 2dly When this persecution and rejection of Christ in his members hath had its progresse and course with the preaching of the gospel itself during the six trumpets from the one end of the earth to the other which hath shined as lightning from the east to the west and when the gospel and obeyers of it shall meet with the sharpest brunt of opposition so as that the dead bodies of the witnesses shall not be suffered to be put in their graves during the last three years and half of this houre and power of darknes that is to come upon the church of Gods hidden ones the remnant of the womans seed that keep the commandments of God and faith of Jesus But they are nevertheles helped and much saved from the flood of their enemies malice by the like mistake as was that of Herod who slew all the children from two years old and upwards hoping amongst them to find the promised seed but failed The earth helps the woman The earthly Ierusalem with her inhabitants shall prove a skreene to the heavenly Mount Zion 3dly When the wise virgins as wel as the foolish shal be found in a deep sleep of security and think the worst past looking for nothing more but the comming of the bridegroom before it be yet midnight The witnesses of Christ wil be ready to make account that their 1260 years of suffering under the reigne of the beast is either expired or upon the very point of expiring and therefore begin to put off their sackcloth or lay it quite aside as taking for graunted that the time is come that sorrow and sighing are flowne away never to returne more But they will afterwards find themselvs deceaved and that they are but falling into the times of the three last years and halfe it being Gods usuall and accustomed method from the beginning to usher in any great exaltation of his saincts with some desperate extreamity and calamity immediatly foregoing And therefore till after the wise virgins sun be turned into darknes and the foolish virgins moon be turned into blood the BRIGHT MORNING STAR of Eliahs ministry comes not But then it does immediatly follow 4thly and lastly when Antichrist and all enemies of the witnesses of Christ shal be in the grearest peace unity and joy imaginable amongst themselvs at the beholding the dead bodies of the two prophets that tormented them that dwell upon the earth and shall cry peace peace as esteeming their mountaine to be made so strong that it can never be moved In one word When the sunshine of their prosperity peace and power is at the height and to their thinking impossible ever to set againe Let this suffice without proceeding farther to speak concerning the two other parts of this great day of Christs second comming which wil be dignified with his owne personall reigne on earth the THOVSAND YEERS of the FIRST RESURRECTION Then will he put an end to this very day of his owne Kingdom by his free and voluntary resigning it up into the hands of the father that God may be all in all Let me only adde this word that the visible reigne of these saints of the first RESURRECTION here on earth for a thousand years wil be in the new Jerusalem state that is to come downe from God out of heaven in a state of beatitude and glory partaking of the divine presence and vision of Christ their King in an immutable righteous state both of body and Soule distinguished from the state of the nations that shall walke in her light all the world over and be happy and glorious also but changeable THE END Mistakes in the printing Page 9. lin 36. for teams read tearms p. 21. l. 30. this r. his p. 41. l. 32. themselv r. themselvs and l. 33. trues r. true p. 43. l. 26. to as r. as to p. 70. l. 21. 3d r. 2d p. 83. l. 31. hasband r. husband p. 84. l. 29. contracted r. contracted p. 91. l. 3. tempestous r. tempestuous and l. 14. eujoy r enjoy p. 95. l. 40. powers r. power
A pilgrimage into the land of promise By the light of the vision OF Jacobs ladder and faith OR A serious search and prospect into life eternal pointing out the way and discovering the passage out of mans mutable state of life into a state of immutable righteousnes and glory through the knowledg of Christ in Spirit Written in the year 1662 by HENRY VANE Knight towards the latter end of his prison-state by himself fully reviewed and perfected some few dayes before his suffering and left as his last Testimony and service to this present generation according to the wil of God before he fell asleep HOSEA 12.3.4 and 6. verses He took his brother by the heel in the womb and by his strength behaved himself princely with God Yea he had power over the angel and prevailed he wept and made supplication unto him he found him in Beth-El and there he spake with us Therefore turn thou to thy God keep mercy and judgment and wait on thy God continually Printed in the yeare 1664. A TREATISE CONCERNING ETERNAL LIFE THe purposes and counsells of Gods mind are first taken within himself before they are or can be knowne to any other They are therefore called the deepe and hidden things of God For God is his owne counsellour There is none that can instruct him His mind is not only comprehensive of all that can be knowne and consulted upon but hath those eternall springs of light and power by which he is the supreame cause and orderer of all things And these as to their manner and kind of operation are three These first and great powers are they who in their name and manifestation are the Father Son and Holy Ghost by whom the same God doth forme and take all his counsells within himself and put them in execution according to the purpose of his owne mind These are the severall distinct powers of discerning and will in the same divine essence With the first of them God minds things after his owne incomprehensibile manner of being knowing and willing them as God Of this patern there is no imitation I am says God and there is none besides me With the second God minds things on earth or in the world condescending to proportion himself in his knowledg and will to the creature in order to be found in the likenes and fashion of created nature and so to act over the law first in himself that the creature may be capable to imitate and fulfill it after him With the third he does so admirably joyne and put both these minds into one and fix them in such most perfect harmony and love that they are not to be divided yet keeps and upholds in each their proper and distinct operations By this threefold operation God sets up the eternall law and causes the manifestation of that which is the very wisedome and reason of God himself the head of Christ the person of the blessed mediatour For he who thus is three in counsell wherein he decrees and orders all things giving the law in one and the same eternall mind does not execute by himselfe immediatly but by the Mediatour his representative or image the Angel of his presēce in whom his name or likenes is placed in order to beare it and bring it forth into the sight and participation of others By the immediate operation of the Trinity he is made and constituted the Lords Christ and true Messiah the secondary and executing power ordeined by God as the breath and voyce of his mouth to fulfill all his wills and all the counsells of his heart This is he who was from the beginning the breath of God the inspiration of the Almighty the face and image of the invisible God First by eternall generation within the mind of God 2. By everlasting emanation as the outshining light and express character of he divine essence 3. By temporall incarnation and inseparable personal union whith the seed of David According to his eternal generation he is without Father without Mother without descent coeternally and coessentially God with the Father or first cause of all no lesse truly and properly God then God himselfe But that which he is by everlasting emanation is the first born of every creature he that was before all things and by whom all things consist And according to his temporall incarnation he was made man like unto us in all things sin only excepted He is the inward writing of the eternal law that is written and lies within the bosome of the father None can read or unloose the seales on the backside of this writing but the lion of the tribe of Judah he that from eternity hath knowne Gods mind and bin his counsellour as the almighty breath of his month inspiring and giving life and being to all things which when put forth doth execute most exactly all that the dictates of Gods mind require to be done Without him is not any thing made that is made Nay admit the creature could receave being without him which it cannot yet the eternal law and will of God could never be knowne to angels or men unlesse revealed to them by this lively oracle and voyce of his month For all things are delivered to him of the father and none knows who the Son is but the Father nor who the Father is but the Son and he to whom the Son will reveale him No man hath seen God at any time The only begotten Son which is in the bosome of the Father he hath declared him even he that was in the beginning was found in the forme of God and thought it not robbery to be equall with God the WORD in whom is life and that life the light of men By him comes all hearing understanding and obedience to be wrought in the creature The first creature in which it is wrought is the building not made with hands eternal in the heavens made part of himself who as Mediatour is a mixed seed of both natures in one person and Spirit In this Spirit he comes in the dispensation of the fulnes of time to be made flesh and so hath in him the voice of God the voice of the head and cheif of angels and of the head and cheife of men by meanes whereof he speakes and converses with all created understandings in their owne likenes and language Thus comes he to be that spirituall ladder and way of graduall entercourse by means whereof the angels that are ascending and descending upon him doe keepe the doore open betweene heaven and earth and he fils al things This is Gods first best and most perfect worke finished from the beginning the works that are so much the object of Gods knowledg and delight that he therein rests subjecting them no more to change This is the building not made with hands eternal in the heavens the invisible and exemplary paterne unto both creations the rock whence they flow Deut. 32.4 He is the rock his work is
seale and lay hold on that one seed which is Christ making it the brightnes of his glory the expresse character of his essential mind which is righteousnes and holines itself This is the WORD that is neer thee in thy mouth and in thy heart that thou mayst doe it that is to say in the heart and mouth of Christ the second Adam and head of al true beleevers by him to be poured out as an anointing for the whole seed rendring thereby the visiō of Gods mind so plain to them that he that runs may read it The ministry of this law is a voice that First invites all freely to come to the waters every one that is a thirst and he that hath no mony to come buy and eat yea to come and buy wine and milk without mony and without price that they may eat that which is good and delight themselfs in fatnes This first general voice and invitation leaves it to mans choice whether he wil obey and come or not But this law and ministry hath also in it a second voice that carries with it such a prevailing attractive power such an unresistible constraining loue as will receave or admit no deniall It does so powerfully encline the eare and heart to heare and obey that by means of this effectual saving grace there is made an everlasting Covenant between Christ and the soule even the sure mercies of David Christ himself in this dispensation is given to be a witnes commander and leader to those that are under it upon such teams as never to faile leave or forsake them 1. The first of these voices in its ministry is tearmed in Scripture the day of Christ first appearance which hath already risē and had its kingdō in word and also in Spirit but sowē in weakenes It hath shined upō the world had its beginning and continuance and is now drawing very neer to its ending wherein Christ is to be rejected and that by his owne citizēs a generation that are inhabitāts of the earthly Jerusalē vnder the name of Christians succeeding their predecessours the jews into whose room they are surrogated in their froward and bitter principles and Spirit wherein they please not God and are contrary to all men This is called the Gospel of the Kingdom preached by means of the outward word accompanied with the Spirit to all nations as a witnes before the end come or before that dispensation come that puts an end to it as perfective of it restoring it out of its dying and declining state into a brightnes and glory that is everlasting as shal be declared at the rising of the witnesses It began with the ministry of John Baptist as the voice of him crying in the wildernes prepare ye the way of the Lord make his paths streight It was continued encreased and carried up to its height even by the personal ministry of the Son of God manifested in flesh who was born of a virgin died for our sins and rose againe according to the Scriptures And by his ascending up on high he did lead captivity captive and gave gifts to men went on in the greatnes of his strengh conquering to conquer till the war and opposition sprang up that was raised against him by the man of sin and Son of perdition for the space of 42 months or 1260 years to the overspreading the face of the church with apostacy and thick darknes Herein so great a progresse hath bin made that we are brought as it were to the shutting in of the evening of this first glorious Gospel day and new Testament ministry in Spirit and by the written word to the verifying that Scripture Luk. 17. which sayes The dayes will come when ye shal desire to se one of the dayes of the Son of Man and ye shall not se it because the light of it must withdraw to give place and make way for the approaching glory of another of the dayes of the Son of Man even that of his second appearance and Kingdom at which time he shall shew himself the only Potentate over all the earth KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS 2. The second voice and ministry of the Gospel above mentioned performed in and by Christs second appearance is that which as hath bin said doth powerfully encline and prevailingly work upon the hearts of men for the obedience of Gods law binding up their soules in the life that is eternall This second appearāce though the yonger does with Jacob lie in the same wombe with the first in the hearts of all true beleevers And though it come not out first yet at last it obteins the preeminence and birthright causing those that are children of this day even whilst they are under the first dispensation to abide with God as pilgrims and strangers therein as all their Fathers were and by faith to espy this promised land and heavenly countrey whilst at a distance and very far off Esai 33.17 and to wait for it with patience in a certainty of hope and stedfastnes of confidence till they enter into and become actuall possessours of it The operation and effect which this second day of Christ appearance shal have upon beleevers in its very morning brightnes will render them in their minds like to the elect angels in obeying the law of God active powerfull and stedfast in working righteousnes It will qualify them also with a meet frame of Spirit for angelicall converse whilst yet in the body as sutable associates and consorts with them in Gods service and worship And from the powerfull influences that shall descend from the intellectuall and superiour part of mans mind quickned with the warmth and life of those holy Spirits in the hand of Christ the animall or souly life and bodily nature of man shal be formed into such subjection as will by degrees work out a perfect redemption of the body from the bondage of corruption even in this life as the needfull preparatory dispensation of Eliah that first comes and restores all things before the personal appearing of the son himself For although he will first shew himself in the glory of the holy angels as the bright morning star in the beginning of this day yet is he to come forth also in the farther progresse of this day in the glory of his father and therein to shine forth as the sun in his strength after that he hath first sent his angels to gather out of this his Kingdom all things that doe offend and them which doe iniquity casting them into a furnace of fire Whē this preparatory work is done by the messengers he sends before him Christ will reveale himself from heaven and by that glorious sight which he will give of himself chang those that then are alive and remain on the earth into his owne likenes in soule and body and gather them unto himself as meet consorts and associates for him in that his glorified state catching them up to him in that
heavenly aire or Spirit where they are to be ever with the Lord. In effect the day of Christs second appearance brings upon the stage of this world life from the dead working and declaring the first resurrection mentioned Revel 20. which is to continue visible to men on earth one thousand years The glorious chang which shal be made in the progresse of this day upon the soules and bodies of the Saincts shal be such as will no more leave them subject to corruption For over them the second death shall have no power This is another of the dayes of the Son of Man which succeeds the first is to continue a thousand years and then also have its end upon the sons making a voluntary and entire resignation of this his Kingdom unto his Father that God may be all in all For during this thousand years the son in his Kingdom shal be exalted as he to whom the father hath committed all judgmēt to be executed so that what he binds on earth shall be bound in heaven and what he looses on earth shal be loosed in heaven Whom he will he shall slay and whom he will he shal keep alive as the most absolute Monarch and only Potentate that ever reigned on the earth to the end that during this season and space of time all mē may honour the son with the honor due to the father and in this appearance of the Son se the father as in his vicegerent and doe him homage in this his living Image the Lords Christ or anointed one the man that by God is ordeined to rule the world in righteousnes even all the nations upon the earth during this his day which immediatly praecedes the day of eternity and last judgment wherein God is to be all in all The son himself after that all things shall have bin subdued and subjected unto him shal be subject to the Father that put all things under him This second day of the Son of Man is that one day knowne to the Lord not day nor night but a kind of middle state between that which is corruptible and that which is incorruptible It is neither absolutely one or the other but a mixture of both And it shall come to passe in the evening of this day it shal be light and the passage out of this into the day of eternity very pleasing and delightsome It shall distinguish itselfe as hath bin already intimated into the 3 usuall parts of a day MORNING MIDDAY NIGHT. 1. In its morning beauty and appearance the Eliah comes and restores all things as is foretold of him the BRIGHT MORNING STAR which is to shew to the kings of the east the neer approach of the only begotten Son himself and be to them and all other inhabitants on the earth the signe of the Son mans approaching and comming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory 2. In the noontide of this day of the Son of Man in his Kingdom shal be seen the height of the sunshine of that royall power and greatnes which shal be exercised by him in the capacity of universall King over all the earth the season wherein there shal be one LORD in his owne person visible and his name one throughout the whole world 3. There shall also be a declining and evening state of this glorious day which willingly and cheerfully gives place to the day of eternity wherein the father unveyled shall shine forth and be all in all How fitly does Ezekiel in the vision he had of the holy waters represent and describe this growing encreasing Kingdō of Christ revealed in the Gospel the light of Gods law that shines forth in the Son himself into the obedience and power whereof we are to be changed from glory to glory by the Lord the Spirit The waters issued from under the threshold of the house eastward on the right or south side Ezek. 47. Their first comming forth was by measure the measure of a man and gradually from the ankles to the knees from the knees to the loins from the loins to a river unpassable by man as meer man in his first constitution of being 2. 2dly then the same waters came forth in a communication above and beyond the measure of mans first nature into a river that man may swim in without drowning or being at all subject to die any more how much higher soever it rise above the head of the naturall man the first Adam And of this Noah by faith was aware who that he might obtein a state of safety from the overflowing flood by which al the world not made beleevers and taken into the arke were drown'd obeyed the counsel and command of God in building the arke and going into it after it was built and ready to receave him Herein have we a lively type of Christs humane nature offered up by the immortal Spirit and brought forth into the life that is from the dead never to die more but hath the keys of hel and death committed to him Unto the likenes of this heavenly building and temple of the living God in Christs person every true beleever is fashioned and conformed and is thereby made a fit vessel to swim in those waters of life safely and delightfully which by rising up above al the measures and proportions of the first world drowne them but are the proper element for those that are saved to live in They are fitted with enlarged hearts and mouths wide enough open'd to take in and receave those streams and rivers of the emanations of divine bounty and love how broad or deep soever they prove and how high soever they may rise and overflow For they have the man Christ Jesus their head the second Adam who as their forerunner is gone before to prepare the way for them and as the true arke in which are many mansions to receave them into himself that where he is they may be also Of what hath bin already said this then is the sum Christ is the eternall WORD and speaking power of God by whom are all things He is also as hath bin shewed the rock of ages the place of Gods rest throughout all generations the eternal Sabbath Heb. 4. wherein God finished his works so fully to his content that therein he took up his Rest even in the person and Spirit of the Mediatour the mystery which from the beginning of the world hath lain hid in God who created all things according to the eternall purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord. Further This eternall WORD who is the creatour of all things visible and invisible being in the Mediatour the image of the invisible God does bear the name of the blessed Trinity and stamps the impression and character thereof upon all the works of his hands He is the Alpha and Omega the Beginning and Ending of the creation of God In the Psalms and Ecclesiastes God is called by the name of creatours as being three
of what already they have receaved from him at his command He is a propitiation for the sins of the whole world Both these divine oracles and manifestations of Gods will law and Gospel were made knowne to Adam in Paradise the one typed out in the tree of the knowledg of good and evil fitly resembling the first created liberty and fredom of will man was left to the exercise of under the law the other by the tree of life placed in the midst of the Paradise of God lively figuring out the better fredom and lasting holines which the Son himself makes us partakers of in the Gospel as he is the end of the law to al that beleeve and can be perswaded to trust him as the Gospel requires In both these respects it is that John sayes I write no new Commandement to you but an old commandement which was from the beginning As it first came forth in law and Gospel before the fal it was the law written in Adams heart and the Gospel set before the eyes of his mind by the ministry of angels in lively types and figures This we are to understand by the law of nature by which all natural men shal be judged who never have atteined or lived under the hearing of the written law or word of God given afterwards in the holy Scriptures 2dly The self-same old commandement of God that is both law and Gospel came forth since the fall by divine inspiration in the bookes of the old and new Testament The law was under this dispensation engraven on tables of stone conteining the ten commandements The Gospel was represented in the ceremonial law of Moses ministry under the old Testament Then againe the law is written in the fleshly tables of Christs heart as he was born of a woman and made under the law and the Gospel was represented in the two Sacraments of baptism and the Lords supper instituted during the dayes of Christs flesh the witnesse whereof is left us upon record in the New Testament as that manifestation of Gods wil which the Son himself in and by his first appearance hath brought to light This we are to understand by the law of the Scriptures which are not of private interpretation nor a prophesy that is come to us by the will of man but that which holy men spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost for a sure ground of truth to be relied upon 3dly and lastly the same commandement or word of God which hath bin from the beginning is to come forth once more in and by the son's second and personal appearance in Spirit a fiery and living law call'd in Scripture the law of the Spirit of life that is in Christ Jesus which by faith is espied and seen as the Land of promise into which all true beleevers must enter and where they must inherit the immutability and eternal life promised a life from the dead which those that possesse whether in the glory of the first or second Resurrection though as yet but in the seed shal never die more The second death shal not have power over them but all tears shal be wiped away from their eyes and all cause of sorrow or fear This is the Son's Kingdom in Spirit which he receaves and enters upon by the appointement of the father He is pleased to begin it in weaknes and subject it a while to great sufferings but will shortly enter upon and continue the exercise of it in power during the space of a thousand years wherein he is to judg the world in righteousnes effectually causing his wil to be done on earth as it is in heaven The law under this dispensation is found as the tables of the Testimony laid up in the heavenly tabernacle of Christ the Son of Man a fiery law of indignation and vengeance in severity without mercy upon all wilful disobedient sinners The Gospel under this dispensation is as the throne or heaven itself together with the earth that is made Gods footstool or the natural man subjected and brought through faith to Gods foot in a way exclusive to al boasting This is the new heavens and new earth of which the new Jerusalem consists that comes downe from God written in and upon the heart of Christs manhood glorified and made immutably holy shining forth as the living Image of God in a twofold forme to wit in the form of a servant not only made a Son which is the first but exalted to a name above every name and anointed with the oyle of gladnes above his fellows that 's the second Thus Christ is the WORD as is above sayd that is commanded to a thousand generations He that was he that is and he that is to come the Almighty He was both law and Gospel in the day or under the dispensation of the law of nature is the same in the day and under the dispensation of the law of the Scriptures and is to come and wil shew himself to be the same also in the day and under the proper and immediate dispensation of the law of the Spirit of life that is in him This is the spiritual day of the Lord the thousand years Jubilee and Sabbath This third dispensation hastens apace draw's very neer and the faithfull and upright in heart beleeve expect and wait for the comming of the Lord therein both as an Eliah in and by his messengers and Servants elect angels and beleeving men that shal restore all things root up every thing that offends by a swift execution of vengeance on evil doers in the morning of this day and after that in his owne person wherein the man Christ by whom God hath ordeined to judg the world in righteousnes wil shew himself as the great King and bridegroom that hath the bride whose mariage he wil gloriously solemnize on earth in order to cary her up with him into heaven upon the expiration of his thousand years reigne and the Resigning up of his Kingdom into the hands of this father that God may be all in all That the matter of Gods command and mans duty is the same as wel under the law as under the Gospel and in them both under all the three dispensations before mentioned is sufficiently cleered and demonstrated nor is the difference lesse perspicuous wherein each of them vary one from another 1. The law of nature writes the matter of the law and duty commanded upon the nature and in the very heart of man teaching and instructing him also in the nature of the Gospel the new nature by the ministry of angels in most apt significant types and figures suited to his natural understanding 2dly The law of the Scripture first writes the law in tables of stone and teaches the Gospel by the types conteined in the ceremonial law or a sort of ordinances that are worldly rudiments being but the shadow of the good things to come whereof the body is Christ Afterwards therefore Christ coming
in the flesh abolishes and abrogates that dispensation of the mosaical ministry and in stead thereof makes the heart and conscience of man in himself and followers the fleshly tables whereon the law is written by the Spirit of the living God Hereby a conformity of holy flesh is wrought in man like unto the flesh of Christ through the hearing of the word This is the washing of our body or natural man with the pure water of the living WORD and Spirit of Christ through the ministry of the outward preaching thereof to the purging and clensing us from all filthines of flesh And this is obteined through the vertue and price of Christs blood together with the atonement and remission of sins past Under this dispensation it is that by the doctrin of the cross signified in the Sacraments of baptism and the Lords Supper and thereby lively represented to the eyes of the very natural man he is taught the Gospel a second time under the Scripture dispensation of law and Gospel Neverthelesse this teaching yet is short of the glory of God to be revealed in and by Christs personal appearance in Spirit which as it is the 3. Third and last dispensation of law and Gospel so does it differ in excellency and glory very much from the other two For it is the fruit of the vine which Christ reservs to drink with his owne brethren and faithful Servants in the Kingdom of his father or which his father hath given unto him that those that have continued with the Son in his temptations and followed him fully in the regeneration may eat and drink at his table in this his Kingdom and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel or the natural and fleshly holy seed jew or gentile who at that day shal be found to be but in their mutable state of righteousnes and life This is the best wine far exceeding any before receaved in types figures and Sacraments being that which Christ keeps till the last as that fruit of himself the heavenly and true vine which will refresh the heart of God and of man or of the divine and heavenly man as wel as of the earthly and natural man brought forth in the exercise of an immutable righteousnes and made after the power of an endlesse life The former of these is to sit at Christs right hand the latter at his left in this his Kingdom and glory unto which both of them are fitted and prepared by the father through the lively conformity they are taken into and made to beare with Christ in his death and resurrection So much be spoken in way of resolution to the first general query of the 4 above propounded to insist on in this Treatise to wit concerning the subject matter of the law or command of God delivered to man by the divine WORD and oracles of God under the threefold dispensation thereof together with the difference of these dispensations under the law of nature Scripture Spirit The time of the latter branch of the 2d dispensation beginning with John the Baptists and Christs owne personal ministry in the flesh is now far spent and the yet more glorious day of Christs 2d appearance and dispensation in Spirit is at hand The second General query to be insisted on is concerning the mutable state man was created in at first and remains in even after the fall out of which he is again capable to be changed and either restored and regenerated by the knowledg of Christ in the Gospel or else cast down for ever into eternal perdition The WORD that hath bin the old Commandement from the beginning that it may evidently appear to all understandings to be the word of Truth doth branch itself forth as hath bin declared into two Testimonies or witnesses which are both of them the law of Gods mouth The one conteins in it the doctrine of the law of works the rule of mans first communion with God in the first Covenant the other the doctrin of the law and righteousnes of faith the rule of that 2d communion which God thinkes fit to take man into in the spirit of his Son which can never be lost as the first may but endures to everlasting life Now two Testimonies according to the law are sufficient for the discovery and confirmation of all truth Answerable hereunto does he that is Truth itself shine and give forth the light of his glory whose two Testimonies may either be joyned in consortship harmony and subserviency with and to one another in the ministry and dispensing of them and so become a law of life to all that heare and obey them that new song mention'd Rev. 14.3 sung before the throne called chap. 15.3 the song of Moses and of the lamb sung together in perfect harmony and agremēt which no man can learne but the 144000 Virgins that follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth being redeemed from among men as the first fruits to God and to the Lamb. But now these two laws or Testimonies of works and of faith as they may be taught and dispensed in difference disagreement inconsistency and opposition one unto the other may become a ministry of death either by setting up and exalting the letter above and against the spirit or disjoyning the spirit from the letter as that which may be without it and needs no consortship with it This is the work of the false deceitful Spirit the father of lies and is not of the Truth Now these being the Testimonies which from the beginning are commanded by God to be heard and obeyed no sooner was man created in Gods image and endued with an immortal intellectual rational and sensual soule made a free agent but God set them before him as a meet and capable subject to be made wise and happy in the practice of them The work of the one of them was immediatly written in his heart by the finger of God at his creation and the word of the other of them as soon as he was put into Paradise was sounding every wherein his eares and was exposed to the sight of his mind in the visible types and signes of the Sabbath the institution of marriage the tree of life and by the ministry of the holy angels Two things are recorded by Moses concerning the first make and constitution of being given unto man by God at his creation The first we find Gen. 1.26 27. where the counsel is taken by the blessed Trinity his creatours within themselvs saying Let us make man in our image after our likenes and let him have dominion over the visible creation and be fruitfull multiply and replenish the earth ruling over every living thing that moveth upon the earth So God created man in his owne image in the image of God created he him male and female created he them God is in his being the highest reason and the operation or work of his mind is discovered and made knowne by the word of his
wel of the one kind as of the other if they shal sin wilfully after that they are come to the knowledg of the truth there remains then to them no more Sacrifice for sin but a most certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries even all the dwellers in that earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it but in stead of bringing forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed doe bear thorns and briars which causes them to be rejected makes them nigh unto cursing whose end is to be burned But if the same earth in stead of bringing forth thorns and briars does become ground prepared and made fit to receave the immortal and incorruptible seed by the word of God which abideth and liveth for ever and to bring forth the proper fruits thereof with patience meet for him by whom it is dressed it wil be sure to receave blessing from God even to be blessed with the having of those better things that are accompanied with salvation For he that is faithfull in that which is least by the same grace laying hold on him and keeping him from evil becomes also faithful in much And he that is uniust in the least even in the use of his least natural fredom wil be uniust also in much even in the highest atteinments which he can arrive unto in that his mutable state and whilst in his owne keeping Without blood there is no remission of sins But through the sprinckling of the blood of Jesus who is our passover whose blood speaks better things then that of Abel the wrath and severity that is by the law is either mitigated and all proceedings in the way of revenging justice for a time at least respited and the persons reprieved upon condition of repentance and amendment of life or else totally and finally remitted This latter is the case of al true beleevers that are in Christ Iesus by the new and everlasting Covenant Thus is that saying made good Iam 2 13. He shal have judgment without mercy that hath shewed no mercy and mercy rejoyceth against judgment on behalf of al that are justified frely by grace through the eternal redemption which Christ hath obteined for them So then though al have sinned and come short of the glory of God he hath not so concluded and shut them up in their disobedience and unbeleif but in and through the blood of Christ he is ready to shew mercy of one kind or other unto all I. First such mercy as is intimated in that parable Matth. 18. v. 23. to the end where the lord at first upon the reckoning he made with his servant pronounced judgment upon him commanded him his wife children and al he had to be sold and payment forthwith to be made which in effect was executed in the case of our first parents but afterwards upon the servants repentance and humbling himself beseeching frō his Lord only patiēce and promising he would pay him all his Lord was moved with compassion shewed him mercy in loosing him and freely forgiving him the debt But this mercy as appears after was not that which is called Gods sure mercies such as David had because capable of revocation upon the servants abuse of it in shewing no mercy afterwards to his fellow servant which renewed his Lords wrath again towards him so that he delivered him over to the tormenters til he should pay all that was due unto him He also made it a ruled case for al in the like condition saying If ye from your hearts forgive not every one his brother his trespasses so shal my heavenly father sayes Christ doe unto you that is not forgive you your trespasses And Luke 13.7 9. the same truth is confirmed in another parable where the Lord of the vineyard sayes to the dresser of it behold 3 years I come seeking fruit on this figtree and find none cut it down why cumbreth it the ground He answering said Lord let it alone this year also til I shal dig about it and dung it and if it bear fruit well if not after that cut it down This first sort of Gods mercies to sinners is conditional and universal common to the whole posterity of Adam He is moved with a general pity and tendernes towards them in the day of their nativity when no eye hath compassion on them Yea to some of them also he is pleased to shew more particular kindnes so that of his owne accord passing by and seing them in their blood he bids them live he spreads his skirt over them to cover their nakednes makes that the season of his love appearing to them teaching them to deny ungodlines and adorning them with his owne comelines Notwithstanding al this they trusting to their beauty and righteousnes in this dispensation wrote in and put upon them doe fal and make themselvs worse by their apostasy then Sodom or Gomorrha Then the Lord judges it equal that such righteous men as these when they turn from their righteousnes as they finally may and commit iniquity should die in it and also hereupō have all their sins committed before their conversion or change to that state of righteousnes afresh imputed to thē though before God had declared they should not be mētioned but buried in oblivion and that in the righteousnes which they did they should live Thus is the Lord many a time ful of compassion to unworthy sinners whose hearts are not right with him so as to be stedfast in his Covenant Psal 78. He forbears howsoever to destroy them til he hath made proof of them to the utmost Therfore turns he his anger away from them again and again and stirs not up al his wrath He deales with them according to the multitude of his louing kindnesses and the variety of mercies that are in him There are no sort of sinners then who in a lesse or greater degree tast not of these riches of Gods mercies the more of which is shewed to them and abused and sinned against the more is their condemnation heightned For by such demeanour they do crucify to and in themselvs the son of God afresh and put him to open shame counting the very blood of the Covenant wherewith they have bin sanctified an unholy thing and doing despite to the spirit of grace With these kinds of mercies Christ is the saviour of al men a propitiation for the sins of the whole world And thus God is in Christ reconciling the world unto himself not imputing their sins and he not only commands but beseeches al men to be reconciled to him to lay hold on his strength and be at peace with him as not having receaved in vaine the grace he hath begun to bestow upon them But besides these his common mercies declaring his good wil to al men as not taking pleasure in the death of any sinner he hath also his choice and peculiar favour and loving kindnes
power and office by the sight givē to them of his star a star that made him known to thē and went before them to conduct them to a sight of him in his owne person which is al that this sort of messengers or preachers of Christ can do Thus the book of the creatures by Gods special Ordination and institution in the way of types ād figures through the ministry of angels does teach and preach the righteousnes of God which is in Christ in order to lead us to the personal sight of him that we may in the end hear himself speak After this manner the righteousnes of God in Christ is and may be manifested without the law or written word Secondly In the same Psalm he mentions another sort of preaching and teaching of the knowledg of Christ and that is out of his law the law of his written word the ministry whereof is for the converting of mens Soules and it is a sure Testimony that makes wise the simple more to be desired then gold yea then much fine gold sweeter also then hony and the hony-comb The righteous statutes and judgments of God signified in his written word reioyce the heart and are true and righteous altogether His commandement is pure enlightning the eyes Concerning the law or command of God thus manifested Christ sayes search the Scripturs whose true office is not only to revive and instruct you in that law that was written in your hearts at the creation and lost by the fal but to send you to me also that by obteyning a personal sight of me in spirit you might be farther instructed in the knowledge of me But ye wil not come unto me that ye may have life Thirdly and lastly Ps 8 2 David shews that there is another sort of preachers that God sends as labourers into his harvest saying out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast thou founded or ordeined strength because of thine enemies and that thou mightest stil the enemy and the avenger These babes and sucklings Christ himself interprets and expounds to us Luke 10.21 first of those his sent ones seventy in number which he immediatly authorized and qualified by commission from himself sending them two by two before his face as his harbingers and forerunners into every city and place whither he himself would come Secondly he expounds it of those babes and children of the fathers begetting to whom he reveals those things which he had hid from the wise and prudent One of these babes Peter is acknowledged by Christ to be Mat. 16.17 when he called him the rock Christ hereupon owned him as one of the blessed seed who had that sight and knowledg of Christ in spirit given to him which none but the father could reveale Flesh and blood could neither give nor receave it For such knowledg of Christ requires a spiritual eyesight and discerning peculiar to these children and babes of the fathers owne begetting the plantation of his owne right hand of whom Christ sayes Mat. 13.16 17. Blessed are your eyes for they see and your ears for they hear Verily I say unto you many prophets and righteous men have desired to se those things which ye see and have not seen them and to hear those things which ye hear and have not heard them For all things are delivered to me of my father and no man knoweth the son but the father neither knoweth any man the father save the son and he to whomsoever the son wil reveal him This sight of the Father and Son in their mutual relations to and fruitions of each other gained by the personal sight of Christ in spirit is mentiond by Paul 1 Cor. 9.1 when he says Am not I an Apostle have not I seen Christ or am not I one of those that by the sight of Christ in spirit and the revelation of the Son in me have receaved grace and Apostleship to the obedience of faith among al nations for his name These are the pure in heart and poor in spirit that are taught after this most excellent manner to se God and have the knowledg of Jesus Christ in order thereby to be made ministers and witnesses as wel of the things at first seē by them as of those also wherein afterwards Christ yet reserus himself farther and more fully to appear unto them These speak the things which they know testify that which they have seē whether their witnesse be receaved or no having themselv first heard the record that God gives of his Son and set to their seal that God is trues This is the threefold cord the lines whereof are streched out over al the world and to the ends of the earth by the quickning power of the living WORD He rideth upon the heaven of heavens of old Loe he sends out his voice in each and in al these his dispensations and that a mighty voice sharper then any two-edged sword peircing even to the dividing asunder of soule and spirit and of the joynts and marrow a discoverer of the thoughts and intents of the heart Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight All things are naked and open to the eyes of this our great saviour and redeemer And as he speaks immediatly by himself by the voice of his owne mouth so does he also send out his voice by his hosts or armies of angels those ministers of his which doe his pleasure and signify his commands to others which they receave as always attending and hearkning to the voice of his word The word therefore as at first it is given in a fore-running and preparatory dispensation to the Sons appearance in his owne person is called Heb. 2.2 the word spoken by angels the command whereof is so stedfast that every transgression and disobedience thereof receaves a just recompence of reward By the Rule and autority of the holy and elect angels exercis'd according to his word and law was God the Mediatour Pleased to put and keep in subjection the whole first creation even man also who in his first and mutable state is the cheif and highest member thereof next under the angels themselvs By means of this angelical ministry and Rule under Christ or in the hand of the Mediatour the righteousnes of God wrought out in the person of the redeemer is made manifest without the law to the gentiles that are without law that is the knowledg of the Scriptures or written word as also by the law to the jews that are in and under the teaching of Gods written oracles and do or may there find the witness and manifestation thereof In and by these it doth appear that Jesus Christ died for our sins and is risen again for our justification By jews in this case we are not only to understand the seed of Abraham according to the flesh but those also among the gentiles who are planted into the same good olive tree Christ on the same tearms of mutability as they
were liable to be broken off again and those also that are after the spirit true heirs according to the promise who are in like manner under this dispensation and teaching til the seed himself come and take them from this Schoolmaster in order to bring them under the most lively effectual teaching and instruction of his owne mouth and by his owne personal appearance in spirit to them either as the day-star arising in their hearts and giving forth the glory of his first appearance in his owne face as he is the Son of man in the form of a servant and fashion of the first Adam made immutable or 2dly as the sun in its strength breaking forth in their soules that are gathered to him appointed and qualified to be with him in the Kingdom of his father and admitted to the peculiar priviledge of beholding his glory in the face of his most exalted and heavenly manhood as he is the only begotten lying in the fathers bosome he that is above all What he hath seen and heard in the beholding of the fathers shape and very similitude that he testifieth but no man receaveth this his testimony that is but a meer man and no more For it is not it cannot be conveyed or communicated unto any but with unspeakable words which it is not possible for man in the single capacity of his first nature and make though become immutable to receave or utter so much doe they surpasse all the knowledg as wel as expression of meer man Under the voice of this threefold ministry God the mediatour who is the possessour of heaven and earth the maker of them and all therein hath made of one blood al nations of men for to dwel on the face of the earth hath distributed to al of them and determined the bounds of their habitations as also the different and proper means to bring them back to himself by repentance from dead works and faith towards the living God He hath awakened that light in every one that comes into the world that shal move and cal upon them at some time or other upon occasion of sundry concurring providences to seek the Lord if haply they may feel after him and find him who is not far from every one of us It ought not then to be a thing incredible with us but that by these means provision is made by God in Christ and care taken not only for the restoring of man againe unto that righteousnes and purity of nature which he lost and to the exercise of that kind of freewil which he enjoyed at creation but yet farther to regenerate and beget him into a more excellent fashion of being and heavenly frame of Spirit in and by which the end of his first creation is fully answered and the law of it accomplished Of this we shal now in the third place proceed to treat by way of answer to 3. The third generall Query which is this In what sence is it possible for man in his mutable state considered either before or after his fall according to the degree of restoring healing grace which he does or may arrive unto to hear and obey the things of Gods law without turning from it finally and in so doing to grow up out of his mutable into his immutable state and be made heir and possessour of life eternal To understand this the more plainly and distinctly and to prevent prejudices and mistakes we shal discusse this subject under these 4 particular enquiries following as branches of this 3d maine point and general query 1. Whether was man at first created in a capacity of being and aptitude of mind possible to obey and fulfill the law of nature so to as answer the end of his creation til brought under a second work of Gods hand call'd the new creation and thereby cast into a new mould and frame of being Secondly whether man by sin be so unmade againe and corrupted so disorder'd and disabled that by the blessing and vertue of Christs blood and the proper and fit means that by the father are put into the hands of the Mediatour he is not in a capacity and possibility notwithstanding his losse by the fall to be restored and made able againe to obey Gods law with the same kind of ability God gave him at first And upon such restoration is he not obliged to set about it at least to shew his good will and syncere inclination of mind there unto according to the measure of the ability he receaves 3. How was man to employ and make use of his naturall ability and strength given for the performance of Gods law and according to what rule might or ought he to have walked with God either before or after the fall which would infallibly guide and unmoveably keepe him in the way to eternall life a way which is called the way of holines such as the uncleane passe not over and the wayfaring men though fooles cannot or shall not erre therein and at the end whereof is immortality and eternall blessednes 4. How comes man in a judiciall manner to be hardned by God and made a vessell of wrath fitted and appointed to everlasting destruction And when is it that he shal be denied any farther benefit by the Sacrifice or Christs death and no more permitted to change his mind and turne from his evill wayes though he should seek it with teares but be in a certaine expectation of the unquenchable flames of Gods wrath ordeined for the punishing and devouring of all fixed and impenitent sinners To the first of these enquiries The creatour did at the beginning put a created ability and principle of motiō into the creature But the strength and power of this first impression is not sufficient for the continued motion of every respective creature in its kind but a perpetuall concourse and cooperation of the creatour is needfull thereunto Then doubtlesse man who was made in Gods image a rationall and free agent the masterpiece of the visible creation ought not to thinke himself exempt from such a dependance nor to covet or desire to be made perpetuall upō such tearms as would in effect dethrone his creatour and make more Gods then one The end for which man was at all created was to be perpetually moving in love and service to his creatour as a vessel prepared with meetnes for the use of his Lord in whatever he should be commāded by him for the advancement of his prayse and glory Now as loue is the end and perfection of the commādemēt so is it the first and cheife principle out of which all true obedience to the commād must proceed and a duration and perpetuity in this loue and duty is absolutely necessary to mans hapines and continuance in Gods favour and good liking For untill a man keep Gods commandements out of this principle and be sure of its unchangeablenes he neither can be sayd to walke in that Covenāt or agreement with God
its persecuting power and war on the saincts who prophesy all the same time in sackcloth as a despised rejected remnant of outcasts are according to the true meaning of the holy Ghost to take their date and beginning from that conspiracy or combination of the ten hornes uniting in one preistly head as to spiritualls Concerning the Rise then of this little horne we may safely assert 1. That there was a time certaine when the papal power did begin and that time was after the dissolution of the Roman empire as it was meerly heathenish And this power was as the corner stone to cement and build up the ruins of the Roman empire into ten Kingdoms bearing the name of Christian and acknowledging the supremacy of the pope Secondly That so soon as this power was first in being the power which hath made war with the saincts ever since did begin For these ten Kingdoms with their Ghostly father the Pope have ever since bin treading down and keeping under the holy city or true citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem necessitating the two witnesses if they will prophesy at all to do it in sackcloth that is under great persecution and tribulation Thirdly It is evident that from the time of such beginning of the power of Daniels little horne or last branch of the fourth Kingdom upon the earth the sackcloth Testimony of the witnesses did also begin And after the continuance of the one and the other for the space of 42 months or 1260 years the day of the Kingdom of Christs patience is to expire and the time of the witnesses prophesying in sackcloth is to be no longer But in stead hereof the time of the lambs wrath is to come and be revealed from heaven against all this bestiall domination over his saints and he will openly take to himself his great power and reigne He will set up his Kingdom over the heads or on the top of all the other Kingdoms and Rule with his saints or the earth one thousand yeaves Rev. 20. In order and by way of preparation to this Christ comes in the latter rain of his spirit upon the earth to gather the harvest of the world and keep the last and great feast of Tabernacles to which the true spirituall Israelits amongst jews and Gentiles are invited Zech 14 16 21. These then are the two distinct commings of Christ wherein he comes to his people as the former and the latter raine in this third day that is the day of his Kingdom in spirit the day wherein first he shews his royall patience and forbearance towards his worst enemies and the day wherein secondly he shews forth his royall power and universall irresistible command in earth as well as in heaven The one as well as the other of these dayes or parts of the third day above mentioned do belong to this great Kings making himself knowne even as he is the Son of man ordeined by God to judg the world in righteousnes But it may be demanded since both these make but the one day of Christs Kingdom in spirit called in Hosea the third day wherein he hath promised to raise up the children of this his Kingdom and cause them to live in his sight how comes it to passe that during the long time of Christs first appearance in the Kingdom of his patience the true saincts are in an outwardly suppressed and afflicted condition as inhabitants of the dust trampled under foot by the powers of the world The answer is easy by this short and cleer distinction The raising up or resurrection of them to live in his sight which Christ promises is twofold 1. Such a raysing up as is wrought inwardly in their minds directing them to the sight of things above and fastning their affections and desires accordingly binding them up in the life which is hid with Christ in God This first kind of resurrection is knowne and experienced in themselvs by the renewings of their inward man day by day under the perishings and decayes of their outward when they are looked upon as in the grave in a very sad and low condition by the eye of the world 2. But secondly there is a raising them up to live in Christs sight discernably to the very eye of the world At that season glory and honour shal be put upon their very outward man and they shal be called to sit downe at Christs right and left hand in the Kingdom of his power to the visible treading all their enemies under their feet like mire in the streets They shall also administer healing and refreshing to the whole creation of God For in this seed all nations of the earth shal be blessed and the very creature freed from the bondage of corruption The promise then of raising up the true children of the Kingdom shal be made good both these wayes and that successively the one after the other as will appear in its proper place when the day of Christs second appearance in spirit shal be particularly spokē to But in this the scripture is very positive and expresse that untill we be children of the resurrection in the first of these respects during the season of suffering with Christ we shall never be children of it in the second If we die not or suffer with him now we shall not live and reign with him thē It therefore highly concerns us even as much as to make our calling and election sure to have the certain and cleer discovery yea and practicall experience of what it is that makes the children of the resurrection in the first sence For over those only that are such the second death will have no power And they also are of two sorts being found in a first or second degree of life from the dead which is wrought out in Christ as he is the Son of man In the first of these they are made sharers with the holy angels in their atteinment and fruition of God and goe no higher But in the second they are sharers with Christ in that higher atteinment and fruition of God which he hath as he is the engraffed WORD and is admitted accesse to the very similitude and shape of God in his owne proper forme Man by his owne voluntary sinfull act hath concluded himself and God by his judiciall act hath concluded all men under the death of sin and unbeleif In these chains might man justly have bin left by God for ever bound up in an alienation of mind from all good But by the tender mercies of God in the redeemer he is visited by the power of that voice of the son of God which raises him out of the grave awakens him out of this deadly sleep into which he is not at first so deeply plunged as to be irrecoverable and without remedy This death is properly of the mind as become the servant of sin and it is not only that by which the spirit of the mind is gone out from its subjection to
Ierusalem Esai 2. And I will assemble her that halts and will gather her that I have driven out and her that I have afflicted and will make of the one a remnant and of the other a strong nation and the Lord shall reigne over them in mount Zion from thenceforth even for ever And nation shall not life up a sword against nation neither shall they learn war any more For all people will walk in the name of their God and we will walk in the name of the Lord our God for ever and ever For a small moment I have forsaken thee and hid my face from thee but with great mercies and everlasting kindnesses will I gather thee For thy maker is thy husband the Lord of hoasts is his name and thy Redeemer the holy one of Israel the God of the whole earth shal he be called Behold they shall surely gather together but not by me Whosoever shall gather together against thee shall fall for thy sake For all thy children shal be taught of the Lord and great shal be the peace of them In righteousnes shall they be established They shal be far from oppression feare or terrour No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper and every tongue that shall rise up in judgement against thee thou shalt condemne This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord and their righteousnes is of me saith the Lord. This is Israel my servant Jacob whom I have chosen and the seed of Abraham my freind These and many more like precious promises we meet with in the Scripturs concerning a most prosperous and glorious state that shall visibly come upon Gods people even in this world according to the assurance thereof given unto Abraham that he in his seed should be heir of the world All these promises are reducible only to the state of those times that shall certainly be brought upon the stage of this world when the Kingdom and second appearance of the great God and our saviour Jesus Christ shall shine forth in its brightnes upon earth This is that which is not only promised so very often and testified by all the Prophets but was much spoken of and beleeved amongst the Jews before Christs comming in the flesh It was universally receaved also in the first age after Christ and all were accounted hereticks and deniers of the resurrection that did not acknowledg it And in that great Council of Nice called by Constantine the great it was asserted in an article of their Ecclesiasticall doctrine to this effect That by foreknowledg God did not make the world in that height of perfection at first which he intended to bring it unto in the end because he foresaw man would sin Therefore say they we expect new heavens and a new earth according to the scriptures And then as Daniel sayes the saincts of the most high shall take the Kingdom and there shal be a pure and holy world a Land of the living and not of the dead This David by the eye of faith foresaw when he sayd I shall se the goodnes of the Lord in the land of the living the land of the humble and meeke Blessed are the meeke for they shall inherit the earth and be clothed beautified and adorned with salvation So Esay 26. The foot shall tread downe the lofty city even the feet of the poor and the steps of the needy This great truth was thus witnessed unto then and afterwards also till the adversaries knew no other way to avoyd it but by denying the book of the Revelation to be scripture In the beginning also of the reformation in England in a catechisme set forth in Edward the sixths time and by him authorized the last year of his reigne that part of the Lords prayer Thy Kingdom come is thus commented upon Hitherto we se not all things put under the feet of Christ we do not yet se that stone cut out of the mountaine without any work or endeavours of man that is to breake and dissipate into nothing the great image described by Daniel that the little stone which is Christ may possesse and obtein the empire of the whole world according to the graunt of the father Antichrist is not yet destroyed whence it is that we are to desire and pray that in Gods due time it may be done and that Christ alone way reigne with his Saints according to his divine promises that he may live and reigne on the earth according to the laws of the holy Scriptures and not according to the traditions and lawes of men and the tyrannicall will of this world So have we it in that Catechisme Another passage there is relating to this subject in the same book upon the article of the last judgment distinguishing between the end of the world and the last generall judgment saying that the holy Scriptures call the end of the world the time of consummation the full filling of the Kingdom and mysteries of Christ in the restitutiō of all things It seemes bu agreable to reasō that the dayes should come wherein the corruption chang and sin to which the whole world hath bin heitherto subjected should cease This shall be done by fire as gold is refined by which it shal be brought to its last and highest perfection And this man the lesser world shall much more experience in being freed from the bondage of corruption and brought into the glorious liberty of the Sons of God For mans sake therefore the visible frame of heaven and earth shal be renewed with a much more pleasant and beautifull face or for me then it had before But secondly as to the last and generall judgment the answer is Christ shall come at whose voice the dead shall arise and be made perfect in soule and body And he shall sit on the throne of his majesty seen by the whole world and pronounce the finall sentence upon the testimony of every ones conscience out of his owne mouth Then the Sons of God shall compleatly possesse that Kingdom of immortality and eternall life which was prepared for them before the foundation of the world and shall reigne with Christ unto all eternity But the wicked which do not beleeve shal be cast into eternall fire appointed for the devil and his angels This distinction between the dayes of the end of the world and the work proper to them called the last dayes and the great day of eternity or the last judgment is well explained and cleered by Mr. Mede who gives the account before mentioned in these things In a word he declares his judgment to be that the seventh trumpet or thousand years reigne of Christ on earth conteined therein is that great day of the Lord the day of his Judgment so much celebrated among the Jews in their writings and from them taken up by our Saviour and his Apostles not a day of a few houres as some suppose but a continued interval of many years wherein Christ
shall first destroy all his enemies even death itself and shall end with the universall resurrection and and passing of the finall sentence winding up all in the resigning up of his Kingdom to the father that God may be all in all Thus the thousand years is no distinct time from the day of Judgment neither before it nor after but the same with it the whole time during which this great day of judgment does continue in the very beginning whereof Antichrist shall finally be destroyed and not before These therefore in Scripture are called the times of Christs Kingdom wherein he will shew himself the blessed and only Potentate the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and this for the space of a thousand years in the last period of which comes the last and finall sentence before mentioned to be pronounced and executed The reason therefore why the excellent promises above recited are not yet performed is twofold 1. The times for their performance are not yet fully come though very neer But most certaine it is as we have heard that they shall and will come 2dly Because the seed also to which they are made is not yet come to be made manifest as they shal be in distinction from all counterfeits and false pretenders which say they are Jews and are not but do lie This discrimination and certaine cleare discovery of the true seed of God from the false will be begun to be made by the ministry of Eliah or the ministry that shall rise up in the spirit and powers already discribed This excellent ministry must and wil be attended with a church of saints answerable which shall consist of the risen witnesses the dry bones that this spirit of prophesy brings out of their graves from the foure winds of heaven causing them to stand againe upon their feet an exceeding great army All of them are to be quickned by the means of this powerfull and glorious ministry with a spirit of life from God that enters into them and shews itself to be that life from the dead in them which is never more subject to corruption It is unto these also that God sayes by a great voyce from heaven which they are fitted with ears to heare come up hither and they do accordingly ascend up to heaven in a cloud their enemies beholding them or rather heaven is brought downe into their knowledg and possession here on earth whilst as yet they are clouded with their mortall body which nevertheles shall at last be changed in a moment and they not se death In the meane time they shall experience their very mortall body freed from the bondage of corruption and restored to the primitive purity glory use and serviceablenes unto the mind which it had in paradise in the persons of our first parents before the fall And to these shall it be given to se the opening of the heavens long since promised by Christ and the temple of God that is there opened also and in the temple the arke of the Testament both which Revel 15.5 are put together and called the temple of the tabernacle of the Testimony in heaven which in that day shal be opened the true tabernacle or sanctuary which God pitch'd and not man Heb. 8.2 In this temple dwelleth the fulnes of the God head bodily the vision whereof is to be made plaine to the eye of our sensuall part or to our inward bodily senses that by seing the mind of God in such legible characters in the spirit and person of Christ the like mind may be found and seen in all that are his who are then to appeare in the same likenes by seing him as he is That which Christ is and in spirit shal be seen to be as the mind of the father is wrought out in him the Apostle Paul points out Philip. 2.5 c. 1. He is in the forme of God the WORD of life who was in the beginning was with God and was God And thus considered he accounts it not robbery to be Gods equall 2dly In the dispensation of the fulnes of time the same that is in the forme of God is also found in fashion as a man and is made flesh with the use of a living soule in the very earthly and outward senses of it bearing the form and likenes of the first Adam in his primitive purity 3. He that thus descended into flesh and the lowermost parts of his habitable earth in which earthly make and nature he became inferiour to angels for the suffering of death is the same that out of this does ascend and is exalted far above all heavens by being made in his humane spirit soule and body the temple wherein all the fulnes of the God head dwells bodily and a meet vessel to receave possesse and be the minister of it unto others He is the WORD of life the brightnes of the fathers glory the expresse character of his substance by which this manhood is sealed and made heavenly partaking with the living WORD as he is the Angel of Gods presence in whom is Gods name He is the cheif and highest Angel and as such is head of all principalities and power And over and above all this in his archangelicall estate he is the true Michael Gods equall the man that is made Gods fellow or second in the same divine throne of glory In these three cheif particulars Christ the temple of God in heaven shal be seen and made manifest as that which he is and will witnes himself to be in the hearts of all true beleevers the sons of his love that are to be are his likenes and to be seen with his name and superscription upon them In this respect it is that he hath given that commandement 1 John 4 20 21. that he who loveth God in Christ love his brother also which those that doe not will thereby prove themselvs liars if they say they love God For how can he love God or Christ whom he hath not seen that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen There is a day comming when that which Christ wil be seen to be in himself he wil be seen to be also in his members that shal be receaved and gathered unto him as joynt heirs and possessours of his fathers love and glory When Christ who is their life shall so appear they shall also appear with him in glory They shall no longer remaine in their hidden and concealed state wherein they are judged according to men in the flesh whilst they live according to God in the spirit Nor shall they any longer be like Princes walking on foot whilst Servants ride on horse back Behold then upon the opening of the temple of God in heaven the powerfull and glorious effects that the ministry of the spirit flowing from thence shall produce and be accompanied with for the making manifest the true Israel of God The Lord himself will descend first with the voice of the Archangel that
of sons of a higher and lower dignity of this man and of that man that is borne there whether of noble or common degree all free heaven-born citizens and subjects of one and the same great and universall King They shall dwell in perfect unity together and be of one accord as brethren singing the song of Moses and of the lambe in sweet harmony and consort and the stranger and the uncleane shall no more passe through this glorious city For there shall in no wise enter into it any thing that does defile nor that worketh abomination or maketh a lie but they only which are written with the writing that is upon both those stickes before-mentioned in the lambs both of life This is the church and civill state which the ministry of Eliah is to prepare the way unto as the end to which all the work of restitution which thereby shal be wrought does and must tend This will be effected by the powerfull preaching of the everlasting gospel by a ministry that shall have the tongues not of men only but of angels filled with the inspiration of the holy Ghost as also yeilding vengeance and flames of fire as a day of great judgment and distinction that is to be brought and executed upon ungodly men and willfull opposers of that work by the pouring out upon them the seven vialls of Gods wrath like as Moses his ministry did upon Pharaoh King of Egypt so long as he hardned himself and refused to let Israel his son and his first born goe free and serve him according to his duty By Eliahs second comming then according to the particulars before declared together with the end itself in order to which this ministry of restoring all things is appointed we are to understand no other then the spirit and power wherein the slaine witnesses of Christ shal be quickned made to stand upon their feet and have withall an ascent given to them into heaven as visible associates and copartners with the holy angels in their power and great glory like bright morning starrs and signes of the comming of the son of man even whilst they are yet remaining in the body on this side death This second comming of Eliah therefore is not to be confounded with Christs owne personall comming which succeeds and comes to give us actually and compleatly a part in that which Rev. 20. is called the first resurrection The change effected by Eliah's comming will rather be a transfiguration then what properly can be called the first resurrection by which our bodies wil be made like unto that glorious body of Christ in which he lived on earth fourty dayes before his ascension and in which power and glory he is to shine forth like the sun in his strength as the brightnes of the day of his second comming encreases and rises up to its height For the ushering in hereof this signe in heaven of the son of mans comming is to go before which as hath bin said is no other then the spirit and power which the slain witnesses or the dried dispersed bones and members of Christs dead body his hidden invisible seed of beleevers his church at that time on the earth shal be quickned and raised up into as a heaven upon earth in the sight of the whole world The wise or teachers that then shal be among them shall shine as the brightnes of the firmament and they that turne many to righteousnes as the stars for evermore By the power of that faith which brings life and immortality to light in the minds of those that are true Israelits indeed inhabitants of the new and heavenly Jerusalem that is above we have declared that Abraham in type and Christ in spirit and truth is the father unto two sorts of Sons that are both heirs and witnesses of what they se and heare from Christ They are both written among the living in Jerusalem with a writing that is never to be defaced or blotted out Some of them are made conquerours and others of them more then conquerours through Christ that hath loved them and caused them to abide and continue with him in his temptations and to beare a conformity in their minds to his death armed with the same mind as he was for suffering in the flesh as well as carrying about in their bodies the marks of the dying of the Lord Jesus They have heard and receaved that language of faith in them and to them with which Paul acquaints us Tim. 2.2 11 12. If we be dead with him we shall live with him if we suffer we shall also reigne with him Unto this carkasse or dead body the eagles the fowles of heaven by a ministry of the spirit of life from God wil be gathered together And as a breath from the foure winds of heaven a wind of prophesy and divine inspiration in the spirit and power of Eliah shall come forth and shew itself in these slain witnesses where ever they shal be found throughout the whole world and bring them together into one sheepfold of visible government both in church and state In this posture it will be found most true that by fire from heaven and as the Lords owne sword they shall plead with all flesh and the slaine of the Lord shal be many that shall fall under them in attempting to rise up against them For in and by this ministry of Eliah the Lord will come with fire and with his chariots like a whirl-wind to render his anger with fury and his rebukes with flames of fire When you shal be awakened to se by the comming of this glorious ministry of God what in this day shal be wrought not by might nor by power but by the spirit of the Lord the seven eyes which run to and fro through the whole earth rejoycing to se his work goe on and taking care that there be sutable dispensations of divine providences to further and advance it whereof the decision to be made in the valley of Iehosaphat will not be the least then your heart shall rejoyce and your bones flourish like an herbe and the hand of the Lord shal be knowne towards his Servants and his indignation towards his enemies Then shall the thoughts and words of the enemies of Gods people in designing against them however hidden and secret even in their very bedchambers be knowne and discovered by this ministry of Eliah and the Mountains full of horses and chariots of fire shal be like walls round about the city of God to defend them And not only the eyes of the Prophet the eyes of the inward man of the Saincts or of the spirit of their mind but the eyes of the Prophets servant also the beast on which he rides the sensual and outward man of the soule in the exercise of the very bodily senses shal be opened to se that there are more with the people of God then can be against them So shall all feare be removed far from them