supports under their sufferings their innocency is taken away from them as far as censure can do it For the most part the Faithfuls troubles come upon them because they dare not know not how to run a course of wickedness with others this then is a very hard case that when men suffer because they dare not sin they must be said to sin because they suffer This usage of Job by his friends of which even now exceedingly battered his spirit and drew from him high language and somewhat distempered in his contestation with them How long said he will ye vex my Soul and break me in pieces with words These ten times have ye reproached me c. Have pity upon me Job 19.2 3 21 22. O ye my friends for the hand of God hath touched me Why do ye persecute me as God and are not satisfied with my flesh q. d. The scourge of God being layd thus smartly upon me it would become you to pity me and not to arraign and condemn mine Integrity and if you will take pleasure to rake in my wounds my bodily sufferings should suffice and glut your cruel delight and you should spare my Soul and state of Conscience which is peculiar to divine Cognizance I the rather take notice of this incentive of Corruption in the Saints under pressing afflictions because I am perswaded it was never so much practised at least never so ex professo or Magisterially made use of as now it is It is now become a current proof yea one of the chiefest Topicks or Common-places from which men draw their arguments against the persons and cause of their distressed opposites and for their own justification This argument hath been so artificially adorned so imperiously consigned and which is more so smiled upon and applauded with subsequent events and observations that although in true divinity it be but meerly fallacious and even with rational men it hath been denyed admission among probable reasons yet it now seems to pass as demonstrative Yea it is at present grown a wonderment mixt with some indignation that the continued disappointments and miscarriages on the one part and the constant successes following if not out-going the designs and expectations of the other do not convince all men It is besides my business to discuss this Argument there hath been enough said to it And if the Evidence of Scripture and the experience and acknowledgment of all sound Judgments in all Ages will not cast off the scales of some mens minds against the present sense of worldly advancement a little time with the turn of the tyde may possibly do it Cosmographers observe That though the common course of the Sea to be ebb and flow every twenty four hours yet there is a place in Affrica towards the Equator from whence the Sea flows continually towards the East This Sea is not the figure of a worldly condition If Affrica can shew such a wonder in Nature no place can yield the like in Civil Affairs There never was any where a continual afflux in temporal attainments These know a West as well as an East an ebb as well as an increase And those that fix their anchor or bottom the equity or approveableness of their way upon this Argument may ride at full Sea but when it ebbs they shall be left on the sand and their own Argument shall serve to gravel them 3. The nature of the sufferings of the servants and Church of God The Measure Multitude and Multiplicity of them When the time of their calamity and day of their visitation is come when the Lord cometh cut of his place to punish the inhabitants of the Earth for their iniquity and in special hath a Controversie with his people and will plead with Israel their miseries fall heavy and thick upon them and in various kinds 1. For their Measure or Heaviness They are resembled to the pains of birth-travel What wilt thou say when he shall punish thee Jer. 13.21 Lam. 1.15 Lam. 3.15 Shall not sorrows take thee as a woman in travel And to the treading of the Vintage The Lord hath troden the Virgin the daughter of Judah as in a wine-press And to a sad drunkenness He hath filled me with bitterness he hath made me drunken with wormwood The Prophet Jeremiah further representing and personating the Churches miseries in the Lamentations sets them forth as perfect admirable incomparable and incredible 1. Perfect or compleat The Lord hath accomplished his fury he hath poured forth his fierce anger and hath kindled a fire in Zion and it hath devoured the foundations thereof 2. Admirable and astonishing She came down wonderfully How doth the City sit solitary how is she become a widow how is she become tributary 3. Incomparable and surpassing Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow which is done unto me wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger What thing shall I take to witness for thee What thing shall I liken to thee O daughter of Jerusalem What shall I equal to thee that I may comfort thee O Virgin daughter of Sion For the punishment of the daughter of my people is greater then the punishment of the sin of Sodom that was overthrown as in a moment and no hands stayed on her 4. Incredible The Kings of the Earth and all the Inhabitants of the world would not have beleeved that the adversary and enemy should have entered into the gates of Jerusalem 2. And then for their Number or Multitude In the Churches or Saints day of trouble or hour of temptation it pleaseth God oftentimes to multiply their miseries to heap affliction upon affliction to add grief to grief and to bring one adversity in the neck of another The Scripture compareth their evils in such a time to waves of the Sea that pursue and overtake one another So David Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy water-spouts Psal 42.7 all thy waves and thy billows are gone over me And to Armies that come in companies and thousands upon a party So Job saith of God His troops come together and raise up their way against me and encamp round about my tabernacle Job 19.12 And to a Leaguer that besets a place on all hands So the Church in the Lamentations Lam. 3.5 7. He hath builded against me and compassed me about with gall and travel he hath hedged me about that I cannot get out And to a festival Congregation as the Church in the same Song Cap. 2. 22. Thou hast called me as in a solemn day my terrors round about And to a chain made of many links as the Church again Chap. 3. 7. He hath made my chain heavy And the Prophet Ezekiel Make a chain c. mischief shall come upon mischief Ezek. 7.23 26. and rumor shall be upon rumor And to the arrows of a quiver as the Church He hath bent his bow Lam.
3.12 13. and set me as a mark for the arrow he hath caused the arrows or sons of his quiver to enter into my reins Thus the crosses of the servants of God come thronging in and coupled together and environing them about on every side I will add but one expression more to this purpose and it is very full one to wit that of Job I am full of confusion Job 10.15 16 17. therefore see thou mine affliction for it increaseth thou huntest me as a fierce Lion and again thou shewest thy self marvelous upon me thou renewest thy witnesses against me and increasest thine indignation upon me Changes and War are against me 3. There is then usually a Multiplicity of sufferings The Lords hand goes out against them in afflictions not only heavy for measure and many for number but manifold or divers for kind He maketh use of variety of ways in dealing thus with them And that either 1. Successively so that when they have avoyded or recovered from an evil of one kind they are met with by one of another kind as in that of the Prophet Fear and the pit and the snare are upon thee O Inhabitant of the Earth And it shall come to pass that he who fleeth from the noise of the fear shall fall into the pit and he that cometh up out of the midst of the pit shall be taken in the snare for the windows from on high are open and the foundations of the Earth do shake And in that of the Lord to Eliah 1 King 19.17 And it shall come to pass that him that escapeth the sword of Hazael shall Jehu slay and him that escapeth from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha slay So the people of Judah were parcelled out to several Judgments A third part of thee shall dye with the Pestilence and with Famine shall they be consumed in the midst of thee and a third part shall fall by the Sword round about thee Ezek. 5.12 and I will scatter a third part into all the winds and I will draw out a sword after them Or 2. At one and the same time Sometime it so befalleth the servants of God that at once afflictions come upon them from God from Man and from Satan that they are troubled both in Body and Soul both within and without at the same time 1. Sometimes they have God immediatly Man and Satan at once against them so it was with Job Satan stood up against him and accused him to God and upon license obtained smote him in all kinds death excepted and in this condition he was afflicted immediatly of God he hiding his face from him and shewing the tokens of his anger against him so that he cryes out The arrows of the Almighty are within me Job 6.4 7 13 14. the poyson whereof drinketh up my spirits the terrors of God do set themselves in Array against me and when I say my bed shal comfort me my couch shal ease my complaint then thou scarest me with dreams and terrifiest me through visions And being thus men also become his tormentors as he often complaineth and particularly in one place he reckoneth up how many sorts of men did aggravate his trouble His brethren his acquaintance his kinsfolk his familiars Job 19.13 to the 20. and inward friends his menial servants his own wife and the young fry of little children In another place he describes at large what a rabble of abject miscreants assailed him * Job 30.1 to the 15. And this is often seen when the Lord layes his hand upon any of his then Men and Devils come in upon them Men that is the vulgar sort and especially the professed enemies of God and godliness do then let slye at them both with tongue and hand with the scorn and derision of the one and with the Rapine and violence of the other Job hath an elegant expression of this Because he to wit God hath loosed my cord and afflicted me they have also let loose the bridle before me Job 30.11 Beza Diodat in Loc. compar with Job 12.18 that is as Beza and Diodate pharaphrase it He hath loosed the bands of my power and authority over them and therefore they run riot and cast off the reines of subjection and modesty In like manner Satan in what he may is ready then to put in 2 Cor. 12.7 1 Thes 3.5 as the Apostle Paul both found it in himself in that thorn in the flesh his buffeting messenger and feared it in the Thessalonians when in his own tribulations he could not forbear but must needs send Timotheus to know their faith lest by some means the tempter should have tempted them 2. Again sometimes they are at the same time troubled both within and without both in soul and body Psal 6.2.3 2 Cor. 7.5 O Lord heal me saith David for my bones are vexed my soul also is sore vexed We saith S. Paul were troubled on every side without were fightings within were feares This then being the Dimension of the endurings of Gods servants seeing they often prove to be so mighty numerous and various it is not to be wondred at if they be surprised with a kind of stupefaction in regard of the exercise of their graces and be somewhat distempered in respect of the acting of corruption Holy and wise Heman being in such a plight of sorrows Psal 88.3 4 15. was in his own acknowledgment as a dead and distracted man as dead in regard of the sense and use of the grace and comfort and as distracted in regard of the fumes of corruption that invaded his mind 4. A fourth consideration of occasion helping forward the said effect in the faithful may be the means of their afflictions or the persons by whom instrumentally they come and this consideration may lye two wayes or there are two sorts of men which not seldome are imployed in laying on the sufferings of the Church and their agency therein may add some aggravation to those sufferings and exasperation to the spirits of the sufferers of them 1. Sometimes the Instruments are of the worst of men and very wicked persons and this adds to their affliction and moves their discontented passions that such as those should be their scourges so the Psalmist makes the Churches complaint O God the heathen are come into thine inheritance Psal 79.1 2 3 6 7 74 4. thy holy Temple have they defiled they have laid Ierusalem on heaps the dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat to the foules of the heaven the flesh of thy Saints unto the beasts of the Earth their blood have they shed like water c. Again they to wit the heathen that have not known thee and the kingdomes that have not called upon thy name they have devoured Jacob and laid waste his dwelling place and in another Psalm thine Enemies roar in the midst of thy Congregations they set up their Ensigns
you in all patience 2 Cor. 12.12 in signs and wonders and mighty deeds Whereby he gives us to observe that patience especially all or compleat patience is a vertue seated in the highest form of Christians and somewhat demonstrative of an Apostle A learned Expositor conjectureth of David that the 73 Psalm wherein he confesseth how he was offended and staggered Foord in Psal 49. 73. and what envy and impatience he was tainted with at the wickeds prosperity and the afflictedness of the godly was written by him when he was yet but young whereas the 37 and 49 Psalms wherein he professeth his quietness and unmoveableness at the flourishing of the wicked and adversity of the righteous and teacheth the same to others were penned by him when he was grown old and thereby attained to be a veterane Souldier in patience Common experience tells us passive grace is much more difficult to get and use then active as it is more ado to travel in a deep or craggy way then in a fair and smooth road as Seafaring men find it is an otherwise labor to sail in a storm then in a calm The exercise of active grace consisteth either in receiving good or in communicating the good endowments we have to others or in restraining from superfluities but these things are much more easie then to bear the want of good the presence of evil and to lay down ourselves and resign up our very Being 6. The last thing I shall take notice of by way of Reason here is the Faithfuls Interest experience confidence in and recourse to God in prayer These references in their ordinary and direct use are the great means to regulate and compose the heart and to give stop to corruption but being reflâ—cted on with a humane Judgment in a state of trouble and seeming desertion they are turned to matter of aggravation of the affliction they help to breed more discontent and give rise to great thoughts of heart It is with the Saints in this case as with one that lies sick Such a man if there be a Physician of greatest skill and account or a receit of most soveraign vertue and if he can procure that Physician to undertake him or that receit to be applyed to him he is in a full hope of recovery but having made use of them if he do not find that effect by them which he looked for he is now the more dejâ—ctâ—d and the greater hopes he had of himself from their worth the worse heart will he have from their disappointment Just so it sometimes is with a Christian Whatsoever can befall him his great Salvo or Refugâ— is â—hat he hath God for his God he hath found the advantage of that relation he continues st dfastly trusting in him and earnestly calling upon him and in thus doing what security and good success doth he not promise to himâ—â—l and indeed what safety and good success may he not promise himself that way But he mistaking the matter that is taking his safety and success to lie within the compass of such a means such an order such a time and such an issue when indeed it doth not he finding his expectation in God failed as to such circumstances of safety and good success which he had circumscribed he is now in his own sense by so much the more unhappy That which had been and still should be his only cordial his infirm mind is ready to take for an encrease of his sorrow and to chew upon as one of his bitterest morsels So it was with David I remembred God and was troubled Why Ps 77.2 3. how should the remembrance of God be matter of trouble to David The words immediately preceding will tell us In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord my sore ran or my hand was stretched out in the night and ceased not my Soul refused to be comforted I remembred God and was troubled He had recourse to God in his trouble and found no present ease neither in body nor mind and hence it came to pass that he remembered God and was troubled Seeing he could receive no relief no comfort from God he reaps an addition of discomfort the more he seeks and suffers repulse the more is his sorrow stirred 1. The Saints Interest in God as his peculiar people in this case exaggerates their grief So the Psalmist O God Ps 79.1 2. the Heathen are come into thine Inheritance thine holy Temple have they defiled the dead bodies of thy servants have they given to be meat unto the fowls of the Heaven the flesh of thy Saints unto the beasts of the Earth c. And so Nehemiah Neh. â— 10 Now these are thy servants and thy people whom thou hast redeemed by thy great Power and by thy strong hand And so also Jeremiah in the Lamentations Behold O Lord and consider to whom thou hast done this Lam. 2.20 And again He remembered not his footstool in the day of his anger 2. Their former experience and enjoyment of God makes his withholdings of himself more strange and heavy So David Psal 42.4 When I remember these things I pour out my Soul in me for I had gone with the multitude I went with them to the house of God with the voyce of joy and praise with a multitude that kept holy-day And in another Psalm Psa 77.10 Furthermore I said This is that which maketh me infirm that the right hand of the most High is changed Infirmare me istud mutata dextra excelsi Tremel Foord Isai 33.17 Lam. 1.7 that is that the right hand of God which was wont to deliver defend and comfort me is now withdrawn or turned against me So Hezekiah Behold for peace I had great bitterness And in the Lamentations its said Jerusalem remembered in the days of her affliction and of her misery all her pleasant things that she had in the days of old 3. Their Confidence in God when not answered as they expect makes them the more confounded Solomon saith Hope deferred maketh the heart sick Pro. 13.12 That which helped to encrease the wonder and sadness of those two Disciples of Christ that on the day of his Resurrection were travelling to Emmaus and communing together in the way of the crucifying of Christ Luk. 24.21 was this But we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel 4. Lastly Their recourse to God in prayer when they find not their desired effect being in like manner reflected on contributes to their perplexity and dejection So Heman Mine eye mourneth by reason of affliction Psal 88.9 13 14. Lord I have called upon thee I have stretched out my hands unto thee But unto thee have I cryed O Lord and in the morning shall my prayer prevent thee Lord why castest thou off my Soul why hidest thou thy face from me So David rather personating our Saviour Christ then himself My God my God why
stand upon my watch Chap. 2.1 2 3. and set me upon the tower and will watch to see what he will say unto me and what I shall answer he is yet delayed in his petition and receives an answer of further Judgments yet to come And the Lord answered me and said Write the Vision and make it plain upon tables Chap. 3.2 that he may run that readeth it for the Vision is yet for an appointed time c. So that his hopes were overwhelmed with fears and terrors which he expresseth in this third recourse in prayer to God O Lord I have heard thy speech and was afraid When I heard my belly trembled my lips quivered at the voyce Verse 16. rottenness entered into my bones and I trembled in my self c. The Apostle Paul was earnest by prayer for Israels Conversion and Salvation that is for the Body of that Nation which continued in blindness and stood upon their own and out against the righteousness of God for Justification Brethren my hearts desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be saved Rom. 10.1 The answer of God unto him in this was That a remnant only should then be called and the rest be judicially hardened for a long time to come Chap. 11.5 7 25. even until the coming in of the fulness of the Gentiles Upon Sauls disobedience and the Lords repenting of his advancement to the Kingdom Samuel prayed a whole night 1 Sam. 15.11 35. yet the Lord rejected Saul from being King over Israel and when this was done Samuel still mourned for Saul Chap. 16.1 till at length the Lord reproved him and sent him to anoint another for that place 2. The holy servants of God have met with stays and disappointments not only in their petitions for others but even in their supplications for themselves and when they have prayed in their own behalf Upright Job that man of Tryals doth in this respect thus make known and bewail his case to his friends Know now that God hath overthrown me and hath compassed me with his Net Job 19.6 7 8. Behold I cry out of wrong but I am not heard I cry aloud but there is no Judgment He hath fenced my way that I cannot pass and he hath set darkness in my paths And in another place he complaineth of thâ— same unto God I cry unto thee and thou dost not hear I stand up and thou regardest m not Cap. 30 20 26 27 28. When I looked for good then evil came upon me and when I waited for light there came darkness My bowels boiled and rested not the days of affliction prevented me I went mourning without the Sun I stood up and I cryed in the Congregation The Prophet David often finds himself in this condition often cries out of it unto God In his 13 Psalm he complains thus for lack of audience How long wilt thou forget me O Lord Psal 13.1 2 3. for ever How long wilt thou hide thy face from me How long shall I take counsel in my Soul having sorrow in my heart dayly How long shall mine enemy be exalted over me Consider and hear me O Lord my God In the 31 Psalm he saith I am forgotten as a dead man out of mind Psa 31.12 I am like a broken vessel In the 69. he 〈…〉 moan thus I am weary of my crying Psal 69.3 my throat is dryed mine eyes fail while I wait for my God Holy Heman also was in this very plight O Lord God of my Salvation I have cryed day and night before thee Psal 88.1 and with what success He tells presently Verse 4 5. I am counted with them that go down into the pit I am as a man that hath no strength Free among the dead like the slain that lie in the grave whom thou rememberest no more and they are cut off frâ—â— thy hand And again a little after Lord I have called upon thee I have stretched out my hands unto thee Yet had he no better speed Vers 9.14 Lord why castest th u off my Soul why hidest thou thy face from me Nay the greatest Example possible we have for this to wit that of our blessed Saviour who in his Passion is pâ—rsonated by David in these words My God My God Psa 22 12. Mat. 27.46 why hast thou forsaken me Why art thou so far from helping me and from the words of my roaring O my God I cry in the day time and thou hearest not and in the night season and am not silent Part of which words he audibly uttered or rather cryed out when he hung upon the Cross I will add hereunto only one Instance and it is as great as can be added to the former It shall be taken from the contâ—nual experience of all true Christians that are or ever were in the world Our blessed Saviour teacheth all his to pray Thy Will be done in Earth as it is done in Heaven And again Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil Now although these things are and ought to be dayly prayed for yet it must needs be acknowledged as it is experienced by all the Saints of God on Earth that never doth any of them attain to in this life an absolute conformity to the Will of God like that of the Angels and Saints in Heaven nor to a sinless distance from all temptations Bellar. T. 4 de Justif lib. 4. cap. 13. Chamier T. 3. l. 11. c. 7. s 21. Bellarmine would infer from hence a capacity of perfection in the Saints â—â—edience in this life for otherwise saith he these petitions in the Lords prayer are in vain taught and used This Inference we deny There are divers things allowed yea commanded and necâ—ssary to be prayed for which yet may never be granted and there are sundry things as those petitions specified which are to be prayed for every day and yet they may in their just and full measure never be attained till our last day and end come 3. Yea when the servants of God have called upon God in and for his own Cause and Concernment yet the Lord hath sometimes hid himself from their prayer Eliah whom the Apostle James brings in for a singular pattern of prevalency in prayer he maketh intercession to God against Israel in the Lords Cause as well as his own saying Lord they have killed thy Prophets Rom. 11.2 3. and digged down thine Altars and I am left alone and they seek my life Yet after this things went still on in Israel in relation to the matters of God as they did before he never lived to see any redress The people of God in Psal 44. call out upon God and expostulate with him as one that seemed to sleep out the time of their heavy Calamities and hid his face purposely from them and put their Case into utter oblivion Psal 44.8 22 23 24. Awake why
Crucifiers hands and I shall only add thereto the example and acknowledgment of that great Apostle of the Gentiles Act. 20.19 St Paul His many tears and temptations which befell him by the lying in wait of the Jews Gal. 4.13 14. 1 Cor. 2.3 2 Cor. 1.8 4.8 9. 7.5 11.29 12.7 Phil. 1.30 the infirmity and temptation which was in his flesh his weakness fear and much trembling the troubles which pressed him out of measure above strength in so much that he despaired even of life How he was troubled on every side perplexed persecuted cast down that without were fightings within were fears How he was as weak in his own sense and repute as the weakest as ready to be offended yea to burn with indignation or fretfulness as any other that he was galled with a thorn in the flesh the messenger of Satan sent to buffet him * Beza in loc that is with the contumelies and violences wherewith his and the Gospels Enemies did by Satans instinct impetuously molest him both in body and mind and that he had a certain conflict or agony within himself These distempers and perturbations of mind he confesseth as the effects of those persecutions which in the course of his Ministry in Asia Greece Rome and other places he sustained And they abundantly testifie that the best of the Saints of God here do as the Apostle in this regard saith of himself and his partakers in the Ministry bear the treasure of grace in earthen vessels that is that they are frail 2 Cor. 4.7 and apt to express some mud and soyl of humane infirmities when they are pressed and chafed with hard endurings SECT IV. Some Reasons wherefore the Persecutions of the Faithful produce in them Heart-discoveries THat so it is is evident enough it may be more apposite to find out whence it is or to take notice of some special Causes or Occasions more then the activeness of Corruption the imperfection of Sanctification and the stimulating nature of Persecutions which are of themselves obvious by which this cometh to pass And this done I shall proceed to the treaty of the Subject intended Amongst other things these following may be considerable as the ground or rise of the premised Effect in such persons 1. The darkness and intricacy of those ways of God wherein he bringeth any great Calamities upon his Church and People those his Works are more then ordinarily obscure and difficult to mens discerning and that not only to vulgar or prophane minds they know not the thoughts of the Lord neither understand they his Counsel Mich. 4.12 Jer. 8.7 Hab. 1.5 they know not the Judgment of the Lord they will not beleeve it though it be told them but to them that are godly and endued with wisdom from above even to them these doings and dealings of God are very intricate Zophar in Job saith Job 11.6 There are in them secrets of wisdom and that they are double to what is or to what appears and is extent to be seen There is much more in them within then in their superficies And Job himself describeth God in those his proceedings thus Which doth great things past finding out yea and Wonders without number Lo he goeth by and I see him not he passeth on also but I perceive him not And again he saith in the same Chapter He covereth the faces of the Judges thereof Job 9.10 11 22 23 24. that is as I understand those that are willing and inquisitive to know and judg of the acts of divine Providence wherein sometimes he alike destroyeth the perfect and the wicked the good and bad Sometimes he laugheth at the tryal of the innocent or is pleased to try them with afflictions and the Earth mean while is given into the hand of the wicked or wicked men have allowed them by him an abundant portion of earthly things Those I say that would be acquainted with these his disposings he covereth their faces or so casteth a vail over their sight and interposeth a cloud betwixt their eyes and his acts that they are not able to dive into and clearly discover them So it was with the Psalmist When I thought to know this it was too painful for me Thy way is in the Sea and thy path in the great waters Psa 73.16 77.19 and thy footsteps are not known The ways of God in the Sea are deep and investigable Seafayring men there see his Wonders Psal 107.23 24. Such are the paths of God in his sharp Correctings of his people by wicked men as his Rods Or as the way of a Ship in the Sea is unperceiveable this is one of the four things which Solomon the wisest of men found too wonderful for him Prov. 30.19 20. so is the way of God towards his when he bringeth them into the rough and tempestuous Ocean of worldly tribulations The same Wise-man having observed that there be just men unto whom it happeneth according to the work of the wicked again there be wicked men unto whom it happeneth according to the work of the righteous Eccles 8.14 17. resolveth thus Then I beheld all the work of God that a man cannot find out the work that is done under the Sun because though a man labour to seek it out yet shall he not find it yea further though a wise man think to know it yet shall he not be able to find it In that glorious Vision represented to the Prophet Ezekiel by the River of Chebar Ezek. 1.16 one thing was a wheel the appearance or work of which was as a wheel in the middle of a wheel This wheel say Expositors * Ezek. 10 13. Hae autem rota ipsae vocatae sunt orbis videlicet ut orbem nostrum in quo versamur figura rent Jun. denoteth the state of this world with all things in it particularly the Kingdoms of the Earth and the Church of God here Militant the outward state whereof is always subject to motion and mutation to be up and down life a wheel and the artifice of it being a wheel within a wheel is the portraiture of divine Providence about the affairs of the world and especially of the Church and more especially of the Church in the furnace of hot Persecutions as at the time of this Vision shewed to Ezekiel she was and it pointeth out to us the mysteriousness of the course of Gods Providence towards his Church in that estate The quickest most searching eyes cannot therein discry the tract and purposes of divine Dispensations there are in them so many cross turnings so many close involations and intricacies The effects produced to wit the evils suffered are obvious to sense and quickly enough apprehended and the secondary means by which they come do oft-times appear but the obscurity of them is as they come from God What are his reasons for which what his ends to which what his mind and affection with
to haste away and pass over Jordan by night 2 Sam. 19.9 never staying till they came to Mahanaim Mahanaim saith Mr. Buntings Itinerarium was a City in the Tribe of Gad 44. miles from Jerusalem near the River Iabok which River was within the Confines of the Ammonites as will appear by Gen. 32 2 22 with Numb 21.24 Deut. 2 37. 3.16 Josh 12.2 the very border of the Kingdom so that as the very Text tells us he fled out of the Land Thus for a time Providence goes along with Absalom and seems to accomplish his and put back godly and innocent Davids prayers And this it appears was taken notice of even by Absalom and his party for David in his Psalm composed upon his flight from Absalom saith Many are they that rise up against me many there be which say of my Soul There is no help for him in God * Psal 3.1 2. But one Example more shall I bring for this and it is a note-worthy one Job the Monument of Afflictions accompanied with integrety maketh this one strain of his adverse condition I am as one mocked of his neighbor who calleth upon God and he answereth him Job 12.4 That Job called upon God and found no answer is expressed by himself in several other passages of this Book which I cited before Here then he meaneth by him who calleth upon God and he heareth him another to wit his neighbor by whom he saith he is mocked Job 19 7. 30.29 19.3 Whether by his neighbor he intendeth any of those his friends who were now in eager dispute with him maintaining a contrary part to him and of whom he complains elsewhere that they had reproached him ten times or another it is not very manifest but the former is very probable Who calleth upon God that is the mocker who was one that made a profession of the true Religion with him who was so bold that he durst pray to God to confirm his works and to prosper him in his wicked courses And he answereth him God answers him really by making the mocker to prosper in his evil way His meaning is that he had Heaven Earth against him and his deriding friends were heard of God when he could not be heard Divines Annotat. in Loc. And Mr Caryl in loc Yet we may take for certain that betwixt Job and him whosoever he was there was some kind of odds or variance that they both called upon God and that in their so doing Job was the just upright man and the other was in the wrong Yet see Job seemeth to himself to be repelled in his prayer and his scornful Antagonist to be heard of God How he was heard Job explaineth in the next Verse but one The Tabernacles of Robbers prosper and they that provoke God are secure into whose hand God bringeth abundantly They were heard it appears in temporal issues and advantages But in stead of my own I will present you with Mr Caryls Paraphrase on those words The Tabernacles of Robbers prosper Robbers are of two sorts There are open Robbers that care not who sees such are warlike Robbers who bring Power to do what they cannot do by Justice such were those warlike Bands and at them Job aims in this Argument of Chaldeans and Sabeans who spoiled Jobs Estate and Cattel By Robbers here we may understand these boisterous sons of Mars men of blood and violence who make their Will their Law and think they may do whatsoever they have power to do Secondly There are secret Robbers Deceit and Fraud commit Robbery as well as Power and Force Some rob while they pretend to seek for right some are rob'd others are murthered by the Law the Law is a shadow to many lawless actions Others rob securely while they seem only to sell Ephraim said Surely I am become rich I have found me out Substance in all my labour they shall find none iniquity in me that were sin Hos 12.8 q. d. I am sure none can charge me with any open wrong or Robbery it appears plainly that I have done no such thing for that were sin that is punishment would follow such iniquity whereas I thrive and prosper Both or either of these Robbers may be understood here They who provoke God are secure To provoke God is sinning with a high hand q. d. I do not speak of those who sin lightly who trade in small sins or sin after the rate and course of ordinary men but they who sin provokingly and boldly they who send defiance to Heaven by sining even those live securely here on Earth Are secure The Hebrew is abstract and plural securities confidences are to them They sin against God every way and they have security every way they sin against God as much as they can and they have as much prosperity as they will all kind of security is their portion who commit all kind of impiety Into whose hand God bringeth abundantly What the worst of men have is of Gods giving he puts it into their hand Satan puts wickedness into their hearts but it is God who puts power into their hands God puts the persons and estates of others into their hands Abundantly Our Translators add that to shew the bounty of God even to many of them who most designedly disobey him Such have not only as much as they need but as much as they desire God brings Quails into their hands as well as Manna In cujus manus venire facit Deus sc omnia animi sui vota Merc. Into whose hands God maketh to come to wit all their wishes There is another reading Who put God into their hand The Jewish Doctors are much for this They may be said to carry God in their hand because they act as if God were in their power and dispose not they in his The Tyrians chained Hercules to a post that he might not depart their Country This is to bring a God in the hand grosly and openly They do it closely and covertly who are unwilling to be guided by his hand They who would bring God down to their wills make Laws for God They who make a Law for God act as if they had made God Thus hath Mr Caryl opened these words for me and we see of what a large extent the answer of an evil mans prayer in opposition to a godly mans may be Thus have I produced Examples of sufficient variety and what pertinency mine observation and leasure would afford to the thing propounded in both the branches of it viz 1. Of Gods hiding himself from his Peoples Prayers grounded on his Promises 2. Of his seeming by his Providences to answer the Prayers which are Contrary thereunto SECT IV. The Conclusion of the Chapter shewing the Vse may be made of the Examples fore-alledged IF it be asked To what purpose may the collecting of this multitude of Examples serve I answer Besides the Resolution of the Query to which
they are brought they may serve for the like end whereunto the History of Job is conceived to have been intended Origen Sixt. Senens Bibliothe lib. 1. p. 9. l. 8 p. 649. and with him the Jewish Rabbins and others conjecture that the Book of Job was first writ in Syriac by Job himself or by his friends and after translated into Hebrew by Moses at what time the Israelites were under the servitude of Pharaoh in Egypt and that for this intent that by the reading thereof they might receive Consolation learn Patience and gather Hope in that their hard bondage by the consideration of Jobs sufferings his pious and patient behavior under them and the redoubled happiness which their end brought forth So in like manner whatsoever burden any of the servants of God may be under now from any suspense they may apprehend lying upon prayers either their own or others either for themselves or their relations these Examples may be of some such use and may raise up their hearts somewhat in representing to them that the same affliction hath been accomplished in their Brethren that have been in the world 1 Pet. 5 9. I will conclude mine Answer to the first Query with another General Observation on the said History of Job It is concerning the state of the Controversie therein debated The great difference between Job and his three friends in it is this Job maintaineth That the Lord may Job 9.22 6.29 23.11 12. 27.5 6. and sometimes doth temporarily afflict destroy desert or defer to hear a righteous man and prosper or grant the desires of the wicked man They on the opposite part contend That God doth at no time leave or cast down the pure and upright Job 9.24 10.3 12.6 27.7 8. 8.20 4.7 8.5 6 11.13 4.8 20.20 21.27 28. 22.15 nor any ways second or favor the ungodly And particularly in reference to prayer one of them viz. Bildad affirms in terminis That if Job would seek presently unto God and if he were pure and upright surely now at that instant the Almighty would awake for him and make the habitation of his Righteousness prosperous And again he asserts Behold God will not cast away a perfect man neither will he help the evil doer Which last sentence taken in the utmost extent so as to exclude all manner of casting away the one and helping the other will no more stand then the former of the Lords instant awakening for and prospering of Iob if pure and praying But why do I interpose to determine in this Controversie The Lord himself doth umpire the difference in the end of the Book and he decides it on Iobs side he tells Eliphaz Job 42.3 4 5 6. Thou and thy two friends have not spoken of me the thing that is right as my servant Iob hath This I suppose is necessarily to be taken as the Lords coming in and arbitrating the main Controversie betwixt them Iob indeed had used some unbeseeming and reprovable speeches of and to God as the Lord before convinceth him and he acknowledgeth but in the main of the question and debate to wit concerning the divine administration in relation to the estates and prayers of the righteous and the wicked Iob was in the right and his three friends besides it Iob indeed had this unhappiness heaped upon his other miseries that both his Person and his Argument were severely censured by his Opponents His Person as a wicked Hypocrite Chap 4.6 7. 22.5 c. His Argument Rebellionem haberi quaerimoniam meam Tremel as Rebellion Chap 23.2 whilest those his Censurers sat high in their own opinion both for wisdom Chap. 15.9 10. Integrity Chap. 22.18 and worldly weal Chap. 22.20 Yet in conclusion Iob and his Tenet are absolved his Friends and their Cause are disallowed by God I cannot pass from this without additionally observing the immediate Consequents of this Arbitration As by this sentence pronounced Iob is vindicated and his three friends rectified so are they both reconciled and they are reconciled in Sacrifice and Prayer Iobs friends provide the Sacrifice and Iob makes the Prayer and these being performed Iob is heard and accepted of God both for himself and his friends and being so he is raised up again to a prosperous estate and that double in proportion to his former havings O if this might be the happy period of the most unhappy divisions of these days about Prayer and Providence As that it may be so is to be the joynt wish prayer and labour of all so there is no necessary reason to despair that it shall be only if they that sustain Jobs condition would hold out to act Jobs approved part in particular that his resolution Chap. 27.3 4 5 6. All the while my breath is in me and the Spirit of God is in my nostrils my lips shall not speak wickedness nor my tongue utter deceit God forbid that I should justifie you till I dye I will not remove my integrity from me My Righteousness I hold fast and will not let it go my heart shall not reproach me so long as I live CHAP. III. The second Query handled viz. How or in what sence God may be said to hide himself from his Peoples Prayers grounded upon his Promises and seem by his Providences to answer the Prayers which are contrary thereunto WE have granted and attested by many witnesses that the Lord doth sometimes and in some sort hide himself from his peoples prayers some ways grounded upon his promises and seemeth by his Providences to answer the prayers that are contrary to them But it will be very necessary that the case may not seem and be apprehended worse then it is that needless and causless perplexities about it may be prevented and that we may understand aright those passages both of Scripture and divine Providence which concerning it have been set before us or may occur that we rake out the true sence of that supposal and concession by a due explication and limitation of it For that purpose I shall proceed 1. In the unfolding of the terms or clauses therein 2. In collecting the explication of them into some Corollaries or summary Propositions The first and chief work will be the unfolding of the terms In the doing of it need will be that I insist severally on these clauses 1. Of the people of God 2. Of the groundedness of prayers upon the divine promise 3. Of Gods answering and of his hiding himself from prayers SECT I. Of the People of God ALl Nations and persons in the world are in one acception Gods people in as much as he is their Creator and supreme Lord they his Creatures and Subjects The Earth is the Lords Psa 24.1 and the fulness thereof the world and they that dwell therein He himself saith Behold all Souls are mine Ezek. 18.4 Job 41.11 and again Whatsoever is
under the whole Heaven is mine But some people are his in peculiar above others and in a more neer and special relation belong unto him in as much as he fixeth a more peculiar property in them and settleth a more special dominion over them and placeth a more intimate presence among them Moses saith unto Israel The Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself above all people that are upon the face of the Earth Deut. 7.6 10.14 15 Behold the Heaven and the Heaven of Heavens is the Lords thy God the Earth also with all that therein is only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them and he chose their seed after them even you above all people as it is this day It must be noted further of these his peculiar people 1. Some are in this relation by external vocation union communion and profession only that is they are appropriated to God by outward acts of Ordinances and Worship and enjoy external ministerial and temporary priviledges and benefits The description of these in Scripture is They are Gods people and Saints that have made a Covenant with him by sacrifice Psa 50.5 2 Chro. 7.14 Neh. 1.10 they are his people which are called by his Name or upon whom his Name is called These are thy servants and thy people whom thou hast redeemed by thy great power and by thy strong hand viz. from Egypt They are they to whom pertaineth the Adoption and the glory Rom. 9.4 and the Covenants and the giving of the Law and the service of God and the Promises that is they have those things as to the outward signs tokens expressions and actions of them 2. Some have over and above this stile and relation a neerer appertainency unto God to wit by inward and effectual grace calling union and communion He that is of this number is called an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile a Jew inwardly Joh. 1.47 Rom. 2.29 that hath the Circumcision of the heart and in the spirit of such the Lord speaketh Surely they are my people children that will not lye Isai 63.8 so he was their Saviour These are such as God hath peculiarly loved freely chosen dearly purchased efficaciously called absolutely covenanted with and singularly qualified and sanctified for this relation and the benefits and glory that ensue upon it The Scripture is industrious in distinguishing betwixt the people of God in the former and in the latter way and shewing the difference which there is between them in sharing of the priviledges of Gods people They that are his in the former way only are set out under this character They are Jews outwardly they are born after the flesh they are the sons of the Bond-woman Rom 2.28 Gal. 4.29 30 Isai 48.1 they are called by the name of Israel and are come forth out of the waters of Judah which swear by the Name of the Lord and make mention of the God of Israel Matt. 7.22 but not in truth nor in righteousness They will say unto Christ Lord Luk. 13.26 Lord have we not prophecyed in thy Name and in thy Name have cast out Devils and in thy Name done many wonderful works we have eaten and drunken in thy presence and thou hast taught in our streets These because they are meer nominals and remain without the spiritual part of this relation without those graces vertues and effectual workings that are in Saints indeed and without the truth power and life of Sanctification therefore they are in the upshot disclaimed Hos 1 9. Ro. 9.6 7 1 28 1 Joh. 2.19 Mat. 7.23 and declared to be not the people of God not Israel though of Israel not children though the seed of Abraham not Jews not of us and Christ will profess unto them I never knew ye depart from me ye workers of iniquity But they that are Gods people in the latter more peculiar and intimate respect they are noted out thus They are the little flock to whom it is their fathers good pleasure to give the Kingdom Luk. 12 32 Mat. 20.16 the few that are chosen of the many that be called his people which he fore-knew Ro. 11.2 5 9.7 8 23 27.4.12 the remnant according to the Election of Grace the children of the Promise Abrahams seed by Isaac the vessels of mercy the remnant that shall be saved not of the Circumcision only but walkers in the steps of the faith of our father Abraham Gal. 4.29 3â— sons of the free-woman born after the Spirit As there is betwixt these two sorts viz. the people of God by external vocation only and they that are his by internal transformation also much difference in other respects so there is particularly in respect of success in prayer and though the Lord may in some sort hide himself from them both when they pray yet not from them both alike the difference will be shewn after SECT II. Of the groundedness of Prayers upon Divine Promises COncerning the groundedness of Prayers upon Divine Promises we are well to observe divers things First That prayer unto God hath in Scripture a twofold ground There is 1. A ground of precept 2. A ground of promise There is a ground of Precept by which prayer is authorized and made necessary and a ground of promise by which it is supported and encouraged The precept is the ground of Conscience for the undertaking of it the promise is the ground of confidence and assurance for the success of it The precept shews the subject for what and the manner how to pray the promise gives us the inducement why we should pray Both these grounds we have delivered together in divers places as in that of the Psalmist Psa 50.15 Call upon me in the day of trouble I will deliver thee Call upon me in the day of trouble there 's the ground of precept I will deliver thee there 's the ground of promise And in that of the Apostle James If any of you lack wisdom Jam 1.5 let him ask it of God that 's the ground of precept and it shall be given him that 's the ground of promise And in that of our Saviour Matt. 7.7 Ask and it shall be given you seek and ye shall find knock and it shall be opened unto you there 's a treble precept Ask seek knock and a treble promise It shall be given you Ye shall find It shall be opened unto you I will not deny but in some kind the promise may be accounted a ground of warrant or precept for prayer yea in some cases it is the only warrant that is where the thing prayed for is a peculiar blessing out of the common road 2 Sam. 7.16.25 27 as was that promise of God to David of a sure House and Kingdom upon which he built his prayer And that made to the Prophet Elijah 1 Kin. 17.1 Jam. 5.17 that there should
fretting her unchearful look her meatless meals were now layd aside There is a promise to them that seek God That he will make them joyful in his house of prayer Isai 56.7 30.19 as he will bestow those blessings upon them which they crave so he will for earnest make them joyful before they go out of his house And in the same Prophet Thou shalt weep no more he will be very gracious unto thee at the voyce of thy cry David praying and being in a very heavy taking having his Soul cast down within him and deep calling unto deep at the noise of Gods water-spouts and all his waves and his billows going over him that is he being as it were overwhelmed in a Sea of sorrows evils flowing upon him like waves one at the heels of another had this reviving giving him Psa 42.4 7 9 Yet the Lord will command his loving-kindness in the day time and in the night his song shall be with me and my prayer unto the God of my life The Lord will command his loving kindness that is he will dispatch it forth to him instantly as a winged Messenger and Harbinger of a good issue of his prayers and afflicting griefs And whil'st he is praying the song of God shall come into and recreate him his own prayer and Gods song shall joyn company together and both at once associate him The Souls under the Altar that cry how long O Lord c. they are put to stay some time for their vindication Apoc. 6.11 Eccles 9.7 8 but in the mean space it 's said White robes were given unto every one of them Those white robes might betoken a chearful habit of spirit a good measure of alacrity put into them during their sufferings yet to be prolonged in assurance of their answer and release in due time to come 3. By a continuation of the Spirit of prayer or an exercise of it When the hands are still supported in their lifting up to God or raised and stretched out higher towards him when the motions vigor and vehemency of prayer are renewed or redoubled in the hearts of Gods servants it is a token from God that it shall not be in vain but to some purpose and effect that they call upon him Hos 12.3 4 When Jacobs strength in wrestling with the Angel was so great and did hold out until day break and he was so set that he would not let the Angel go until he had blessed him this was a strong argument of his power and prevalency with God and that he should prevail with men also with his Brother Esau and all his Troop The pouring upon the House of David Zec. 12.10 and upon the Inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and of supplications is put in the Prophet as a fore-running presage and introduction to many great mercies to them The Apostle brings in this as a clear earnest to Believers of deliverance from sins and sufferings and of receiving the glory and redemption of the body expected and groaned after That the Spirit helpeth our infirmities and maketh intercession for us in prayer with groanings which cannot be uttered Rom. 8.26 As it is a special favor and a good sign to a people that God gives to his Prophets the opening of the mouth in declaring his Word Eze. 29.21 so it is also that he bestows upon them a mouth opened wide and a voyce loud and lifted up in prayer Open thy mouth wide saith God to his Israel and I will fill it Psa 81.10 4. By an erected confidence and it may be a clear foresight and evidence that the Petition is dispatched in Heaven and shall assuredly be accomplished in time on Earth This pledg God doth sometimes vouchsafe his faithful ones upon their seeking of him and before he work to the effecting of their prayers as it is in the Psalmist Lord thou hast heard the desire of the humble Psa 19.17 thou wilt prepare their heart or as the Margin thou wilt establish their heart that is When they have poured out their desires unto thee thou wilt give them a seal of success by setting impressions of confidence and evidence of it upon their hearts This we often find in David in one part of his Psalm he is praying weeping complaining expostulating and deprecating the dejections and desertions of his Soul for lack of audience and by and by before any thing be done about the affairs or particulars of his prayer he is lifted up and composed in full assurance of having his requests yea triumphs in them as already embraced Depart from me all ye workers of iniquity Psa 6.8 9 13.5 6 â— 20.6 42.11 142.7 for the Lord hath heard the voyce of my weeping the Lord hath heard my supplication But I have trusted in thy mercy my heart shall rejoyce in thy Salvation I will sing unto the Lord because he hath dealt bountifully with me Now know I that the Lord saveth his anointed he will hear him from his holy Heaven with the saving strength of his right hand Why art thou cast down O my Soul why art thou disquieted within me Hope thou in God for I shall yet praise him The righteous shal compass me about for thou shalt deal bountifully with me Cornelius the Centurian in one of his Fast-days and whil'st he was praying had a vision of assurance in which an Angel told him Cornelius Act. 10.30 Luk. 1.13 Philem. 22 thy prayer is heard and the like had Zacharias the Priest in the Temple at the time of prayer The Apostle Paul also being in prison at Rome conceived such a confidence of his being given up to the Christians at Coloss by way of enlargement upon their prayers that he sends out of his prison to Philemon at Coloss to prepare him a lodging with them there This may be sufficient for the illustration of the first way of the Lords answering prayer to wit by way of Obsignation or Assurance wherein we have noted four instances or acts I come to the second kind of answer which is by way of performance this is when the thing entreated for in prayer is accomplished This is the most sensible and most noted way of prayers return from Heaven to the Petitioner David describes it in that his benedictory Psalm Psa 20.1 4 21.2 The Lord hear thee in the day of trouble c. Grant thee according to thine own heart and fulfil all thy counsel and in the next Psalm to that Thou hast given him his hearts desire and hast not withholden the request of his lips It will not be unnecessary to observe the several methods of this answer of performance 1. Sometimes it is instantaneous or dispatched all at once it is finished in one compleat act as when Samuel cryed unto the Lord for Israel at what time the Philistins Army stood ready to give the on-set upon them it is said The Lord heard or in the
Margin answered him 1 Sam. 7.9 10 and as Samuel was offering up the burnt offering the Philistins drew neer to battel against Israel but the Lord thundered with a great thunder on that day upon the Philistins and discomfitted them and they were smitten before Israel 2. Somtimes it is successive or effected by degrees when the servants of the Lord in their straits and needs call upon him he often helps them gradatim or by successive steps Two steps more frequently he makes in this work 1. He sends strength and support under and during the affliction or want of the benefit desired 2. And then after he gives them deliverance from it he loosens the bands of their distress and they escape out of it both these we have distinctly noted in divers Scriptures as in that of the Psalm He shall call upon me and I will answer him and mark the degree of the answer which follows I will be with him in trouble there 's the one I will deliver him and honor him there 's the other And again In the day when I cryed thou answeredst me and strengthened me with strength in my Soul there 's the first present support in his exigence which is further amplified after Though I walk in the midst of trouble Psa 138.3 7 thou wilt revive me and then follows in the next words recovery out Thou shalt stretch out thine hands against the wrath of mine Enemies and thy right hand shall save me This double step of relief from God to his people upon their prayer is notably set forth in the Prophet Malachi When the state of things was grown so forlorn Mal. 3.14 c. as that the ordinary sort of Fasters and Prayers concluded it a vain thing to sâ—â—ve God and a profitless course to keep his Ordinances and to walk mournfully before him yet there were some left that truly feared the Lord that spake often one to another in mutual corroborations unto piety and that thought upon the Name of God in diligent and constant calling upon it and observe the issue these have a twofold day set for them and in them have those 2 degrees of help from God successively 1. There is a day when God makes up his Jewels or as Drusius interprets a day when he makes Judgment or proceeds in Judgment and in that day they saith the Lord of Hoasts shall be my Jewels and I will spare them as a man spareth his own son that serveth him that 's the first day and first step of succor The Lord will own them for his in the evil day he will take care of them as of his choycest and preciousest goods and he will moderate their share of troubles and support them therein so that as it is in the next words there shall be a palpable difference put and discerned betwixt them and the wicked in their sufferings 2. There is another day cometh after a day that shall burn as an oven and in this latter day is that other step of the help of those fearers and seekers of God that is their deliverance and full satisfaction For in that day the proud yea and all that do wickedly shall be stubble and the day that cometh shall burn them up saith the Lord of Hoasts that it shall leave them neither root nor branch But unto you that fear my Name shall the Sun of Righteousness arise with healing in his wings and ye shall tread down the wicked for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this saith the Lord of Hoasts I will further note that the latter of these two degrees of Gods return to prayer viz. Deliverance out of trouble or fruition of the thing asked may have its several degrees also As 1. When God raiseth up the means and secondary causes which he will use and sets himself to work by them 2. When he doth carry on and consummate deliverance with them This order he pursued in bringing Israel out of Egypt upon the hearing of their cries and groans he first appears to Moses in Midian and gives him a Call Commission and Instructions to go into Egypt and fetch them out I have heard saith he to them out of the burning Bush their groaning Acts 7.34 and am come down to deliver them and now come I will send thee into Egypt And then Moses and Aaron being joyned together in Egypt and after many goings in there unto Pharaoh for dismission of them and many additions of oppressions upon the Israelites and many miraculous plagues upon Pharaoh his People and Land they are led or posted out of Egypt in one night And in the recovery of the same people long after from their captivity and ruines under the Babylonian the Lord proposeth in his promise several degrees as in the Prophet Hosea And it shall come to pass in that day I will hear saith the Lord Hos 2.21 22 21 I will hear the Heavens and they shall hear the Earth And the Earth shall hear the Corn and the Wine and the Oyl and they shall hear Jezreel and I will sow her unto me in the Earth and I will have mercy on her c. Such a series of causes and operations the Providence of God doth often go through in delivering his people This is spoken figuratively in the Prophet not as if the Heavens and the rest of the inferior Creatures here had a voyce or did pray and we must not understand it as spoken of the order of Gods receiving but of his performing prayers In order of receiving prayer God immediately and only hears Jezreel his people but in order of answer and execution he first hears or answers the Heavens that is puts efficacy and influence into them and then by them into the Earth and by the Earth into its fruits and so comes home to Jezreel and then also Jezreel must be sown in the Earth that is must be cast into the ground and lie under the clods of affliction and be in appearance as dead for a time and then spring up and be restored The smoke of incense which came with the prayers of the Saints Rev. 8.4 and ascended up before God out of the Angels hand by it and them were procured the seven following Trumpets Now these Trumpets the issue and execution of those prayers sounded successively one after another and did accomplish those prayers by so many degrees and the term of their succession and continuance ere all be finished is supposed to be for many years yea divers ages Thus of the second way of prayers receiving its answer and the several steps of it The third and last is that of Commutation The Lord doth sometimes hear and answer the prayer when he doth not give the very thing prayed for There is an answer by way of exchange to wit when God gives in lieu of that which is asked another thing which is as good or better for
of the Sea-bestormed Psa 107. yea out of this universal commiserativeness God is said to hear the cry of brute beasts as of the young Lions of the young Ravens nay to hear inanimate Creatures as the Heavens the Earth the Corn Wine and Oyl Thus it comes to pass that many times very wicked men have their desires and prayers in temporals granted them The Lord took notice of Ahabs humbling himself upon Elijahs reproof and denunciations and because of it he said 1 King 21 29 He would not bring the evil upon his house in his days Wicked Jehoahaz delivered of God into the hands of the Syrian Kings 2 King 13 4 5 He besought the Lord and the Lord harkened unto him and the Lord gave Israel a Saviour so that they went out from under the hand of the Syrians Israel in the Psalmist when they under his Judgments sought God and returned and enquired early after God though it was but in flattery and hypocrisie Psa 78.34 Yet he being full of compassion forgave their iniquity and destroyed them not 2. God appeareth to prayer out of that favor which is special and more peculiar he heareth the faithful seekers of him his own children from a neerer impulsive out of a dearer respect and consideration which he beareth towards their persons out of a federal and fatherly love and he embraceth their prayers not only out of a general but out of a special benevolence nor meerly with benevolence but with complacency and acceptation their prayers are as sweet as incense to him To the dwellers in Zion the Prophet saith Isai 30.19 He will be very gracious unto thee at the voyce of thy cry These are the different grounds of Gods hearing prayer Secondly For Gods hiding from prayer he doth it also upon the like different grounds 1. It is some yea most times out of wrath and that is either 1. Judicial or a wrath of loathing and hatred a full pure unallayed anger such he bears to carnal wicked men and to their prayers Zech. 7.12 13 as it is in the Prophet Therefore came a great wrath from the Lord of Hoasts therefore it came to pass that as he cryed and they would not hear so they cryed and I would not hear saith the Lord of Hoasts 2. Or Paternal and Conjugal the wrath of a Father or Husband a wrath tempered with and in time overcome and swallowed up of love intimate and peculiar love a wrath joyned to bowels of mercy such is that in the Prophet Isai 57.17 18 For the iniquity of his covetousness was I wroth and smote him I hid me and was wroth c. I have seen his ways and will heal him I will lead him also and restore comforts to him and to his mourners Such a wrath as is again exprest by the Lord in the same Prophet In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment Isai 59.8 but with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee saith the Lord thy Redeemer Mark well the great difference of this wrath from that which is against others it is the present wrath of a provoked Husband against an offending Wife by which she is widowed cast off and so barren and desolate in her prayers for a time for so are the words before The Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken and grieved in spirit and a wife of youth when thou wast refused saith thy God Again it is a little wrath and but for a moment and a small moment The sum is it is a moderated anger mixed with a dear relation and band of affection to them and it is a short and quickly cooled and forgotten wrath 2. This hiding from prayer is sometimes out of mercy yea it may be in special favor and the favor in withholding may be greater then it would have been to have granted the thing prayed for It may seem otherwise but the very truth is God doth sometimes deny his peoples prayers in indulgence and mercy to them they not seldom are set upon that which would be hurtful for them and ask the things which would be very bad for them to have in this case the want of their desires is better then the grant and God consulteth their good sheweth them favor in withholding their wishes from them Rachel was excessively bent to have children Give me children saith she or else I dye Well at length she had her longing but what came of it she dyed of child-bearing her second child was her Benoni the son of her sorrow so named by her self he was her bane and death As God giveth sometimes in anger so he withdraweth and denyeth sometimes in good-will and love As the natural father will give none but good gifts to his children he will not give his son a stone a Serpent a Scorpion for Bread for a Fish for an Egg So neither will our heavenly Father If the natural father will not exchange good petitions into bad gifts much more will our heavenly Father suspend bad Petitions or exchange them into good gifts * Deus quaedam negat propitius quae concedit iratus August Fideliter supplicans Deo pro necessitatibus hujus vitae misericorditer auditur misericorditer non auditur Quid enim infirmo sit utile magis novit medicus quam aegrotus August apud Aquin 22. qu. 83. art 15. Quid enim ratione timemus aut cupimus Quid tam dextro pede concipis ut te conatus non paeniteat voâ—â—que peracti evertere domos totas optantibus ipsis dii faciles nocitura toga nocitura petuntur militia Juvenal Saty. 10. Mr Goodwin Return of Prayer Chap. 9. Sect. 3. A worthy Author saith Oftentimes some great cross is prevented by the denyal of a thing which we were urgent for if we had had many of our desires we had been undone So it was a mercy to David that his child was taken away for whose life he was yet so earnest who would have been but a living monument of his shame SECT IV. The Answer to the Query summarily recollected and formed I Have finished the main tractation of the Query propounded in the Explication of the several terms or clauses and have shewed the difference to be noted among them that are stiled the people of God how Prayers are to be grounded both upon Precepts and Promises and the divers ways in which and grounds upon which God doth appear to or hide himself from Prayers I shall now only gather up all into a few Corollaries or summary Propositions fitted by way of Answer to the Query The Question was How or in what sense God may be said to hide himself from his peoples Prayers grounded upon his Promises and seem by his Providences to answer the Prayers which are contrary thereunto I answer 1. They that are the people of God by name outward call profession communion and form of godliness God may hide himself from their
unto vanity that is whose desire and affections do not stray from God and that which is truly good after some unlawful thing This then must stand as a firm and clear truth The prayer that is put up by a wicked man or that is made with an evil mind or in an evil manner it may be prosperous but it is not pleasing it may be effected but it is not affected it may be acted but it is not answered it may be happy but it is not heard with God And they that but so have their prayers they have but either the fruit of Gods general goodness or the consequence of his special anger therein * Quinetiam nocturna sacrificia sceleratasque ejus preces nefaria vota cognovimus quibus illa etiam Deus immortalis de suo scelere testatur neque intelligit pietate religione justis prelibus Deorum mentes non contaminata superstitione neque ad scelus perficiendum caesis hostiis pesse placari cujus ego furorem atque crudelitatem Deos immortales a suis aris atque templis aspernato esse confido Cicero Orat. pro A. Cluendo Non tamen est cur fideles deflectant a lege sibi Divinitus imposita vel invideant incredulis quasi magnum lucrum fecerint ubi adepti sunt quod volebant Calv. Instit l. 3. c. 20. S. 15. The people of God then may let such have their prayers sometimes without either their envy or imitation But seeing that by these two last Propositions it is asserted That Divine Providence may for the present run cross to those prayers that find audience and answer with God and may second the desire and end of those prayers that are not accepted or answered by him it must needs be a matter of some difficulty to know and discern when prayer is heard and answered and whether success ensuing upon prayer it be in answer to prayer or no. Upon this I have here no room for any large discourse only I shall give this word of resolution Besides extraordinary or at least immediate testimony from Heaven of which I have spoken something before I know no other or at least no better way then to look whether our prayers run parallel with the rule of Gods Word without this Cynosure our Judgments may either be at a non-plus or stray very wide from the Truth This direction is commended to us by the Apostle John and it is notably worth our exact inspection And this is the confidence that we have in him 1 Joh. 5.14 15 that if we ask any thing according to his Will he heareth us and if we known that he heareth us whatsoever we ask we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him Mark it he teacheth us to gather the knowledg that we have the petitions that we desired of him from this that we know that he heareth us and to infer the knowledg or confidence that he heareth us from this that we ask a thing according to his Will by this rule we must judg of our having our petitions not by sense or visible providences but by Gods audience and we must judg of his audience not by instant effects but by the quality of our prayers and persons Some men of this generation proceed directly contrary they will judg of their audience by their havings and they will judg of and justifie their askings and the designs they concern by their receivings and they will not be brought to begin their inferences at the accord and conformity of their prayers to the revealed Will of God and by it to be led to the confidence of hearing and so from this confidence of hearing to pass to the discerning of the receit of their Petitions CHAP. IV. The third Query discussed viz. What may be the Reason of Gods hiding himself from his Peoples Prayers grounded upon his Promises and of his seeming by his Providences to answer the Prayers which are contrary to them SECT I. The difficulty of resolving this Question and whence it is IF it be so why am I thus Gen. 25.22 so said Rebecca when she had conceived and the Children struggled together within her and so are we ready to say upon every strange and disastrous occurrence So are the servants of God apt to say upon this one of the saddest of their disasters and so it is not unlawful yea it is requisite that they say Eccl. 7.10 Trap. in loc provided that they enquire wisely concerning this when any great thing befalls us contrary to our expectations and wishes we are naturally disposed to expostulate the cause of it Male-contents saith one are commonly great Questionists But the matter is to enquire wisely to make a religious sober impartial and profitable inquisition this we are not very apt unto and if at all we be disposed and seek to know it we find it no easie work to make the discovery it proves a difficult enterprize and hard to effect not because we do not seek nor because we are destitute of means to find it out but because we go wrong to work we look not the right way or we look not with good eyes or we look not to the right end First We look not the right way we are apt to look for the fault or fail in God or to charge it upon him at all-adventures when the root of the matter is in our selves In the Prophet Haggai when the House of God lay waste and the peoples labors were all improsperous and their wealth and store unblest unto them when they should have considered their own ways wherein they might have found a plain reason why it was so they turn their eyes up to Gods ways and designments and in them in stead of meeting with a reason Hag. 1.2 they make one They say the time is not come the time that the Lords House should be built q. d. there is a certain time when the Lords House should be built this time himself hath prefixed and until that time be accomplished our labor will be in vain upon it it is bootless for us to go up to the mountain and thence bring wood to build his house we may as well let it lie waste as it doth We see our ordinary labors about natural means and for our bodily provisions our sowing and reaping and day-laboring yea and the efficacy of natural causes as of the Heavens sending down dew and the Earth sending forth fruits and the fruits affording their sustenance these all decay and disappoint us of their benefit how then shall we think to speed in that harder and higher work of Temple-building Thus their want of duty to God in the forward instauration of his House and Worship whereof the succeslessness their own affairs was the effect they will needs father on Gods Decree and falsly surmise an immaturity of his time In like manner did the same people in the Prophet Malachi's time they missed of the
Moses ere those things were effected much time passed many stops occurred and Israel was many times out of hope of attaining them both in Egypt and in the Wilderness Nevertheless as the Lord audibly told Moses out of the bush that he was now come down to accomplish those things so his appearance in that manner to wit in a bush burning with fire yet unconsumed visibly told him if I may so speak the reason of all those delays and difficulties and the equivalent recompence or rather the advantage afforded them for and by the same Whilest the Lord was bringing them up like a vine out of Egypt to transplant them in Canaan they were like that bush all on a flame by reason of the afflictions and oppositions meeting with them from first to last in their way and their danger of perishing thereby yet they came through and survived them all by which means the presence and power of God in and for them was the more put forth and evidenced they had the light and lustre of that fire but escaped the devouring heat of it God shewing himself the more apparently with them and in their conservation As a Commentary or Paraphrase upon that Emblem of the burned unburned Bush we may take that of the Apostle spoken of himself and his fellow-laborers in the Ministry We are troubled yet not distressed we are perplexed but not in despair persecuted 2 Cor. 4.8 c. but not forsaken cast down but not destroyed always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Iesus How and wherefore is all this That the life also of Iesus might be manifest in our body for we which live are always delivered unto death for Iesus sake that the life also of Iesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh Here are a heap of expressions of sufferings and straits troubled on every side perplexed c. but each of these hath its stop allay and correction here are many plunges over head as if they were quite drown'd and lost but here are as many recoveries and fetchings up again But observe what 's the efficient cause of these their recoveries and what 's the final cause or end of their delivery up to such depressions and deadly hazards and of their holding out and safe coming off The efficient cause of their recoveries is the life of Iesus that it is that still brings them back and raiseth them up again when they are welnigh gone and the final cause both of their relinquishment to those dejections and perils and of their safe enduring and coming off from them is that the life of Iesus might be made manifest in them they are in deaths oft they dye dayly they are pressed out of measure above strength even to despair of life and have the sentence or answer of death in themselves as the Apostle elsewhere saith * 2 Cor. 11 23. 1 Cor. 15.31 2 Cor. 1.8 9 and wherefore all this but that they may have so many resurrections from death and those as eminent and as dayly reiterated and that the power vertue or life of Christ might be so much the oftner and the more conspicuously put forth in those resurrections With good congruity therefore doth Beza understand what follows vers 14. of the civil and analogical resurrections where he saith Knowing that he which raised up the Lord Iesus shall raise up us also by Iesus and shall present us with you 2. It may be for the Lords more illustrious appearing afterward or in the issue and upshot of the delay The greater deferrings and the stranger crossings there be of prayer while they are in putting up and prosecuting the more glorious may the appearing of God be in the end when they come to be answered What the Apostle saith to Philemon of his new converted servant Onesimus For perhaps he therefore departed for a season that thou shouldst receive him for ever Philem 15 16 not now as a servant but above a servant a brother beloved the like may be said of God in reference unto this case he may hide himself for a time that he may be the more seen and the more welcom and the more comfortably and constantly enjoyed when he doth manifest himself David tells us He waited patiently or he waited long for the Lord Psa 40.1 c. and then he inclined unto him and heard him he brought him up also out of an horrible pit out of the miry clay and set his feet upon a rock and established his goings This appearing of God after so long waiting when he was sunk so low and dangerously raised up Davids thankfulness unto God and admiration of him very high He hath put a new song in my mouth even praise unto our God Many O Lord my God are thy wonderful works which thou hast done and thy thoughts which are to us-ward they cannot be reckoned in order unto thee Upon this so earnestly sought so long expected so extreamly needed and now so admirably effected a deliverance God is very much exalted and dignified in Davids eyes his praise is now set forth not by an ordinary but by a new song in his mouth he is now rapt up into a wonderment at the works and contrivances of God and he sees an inexplicable multiplicity of marvels in them The Penman of Psalm 102. in the midst of all the sadness and solitariness he is in in Sions behalf foresees yet that the Lord will regard the destitute and not despise their prayer He will look down from the height of his Sanctuary and from Heaven he will behold the Earth to hear the groaning of the prisoner Psal 102.15 c. to loose those that are appointed to death And when thus it shall be he foretells what will be the consequent of it in reference to God to wit high and general and lasting advancement of his Name Glory and Praise So the Heathen shall fear the Name of the Lord and all the Kings of the Earth thy Glory When the Lord shall build up Sion he shall appear in his glory This shall be written for the generation to come and the people which shall be created shall praise the Lord. There is a like remarkable place in Isaiah setting forth both unto what extremity the Lord sometimes deferreth his craving people and whereto it tendeth When the poor and needy seek water Isai 41 17 c. and there is none and their tongue faileth for thirst I the Lord will hear them I the God of Israel will not forsake them Unto this extent of delay the Lord may put off his servants prayers even till they be as a people that have all their pools and springs quite dryed up so that they cannot find a drop of water to cool their thirst and till their tongue be tyred and spent with drought and importunity of asking yet he hears them at length and then he hears them to the purpose I will open rivers in high
eye-sight is able to ken or overlook the whole In short unto a full and perfect discovery of the reason I mean not of what is hidden in Gods councel but of that matter of reason which is extant and enquirable by means afforded to us of this effect in our Case there must go these three things 1. An exact knowledg and remembrance of the whole Oracle of God at least so much of his Word as delivers us any rule or light in this matter 2. A perfect understanding of the spiritual condition of the ways and of the prayers of all the persons that have any either influence or concernment in this effect 3. A faculty of discourse or deduction which is unerring or certain both by way of application of the Rule to the subject and of inference of the conclusion thereupon So much as any is deficient in any of these as who is not in every of them so far he shall come short of a compleat and absolute resolution of this question Now if I should say some kind of certitude in the point of Application and Inference is attainable yet it must be acknowledged very rare and difficult in this imperfect state of man on Earth and in these byassing and partial times But for a perfection in the two former who can in this world once pretend to it Yet must not the Question therefore be wholly layd aside For 1. Though an exact knowledg and comprehension of the Rule of Scripture be not to be acquired yet some good and serviceable measure thereof is acquirable and though the full state of mens hearts ways and prayers be not humanely fathomable yet there is much matter of fact obvious unto those that will observe as to many particulars which do most concern us to lay to heart a curious search a critical Judgment Josephs divining cup or his divining for his cup needs not they are plain enough to be seen we have not so much need to be new informed as to be put in mind of them and the work is not so much to bring them within our sight as to press them upon our hearts 2. As it most nearly concerns us so it may much advantage us to discover what we can in this query though we cannot be so absolute and exact in our solution of it for we shall never seek remedy either by the removal of the procuring Causes or by endeavoring after the Ends of this hiding of God from us until we be somewhat resolved herein and so far as we gain any discovery and satisfaction about it so far we are in an advance towards the remedying of it 3. If we be diligent to find out what we can and to practice according to what we find we then may hope God will both accept and meet us in the discovery we endevor and promote us both in it and in our recovery out of that evil which is the subject of it Although there may be divers reasons in men moving God to this deportment toward his people which we can never search out yet the invincible ignorance of them shall not prejudice us God imposeth not upon us to find out what is inextricably hid but to destroy and own what is occurrent to our knowledg and to rectifie what is so desired If each man would busie himself about this and we would all communicate each to other and borrow one of another our several apprehensions though one can say but a little yet all together might by the help of divine grace search out and bring in much towards the making up of a sufficient answer to this That which I apprehend and will here say of it shall be contained under these three Propositions 1. It is more then probable that of all those causes of the Lords hiding himself from his peoples prayers above collected not one or some few only but many if not all have some place causality or efficacy in the present case 2. That plurality of reasons which there may be of this thing among us we cannot reasonably suppose ascribable wholly to every one or to any one person or party but we may attribute them to the whole community distributively or dispersedly so as that some of them more properly belong to one some to another and all to the whole by way of distribution 3. Although many most or all the recited causes may have influence in the present case yet some of them may be conceived more predominant and more notable in the effect then the rest and therefore more necessary for us to observe and lay to heart Somewhat of each of these in order 1. It is more then probable that of all the reasons of the Lords hiding himself from his peoples prayers above enumerated a multitude of them if not the most or all have some place causality and efficacy in this effect now among us I mean of all of both those sorts viz. whether meritorious or procuring on mans part or final and intentional on Gods part All the causes of both these kinds or many of each of them may now have influence in the producing of this sad effect Our case seems to yield much matter of reason in both these respects many and mighty provocations in us great and various designments of God 1. For the matter of provocation on our part we need not look far or ask for which of those sins before rehearsed it is that the Lord deals thus with us there is such store of them among us that we may ask which of them is not found in us and that in an high degree and therefore which of them is it not for We can scarce tell how to pitch upon any of them to say it is for this or that more then the other they are all so rife amongst us As the Lord tells his people of Iudah I have wounded thee with the wound of an Enemy Jer. 30.14 15 with the chastisement of a cruel one for the multitude of thine iniquity because your sins were increased And again Why cryest thou for thine affliction thy sorrow is incurable for the multitude of thine iniquity because your sins were increased I have done these things unto you And elsewhere having pronounced his desolating judgments upon them and having told the Prophet that when they fast and offer burnt-offerings he will not hear their cry nor accept them yea and forbidden him to pray for them for their good and told him though Moses and Samuel were interceding for them his heart could not be towards them for all this he alledgeth the reason after this manner Jer. 15.13 and that for all thy sins even in all your borders All their sins committed in all the quarters and coasts of their Land the Lord doth as it were gather and bundle up together and lay in the ballances with their prayers and those do far over-weigh these So may it be said of us why hath the Lord in so many and great things
of all these and of whatsoever else any will further take up and contribute and let all England go a whoring after it according as his deluded phancy shall lead him But that Ephod proved a snare to Gideon and to his house a snare first of sin in their superstitious use of it and then of punishment in fratricide and usurpation of Abimelech and the sedition and bloodshed that followed chap. 9. A sad presaging pattern The main pillars and vital parts of Religion to wit Piety Love Charity tenderness of Conscience and Courage are grown faint and brought low It is very plain to be seen that Luxury and Epicurism in some worldliness in others and an heretical judgment or a dividing and contentious spirit in a third sort hath deadened and destroyed Religion and besides these three sorts there are but a few left to keep up any life of it among us Many of the Disputes about it and about the outward support of it by the power of the Magistrate and the set maintenance of the Ministry may justly be deemed to arise from the mean esteem cold affection and nauseating weariness of it into which many are declined They account every thing in it unnecessary and burthensom any command of it over them any diligence in its practice any charge bestowed on it though by others seemeth too much They fall to question and quarrel with it as being desirous to ease themselves of its power restraint cost and labor All the dotage unsetledness and Libertinism in opinions and ways that is on foot seems to be from a Paralysis or dead Palsie seized on our Religion In that disease there is a decay or stop of the animal spirits and from thence a resolution of the sinews and muscles and so a stupefaction of the senses and a loosening of the members and limbs of the body In such a manner it is now analogically with Religion A dead Palsie hath struck us the vigor and spirits of our Religion are perished and from thence it is that the understandings of men are become so vain and phantastical their minds and consciences so loose unstable and extravagant That zeal which should heat mens hearts and warm their affections unto the practice of their duties and the resistance of gross errors and sins is cold and extinct to that use and enflamed only to strife and debates of tongue pen and hand either frivolous or plainly heterodox and unrighteous Our unkindly and sickly heats in Religion have begotten Wars and these Wars have not only destroyed the natural lives and worldly estates of many but have drawn out the life and blood of Religion it self and have left it as a cold mangled and liveless carcass Even in many of those who seemed to be affected to Religion above the generality it is evaporated into winds of Doctrine fumes of contention or flashes of high-flown notions or expressions I have culled out these amongst many of the sins of England against the first Table which stand up against and may well out-cry the prayers that are put up for her For those against the second Table they are also as flagrant among us Blood-guiltiness injustice and unmercifulness I need not point at they so break out and fill every place that there is no room left for my complaint against them Covetousness I have met with afore Only a word of Pride Here is pride even in its height Luciferian arrogancy Pride was the National sin of Sodom and after that of Jerusalem and it brought them both to ruine * Ezek. 16 49 and it is now our National sin as much as ever it was either of theirs or any others We have been proud of all the earthly of all the heavenly blessings God hath given us We have been proud of our plenty power wisdom peace successes impunity deliverances We have been proud of our Gospel-priviledges of our Religion Reformation Profession Ministers unseemlily preferring our Church Clergy and Professors above those of other Nations Our pride appears in our discords and jars If contention be the proper issue of pride as Solomon saith it is * Prov. 13 10 then we may conclude our selves the most pride-swollen people under Heaven for we are absolutely the most broken and divided Nation that is or ever was I think upon the Earth Our pride appears in the seditious and aspiring spirit that now lifts men up Every man almost is a Korah and takes too much yea all upon him Every man almost arrogates the highest demerit honor and power to himself scarce a man to be found especially of the lower degree and worth but thinks himself fit and worthy of the chiefest employment and command and none so fit as himself It is not now as in Jothans Parable wherein the Trees going to anoint a King over them first offered their Kingdom to the more noble and profitable Trees the Olive-tree the Fig-tree and the Vine and they refusing then to the Bramble but these being rejected and trambled under-foot every Bramble assumes to himself superiority and will rather set all on fire then not be a Ruler Our pride appears in that contempt and disdain which men cast one upon another The exalted spirits of the Times as they greaten themselves in their own eyes so they lessen and detract from others they look at themselves as more then men at others their Connatives in the Land their Brethren now or once in religious profession and it may be both in the eyes of God and other men their betters as Pagans or Dogs not deserving any respect society liberty protection or subsistence with them Our pride appears in that like the Caldean or Amaeziah King of Judah we cannot keep at home but must be enlarging our desires unsatisfiedly Hab. 2.5 2 Chro. 25 19 and stretching our line to and gathering unto us all Nations and heaping unto us all people Although we are become a shame and a derision a proverb and a by-word a reproach and a taunt unto the Nations that are round about us yet we vaunt and boast it out we stand upon tiptoe we are high and honorable in our own conceits we glory in our selves yea in our shame In these days in which the spirit of drunkenness and deep sleep darkness and dotage is poured out upon us men dream of a higher measure of light and will needs fancy to themselves extraordinary illumination like the Prince of Tyrus Ezek. 28.12 13 14 we seal up the sum full of wisdom and perfect in beauty as if we had been in Eden the Garden of God or were become anointed Cherubs Next follow as obstructers of prayer the sins we are guilty of in and about our prayers If I should take scope in them every one severally I should scarce find a way to any end In brief therefore We pray yet sin though open and in impudent enough in it self is as to our distinct and convictive acknowledgment latent and hidden Many of those
against and strike at in his present proceedings among us This is very evident to him that will see Whilest people of all degrees are busie with head and hand by policy and power or industry to raise and secure their Interest in the world so that Religion Truth Right and publique Peace are nothing regarded in comparison of it the Lord seems even to set himself against them and to cross thwart and curse them in that their beloved concernment What is become of those secular Prerogatives and Priviledges of the which superior persons have been so much more jealous and tender then of the weightier things of their charge particularly the honour of God the safety and lustre of his Truth and the purity and order of his House What satisfaction or success have others had in all their private labours cares and ploddings for the world The sollicitude and turmoyl of most hath proved to be vain and voyd yea to their loss and going backward so that we may say with the Prophet Behold is it not of the Lord of Hosts that the people shall labour in the very fire and the people shall weary themselves for very vanity Hab. 2.13 Have not we experience of this Mens wordly endeavors now are as labour in the very fire wherein the laborers have pain in stead of profit and their work consumes as fast as they make it Verily the toyl adventures and strivings of the most in these days for their earthly respects comes to the same reckoning with theirs in Haggai Hag. 1.6 Ye have sown much and bring in little c. all endeavors prove unhappy and abortive and it is from the same agent and for the same cause that then it was so I did blow upon it Why saith the Lord of Hosts because of mine house that is waste Verse 9. and ye turn every man to his own house Never were people more intent and desirous to grow high great and rich in the world then of late have been and now are the men of this generation and how remarkably even to almost every mans conviction doth God appear against them unto their debasement and impoverishment by Wars and distractions at home and abroad by Land and Sea The Lord by his ways may be conceived to have passed a peremptory sentence of us as in the words of the Prophet Yea they shall not be planted yea they shall not be sown yea their stock shall not take root in the Earth Isai 40.34 and he shall also blow upon them and they shall wither and the whirlwind shall take them away as stubble q. d. Men would fain take root in the Earth they assay to sow to plant they attempt all ways of thriving in the ground but all in vain God is against them in it he says it thrice over they shall not they shall not they shall not which may respect those three ways of disappointment Either he prevents them in the beginning they shall not be planted they shall not be sown he denies them materials wherewith or soyl wherein to set up their husbandry Or he crosseth their progress their stock shall not take root in the Earth either the storms from without shake it or some vermin at the root some secret curse of God deads it that the stock of wealth parts or friends with which they set up rots and consumes in the Earth Or he blasteth them before the harvest they shall wither and the whirlwind shall take them away as stubble all their gay hopeful and promising flourishes do in a short while ere the years end miscarry if they can stand out ordinary storms which nip others the Lord himself will blow upon them with his mighty whirlwind and that turns their fruit into dryed stubble In the midst of the falls and miscarriages of the most some it may be gather and go away with great spoils of wealth honour and advancement but what quiet or comfort have they withall what blessing either from God or man attends them Do we not see the Lord sending among the fat ones leanness and kindling under their glory a burning Isa 10.16 33. Do we not see the Lord lopping the bough with terror and the high ones of stature are hewn down We see one War Combustion and Change coming after another in which the greatest do take their turns both in ascending and coming down There is a War now on foot threatening sad things in many respects and particularly in this of mens worldly interest if it go on as it must needs wear and waste the Community in Blood and Treasure by Slaughter Impositions and loss of Trade so it may abate and shrink the strongest Power the highest arm of flesh the deepest Treasury Methinks the Lord bespeaks our Mammonists and Matchiavels less and greater now as he did them of Judah or Israel by Isaiah Isai 10 3. And what will ye do in the day of visitation and in the desolation which shall come from far To whom will ye flee for help and where will ye leave your glory c. 4. Let the Consciences of men speak Do we not generally acknowledg this to be the reigning sin of the times Do we not universally note and complain of it We take not the charge of every one home to himself yet we cry out of it in one another and as the sin of the age The Country charge the Soldiery with it the Soldiery lay it upon them of higher place and office Clients and Suiters complain of it in Courts and Judicatories and they again retort it The Ministers reprove it in the people and some of the people cast it upon their Ministers None own it in themselves but every one asperseth his neighbor with it I shall not here say where it lies more then otherwhere or endeavor the excuse of any but thus it is evident by every mans confession that it is the Nations regnant sin 6. To conclude This is a sin which the evil under present consideration the Lords hiding from prayers reflecteth on by way of proportion This evil is a suitable retaliation to that fault In having recourse to God by prayer we make profession to place our Interest in Heaven but if under that profession our hearts our dependencies be nevertheless upon the Earth it is but suitable that God should put us back and our interest in Heaven desert us in our recourse to it In so doing God doth but say to us as he did once of Israel Where are their gods Deut. 32.37 38. See Judg. 10.14 their rock in whom they trusted which did eat the fat of their sacrifices and drank the wine of their drink-offerings let them rise up and help you now and be your protection If our ambition and aim be to be great and potent in this world we must think to be but weak in Heaven If we will court the world we must expect but cold entertainment with God If we make the world
and argue us of hypocrisie 1 Sam. 12.23 Isai 64.7 Gal. 6.9 Nisi ad sit in oratione perseverandi constantia nihil orando agimus Calv. Instit l. 3. c. 20. s 52. Job 27.10 5. One special end of Gods deferring our prayers is to train us on to seek him more diligently Hos 5.15 6. Lastly How hath God been over-intreated by incessancy in prayer as by Jacob distressed at his brother Esaus approach Gen. 32.26 by Moses for Israel Deut. 9.18 19. by Israel under the Ammonitish bondage Judg. 10.16 and by the Church of God in Peters behalf Act. 12.5 Learn we then and keep to this Lesson Let us in the Scripture phrase roul our way upon the Lord Psal 37.5 55.22 Prov. 16.3 Though he should seem to turn it back again from him by delaying to accomplish it yet still be rouling or devolving it over to him by ingeminated petitions Let our prayers be poured out unto God as the Church saith her tears shall be without any intermission till the Lord look down and behold from Heaven Lam. 3.49 c. 3. Beleeve what you see not to wit the presâ—nt acceptance and future return in some or other yea the bâ—st way of your prayers framed accordiâ—g to the Will of God As we must pour out our hearts before God so must we trust in him at all times Psal 62.8 and in particular trust in him for the prayers which we pour out before him From whence had David that lively confidence of the Lords audience of him and the prediscovery of the issue of his prayers so clear as if he saw them already performed before his eyes the which he often professeth even under or together with his most bitter complaints of the Lords hiding himself from him as Psal 6.8 9. 13.5 6. 22.24 43.5 54.7 Had he it from any peculiar or extraordinary revelation or by vertue of the promise of God in his Word layd hold on faith I suppose it might be by the latter way only But by whethersoever it was I see no reason why the vigor of a Christians faith may not without the former extraordinary means attain to the same assurance and triumph which he arrived at For whether it was upon special revelation or upon the written Word that David was so bottomed it was still but by force of a divine word or promise the difference 'twixt those two lies but in the manner of receiving The promise which all Beleevers have in the written Word for the success of their prayers is as firm and certain as that which David built on could possibly be The Lord telleth all his people Isai 45.18 19. in substance thus much He is the Lord that created the Heavens that formed and made the Earth and established it And as he created it not in vain but to be inhabited so he hath not commanded the seed of Iacob to seek him in vain As sure as he made the Earth to be inhabited so sure he hath ordered his people to pray that he may perform and they may possess their prayers What can be a surer testimony to the validity of any thing then that asseveration of our Saviour is for the validity of prayer Luke 18 7.8 Shall not God avenge his own Elect which cry day and night unto him I tell you that he will avenge them speedily I tell you If Christ tell us so in his Gospel it is as sure as if the Spirit told us so by his inspiration to us Can there be a firmer bond to ascertain us then is that tye which we find betwixt the spirit of prayer poured out Zech. 12.10 and the hearing and answer of prayer Chap. 13.9 And from this we may assuredly conclude God hath not in these days poured out the spirit of supplications and thereby put his servants on so universally solemnly and earnestly to pray yea and to enter into such vows and covenants but it is for a great and gracious end at least to themselves in which he will specially manifest himself to be their God and they to be his people Prayers and tears have been accounted the Churches weapons and doubtless what is said of the bow of Ionathan 2 Sam. 1.12 and the sword of Saul that they never returned empty the same shall be made good of those arms of the Church And as the assurance that is given to prayer in general is so stable so is that which is given in special to the prayers of the deserted The needy shall not alway be forgotten The expectation of the poor shall not perish for ever The Lord will not cast off for ever but Psal 9.18 Lam. 3.31 32 Psa 102.17 Zech. 10 6. though he cause grief yet he will have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies He will regard the prayer of the destitute and not despise their prayer I will be as though I had not cast them off for I am the Lord their God and will hear them To perswade us further to exercise faith in this behalf 1. Consider God hears and sometimes the petitioner doth not discern it For this take that of Elihu Job 35.14 Although thou sayst thou shalt not see him yet judgment is before him Mat. 21.22 therefore trust in him 2. The promise of audience takes in faith as a condition or requisite 3. The special use of faith is to settle the heart in beleeving and hoping things unseen Heb. 11.1 Rom. 4.18 19 yea and what is cross to present and visible things and in particular things of that nature in return or answer to prayer This is the confidence that we have in him 1 Joh. 5.14 15 that if we ask any thing according to his Will he heareth us c. This is the confidence we may understand it either that this is the matter of the confidence or this is the office or use of our confidence or faith to wit to beleeve and know the success of our prayer though we sensibly find it not 4. This exercise of faith will enable us to wait patiently and regularly Isai 28.16 He that beleeveth shall not make haste 5. Such a faith will be a token or pledg unto the petitioner of a happy issue of his prayer and desertion But I have trusted in thy mercy my heart shall rejoyce in thy Salvation Psal 13.5 6. Lastly All the interpositions improbabilities difficulties or oppositions which come betwixt us and our prayers by reason whereof we apprehend God hidden from us and our prayers hindered do not make the least distance obscurity pawse or impediment to the real presence or working of God to us or for our help * Ps 73.23 Zech. 8.6 4. Be content to stay Gods time for the issuing of your prayers wait upon God with constancy and patience So the Prophet Isai 8.17 I will wait upon the Lord that hideth his face from the house of Jacob and will look
without scruple 2. Others are bent against the persons of men and these are also differenced into 1. Such as are not for mens destruction but correction only by some temporal evil or affliction which is desired to befall them for this end that they may be brought to understand humble themselves repent of their iniquity and turn to God As is that of the Psalmist Psal 83.16 Fill their faces with shame that they may seek thy Name O Lord. So Elihu is conceived to pray concerning Job My desire is that Job may be tryed or O my Father Job 34 36. let Job be tryed unto the end because of his answers for wicked men that is as Diodate paraphraseth it Do not O God withdraw thy visitations from Job until thou hast brought him to the duty of a child and to the only means of obtaining pardon which is humility and confession Neither is the lawfulness of Imprecations like to these stuck at by Divines 2. Such as are against mens persons for their subversion and these are of a threefold nature or Consideration 1. Some are against men as they are Gods Enemies a Psa 68.1 69 2.109.6 Rom. 11.9 Judg. 5.31 2. Some are against men as they are the Churches Enemies b Psa 79.6 137.7 Lam. 3.64 Neb. 4 4 3. And some are against men as they are their own Enemies that pray c Ps 55.15 59.13 71 13 Jer. 15.15 17 18 18.21 20.12 2 Kin. 1.10 2.24 2 Tim. 4.14 Now these three kinds of Malediction are those that are called into question and that two ways 1. Whether they were Justifiable in them that used them in sacred writ 2. Whether they be imitable lawfully in by us against the like Enemies First For the former Question The Justifiableness of them in them that used them in holy Writ is generally assented unto and thus cleared 1. Many of those Execrations may be taken to be uttered by a Spirit of Prophecy and so to be rather Prophetical Predictions and Denunciations of divine Judgments certainly foreseen to come upon the parties then meer wishings and desirings of evil to them proceeding originally from the wills of them that pray d Verba praedicantium non vota imprecantium * August contra Faustum idem de Serm. Dom. li. 1. Optativo modo usi sunt pro Indicativo 2. Others of them if they came not from a divining Spirit yet they might come from a discerning Spirit peculiarly given to them whereby they might be able to discover those against whom they so prayed to be implacable and desperate Enemies of God his Church and Truth 3. The Utterers of those prayers being Penmen of holy Writ or otherwise extraordinary persons may well be deemed to have been moved with a pure zeal of God and his Cause and clear of those base incentives of private passion malice and impatience more incident to others And whereas those prayers may seem to oppugn the Rules of charity and prayer for our Enemies it may be said Those Rules are to bind where there is no special Warrant for exception and charity to men must be subordinate and secondary to our love and zeal towards God 2. But if any vitiosity may be supposed in any of those Instances as some incline to admit in those votes of the Prophet Jeremiah e H. Bullinger in Jer. 15. â—5 And Scultet de prec c. 16. p. 76. such doubtless are to be born with in them and passed over by us without following them therein Secondly For the latter Question about them viz. their Lawfulness for us to practise This may not simply be granted but we are to distinguish of the manner of conceiving such prayers which may be 1. Either generally or indefinitely as when one prayeth against the Enemies of God and Christ whomsoever they be not pitching upon any particular persons and without eyeing or judging these or those to be such but leaving it to God to find them out and deal with them accordingly Of this nature is that of Deborah and Barak So let all thine Enemies perish O Lord Judg. 5.31 And that of the Apostle not only pronounced by him but imposed upon others to concur in If any man love not the Lord Jesus 1 Cor. 16.22 let him be Anathema Maran atha Such like Imprecations keeping within the general denunciation both with tongue and eye are not inconvenient for Christians now 2. Or particularly conceived that is personally applyed and fixed on this or that man or people and these Maledictions are to be held unwarrantable for us ordinarily we having no special or infallible gift of prophecy or discerning whereby we may be enabled to see into mens spiritual estate or to foresee what is absolutely the portion of their cup from the Almighty or to dictate unto us such prayers we falling short also of that clearness of zeal and immixture of Love to God which in some in times past hath been We having no such special call or assistance as others have had our safest and clearest way is to take notice of that rebuke of our Saviour unto James and John Luk. 9.55 Mat. 5.44 Ro. 12.14 19. 1 Pet. 3.9 1 Pet. 2.23 Lu. 23.34 Acts 7.60 when they would have called for fire down from Heaven upon certain Samaritans And to walk by those Rules which on the other hand are given us in the Gospel of Loving doing good to blessing praying for our Enemies Cursers and Persecutors and of refraining cursing self-avenging and wrong-retaliating And for which we have the practise of our blessed Saviour and of his servants set before us in Scripture We have thus an Extract of the Rules of Scripture concerning the Subject of prayer both as it respecteth things and persons There is yet another branch of this preceptive ground of prayer to be viewed viz. that which prescribeth the way in which prayer must be performed and put up to God This hath included in it two things 1. The means or assistance by which we must pray 2. The manner how Briefly of both First The means or assistance by which we must pray this is twofold 1. It must be in Christ 2. It must be in the Spirit We are to make use of both these by way of Intercession or Advocateship Christ maketh Intercession for us in Heaven a Ro. 8.34 at the right hand of God The Spirit maketh Intercession within us in the heart b Ro. 8.26 Christ is our Advocate with the Father c 1 Joh. 2.2 The Spirit is our Advocate abiding with and in us d Jo. 14 16 The Spirit is called another Advocate in relation to Christ who is also our Advocate The Spirit is another because different from him both in person and in the nature of his Advocateship Christ is our Advocate in Heaven by way of Expiation of our sins Attonement Reconciliation and Representation of our persons and of our prayers before God The Spirit is our
Advocate here on Earth by way of Instruction and Excitation of us to pray and animating or enlivening our requests within us We labor of a double incapacity to go to God in prayer 1. Of guilt and unworthiness as being enemies and transgressors against God 2. Of ineptitude or infirmity both in point of understanding and will as being both ignorant and liveless to ask any thing of God Wherefore we have need of and have given us a double Advocate First Of Propitiation in Heaven the Lord Jesus Christ Secondly Of Interpellation or Efficiency with and in us this is the proper work of the Holy Ghost And therefore we are said to have access unto the Father through Christ and by the Spirit The Rule then in this place to be followed is We must pray 1. In Christ Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my Name Ask and you shall receive that your Joy may be full At that day ye shall ask in my Name Io. 16 24.26 Rom. 3.25 Psal 80.1 Exod. 30.6 Christ is our Propitiatory or Mercy-seat As in the time of the Law the Lord afforded his presence over the Mercy-seat and thence gave Answers to the Enquiries of the high Priest and people of Israel so are we now without such visible and local types brought near unto God and vouchsafed audience through Jesus Christ 2. We must pray in the Spirit Praying in the Holy Ghost Iudâ— 20. Eph. 6.18 Tim. 5. â—6 Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit The Apostle James saith The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much Prayer is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 effectual Dr Downham doctr of pâ—ayer cap. 6. p. 27. when it hath the inward 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or working when it is actuated and effectuated by the Spirit of God in generating this inward efficacy in our prayers which we are not able to give them saith a most judicious Author Our prayer must not be the work of our lip or voyce nor of our brain wit memory nor of our will and carnal desire only it must not be a meer humane work or but from a common acquired gift of prayer serving only to put our case into a form of words and method but it must be the work of the Spirit upon the heart it must be made of impressions and expressions that are inward and proceed of the Spirit of God impressions of softness tenderness and mourning Zech. 12. â—0 Rom. 8.27 expressions of groanings that cannot be uttered We see this part of the way in which prayer must be offered up viz. the Means by which Secondly The Manner There are certain particular Qualifications and Affections that must accompany prayer Those are these following or the main of them 1. Understanding a 1 Cor. 14 15 2. Faith b Mat. 21.22 Iam. 1 6. Rom 10.4 3. Repentance c Ps 66 18 Lam. 3 40 41 4 Sincerity d Heb. 10.22 Psa 145.8 Ro. 12 12 5. Fervencye. 6. Charity f Mark 11 25 1 Tim. 2.8 7. And lastly Perseverance g Luk 18.1 Eph. 6 18. I leave the Reader for brevities sake to search the places quoted in the Margin I have thus given a brief description of the ground of Precept layd down for prayer in the Word of God I am now to come to the ground of Promise and to do the like by it I shall for our survey of this propose unto observation two things 1. The several kinds of promise upon which prayer is to ground it self 2. The right sence and acception in which those promises are made and to be taken by us in building our prayers upon them and consequently of the grounding of prayers upon the promises First The several kinds of promises for the bottoming of prayer The Promises of God upon which prayer may fix and hold are of two sorts 1. Irrespective or such as are made of doing good without any express mention of or relation to prayer 2. Relative or such as are made to prayer as of hearing or of giving this or that blessing upon prayer The former promiseth the matter or thing prayed for the latter promiseth it unto prayer So that the former I may term the material the latter the formal ground of prayer First For the irrespective promises I need not may not be particular upon them they are so huge a multitude they make a principal part of Scripture and for their nature they are great and precious of a vast and various comprehension they are extended to all things times persons states and uses they are by themselves a subject large enough for a whole Treatise and so they are put forth by a learned and worthy Author with much diligence * Mr Leigh Treat of Divine Promises now a 3d time imprinted Only I shall note one distinction of them 1. They are either such as concern all are made and propounded and so in some sort appertain to all or any whomsoever so they come duly qualified to them such are the main bulk and current of Scripture-promises 2. There are that belong to some special persons only who are usually by name spoken to or of in them such was that promise made to David of a lasting family and succession in the Kingdom over Israel 2 Sam. 7.16 Isai 38.5 and that promise made to Hezekiah of recovery from sickness and of an addition of fifteen years unto his life and of defence of himself and the City Jerusalem from the King of Assyria and as a sign of the same of the return back of the shadow upon the Sun-dyal of Ahaz ten degrees and that promise made to the captive Jews of a return home from Babylon after seventy years accomplished in captivity Secondly For the relative promises or those that are made expresly to prayer they are as the former 1. Either peculiar to some persons as God promised Abraham upon his prayer to spare Sodom Gen. 18.26 20.7 according to the conditions by him inserted touching the number of the righteous to be there found and he promised Abimelech King of Gerar life upon Abrahams praying for him 1 Kin. 17 1. Jam. 5.17 And he promised Elijah that there should not be dew nor rain for some years but according to his Word which was his prayer 2. Or universal and layd down for all and these are the promises now of use to us for the grounding of our prayers upon them and therefore we are to take these into our more special consideration They are all general in regard of object or extent to persons but in regard of their subject or the matter promised 1. Some are more generally propounded as when the Lord promiseth to hear Isai 58.9 Psâ—l 144.18 19 50 15 86.5 Rom. 10 12 13 to answer to save to be plenteous in mercy to be nigh to be rich over them that call upon them or that they that ask shall receive and the like These are promises