pining away in the sense of it and I will go to my Father Go no more after Idols Hosea 14.8 that afford no comfort or profit but to him whose love at first begat hope as well as at first his hands did make me And I will say to him Father I have sinned against heaven and before thee A resolution to confess his sins against God and man against Christ the heavenly one against the Holy Spirit that is from Heaven and against the Word that is from Heaven too and against the Angels in Heaven whose Service and Ministry is abused in our sin And before thee that is in the sight of and so against God himself in all this and in all other his mercies abused All which confession springs from hope in God whence he challenges him for his Father though offended by him but yet addes as humbling himself before him and submitting himself to him and his Dispose Verse 19. I am no more worthy to be called thy Son as if he should say though I am by Creation and by thy former gracious Call Adoption and Regeneration thy Son yet I have forfeited that relation as to thy owning me so any longer and giving me the title and priviledges of a Son I have so defaced thy Image and likenesse in me by my sin and so disobliged thee by my disobedience Make me as one of thy hired Servants Give me but a room in thy house and let me have but their portion who serving thee for themselves only and thy reward are under thy maintenance and protection a speech in which he judges himself and submits himself to any mean condition So his Father would but take him into his house again though to be under the servitude of the Law rather then to be left still to be a drudge to Sin and Satan Thus Sinners come home by weeping cross forfeiting their priviledges honour favour and dignities by their transgressions but all this while here is only repentance resolved on the practice of it must follow the resolution And so it was Verse 20. And he arose and came to his Father there 's the practice of repentance the arising from sin and from the discouragements under the consideration of sin to return and come by Faith Hope and the desire of heart to God to seek after him and submit to him as he discovers himself to us in and by Christ And now see the mercy of God to penitent Sinners painted out in the compassions of a tender hearted Father to his Prodigal but repenting and returning Son for it follows But when he was yet a great way off his Father saw him and had compassion and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him Oh how quick sighted is Love and Charity of what is good fatherly love to a returning lost Childe the love of God to truly penitent Sinners While the Sinner is yet short in his Repentance and a great way off from coming up to God in conformity to what his word requires yet he being really in the way thereto seriously desirous of and endeavouring after it God sees he takes notice pittieth his misery and is ready to encourage and animate him in his Repentance The Son goes towards his Father as being between hope and fear of acceptance with him but the Father runs towards his Son as it were to hasten his endeavours or prevent them with encouragement to more assured confidence of welcome therein yea and before the Son can fall at his Fathers feet with tears of Repentance the Father falls on his neck and kisses him with kisses of his welcome the kisses of his mouth the sweet encouragements of his Word and Spirit which hinder not but quicken the Sons repentant Confession and humbling of himself to him Verse 21. And the Son said to him Father now he may call him so with more boldness as having found before-hand such renewed testimonies of his former kindeness and tender mercies I have sinned against heaven and in thy sight and am no more worthy to be called thy Son The sense of Gods love and mercy quickens confession of sin and self-abasement in the sight of our vileness Ezek. 16.60 61 Nothing humbles and melts so much as Gods love preventing and following us being notwithstanding our unworthiness streamed forth to us and perceived by us But before the Son can say as he pre-resolved Make me as one of thy hired Servants his Father prevents him as follows Verse 22. But notwithstanding the Son had so sinned and judged himself unworthy to be any more called his Son the Father forgiving all past and glad of his lost Sons return said unto his Servants Bring forth the best robe and put it on him and put a ring on his hand and shooes on his feet He finds his Son in a poor tattered case in a ragged condition cloathed with vile Apparel or in a manner wholly naked like a Swineheard far unlike what became his Son so sin makes us and he dislikes it and pitties it And now the Servants must apply themselves too to recruit and comfort him and such the gladness of a loving Father to have his lost Son again that forgetting all his offences and not so much as once upbraiding him instead of shutting his doors against him or calling for Rods and Staves to beat and correct him he calls for the best Robe with Ring and Shooes to adorn him which the Servants must apply to him and put upon him too as thinking nothing too good for him to be afforded him He will have him clad and waited on as his Son again to signifie as what sin continued in deprives us of so also how acceptable it is to God that his Servants and Gospel Ministers make it their business to incourage comfort and restore penitent Sinners Yea he addes further Verse 23. And bring hither the fatted calf and kill it and let us eat and be merry The poor sinning Childe was hungry as well as ragged ready to Famish and his Father knows his needs and will supply them with what may best shew his love and gladness for his return When he was keeping Swine Bread and Cheese would have been welcome might he have had them yea now being returned he would have been glad and accepted it might he have had ordinary fare and Servants entertainment in his hunger he mentioned only bread enough in his Fathers house but that suffices not his Fathers love to him to testifie how gladly he receives him no if there be one Robe better then another he shall have it to clad him and if one dish better then another he shall have it to feed him the fatted Calf The Righteousness of Christ is the penitent Sinners cloathing and garment the Father gives him The Vertues of Christ and his Spirit incircle his Works as a Ring his Finger The preparations of the Gospel of Peace shod his Feet and the choicest demonstrations of Love and Grace shewed forth and exhibited in
them of sin and shew them their need of Christ and the forgiveness of their sins through him and to signifie and shadow him out with the grace in and by him that as by a School-master they might be directed to him to seek him and righteousness and life in him Whence it is said Moses wrote of him and the Law witnessed to the righteousness of God that is by the faith of him Gal. 3.23 24 25. John 5.46 Rom. 3.21 Many of them not understanding the Law nor seeing to the end thereof which was Christ for righteousness to every one that believeth Rom. 10.4 being blinded by their unbelief and listning to Satan and closing their eyes and stopping their ears against Gods Doctrine who so speaks of Christ in all his teachings that whosoever hears and learns of him comes to him John 6.45 rested only in the Type Shadow and work of the Law seeking righteousness as it were thereby and not coming to Christ for life nor submitting to him as the righteousness of God but stumbling at him John 5.40 Rom. 10.3 yet these not seeing their sinfulness and the curse they were under by the Law in all their works but conceiting themselves alive in the observations of it took themselves to be the Children of God and are called in a sense as the Children of God either they or the Judaizing Christians which I think the likelier being compared to one of the Sons of Abraham who bare a kinde of Type or representation of God in his two sons But these indeed are servants or such sons as Ishmael the Law gendring to bondage and so bond-men and not such Sons as are ever with God as a Son with his Father but were to be cast out and are cast out with their Mother that bare them from inheriting with those that are indeed his Sons as Isaac was and of this stamp too are they that being ignorant and neglective of the Grace of God in Christ do live upon their duties and observances of outward ordinances under the Gospel 2 Cor. 3.13 14 15. and 4.4 Matth. 13.15 Rom. 9.30 31 32. and 10.3 John 8.41 Gal. 4.22 30. Luke 18.9 11. and such Sons the Pharisees might be But 5. They and they only that being Baptized into Christ or initiated into him do put on Christ or being called of God to him do receive him own entertain and believe in him do by vertue of him and in union with him become the Sons of God in the choice sense of of it and attain that dignity and priviledge so to be made and called being in the gracious call of God to him overcoming them to receive and believe in him born also of God begotten of that immortal seed of his word that lives and abides for ever and in believing on Christ receive by and through him the spirit of Son-ship even the Spirit of the Son framing them to a child-like love to and confidence in God as their Father and infusing into them his Divine Nature and so renewing them in or in them the Image of Christ Jesus his only begotten Son and making them like to him by degrees Who is the first-born amongst many brethren Rom. 8.29 And now sure they that being thus made Sons of God do also follow after and are led by and so retain the Spirit of the Son are and must needs be the Sons of God as it is said To them that received Christ to them he gave this priviledge to become the Sons of God even to those that believe in his name who are born not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man but of God John 1.12 13. and Ye are all the Sons of God by faith in Jesus Christ Gal. 4.26 and If ye know that he is righteous ye know that every one that doth righteousness namely in believing on him and so being led by his Spirit is born of him Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the Sons of God 1 John 2.29 and 3.1 and So many as are led by the Spirit of God they are the Sons of God Rom. 4.14 15. being thereby led into and kept in union with and dependence on the Son of God and made like to him in conformity in righteousness holiness c. And indeed men being made the Sons of God by this divine regeneration into and in the Son of God and brought to God what can unson them again if they abide and tarry with God not departing from him God who at so dear a rate and in so great love hath made them his Sons will not out of mutability of minde unson them again No his gifts and calling are without repenting of them Rom. 11.29 Sins and failings they may have froward passions and peevish distempers as other mens Sons and Children have and may have and therefore as in their infancy and minority under the Law they were under Tutors and Governors to nurture and order them till the time appointed of the Father Gal. 4.1 2 3. So also still they may need to feel the rod of their Father though no longer under the tutorage of Moses Law as formerly as it is said Whom the Lord loveth he chastneth and scourgeth every Son whom he receiveth Heb. 12.6 and such will be their state while here till they come to perfect age To the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ till they see him as he is for then they shall be compleatly like him and have nothing more of ignorance error frowardness or disobedience in them Eph. 4.14 1 John 3.1 2. but those frailties and failings peevishnesses and passions do not unson them unless they wholly turn them out from Christ the Son in whom they have their Son-ship and are Sons Indeed if any depart from him so as to be abolished from him then they fall from that Grace and Favour in which the Believer and abider stands even from the Grace of Son-ship Christ shall profit them nothing Gal. 5.2 3. or as the Parable hath it become Sons dead and lost that are as if they were not and without a reviving perish from Gods presence and if they may be called Sons as Abraham calls the rich man in Hell his Son they can have but only the title and the quondam relation the nighness and priviledges of Sons with their Father and in his house they can never obtain when the gulf is fixt upon them for ever and ever as the Parable hath it in Luke 16.25 26. But the walkers with God the continuers in his Faith Fear and Service must needs be his Sons inasmuch as they abide in Christ his Son Such the first Branch of this hapy state they are Sons of God Vse 1. And is this nothing or is it but a small matter to be a Son of God is it not a very spring in and through Christ of infinite and unspeakable hope and consolation a Son of God who
drink-offerings to him and the heart of man as believed in by us for God also sets him forth for us to feed upon His flesh as meat indeed and his blood as drink indeed for us John 6.33.55 Judges 9.13 even as of old God had communion with his people in their Sacrifices taking part by the Altar and Priests for himself and giving part to the Sacrificers so both God and his people feed together in Christ Jesus Yea God the Father here would have had his elder Son have come in and eat with him and his other Son and Servants of the feast prepared the fatted Calf only the elder Sons own frowardness kept him out and so he is in bed with his children too sometimes as it is parabolically expressed Luke 11.7 while and they spiritually rest and repose together in Christ Such in a sort their fellowship with him that obey and walk with him 3. With him so as in a sense in him The Church of the Thessalonians that is in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ 1 Thess 1.1 and 2 Thess 1.1 and we are in him that is true 1 John 5.20 in him because in Christ as to their hopes heart love faith life Our life is hid with Christ in God Col. 3.3 in him in his eye or view For the eye of the Lord is over the righteous and they are ever in his sight walking with and before him as Noah Enoch Abraham Gen. 17.1 They being his spiritual House and Temple in Christ what was said by him of his Temple typically is true spiritually and more really as to them Mine eyes and my heart saith God shall be there perpetually 2 Chron. 7.16 1 Pet. 3.1 in his hand power and dispose to order hold or uphold them yea to lead guide or carry them in his love All his Saints are in thine hand Deut. 33.3 Psal 139.9 in his minde and remembrance The Lord thinketh upon me saith Psal 40.10 he forgetteth not the cry of the humble Psal 9 12 yea to that purpose they are ingraven as on the palms of his hand so as they are ever before him in all his works Isa 49.15 and set as a signet upon his arm yea they are in his heart his love and choicest affection as a seal upon his heart Cant. 8.6 his heart is ever upon them The Lord loveth the righteous Psal 146.8 His countenance doth behold the just his heart and eye is upon them for good because of Christ the well beloved of his soul as found in him He loveth them with the love wherewith he loves him even with a love of delight and pleasure taking John 17.23 26. with 16.28 Psal 32.18 and 147.11 and 149.4 4. With him they are as children with a loving kinde and careful Father who hath all power and sufficiency to help and succour them and therefore thence great advantages accrue to them because being with him he is also with and for them as is said 2 Chron. 15.2 The Lord is with you while ye are with him on his side and in his presence keeping at home with him and this is through Christ who is Immanuel God with us God and man in one person and the Mediator and band of union between God and man through him the Lord is with that is both on their side and present with them by his power favour and grace for their helpfulness whence they have cause of greatest security in him greatest quietness and confidence as appears from that song of the Virgin Souls Psal 46. The Lord of Hosts is with us the God of Jacob is our refuge as the burthen of the Song and that was the spring of their rejoycing gladness and fear-exceeding-confidence expressed by them verse 2 3 4. Therefore will we not fear though the earth be moved and though the mountains be cast into the depths of the Sea c. For from hence they may be sure of 1. His defence He being infinite both in power goodness and faithfulness and being immutable and eternal in what he is and he having said and promised that he will take the care of and defend them that are with and obey him For on all the glory shall be a defence Isa 4.5 The Lord God is a Sun and a Shield and he will give grace and glory and no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly Psal 84.11 Thence let all that trust in thee rejoyce for thou wilt defend them with favour wilt thou compass them as with a shield Psal 5.11 12. And thence that glorying The Lord is our defence the holy one of Israel is our King Psal 89.18 and who can harm them that are with God as their Father and have him with and nigh to them to defend them as in 1 Pet. 3.13 yea they have his defence both 1. By his Word and his Spirit therein yea his only Son pleading for and justifying them He is near that justifieth me who will contend with me let us stand together Isa 50.7 8. Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect those that are in Christ Jesus walking not after the Flesh but after the Spirit to whom there is no condemnation from God It is God that justifieth who is he that condemneth it is Christ that died yea rather is risen again c. Romans 8.1 33 34. 2. By his truth and faithfulness love and favour covering them over as wings and feathers as an Hen her Chickens I will say of the Lord He is my refuge my fortress my God in whom I will trust sayes Psal 91.2 as one resolving to dwell in Gods secret place his Christ his Covenant and then saith his Holy Spirit to such He that so doth shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty and surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the Fowler and from the noysome Pestilence He shall cover thee with his feathers and under his wings shalt thou trust his truth shall be thy shield and buckler ver 1 3 4 5 and With favour will he compass them as with a shield Psal 5.12 3. By his right hand which doth valiantly and brings great things to pass by that he saveth them that trust in him Psal 17.7 even by his glorious power and providence graciously exercised over them for and about them and holding them from falling and all these together in one in Christ Jesus our Lord Ephes 1 19 20. 2. His counsel they may certainly expect that also for he is nigh to them to teach and instruct them in the way wherein they should go and being their Father will not withhold it from them they asking it of him and waiting upon him for it as it is said Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel and that as a consequent of Gods being with him and he with him for so it is said Psal 73.22 23. Nevertheless I am continually with thee thou holdest me by my right hand Thou shalt or wilt guide me by thy
and of them to the spirits of just men made perfect to be their brethren followers of their faith and to be in the hope of and to have the title and way to their enjoyments and to God the judge of all to protect bless reward and satisfie them And to Jesus the mediator of the New Testament and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better things then the blood of Abel to be prepared for kept and brought to the enjoyment of the Glory of God by him and in the vertues of that his precious blood Yea coming to Christ the living stone they are made living stones too and are built up a spiritual house and an holy Priesthood c. A chosen generation a royal Priesthood an holy Nation and a peculiar people to shew forth the praises of God who hath called them out of darkness into his marvellous light Heb. 12.23 24. 1 Pet. 2.5 9. Can there be a better state and condition in a word it s the same condition that the person is in that keeps to God and never departs from him a state of Son-ship to God of being ever with God and having interest in and benefit by all that is his for as Blessed is the man that is undefiled in the way and walks in the Law of the Lord so also Blessed is the man whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered Psal 119.1 and 32.1 2. Blessed is he to whom the Lord will not impute sin c. Both of them are in a blessed state and what can be better then blessed wherin is a removing of all evil and an estating in all that is good either as to the way to it or end attained Such is this condition Good in it self and then it s 2. It s good to others also as 1. To God in such a sense as any thing besides himself can be good to him not as if it added to him who is infinitely perfect in himself and not to be added to by any thing but good to him as its pleasing to him as a satisfaction to his love an attainment of his desired end in all his goodness expressed and testified towards the sinner at least so far as he hath attained He would have all men saved he hath no pleasure in the death of the wicked but rather that he turn and live He hath pleasure then that a wicked man turn and live Ezek 33.11 1 Tim. 2.4 That 's good then to God that 's pleasing or a pleasure and delight to him That that he is glorified in and by even his mercy and truth in Christ are herein glorified Psal 1 â—5 1. Such a person will praise him The living the living they shall celebrate or shew forth thy praises Psal 115.17 18. Isa 38.19 Yea and others will glorifie God in and for such a person as they did in Saint Paul Gal. 2.23 and his house and kingdom is hereby increased and the Kings honour is in the multitude of his Subjects Prov. 14.28 2. To Christ also upon all the same accounts It s matter of joy to him when what he labours for and in succeeds That his Plantation thrives and that any tree of his setting revives and prospers John 15.12 3. To the Holy Spirit for as God is love and Christ the Son of the Father in love and truth so the Spirit is the Spirit of Love and its a rejoycing to love when it hath what it may love and when what it loves succeeds and is well as he is grieved and vexed in his peoples ill-doing and rebelling so he is delighted in their well-doing and repenting Isa 63.10 11. Ephes 4.30 4. To the holy Angels who loving men and their good desire it and in such persons have their desire answered and the number of their blessed company in a sort increased Luke 15.10 Heb. 12.23 5. To their Brerhren whose number is added to or preserved from being in such diminished and whose spiritual desires breathings prayers and endeavours are herein answered and they may have benefit by them in mutual fellowship with them if here surviving or if not yet edification however in the beholding or here-say of the Vertues of Christ and his Sacrifice and the power of the Grace of God appearing in them in their dying 6. Yea to all other men its good either as making them fit to pitty pray for and seek the good of them and be useful to them or as affording inducement to them to repent also and seek God and hope in him and it cannot but be 7. Good to a mans self such and so happy a condition as in which is the confluence of all good to a man Now that that is good and so good surely it is meet that all that are good and love what 's good or may have good by it should rejoyce and be glad for it And so God makes this mirth here and a feast hereat for all that can and will be glad of it and we should make merry by exhorting and exciting all to gladness by all means we can upon such occasions 2. It is meet we should make merry and be glad on such an occasion because of the relation the sinner stood and stands in to us to God and his people especially This thy Brother and ver 24. This my Son Love will lead us to be glad for strangers or enemies if they come to good to what 's truly good to what 's spiritually and eternally good but how much more for a mans own near relation The Lord rejoyces in his works the works of his hands as being all as his works good and holy and just but how much more in man his choice work for whose sake he made and to whose good he ordered all the rest made in his own likeness and image and so his Son but yet how much more for and in those that were and are again Sons in his Son in his only begotten and beloved Sonâ— Those whom he begot with such desire and love as through the gift of his Son and his Son bare and brought forth with the travail of his soul poured out to Death and brought to be his Sons by the Word thereof and by his Spirit breathing therein and whom he nourisht up with the flesh and blood of his Son and vertues thereof Should not the Father rejoyce and make merry to see his Son and so dear a Son in a good condition And should not Brethren make merry and be glad at the preferment good or recovery of their Brethren Would it not be unnatural for Brethren not to rejoyce in love for one another when they do well very well and one as well as another and all well Shall the Angels not so related to us Men be glad of our good and shall not we Men for one another and especially for such as have been our whole Brethren and so are Yea and should not all the Servants be glad of the happiness of their Masters Sons with
Christ Crucified and the precious promises therethrough made by his blood ratified are his feeding and nourishment And now behold at this feast of fat things God and his Angels and Servants will rejoyce with the restored convert who shall sit down and feast and rejoyce with them in Christ Jesus Yea God himself by his Spirit calls upon both his restored Son and his ministring Setvants to rejoyce together saying Let us eat and be merry And why not because the sinner hath so greatly sinned but because he who by his sin was so near destruction is by grace reduced and brought back to salvation for so it follows Ver. 24. For this my Son was dead and is alive again was lost and is found and they began to be merry Oh the wonderful grace and love of a merciful Father Here are now no bad tearms given 't is not this Rogue or Vagabond this Adulterer or Murtherer but this my son was dead and is alive was lost and is found And they began to be merry for they had Musick and Dancing saith the next verse not such as he used to have in his riotous living that is sit for Rogues and Whores Bawds and Ruffians but such as may become the Palaces of Religious Princes or the Saints of Heaven such as Davids when he danced before the Ark and as the Virgins and women of Israel used and sometimes the Holy men upon occasions of rejoycing and thanksgiving to God But the Devil will marr this musick and disturb this mirth if he can and to this purpose though he could not prevail with the elder Son to leave his Father and turn Prodigal too but he was hitherto dutiful and obedient yet he will now infuse a bad and envious thought into him against his Brother and put him into a froward and pettish humour against his Father and the Servants and all that forward the such entertainment giving to one so far unlike him in his former demeanour For so it follows Verse 25. Now his elder son was in the field Not with his Father in the house but it may be wandring in his minde or his own wisdom or perhaps about his Fathers business and looking after his affairs in the services of his Law and as he came and drew near to the house to take notice how things were in Gods Church He heard Musick and Dancing he perceived some more than usual mirth and rejoycing and wondering at it Verse 26. He called one of the Servants and asked what these things meant Verse 27. And he the Servant said unto him Thy brother is come thinking that whom their Lord owned for his Son the Servants might well call his Brother And thy Father hath killed the fatted Calf hath made a costly Feast because he hath received him safe and sound A fair answer and well given Thy Father hath killed the fatted Calf as knowing his authority should be great with him and the very saying it was his Fathers act should satisfie and content him Whereas if they had done it and made merry of their own heads without him they might worthily have been charged with rashness by him But yet here is not only the Fathers authority alledged to satisfie him but the ground and reason too upon which the Father did it Viz. Because he hath received thy Brother safe and sound That love to his Brother as well as duty to his Father might work upon him Verse 28. But he was angry and would not go in Was discontented at his Fathers kindeness and love to his Brother and would not joyn with him his Brother and Servants in their merry meeting and rejoycing and in this our Lord brings up this parable to the occasion of it to shew the evil unreasonableness of the Pharisees murmuring and taking offence at Christ for his receiving Publicans and Sinners to hear him and eating with them that it was but like the folly pride and frowardness of such an Elder Son that should be angry at such a Father and his Servants for making merry for and giving good entertainment to a prodigal repentant Son But yet to instruct us in Gods lenity and goodness to all his Children even his pettish Sons too He addes Therefore came his Father out and entreated him A perfect pattern of a loving Father and a right Emblem of God our heavenly Father who when by his authority he might check and reprove the forwardness of a peevish Son and command his coming in waves the exercise of his authority and gives way to his bowelly affection to steer and lead him and therefore he goes out and intreats him It had been the Sons part to judge his Father wiser then himself and to have acquiesced in his wisdom and authority and hearing that the mirth was by his order and at his appointment to have complyed with him But where the Son fails of his duty the Father exercises the more love and laying aside his authority seeks to gain him to a better Decorum by his greater condescension and goodness towards him And well may the Servants intreat froward Children and not be froward and fretful against them when their Lord sets them such a pattern But see how tenacious the passionate creature is of his peevishness instead of the Sons being ashamed that his Father that might command him in should abase himself so as to come out to him and intreat him as if he had shifted place and relation with his Father very sturdily and proudly replies upon him And Verse 29. He whose mouth should have been stopt by the very authority and presence of his Father much more by his intreating him expostulates the matter with him and answering said to his Father Lo these many years have I served thee neither at any time have I transgressed thy commandment and yet thou never gavest me a Kid that I might make merry with my friends Here is a very undutiful demeanour an unchildlike answer no sign of any reverence neither Sir nor Father to usher in his saying but only a charge of unlovingness towards him as if according to the old complaint of froward people he had served God his Father for nought and there was no profit in so doing He draws up an account of his many years Service his great dutifulness and obedience forgetting and quite blotting out of his minde all the great engagements that were upon him toward his Father which might challenge more from him then he did or could have done and he layes a charge against him of neglect or sparingness toward him He had never given him a Kid a lesser matter then the fatted Calf to make merry with his friends Here we meet with a proof of the position we began with that as men are apt to minde and keep strict account of their own righteousness and services so its hard for them that do so not to be proud and from that principle wrangle with God if he in all things please them not in
their humours and act not to their mindes and indeed to under-estimate Gods mercy and goodness as much as they over-value their own righteousness for so did this elder son in this froward fit being ready to shift places with his Brother and because he is received in will keep himself out and stand against his Fathers intreaties to justifie himself in his so doing for it was his Brothers reception that was the great thing stirred him as the next words manifest viz. Ver. 30. But as soon as this thy Son was come which hath devoured thy living with Harlots thou hast killed for him the fatted Calf Every word hath weight in it and bespeaks him passionately froward But in a clean contrary carriage towards him to what thou hast had to me assoon without staying to see him sufficiently humbled and penitent as if his Father was too hasty so to receive and respect him and as implying it had been meeter however to have frowned a while yea some long while upon him and made him lie and bewail himself at least for sometime first at his threshold before he had received him and welcomed him but assoon as this thy Son this by way of disdain and thy Son not my Brother as if he scorned to own such a one as he for his Relation much less his Brother but thy Son as if he had had a minde to disown himself a Son or him his Father because he so and so suddenly owned him and as if he only was made a Son by his Father because he so welcomed him As soon as this thy Son was come before any longer probation or tryal was made of the reallity of his repentance though he is he that hath devoured thy living with Harlots See how he as much debases and aggravates his brothers Sin as before he had amplified his own service and righteousness as if there was a direct Diametrical opposition between his own obedience and this follows lewdness He hath devoured thy living as if he had ravenously consumed all and left his Father nothing to live on when as it was but only that portion of it that fell to his lot or division But envy and frowardness is passionately Rhetorical to aggravate what offends with the largest note upon every circumstance transports beyond all bounds of soberness and leads to represent every thing in the worst colours and therefore he also addes that he had devoured his Fathers living with Harlots Though that 's beyond the first relation of his evil courses and more its likely then he had any positive evidence for but what his passion suggested His Father mention'd none of those things to him for gladness of his return but blots them all out with an act of oblivion Ah but the froward Brother will rip them all up and not suffer his Father if it may be in his power so to forget them that if possible he may move him to undo his acts of Grace again and seeing the error of his love expel him his house and make him once more seek his fortune and no doubt but the Pharisaical wisdom of the offended Son would readily suggest that it was a far evener and more just carriage towards him for his Father to have shut his doors upon him then so soon to have received him yea and because he had voluntarily and of his own vain head run from his Father and despised him his House his Brother and whatever else was therein he should now against his will have been made to keep from them and go get his living with those riotous companions he had preferred before them and in those places that he had haunted rather then his Fathers Habitation or at least to have made him bite by it a little after his return and put him into the worst apparel and fed him with the worst fare and not the best his house afforded So much wiser are we apt to be in our pride of our selves and uncharitableness to our sinning Brethren more then the most Holy and only wise God who as he is perfect in Judgment so he hath more love and charity towards them for this seems an intollerable respect to so vile a varlet one whom others of his temper would be ready to call an whoremasterly Villain to make for him such dainty provision as is implied when he addes Thou hast killed for him the fatted Calf Had it been killed for himself before he would have thought it enough to let him taste of it worser fare he thought might have been too good for him but to kill any thing for such a lewd fellow that mattered not to kill his Father by spending his substance to his grief yea to kill the fatted Calf the most reserved dainty that his Father had when as he never at any time gave him a Kid Oh how could he look upon such a partiality without indignation and yet as intimately taxing his Father with such rashness as to act all things without good advisement or fore-consideration or with such blindeness through his too partial affection toward his disobedient Son that he could see nothing either of his deserts from him on the one hand or of his ungracious Sons demerits on the other or of his own too much indulgence to sin as if he hated it more and were better then his Father her prefixes an Ecce before all this heavy charge thus drawn out in length Lo these many years I serve thee neither at any time transgressed I thy Commandement and yet thou never gavest me a Kid to make merry with my Friends but as soon as this thy on was come who hath devoured or swallowed up thy living and there 's an emphasis in that word devoured as if he greedily like a glutton or drunkard without any regard of thee or what should become of thee or thy glory hath eaten or swallowed up all thy living and that with Harlots yet thou hast killed for him the fatted Calf Oh how blinde is Love and Charity how quick sighted how Eagle eyed jealousie and passion how eloquently can anger argue here 's nothing omitted that may exaggerate the Fathers over-sight in his indulgent carriage towards his returned Son as if his Father like some old blinde man had seen nothing but he sees all both for himself and against his Brother and as if his Father had been as injurious to him as fondly indulgent to his Brother if his stomack could bear it so to repute and call him but he will make his Father see how unequally he carried himself between them he therefore sets before him the years yea the many years service he had performed to him whereas so many years his other Son was run from him and had left him to look after his concernments himself for all him yea and the exactness of his obedience to him in all that time never at any time transgressing his Commandment whereas his brother on the contrary not only had not obeyed him but
also greedily with Harlots consumed his living and yet see how unequal the Father between them he in all those years never gave him a Kid which was far less then the fatted Calf though to eat in an honest way and to make merry not with Whores and Drabs but with his friends who he being so dutiful a Son could be no such lewd Varlots but persons of good fashion and honest reputation whereas on the other side his love was such to his other Son that notwithstanding all his badness disobediences and mis-spendings of his substance he could no sooner see him coming towards him but he runs to meet him and quicken him in his pace and instead of chiding him pitties and kisses him and kills the fatted Calf too so soon as he gets him home to feast him And had not this elder Son great reason 〈…〉 his Father and refuse to joyn 〈…〉 with him and his other Son and Servants in such a merry frollick so inconsiderately made as he hath represented it to him have we not many that are ready to be of his minde what when they have said their Prayers a thousand times over been good Church-men honest livers sober persons no Thieves Drunkards Whoremongers Harlots or wicked livers but have as they think served God justly accordingly to the laudible customs of the Church and perhaps also in private Prayers and Devotions hearing Sermons praying in their Families fasting as often and making as many and as long Prayers as the Pharisees strict and zealous in their conversations abstaining from all gross and known sins yet they could never be assured of Gods owning them nor meet with such ravishments of heart as to cause them to rejoyce much in God and to be willing to dye and depart this life and lo here or there a grat Sinner a Whore a Thief a Murtherer a wanton Person being convicted of their Sins and confessing their faults and crying to God for his Mercy listning to and imbracing his Gospel so inwardly filled with and outwardly testifying their sense of Gods love and exceeding comfort and consolation therein that they can glory in God as forgiving them their Sins have hope in their Death and talk of their assurance of Gods favour as if they had been all their lives Saints must not these either be deluded persons or what what shall we say or think of God but as those in Ezek. 18.25 That his wayes are unequal or as in Mal. 2.17 That every one that is evil is good in the sight of the Lord or else where is the God of judgement or judgement of God where the equity of his doings and proceedings with men But thou art holy O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel and wilt be justified in thy sayings and overcome when thou art judged Psal 22.3 and 51.4 stay then and let us see what the Father hath to say to his offended and discontented Son before we justifie his plea and pronounce on his side and that is held forth in the words that I have chosen herein to treat on as followeth CHAP. III. The Text Pharaphrased Verse 31.32 And he said unto him Son thou art ever with me and all that I have is thine It was meet that we should make merry and be glad for this thy Brother was dead and is alive again was lost and is found IT is a true saying of Solomon He that is first in his own cause seemeth just but his neighbour comes and searches him out Prov. 18.17 For here we have an answer confutes all the Son hath said in his passion and clearly evinces the equity of the Fathers carriage between them and of his thus entertaining his Son in his return And first here we may admire the Fathers meekness and gentleness towards a froward passionate Son in that he gives him no bad nor angry language He sayes not thou proud and insolent fellow that offerest to make thy self wiser then thy Father and liftest up thy self above him to call him him to an account and draw a charge against him for his actings as if thou wert wiser and of more authority then he whereas it s thy part and place to submit thy self to him and give him honour in judging him wise and righteous in his doings No such angry speech proceeds from him but only he gently calls him Son and gives him a fair answer to his charge and an account of his doings shewing the great condescension and goodness of God to his pettish people in their spiritual Distempers He sees his Son was in a passion and he would not take the course further to heat and inflame him but seeks to calm him like a loving Father who seeing his Childes Body over-heated and in danger to fall into a Feavour endeavours some wayes its prevention being wiser then his Son he sets not himself to answer him according to his childish folly but exercises love with judgement and discretion towards him and though his Son in his anger would neither vouchsafe to call him Father nor his Brother Brother yet he in whom fury is not but Love Meekness and Charity will not therefore disown or provoke him but pacifie and rectifie him and therefore calls him Son Oh the graciousness of God as a loving Father to froward and male contented Children especially while he sees their frowardness proceeds from ignorance weakness or the strength of temptation a pattern worthy imitation Be we followers of of God as dear children and walk we in love as Christ hath loved us c. Shall we weak purblinde and sinful men be froward with and harsh to our froward brethren when through temptation and weakness envyings swellings and discontents befal them when as our great God and Father is so graciously tender milde and gentle to such yea to our selves when so distempered and discomposed towards him But see again how blinde passion is though it seems to see very much yea and to see more then others that have not their hearts thereby heated and quickned to make diligent observation of things before them It is indeed quick-sighted of what makes for its nourishment and strengthning in its cause but while it looks upon all such things as it were through Multiplying and Magnifying Glasses and sees them more and greater then they be and so represents them it is so filled with the sight of them that it over-looks and sees not other things before it that judgement charity and right reason takes notice of and the sight whereof reduces the other things seen to their due scantling and proportion For the calm judgment and charity of the wise and patient Father the representative of the most wise and merciful God sees and observes here what the Son over-lookt and what might stop the mouth of his most clamorous passion He was Eagle-eyed to see yea more than was to be seen of his own service and obedience which yet in this his passion he shewed but little of but see not
fatherly authority though that might have been sufficient to have silenced him he also condescends to shew as all the way of the Gospel is a way of condescension that there is reason and equity in what he sayes and that he might see and be silenced and brought to submission he addes For this thy Brother was dead and is alive again was lost and is found Passion had blinded his reason and extinguished his affection to his poor Brother so as he took no notice of any relation between them and pride so transported him that he even scorned to see or own his relation This thy Son saith he to his Father as if he could be his Fathers Son and yet not his Brother or as if a brotherly relation was nothing to challenge and excite compassion love and affection to him Oh forsooth he was so holy just and righteous above his Father it seems that he disdained to own him for or call him his Brother though his Father had owned and called him Son as if he would have intimately said What should I own such a vagabondly Rogue or riotous Rascal or Whoremasterly Spend-thrift as this for my Brother As some such riotous livers amongst us in their own eyes would be ready to say of such though they have confessed their sins and been afflicted for them Should I believe that God will give pardon and peace and assurance so easily to such miscreants But the calm unpassioned and loving Father calls him to a calm remembrance that for all that whatever he had been or done he is yet thy Brother Hath not one God made us yea and of one mold and of the same blood whether Jews or Gentiles bond or free zealous or prophane yea did not one Christ dye for us and being called and brought to him to believe in him and submit to his grace are we not all in him that do so justified and made righteous and the children of God by the faith of Jesus whose blood washes away both the greater sins of the prodigal Spend-thrifts and the lesser murmurings and spiritual distempers of the self-over-weaning Saint or more righteous liver The same good Creditor forgave Simons fifty pence and the sinful womans five hundred Luke 7.41 42. and had it not been that he had forgiven both both might have gone to and lien in the prison neither having to satisfie what was owing Nay a Debtor that owes ten thousand Talents humbling himself to his Creditor and craving forgiveness and being forgiven may walk abroad boldly and look upon his Creditors face securely and confidently when he that owes but fifty pence taking his Brother that owes him less by the throat and being uncharitable to him and being not pardoned or forgiven his less debt by the Creditor may not dare to walk abroad or shew his head for fear of an arrest or be in so good a condition as the far greater Debtor that hath received a discharge for what was owing This thy Brother This was a particle of contempt in the Soâ— toward his Brother when he said This thy Son But a particle of Commiseration and moving to compassion in the Father when he saith This thy Brother as if he would say canst thou behold him and see him here present even this thy Brother so marvellously preserved and recovered and not commiserate him nor rejoyce for him Canst thou so far lay aside all natural affection and banish all remorse or joy from thine heart concerning him This thy Brother was dead was lost as if he would have said Thy evil eye is upon thy brothers doings but my good and merciful eye is upon his sufferings thou takest notice in thy pride envy and passion of what he acted and how he hath lived and aggravatest that to the heighth he ran away spent yea devoured my living and that with Harlots was a Rogue a Whoremaster or the like but my fatherly heart bleeds to think what a case he was in what miseries he met with what sorrows he sustained in his absence went not my heart after him where he went and did not mine eyes behold him under the fig-tree when he began to want and joyned himself as a Servant or an Apprentice to a Citizen of a strange Countrey he that was free born being brought into bondage and he that might have lived as well as thou being reduced to beggery I think upon his servile state and what drudgery work he hath been put to while thou hast lived like a Prince or Gentleman and seest not poverty or want I think on his base employment his hungry belly his ragged and naked back his pining griefs and pinching sorrows even unto phrensie distracting him so grievously that he knew not what he did nor whether he went my tender bowels rowl within me to think of these his sad sufferings yea and then was he most dead when he least see his danger and maddest when he was the merriest He hath eaten the fruit of his own wayes and been filled with his own inventions Thou hast lived pleasurably to him and knowest not what were the sad effects of his sinnings hadst thou thou wouldst have had more pitty on him and compassion towards him He is my Son but he was dead thy Brother and he was dead so great his sufferings sorrows and miseries as bereft him of all life and senses he was lost no where to be found in House or Fields till his own miseries that he pull'd upon himself fell so hard upon him as to make him remember himself and return to me I and thou might call him but he was out of the hearing of our voice My servants might call and seek him but he was gone and not to be heard of Thou lost nothing by serving me but he lost all he had yea himself was lost by deserting me and going from me didst thou lose but a Sheep or Kid thou wouldst resent it and be troubled for it yea thou takest it to heart that I have killed the fatted Calf and was one such creature more to thee then thine own Brother that was dead and lost Oh the mercies of God above our mercies to one another we see and note this and that evil such a one hath done but God knows the dangers they were in the sorrows of their hearts their secret sighs and groans the throbs and sobs that they have met with as the fruits of their sins when Gods Spirit hath been removed and withdrawn or driven from them by their iniquities and rebellions against him the bangs of Conscience and bleedings of heart the fears the despairs the inward horrors and outward feelings of correction sometimes upon them in losses poverty or the like the spiritual death and lostness of their souls from the feeling of Gods presence and the comforts thereof or any aptness or desire to any spiritual action and so the danger of being lost for ever These God hath his eye upon that we see not usually nor are apt
is great in power rich in glory in mercy in wisdom in love and goodness able to do all things good to all and his tender mercies over all his works bountiful to Servants that are but hirelings and serve him only for their own interests and rewards and may not abide in the house for ever being not made Sons How many hired Servants saith the Prodigal are in my Fathers house that have bread enough and to spare Luke 15.17 Yea good to his enemies loving them and doing good to all making his Sun to shine and rain to fall on the good and on the bad the unthankful and evil giving whole Lordships yea and Kingdoms of this world in his great bounty to them also that regard him not bâ—t hate him careful of the very inferiour creatures feeding the Ravens caring for the Fowls of Heaven even the little Sparrows five of which are sold for two farthings and not one of them is forgot before him Yea he giveth food to all flesh for his mercy endureth for ever If David counted it so great an honor and priviledge to be Son in Law to Saul an earthly and mortal King whose breath was in his nostrils and his power of narrow compass in comparison of Gods as well as his goodness Oh what may not a soul promise it self of felicity and happiness in being the Son the adopted and genuine Son of a King so great so full so good so free so liberal to and careful of all even of the worst men and creatures as God is what cannot what will not such a Father do for his Children especially such Children too as obey and abide with him Yea what may they not upon that consideration incourage themselves to look for and expect from him having also such an elder Brother with him as is infinitely perfect and dear to him to plead for them and take away the defects and sailings of their obedience towards him shall he be good to strangers provide for inferiour creatures give large crumbs and offals to dogs and birds and beasts and will he not give what is convenient to his children surely yes Shall he give good things to his enemies and neglect his children surely no. Surely he hath far better things for them then for any others not so near to him nor in such relation with him It is our Saviours argument Consider the fowls of the air for they sowe not neither do they reap nor gather into barns yet your heavenly Father feedeth them Mark the Emphasis Your Father and therefore loves you Your heavenly Father who in that he is heavenly is above all and hath all power and all creatures subject to him and in that he is heavenly is holy and pure from earthly affections as covetousness and other passions which our earthly Fathers are bemudded with He is your Father your heavenly Father yet he feeds them that are of no compare with him to you and to whom he owns no such relation shall he feed them and neglect you what earthly Father will do so to feed his chickens and forget or famish his children much less can or will your heavenly Father Matth. 6.26 and the like in Matth. 10.29 Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing and not one of them shall â—all to the ground without your Father as â—f he would say doth he that is so early related and dearly affected to you who stiles himself your Father and owns you as his Children take such care of so inconsiderable a creature as a sparrow two whereof are sold for a farthing and who are so infinitely below him that he stiles not himself in such a relation to them and can he neglect you who are his Children whom he hath so valued as to give a price greater then heaven and earth even his own Son for you Fear ye not therefore ye are of more value namely with him then many sparrows This then is a relation estating in such a condition as affords exceeding ground of highest confidence and greatest expectation in and through Christ in whom he makes and takes us for his Children of greatest advantages and fullest happiness and in the mean while of all that he that is so great and good can do for us and sees good and meet to be done Behold then what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us who are in Christ Jesus that we should be called the Sons of God Surely it s well worthy of our beholding for there is in it to be seen heighth and strength of love and affection and matter of marvellous consolation and in beholding this we may 2. Behold also how infinitely we are ingaged to God and to our Lord Jesus Christ to love and live to them to honour and glorifie them for what love was that that led the Father to give his only begotten Son to be the Son of Man and thereby exposed to all the miseries of man yea all that man by his sin had deserved as its just reward to be sustained and born by him that he might open the way from destruction to such an high priviledge as Son-ship to God by him and make him the root of it for and to us through what he hath done to him in the body he prepared and gave him could it be less then infinite love in him that moved him to design such exaltation of so base and vile creatures as we by the so great abasement of one so high and glorious as he and oh what love was that in Christ Jesus what grace what pitty what mercy and kindeness not to shrink back from the state of service to make us sons yea from the state of sin and death For he that knew no sin was made sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in him and died for all that through him we might attain such dignity and glory as cannot be valued by us how should it engage our hearts and affections to him and make us ready with all diligence to obey and live to him that to such and so glorious an end died for us and rose again For he was made under the Law for such as were under the Law as in a sense all were Rom. 3.19 that we being redeemed from the Law might receive the adoption of Sons Gal. 4.4 5. 2. Herein also we may see and be instructed into the way whereby sinners may be made the Sons of God even they that are not so but are the children of wrath For as Christ hath by his sufferings opened and made the way for it so he thereby as raised from the dead and taken up to glory in the nature of man and owned as the Son of God and glorified is become the root of Son-ship unto us as is said and therefore the way for us to be made the Sons of God is to receive and close with him the Son of God as God is commending him and setting him forth to us by
his Word and Spirit so to be diligent to hear and learn of him that being therein drawn we may come to and believe on him who cannot of our selves come to him nor have any way to be the Sons of God in truth but in and by him received and believed on as the Apostle James also instructs us when having said Of his own good will begot he us by the word of truth that we might be a kinde of first-fruits of his creatures to him James 1.18 19. Then he addes Let every one be swift to hear slow to speak and slow to wrath namely that so he also may be begotten of him to like priviledges In Gods drawing us then with the cords of love and bands of a man take heed of breaking his bands and casting his cords from us of closing the eye and stopping the ear and hardening the heart lest we should see with the eye and hear with the ear and be converted and Christ should heal us and advance us to so high favour and dignity and so we deprive our selves thereof but hear we his voice while its called to day and yield we to his drawings of us to believe in him obey we and follow we after the Holy Spirit sent forth in his Name with his Word and Doctrine to us to convince us of sin and glorifie him to us that in obeying his voice we may be led to him and knowing his name through his light and teaching we may by his renewing quickning vertue be framed and strengthned to believe in him John 6 45. and so being born of Water and of the Spirit may be made the Sons of God in him Phil. 9.10 John 3.3 3. Yea what ground of content with our conditions may we here see being brought into Christ and made thee Sons of God by faith in him what cause or ground is there for such to envy or murmur at others for being high born rich honourable or mighty in this world what 's all the dignity and happiness of the greatest Princes Children or of the wealthiest and most potent Monarchs in comparison of the happiness of those that have God for their Father and can truly say they are born of him How poor and sorry shadows are all titles excellencies and enjoyments to what this dignity admits to and to the substance that is therein should a Princes Son envy another because he is Son to the Mayor of some decayed Corporation or because he wears a few glittering brazen Buttons or silken Ribbands when he happily hath none such but hath that that is ten thousand times more precious on him Nay not only no ground to envy sinners but none to envy any other Sons of God or any of our Brethren for what have they right to but we have also the same having one Father and one infinite Inheritance in and with him all in common though we have not the same stature the same employments the same garb yet we have the same rich powerful and loving Father that is an impartial lover of his Children and designs to make them all his children in sharing his Inheritance amongst them or rather making each of them heirs of the whole ground here is of love rightly considered but of envy and fretting for the Fathers now smiling upon one rather then upon another none 4. Yea what folly and madness must they needs be guilty of that having in and through Christ way made and advantage afforded for attaining this dignity either take up so much content in being the children of some mortal rich or great ones or in having such earthy estates pleasures or fading enjoyments or else are so taken up with care to get and keep some earthy worldly things that will not either satisfie or save them that they utterly neglect and trample under feet like Swine or very luke-warmly and coldly seek after and so miss for want of more hearty seeking such a pearl of so infinite value as this is as if there were more in being the Sons or Daughters of Gentlemen Knights or Princes or more in a few perishing riches deceitful pleasures or empty titles or honours then in being the Sons of the highest and having his favour and affection placed for ever on us Sure this is great folly and madness and yet through the deceits of Sin and Satan it is most common 5. And how might it provoke such as are the Sons of God to cleave to and tarry at home as it were with him and to that purpose to beware of accompanying themselves with the world or being unequally yoaked and bound up with them lest they draw them into disobedience and rebellion and so to deprive themselves of the love and friendship of so high a Father and provoke his anger and displeasure against them but rather take the Apostles counsel and keep to it to Come out from amongst the world and be separate to God in Christ and not touch the unclean things the unclean principles or practices of the world that so God may receive them more and more as his and be their Father and they may be to him as Sons and Daughters Yea as obedient children not to fashion themselves to the lusts of their former ignorance but as he that hath called us is holy to be holy in all manner of conversation 2 Corinth 6.14 17 18. 1 Pet. 1.14 15 16 17. 6. And it may provoke them to behave themselves as the Sons of God and so 1. To be followers of God as dear children imitating him in love mercy and goodness as Ephes 4.32 and 5.1 2. Seeking to honour God as their Father in word and conversation Malachy 1.6 3. And to that end to live chearfully in God not giving way to or sinking under cares and fears c. Phil. 4 4 5 6. 1 Pet. 5.7 Luke 12.32 4. Loving their Brethren as Sons of God also with them Ephes 5.1 2. 5. Putting on and wearing such apparel as becomes such high born persons Putting on as the elect of God holy and beloved bowels of mercy meekness humbleness of minde c. Col. 3.9 10 11 12 13. 6. Living above the world and the things of it yea contemning such worldly lusts and delights as far below them 1 Pet. 2 11. Tit. 2.11 12. And great is the advantage of being obedient children to God and not running from him but living as his children with him as follows CHAP. VI. The second Branch opened and applied THOV art ever with me They that are obedient to God and Christ and depart not away through pride and folly from him have the advantage of being ever with him For God doth not as other Fathers sometimes do send away his Children to live from him they that forsake not him shall not be forsaken or thrust away by him They that come unto Christ and so unto God in Christ he will in no wise cast them away or lose them John 6.33 and 18.9 Other Fathers that have divers Children
and everlasting fire is theirs not they its to avenge them of their enemies the Devil and his instruments and all the evils that here did molest them and to give them infinitely more occasion and provocation for ever to admire his mercy towards them and bless him Psal 145.20 21. Luke 12.32 Mat. 25.35 36 41 46. Isa 66 2â— â—4 A marvellous full and glorious portion and such as passes understanding only there is this difference between the believers enjoyment of it now and hereafter now they have the title to it and the encouragement of the faith and hope of it and so much of it as they need and God sees good for them But hereafter they shall have all that shall be then to be had in the most full absolute and glorious sight and fruition of it Use 1. And the consideration of this with all before may serve 1. To move such to contentation with their condition for what can they want who have such a portion as God and all that are his to satisfie and save them The just shall live by faith and this is a truth to faith not to sense and in living by faith may abundantly and will administer content in every condition and Godliness with contentment is great gain The Lord is my shepheard saith David and thence infers I shall not want yea thence he had abundant experience of Gods provision for him and supplies of him and faithfulness to him in all cases and therefore concludes Surely mercy and goodness shall follow me all the dayes of my life Psal 23.1 6. as thence also or from the like consideration of Gods goodness and the blessedness of all that trust in him he exhorts and incourages others Fear ye the Lord ye holy ones for there is no want to them that fear him the Lions shall lack and be bit with hunger but they that seek the Lord shall want no good thing Psal 34.8 9 10. It s true the dispose of all is in the Fathers hand but he being wise and loving gracious and full of compassion and abundant in goodness and truth cannot nor will suffer his children at home with him to want any thing that may be good for them And it s but a childish humour from which its good that we be weaned to pet and cry and be froward for that that is not good but hurtful for us having all things that are our Fathers and he being free to afford out of it all good for us Be careful in nothing be peevish and discontent in nothing be not covetous of more then we have or of more then he thinks meet to give us into our possession and fruition but be we content with what we have for he hath said I will never leave thee no I will never forsake thee so that we may boldly say the Lord is our helper we will not fear what man can shall do unto us Heb. 13.5 6. Minding what we have in Christ and what ground of confidence that God will give us all things with Christ because he hath not spared Christ but delivered him up for us all let us through him be content with what he gives us either of outward supplies for this life or of spiritual gifts discoveries experiences comforts or the like waiting upon him to give us especially spiritual blessings and taking what he gives without envying at others or murmuring at him for what he gives them But 2. Oh the evil nature of envy frowardness pride and discontent though a man hath all things in Christ and God is faithful to give us all things with him as he sees we need and is good for us and though he gives abundantly like a Father to us yet the froward soul findes no good Prov. 17.20 Frowardness and discontent eats out the good of what we have and deprives us of the comfort of it rendring it as nothing to us and hinders us of what we might further have as being freely exposed to us as may be seen in Haman partly and in this elder Son Haman though he had Honour and Riches and Wife and Children the Favour of the King and as he thought of the Queen too yet the only want of a bow or prostration from Mordecai a slight from him marrs all the mirth from all other things What 's all this to me saith he when he had been telling his Wife and Friends of all his glory and happiness and enumerating all its several particulars so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the Kings gate such a viper is envy and discontent to eat out the bowels of them that breed and nourish it And what less or better here was the case of this Elder Son this righteous person leavened with the Pharisees leaven though all his Father had was his yet all that contents not because his Father had killed for his Brother the fatted Calf and therein testified his love to him and joy for him as if all was lost that fell besides himself But what was he like to lose his share in any thing because of because of his Brothers having part therein surely no. The fatted Calf was not taken from him by being killed for his Brothers welcome there was meat enough in it for him and his Brother too yea for the Father and Sons and Servants and all to feast on and if that could have been too little yet the Son needed not fear want the Father hath enough beside to maintain and satisfie him nor was his love the less to him by being testified thus to his Brother The same feast though made by occasion of his Brother and for his entertainment is free for him also and his Father had intreated him to come in and take part of it there was neither want in his Fathers love nor in the sufficiency of the chear to have made him as merry as his Brother and the rest that were making merry within It was only his own pettish humour and discontent causelesly at his Fathers dealing that was the let that he was not as merry and as well refreshed as any of them his Father would have had him come in and welcome and to be sure his Brother would have been glad to have seen â— much love and freeness in him towards him and all the servants would have liked to have had his company with them and as for the fatted Calf it was an everlasting dish that would have given him with all the rest full satisfaction it was spiritual and living meat like to or better then that the Jews call living water that is Spring-water that while its drawn out or received in its streams is not lessened by mens taking of it but runs still perpetually and increases in its running and meets the person that likes to use it and offers it self of its own accord unto him Such is living bread and meat like the meat in the miracle the loaves and fishes that multiplied in the eating of them increased
into that separation and with-drawing from his Father which brought upon him all this misery that befel him which now after so large a view taken of the elder Brothers state comes in the next place as the second Branch of this Text to be considered by us viz. CHAP. VIII The second state of wanderers from God in two Branches opened and applyed THE misery of departing and wandring from God implyed in these words This thy Brother was dead was lost a two-fold metaphorical expression to represent it by Let us briefly and but briefly consider them Branch 1. Was dead A sinner by leaving God and running after sin and Satan brings death upon himself becomes as a dead man So Solomon tells us too Prov. 21.16 He that wandereth out of the way of understanding shall abide in the congregation of the dead For as the Apostle saith also to the Believers Rom. 8.13 If ye walk after the flesh ye shall dye and it must needs be so for 1. With God is the fountain of life Psal 36.9 In his favour is liâ—e Psalm 30.5 and his eternal Word or Son is that eternal life that was with the Father in the beginning in whom was life and that was manifested in these last dayes more fully to us 1 John 1.2 with John 1 4. The Spirit of God is life and the spirit of life Rom 8.2.10 by whom God through Christ breaths in life and so this God this one Father Son and Spirit having life in himself gives life also to others as he pleases and hath given to all life and breath and all things and so in the beginning when he made man made him of the dust of the earth and breathed in him the breath of life and man became a living soul Gen. 2.7 both as his body and person was made alive in the world indued with breath sense motion and understanding and also as his soul or inward man being upright and having its dependance on God being in subjection to his Word and Spirit in his image and likeness and so in his favour while upright he was owned of him and in union with him and had peace and joy and spiritual life in himself as so deriving it from him but in departing from him his word and command which is life and tends to life also is death and man so doing he dyed Spiritually First as to the loss of the favour of God in which was his life and of his subjection to God and fellowship with his Word and Spirit the fountain and conveyor of life and he fell under his displeasure in and from which is death even the death of the spirit of man inasmuch as the favour and fellowship of God his Word and Spirit being withdrawn his life was withdrawn with them and inasmuch as it lay open to his anger to inflict misery upon it and so the inward state of the soul and spirit became unquiet dead without sense of the life of God the favour spirit and operations of his grace in it and was filled with fear shame guilt as the effects of the life withdrawn and misery deserved and exposed to and then bodily death as to its principles entred and so the sentence for dying at Gods pleasure bodily and for ever had not mercy looked upon man and prevented followed also Gen. 2.17 and 3.18 19 Rom. 5.12.18 2. But God rich in mercy looking back upon his prodigal Son man here devised his recovery and to that end sent his Son or Word that eternal life that was with him and made him flesh and in that flesh mortal and under the sentence of death that was upon man and accordingly delivered him up to death for our Sins who by his death destroyed him that had the power of death that is the Devil and swallowed up death from off the nature of man as it is in him and filled it with immortallity and eternal life so as he having dyed dyeth no more death hath no more dominion over him but the fulness of the God-head dwells in him bodily and all the fulness of his favour grace and blessing in which is life yea and the Spirit of Life is in and upon him so as he also in dying and by his death inasmuch as it was sustained by him for us even for all men hath obtained a release of all men from under that first Death and Judgement in which all universally and alike were condemned to dye as it did and must have stood upon us without his interposing and hath the ordering of Death and Grave and Hell in his hand and dispose with power and authority to bring us thereout and enliven and quicken soul and body yea and invest them with immortality and eternal life as pleases him he being in himself and for mankinde the resurrection and the life the deliverer and the raiser and the only ground or foundation cause and effector of the Resurrection in others either as to soul or body and the life quickning them and in which they being quickned live John 11.25 Yea in him is and God hath given to us even to the same us whom he commands to believe which is all men or men indefinitely eternal life so as that in partaking of him we partake of the Resurrection and are raised up in and by him in our spirits and partake of life spiritual life and so whosoever believeth in him though dead in himself is enlivened by him and shall live and being made alive in believing and going on yet to believe shall not dye shall not lose this life that he hath in and by him for ever but is alwayes in the raised state as to his state spiritually and shall be so at the last day bodily too and so alwayes in the favour of God in which is life in a justified state from sin and wrath curse and death and in a state of acceptation with God and heir-ship to the life promised further of God in and by him and hath his interest in and fellowship with God the fountain of life and the Spirit of God and its influences who is the Spirit of life and gives and upholds life as it is said He that hath the Son hath life and he that hath not the Son hath not life and so as all mankinde are in a released state from the destructiveness of the first death as in and of it self and in a possibility of life because in the hand of Christ where is life even spiritual and eternal life yea both for soul and body as in a root and fountain for them and communicable to them so all such of men as in hearing and receiving the Word and Doctrine of Christ which is called the word of life and life Acts 5.20 John 6.63 Prov. 4.13 because Christ objectively is in it as the matter of it set forth in and by it and his Spirit which is life and the Spirit of Life accompanies it and breaths in it are therein by the
Spirit quickned and raised to spiritual life endued with spiritual sense and perception of spiritual things and so of God and Christ and to spiritual breath and desires after them and motion towards them and in them and so spiritual understanding peace joy satisfaction according to the measure of Christ partook of by them but yet so as the room enlightned by the Sun retains its light by admitting that light from without into it so as if that be withdrawn and shut out the light within is gone or as the branch lives in the stock and root so as if it be separated therefrom it dies and withers so is it here The soul in thinking ro live on it self or what it hath in it self yea what life it hath received in it self from Christ and so with-drawing from Christ and from his Word and Spirit loses its life and dies as it lets slip departs from and rejects Christ or the Knowledge Faith and Spirit of God and Christ so it departs from and le ts slip its life Whence that of Moses Deut. 32.46 47. Set your hearts to all the words that I testifie amongst you this day for it is not a vain thing for you or an empty word for you for it s thy life and in this word as the Hebrew words are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 you shall prolong your dayes and so Prov. 4.13 Lay fast hold of instruction let her not go keep her for she is thy life and ver 23. Keep thy heart above all keeping or with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life and the Apostle John 2 John 9. tells us that He that transgresseth and abideth not in the Doctrine of Christ hath not God that is as by the opposition in the next branch of the verse appears the Father and the Son and so by consequent the Spirit of both they are strangers from the life of God and so without God and Christ in the world Ephes 4.18 and 2.12 and so they are dead 1. Spiritually as being deprived of spiritual life and destitute of it being in departing from the Word of God and obedience of the Spirit of Christ therein 1. Gone from Christ and his Spirit and the Spirit of Christ departed and gone from them as to any enlivening or living efficacies in them as a principle of spiritual life in them though in this there may be as a gradual departing from the word of God and from God and Christ and the Spirit therein so a gradual with-drawing and dying of the spiritual life in them as it is in the natural life when a man forsakes his meat that should preserve life in him yea and then 2. There is a spending consuming or dying of the spiritual gifts or efficacies of the Spirit of Life formerly infused and found in them though there may be for a time somewhat of these abiding as it is in a branch that though the life of it be gone yet something of the sap and greenness the effects of that life abide for a time and go away by degrees John 15.5 6. and as the heat in a dead body after the life and soul is gone yet something of the heat and warmth often abide that was the effect of the soul and life while there but that 's decreasing too and goes away at last and this may be signified in the Parable by the Prodigals spending his portion or substance in riotous living it was not all gone so soon as gone from his Father but it soon after went away and was spent though yet the rational sense as a man a natural man may abide and so he began to be in want he was sensible there was not that of gifts parts and graces fore-received from the Spirit of God as used to be but that there was a loss of those things and so of his comfort and hope springing from them they were gone but then 3. There is a senselessness of spiritual and divine things properly such and of his state in that respect no sight and view of the Glory of God that is in the face of Jesus nor of his excellencies and preciousness the Vertues of his Blood and Sacrifice no hearing of his Calls Counsels Instructions no spiritual hearing of his Voice when wholly gone from God and Christ he is deaf to all these things nor knows nor regards the meaning of them no taste and rellish of the Grace and Favour of God to and in his Spirit no sense and feeling of the joyes of Gods Salvation and the workings and breathings of his Grace in him Prov. 23.35 nor of his judgements upon him no savour or taste of his graciousness nor smell of his ointments could he but finde gifts or parts or some such things or have but the love respect or favour of such as admired him before it s all he desires is sensible of the want of or troubled about 4. There is no breath no spirit in any of his profession if the carkass of that remain an outward form of godliness there may be and of religious acts but no breath in them no divine force power or vertue from Christ as the body without the spirit is dead so faith without the works of it or that works nothing in the soul or upon others is dead James 2.26 Nor is there any inward spiritual breathing after God or towards him as is seen in the Parable where when the Prodigal began to be in want he hath no sense or remembrance of his Father or Fathers house nor desire after it but all spiritual things being gone he goes further from his Father and joyns up himself to a Citizen of that Countrey puts himself servant or an Apprentice to his lust or to Satan wholly to be given up and be at the beck thereof and to seek satisfaction in and from it as the Apostle saith His servants ye are to whom ye obey whether of sin unto death or of obedience unto righteousness Rom. 6.16 and so he only savors the things of the flesh now and desires the husks that the Swine feed on which this Citizen set him to keep even such things as bruitish men delight and rejoyce in and have their comforts from Nor 5. Is there any motion God-ward in him no creeping stirring much less going towards him in his heart or spirit but as a Swine-heard a moving only as a rational or bruitish man after the Swine and their husks after and with evil sensual and wicked persons but as no thought or desire after so no seeking to go to his Father till he came to himself from out of that spiritual swoon or death as we often finde the Scripture tells us the way of sinners is that being gone from God when they fall into misery or want yet they return not to God that smites them nor seek healing and help in Christ but run after dead works or empty lying vanities asking counsel but not of God and covering with a cover but
meet him and falls upon his neck and kisses him Oh hasty Father and too passionately fond thinks his Pharasaical Son to shew so much love before no more humbling He was not yet fallen on his knees scarce and behold his Father falls upon his neck He had not yet confessed his sins only says he would and the Father prevents him with his compassion and before he could utter all he had to say calls for the fatted calf and the best robe to feed and cloth him and therefore he hears of it afterward As soon as this thy Son was come that hath devoured all thy substance with harlots thou hast killed for him the fatted calf And so how apt are we to say Oh! they must be soundly humbled before we may shew them any hopes of mercy towards them and yet indeed its hope of mercy here that humbled him yea the best and sweetest humbling is after the receit of mercy Then Mary loved much and wept much when much was forgiven Luc. 7.47 and so in Ezeck 16.60 61 62 63. when God remembers his Covenant with adulterous and idolatrous Jerusalem and makes an everlasting Covenant with them then she shall remember her ways and be ashamed c. yet if God speedily comfort men we are ready to say it was some delusion they were not humbled enough But what is that that men call humbled enough I fear as some are not humbled and ashamed for their sins so some may mistake and idolize it If by being humbled enough they mean so as to give satisfaction for their sins or make an amends for them that 's an enough that none can attain to and therefore Christ humbled himself to death the death of the Crosse for us Philip. 2.7 and was not he humbled enough for us think we it is upon the account of his humiliation and not of ours that God receives satisfaction and forgives us None can be sufficiently humbled for the least abuse of any mercy to deserve the forgiveness of it thereupon but in Christ God is the best estimator of our being humbled so as to be fitted to receive what Christ's humiliation and sufferings for us have purchased and he seems to men sometimes to accept of a small measure or time of humbling as the instances before recited make manifest And if God speak peace to any upon short and slight humbling to appearance yea or when he sees us go on frowardly turning aside in the way of our 〈◊〉 if he see our way and heal us and create the fruits of his lips peace to us as Isa 57.17 18 19. seems to import who or what are we that we should limit or fault the Holy One When God comforts any how can they be dejected would we have them play the hypocrites to humour us counterfeit terrour and dejection when God speaks peace to them surely no. Again we vain creatures are apt to judge of mens being humbled by the outside the sad countenance plenty of tears sorrowful tones wringing of hands c. but God sees the heart And God that knows the heart bare them witness says Peter speaking of the Gentiles so suddainly in their uncircumcision received in by him And indeed we may find the Scriptures mention persons as well humbled and so as God counts them meet to be comforted When 1. They having sinned do or are willing to ingenuously confesse and not hide cloke extenuate or plead for their sin and filthinesse and turn from them So in Prov. 28.13 He that bideth his sins shall not prosper but he that confesseth and forsaketh them finds mercy And in 1 Joh 1.9 If we confesse our sins God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness Though this confession as to particulars is not needful to be made publike to all men but to God I said I would confesse my sins to the Lord and thou forgavest me Psal 32.5 and in some cases to some faithful men Jam. 5.16 that are concerned and the heart made free to 2. When they see themselves so vile and their sins so hainous that they cannot take comfort in any of their confessions weepings humiliations fastings but go out of all to the grace of our Lord Jesus and his precious blood Psal 51.1 2.7.16 17. And indeed they are proud persons that have their hope in other things as their weepings humiliations c. for they think so well of themselves as to conceive some excellency in such their acts that they may do something in their worthiness with God to procure his acceptance of them It 's a greater act of humility or humiliation to see such emptiness or nothingness in them all as to disown any resting in them or comfort from them but only to hope in the mercy of God and the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ And 3. In case God lead them out to sorrows and griefs bring shame and sufferings upon them to be willing to yield our selves to God To be afflicted and mourn and weep Jam. 4.9 Accept the punishment of ones iniquity and bear the indignation of the Lord till his wrath be past as having sinned against him Mic. 7.8 9. This God himself makes the character of an humble heart in his sight when in the view of him the uncircumcised heart is humbled and they accept of the punishment of their iniquity confessing that they have walked contrary to God and he hath walked contrary to them Lev. 26.40 41 42. and that was the great act of Christ's humbling himself for us that he accepted the punishment of our iniquity and yielded up himself to bear it quietly not repining or grudging thereat And here also in this Parable the Prodigals humiliation appears in this chiefly that rising and coming to his Father he confesses his sin submits himself to bear the shame of having his Father or Servants see his poor estate and to be in any place how mean soever that his Father would put him in though of an hired servant so he might but be received And surely when we finde any that have been great sinners turned in from their evil ways confessing their sin and vilenesse and submitting to the grace of Christ to seek their absolution rest and righteousnesse there submitting themselves to walk in his ways and bear his chastisements and if in so doing yea though there be some imperfections in their so doings they meet with refreshings and rejoycings in God and Christ and in the riches of his grace we may rejoyce in their behalf as here the family are called upon by the Father Let us make merry and be glad Though others that are prophane scoffers may take occasion from such falls and miscarriages of professors of the truth to jear and blaspheme for which and for whom we have cause in such cases to be sad and grieved and others take occasion thereby to abuse God's goodnesse and mercy to such to harden themselves in sin for whom we
and Servants at a greater distance this belonged to Israel alone Psal 147.19 20. and 148.14 yet in this he bound not his own hands but that in case these his adopted children or houshould servants rebelled against him and would neither by mercies and lenity nor by his threatnings and punishments be reclaimed he might harden and give them up yea and cut them off and destroy them as any of the other Nations about them and call in others into their places as he pleased Even as Solomon suppose chose himsef houshold-servants who had great priviledges so as to be pronounced happy in them because they might stand before him and bear his wisdome so as his remote subjects could not though he was good and just to them also yet he was at liberty for all that choise to cast off or put to death any of those his servants as well as others in case they lifting up themselves in pride should rebel against him and might have taken out of his remoter subjects whom he had pleased the dispose of honours being not of any of the servants however forward or obedient but of himself the Lord though to such as were ready to obey he would be ready to give good honours and rewards as he saw fitting So was the case here as the proposals of his choice honours by him of whom the dispose is even him that shews mercy and not of any that wills or runs for them upon condition of their obedience to be continued to them and his threatningt of destruction otherwise and to call in and honor those that were not a people into their place evince see Exod. 19.5 6. Deut. 7.10 11 12. and 8.19 20. and 28.1 13 43 44. and 32 21. with Rom. 10.19 though yet out of love to their Fathers he ingaged that he would not utterly cast away all their seed but reserve a remnant always with whom he would take pains as it were further and use means still to reclaim them to obedience and being made obedient receive them into favour again see for this Jer. 30 11. and 46.28 Zech. 13.8 9. with Rom. 11.28 and in all this he exercised and still exerciseth such power over men as a Potter over his clay framing them in his providential government one to honour and another to dishonour executing wrath also on one when fitted to destruction and shewing mercy and long-suffering to another and so having mercy on whom he will have mercy and hardâ—ning in their sins and rebellions whom he will and so he hath had mercy now on us Gentiles and framed us to honour even the honour fore-given to Israel as to many things in it having called us into their place and hath shewed severity to them giving them up to hardness and blindness and framing them to dishonour because of their unbelief and stumbling at Christ Rom. 9.30 31 32 33. and 11 20. though yet he hath not so rejected them but that the Apostle still prayed for them and endeavoured even for such as had stumbled that they might be saved Rom. 10.1 and 11.14 telling us they have not stumbled that they might fall â—nd that God is able to graft them in again â—â—d will if they continue not in unbelief nor hath he so honoured us but that if we continue not in his goodness we also shall be broken off Chap. 11.11 23 24 That 's the substance of those two too much mistaken Chapters of Rom. 9. and 11. and what I have here said of them agrees with the other Scriptures 3. Now in all this God still reserves the dignity of giving eternal life to Jesus Christ only to which he hath chosen in him from before the foundations of the world all that are or come to be and abide in him through the prevailing force of his grace with them chusing culling and bringing them out of the world into him or daining framing and disposing their hearts to eternal life and so to believe on him for it whither they be of the Jews or Gentiles the honoured or dishonoured vessels 2 Tim. 2.21 as it is said Know ye that God hath set apart for himself that is to be holy and blameless before him in love so as all the chosen into the former priviledges of the visible Church are not the man that is Godly Psal 4.3 typified in Isaac Gal. 4.23 28 31. Eph. 1.4 rejecting all that refuse and disobey Christ whither Jews or Gentiles whither they be workers for life according to any law of works and rejoycers in their fleshly priviledges of whom Ishmael was a type Gal. 4.22 23 24 25. or prophane abusers of the goodness and grace of God typified in Esau Heb. 12.16 17. and therefore it behoves thee and all men to come to Christ and to his grace wherein the Election is For 4 As salvation comes of the Jews by Gods Election and hath in it blessing for all the families of the earth so from that even from Christ who is Gods salvation to the ends of the earth Isa 49 6. none in Scripture language are called Reprobate till through their willful resistances against the light truth and grace of God extended to them through Christ all means used towards them becoming ineffectual God gives them up and leaves striving with them as Psal 81.10 11 12 13. Jer. 6.8 8 29 30. Rom. 1.21 24 28. 1 Thes 2.10 11 12. for Christ that blessed seed and Gods salvation hath dyed and therein given himself a ransome for all and tasted death by the grace of God for every one and is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world 2 Cor. 5.14 15 1 Tim. 2.6 Heb. 2.9 1 Joh. 2.2 And God himself who cannot lye hath sworn as he lives that he hath no pleasure none neither secret nor revealed in the death of the wicked by his still sinning but rather that he should turn and live and therefore calls such even the worst of sinners the simple scorners fools that hate knowledge and such as disobeying these his calls to the end shall perish and he will laugh at the destruction of saying Turn ye at my reproofs behold I will pour out my spirit to you and make known my words Isa 55.7 Exek 33.11 Proc. 1.22 23 24 25. Thence doth Paul the Apostle of the Gentiles tell us that God wills that all be saved and come to the knowledge or acknowledgment of the truth which in a measure therefore at all times he was making known to and in the heathens so as they of them also that rebelled were without excuse Rom. 1.18 19 20 21. with 2.22 14 15 he being one God both of Jews and Gentiles and having constituted one Mediator of God and Men indefinitely the man Jesus Christ even him who hath given himself a ransome for all a testimony in due or in their proper seasons whence those frequent calls of all Nations all the earth to make a joyful noise to God serve him with gladness enter his Courts
or tookno notice of his better condition and greater obligements through his Fathers love and freeness towards him which therefore the loving meek and wise Father for curing of his distemper mindes him of saying Son thou art ever with me and all that I have is thine and what 's a Kid or a fatted Calf to an Inheritance that in his distemper was forgotten by him Peevish frowardness and passionate envious distempers are no good guides or counsellors for us to listen to or to be led by in our judgements or goings they see where they should be blinde and are blinde where they should see It is not for us to take notice of our services and obedience but God who is the wiser and best estimator of them and will not undervalue or underweigh them one grain nor come short in the least reward of any thing truly acceptable in them but is ready to reward them like a bounteous King so as to shew his riches of liberality far above any inward excellency they have in them It is for us and more behooful and profitable to minde and take notice of his love and goodness to us to quicken us up to and in our duties and obedience and to preserve us from proud and haughty miscarriages and froward repinings and murmurings at his dealings with us or others The minding Gods goodness to us will beget and nourish love and obedience in us to him and then we shall not need to minde how dutiful and obedient we are to him but rather shall see cause to confess our selves in all we do unprofitable servants to him that have done nothing but what his goodness already extended challenges and makes due from us and so that we cannot challenge any thing of due debt or merit further from him yet he will also such his goodness minde to reward us with rewards undeserved by us and exceeding glorious But as this proud and froward distemper made him overlook the goodness of his condition with his Father and his obligations to him so it blinded him also from seeing what was meet to be done for and toward his returned Brother and the equitableness of his Fathers carriage towards him which therefore his Father to cure him and argue him by reason and judgement out of his distemper mindes him of also It was meet that we should make merry and be glad That by his fatherly authority and wisdom he layes down as a certain truth to be received and believed by his Son as an Oracle proceeding from his more perfect understanding and unerring wisdom teaching his Son who in duty ought to hear his Fathers Instruction about what was meet and not to take upon him to correct his Father and be an instructor and teacher to him The over-eying and over-weaning of our graces services doings duties c. are very apt to yea very certainly and necessarily do puff us up with spiritual pride and that lifts us out of our places and makes us ready to disanul Gods Judgment and condemn the Almighty to justifie our selves and make our selves righteous As God sayes of Job sinning in that way of sin through that root of spiritual pride Job 40.8 and instead of learning of God and Christ to lift up our selves against them quarrel with them and set our selves to inform and teach them doing as St. Peter dâ—… who after he had heard Thou art 〈◊〉 and I will give to thee the Keyes of the Kingdom of Heaven by and by lifted up himself as high as the Pope would be upon that Scripture lifted up by men to after and correct his Masters sayings and doings going therein before him and not coming after him him as Disciples and learners use to do to their Masters Mat. 16.18 19 22 23. yea taking him aside and rebuking and advising him as if his Keyes of the Kingdom gave him authority over him and his Doctrine too as the Pope practices upon that pretence with Christ and his Institutions thereby proving himself to be and to deserve the name of a Satan as Christ gave to St. Peter upon that account and we may very safely by the by observe this truth that while the Pope or any else under pretence of having the Keyes of the Kingdom given them do take upon them to alter and correct Christs sayings or doings his Ordinances and Institutions as they do in the order and manner of the Sacrament of the Lords Supper amongst other things coming in with their non abstante though Christ ordered thus yet that notwithstanding we order it otherwise though Christ ordered and the Apostles practised the receit of the Supper in both kindes yet we for all that order it to be received in one kinde only though God hath forbidden the worship of Images and Christ came not to dissolve his Fathers Laws yet we command them to be made and worshipped c. While I say the Pope and his Councils or any else do thus they are so far from being the Rock Foundation or the Head of the Church that they are Satans enemies and adversaries to Christ and his Church and so plainly Antichrists Yet this the pride of gifts places offices and services puffs up men too usually to But the Father would have his froward Son here reduced into better order and as Christ said to Peter come behinde him and hear and learn of him not argue against him and rebuke him as here he did opposing his Fathers practice and order of making merry for his lost Son found again It was meet that we should make merry and be glad Prepare a feast for mirth and make mirth outwardly at it and be glad too inwardly and in heart But he doth not only instruct him and teach him or by his Fatherly wisdom and authority dictate so much to him but also demonstrates the truth of his doctrine by solid and sound reason that he might as well inform his judgement and make him see the truth of his saying with his own eyes or understanding as it were as well as assure him of it upon his own authority and the authority of his saying which ought for it self to be received because he is the Lord though he gave us no other account of it and indeed this is one great difference between the Law and the Gospel The Law delivers precepts from God barely upon the account of his authority Thou shalt do or not do thus for I am the Lord But the Gospel insinuates things to us and perswades us to them by reason as laying down the grounds and reasons why that we might offer to God A reasonable service Rom. 12.1 whence also as Christ is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by a name signifying not only word but reason John 1 1. So they that believe not the Gospel are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Absurd or unreasonable men 2 Thess 3.2 and so I say here the better to convince him that he doth not impose upon him meerly by his
counsel c. So also in Psal 25.12 Who is the man that feareth the Lord him shall he teach the way that he shall chuse and again I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way that thou shalt go I will guide thee with my eye c. Psal 32.8 and again In all thy wayes acknowledge the Lord and he shall direct thy paths Prov. 3.6 and this also is an exceeding benefit and advantage we being childish foolish and apt to mistake in our wayes designs and undertakings and of our selves to chuse what would hurt us 3. His help and assistance in all services and difficulties Let your conversation be without covetousness for he hath said I will never leave thee nor forsake thee so that we may boldly say infers the Apostle from thence the Lord is my helper c. Heb. 13.5 6. A mighty powerful helper being God Almighty and of his help his obedient Children may be secure through Jesus Christ covering the imperfections of their obedience and pleading for them for help for them because he is their loving merciful Father and he helps 1. By his Word and Spirit therein incouraging them to and in their services and sufferings to do and bear what he calls and leads them to and that 's a good help in any work or combat to have a loving Father and one of authority and power standing by us and heartning of us as it were countenancing us by his presence and speaking comfortably to us and so doth God to his obedient Children as we finde him to Israel Deut. 31.3 4 6. The Lord will go over before thee and destroy these Nations from before thee Be strong and of a good courage fear not nor be afraid of them for the Lord thy God he it is that doth go with thee he will not leave thee nor forsake thee So also to Joshuah he himself saith the like Josh 1.6.7 Be strong and of a good courage for unto this people shalt thou divide the land for an inheritance c. Have not I commanded thee Be strong and of a good courage be not afraid neither be thou dismayed for the Lord thy God is with thee whither soever thou goest ver 9. And we may see the like to Gideon in Judg. 6.14.16 and to Jeremy Jer. 1.7 8. and to Ezekiel chap. 2.6 7. and 3.8 9. and in a word to all that wait on and hope in him as Psal 27.14 Wait on the Lord be of good courage and he will strengthen thine heart wait I say on the Lord and Psal 31.24 Wait on the Lord and he shall strengthen your hearts all ye that hope in the Lord so also in Isa 41.10 14. Fear not for I am with thee be not dismayed for I am thy God I will strengthen thee yea I will help thee yea I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness fear not thou worm Jacob. Yea he will have his Servants also to incourage them as in Isa â—5 4 Say to them that are of a fearful heart Be strong c. and so he comforts them in their griefs John 14.16 17. 2. By his Word and Spirit putting in strength into them both for doing and suffering his will and pleasure as Psal 138.3 In the day that I cried thou answeredst me and strengthnedst me with strength in my soul So God dealt with Daniel chap. 10.18 19. One like the appearance of the Son of man Christ touched him and strengthned him and said O man greatly beloved or man of desires fear not peace be to thee be strong yea be strong and when he had spoken unto me saith Daniel I was strengthned and said Let my Lord speak for thou hast strengthned me and so the Apostle Paul saith I can do all things through Christ that strengthneth me Phil. 4.13 3. By his hand and power the force of his Grace and Spirit or also the operations of his providence working with them and doing their work for them and therein helping them both 1. In carrying on their work and business as 1 Cor. 15.10 I laboured more abundantly then they all yet not I but the grace of God that was with me and so he answered Paul in his temptations and under the feelings of the buffetings of the messenger of Satan desiring to be freed of them My grace is sufficient for thee for my strength is made manifest in weakness 2 Cor. 12.9 His right hand also and glorious power fought for Israel against their enemies brought them in and planted them in the land of promise For they got not the Land in possession by their own sword neither did their own arm save them but Gods right hand and his arm c. Psal 44.3 Acts 23.11 12 16 17 18 19 c. and he helped Paul not only by incouraging him and strengthning his soul but also in ordering by his providence that his Sisters Son should hear of and discover the plot of those that conspired against him and moved the chief Captains heart to secure him from them 2. In keeping off and obstructing what might obstruct their work or oppress or overwhelm them in their suffering as in the now mentioned instance is also to be seen and so also it is said The wicked watcheth and seeketh to slay him but the Lord will not leave him in his hand nor condemn him when he is judged Psal 37.32 33. and Surely the wrath of man shall praise thee and the remainder thereof thou wilt restrain He will cut off the spirit or anger of Princes he is terrible to the Kings of the earth Psal 76.10 12. So he suffered no man to harm the Patriarchs he rebuked Kings for their sakes dried up the Sea and cut off the waters of Jordan before his people and many the like 4. His care and providence for the Children lay not up for the Fathers but the Fathers for their Children and he being both a great and good Father and they being with him on his side and at home with him he will take care of them as a Father of his obedient Children Whence it is said Let your moderation be known to all men the Lord is at hand In nothing be careful but in all things make known your requests to him by prayers and supplications with thanksgivings and the peace of God that passeth all understanding shall guard your hearts through Christ Jesus Phil. 4.6 7. And again cast thy burthen upon the Lord he will sustain thee Psal 55.22 And Cast all your care on the Lord for he careth for you 1 Pet. 5.7 And the Lord is my shepheard I shall want nothing he makes me lie down in green pastures and leads me by the still waters c. Psal 23.1 2. Yea He is a sun and shield and will give grace and glory and with-holds no good thing from them that are upright with him 5. His infinite sweetness satisfactions joy and pleasures for in his presence is fulness of joy and at his right hand
pleasures for evermore therefore it is also said O how excellent is thy loving kindeness O Lord therefore the sons of men put their trust under the shadow of thy wings they shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of thy house and thou shalt make them drink of the rivers of thy pleasures for with thee is the fountain of life Psal 16.11 and 36.8 9. See also Psal 65.4 5. though the dimness of our sight and the vail that is over our eyes hinders our full sight and knowledge of him and so deprives us while here of that fulness of satisfaction that is in him Object But some may say Oh but we see Gods people fall into troubles and wants oftentimes what meant Asaph else to complain that he was plagued all the day long and chastned every morning and yet he was one that cleansed his heart and washed his hands in innocency as Psal 73.13 14. tells us And did not Lazarus beg at the rich mans door though afterward carried into Abrahams bosom Luke 16. and are they not often poor in this world that are rich in faith James 2.5 Answ True but yet in all this God defends and helps them and they want no good thing nor sustain any evil that walk uprightly with him for as 1. Oftentimes his children that sustain such things bring it upon them by departing from him running themselves into mischief and misery as the prodigal and then they may fault themselves and the case is not the same we speak of So 2. When such things befal upright and obedient ones it is but for tryal of them their faith patience submission love and other vertues and for the exercise of them that they might be intire and want nothing James 1.2 3 4. 1 Pet. 1.6 7 8. and then in these things also they prove and try the faithfulness of God and finde him nigh to them to defend counsel incourage help supply and satisfie them with himself Yea 3. These are of those things that he sees good and not hurtful for them and therefore also in love and faithfulness to them orders to befal them as means of brighting purifying and profiting them many wayes as Psal 119.74 75. Prov. 3.11 12. Heb. 12.6.7 As it is said By this shall the iniquity of Jacob be purged and this is all the fruit to take away their sin Isa 27.8 9. And the Apostle saith in these chastisements He doth all things for our profit that we might be made partakers of his holiness Hebrews 12.10 So that as washing is sometimes needful for the best Linnens and the Plough and Harrow for the best Earth and the fining Pot for the best Silver and the Furnace for the choice Gold and the Flail and Fan for the best Corn and the Rod for the best Children so are these tryals for Gods best Children here yea the Lord himself in whom was no sin went not unto his Glory but through sufferings in which he never fails his obedient ones nor suffers them to miscarry Object 2. But do not such holy ones also sometimes complain that God is far from them though they walk with him as Psal 10.1 and 22.12 Answ Even from such he may seem to their senses to be far off sometimes when as yet in truth he is nigh to them as when Christ complained that he was forsaken of his Father yet even then he upheld him Compare Psal 22.1 with Isa 42.1 As sometimes the indulgent Mother to try the Childes behaviour and how it will look for and prize her presence will hide her self behinde the Wall or Curtain and while the Childe calls and cryes and seeks her and yet neither can see nor hear her he concludes she is gone away and is at a great distance when yet all the time perhaps she is both within the sight and hearing and reach of her Childe and though she try it will suffer it to take no harm even so God is a God that sometimes hides himself and yet even then is the God of Israel and his Saviour nigh at hand to all that call upon him that call upon him in truth and in his due time discovers his nighness also Isa 45.15 17. Psal 34.17.18 and 145.18 19. Use 1. This truth thus cleared then represents it an excellent thing to be a dutiful and obedient childe of God and not depart from or rebel against him seeing all that are dutiful are so with him nigh to him have fellowship with him are in him even in his arms and bosom in his choice love and affections and he nigh to them in all they stand in need of and call upon him for to protect counsel incourage help care for and satisfie them who can express how rich a vein this is of strong comfort and consolation if minded by them and they judge not after sense and flesh but faith and spirit therein Oh what a ground of peace security and tranquility of spirit is this where enjoyed and minded how indeed may they worthily let their moderation in their desires cares fears griefs appear to all men seeing they have God so nigh them and how well may they be without carefulness and be filled with peace and confidence being with such a Father and ever too with him Phil. 4.5 6 7. What cause have they of discontent or frowardness and fretting at the worlds portion that are strangers from God and in their fulness otherwise have not him with them nor are they with him but against and far from him Alas their portion is sad For all they that be far from him shall perish and he will destroy all that go a whoring from him Psal 73.27 either in mercy as to their peace comforts designs delights here that they might not rest content in them but seek him and his name that they might have him for their portion to delight in or else if that will not do it but they yet persist in their whoredoms from him destroy them in fury in and with their sins for ever and then as the Psalmist notes how sad is their portion They are set in slippery places and God casts them them down from all their riches pomp dignity into destruction and then how are they brought into desolation as in a moment they are utterly consumed with terrors but great peace have they that love Gods law and nothing shall offend them minding the happiness of their condition they need envy none no nor any of their brethren because of any parts or gifts or places in which they may have more then they for they have their Father alwayes nigh them and their nighness to him is alwayes for good for the chiefest good to them through Jesus Christ whose blood cleanseth them from all sin Indeed there is not a just man upon earth that doth good and sinneth not The best have their passions and their affections apt to be disordered their mixtures their mistakes their failings so that should God enter into judgement
he was a rich creature and in honour with him But man being in honour did not consider so as to resist the temptation of the wicked one but being drawn by him into rebellion against his Maker because he forbad him the tasting of one Tree planted in the pleasurable Garden into which he put him he forfeited all that God bestowed upon him yea both mental and bodily endowments of excellency nay his very life and being and all the whole Creation given him and deserved to have been thrust back into his own nothing again or rather with the Serpent into Hell and destruction far worse then nothing Poor man But oh the riches of the mercy of the Lord that was not well pleased to see his creature man so poor but devised a way how to set him up and inrich him again and to that purpose sent forth his rich Son the Lord in heaven the maker and heir of all things and by making him one with the nature of man made him in the poverty of man that by laying down his infinite riches for man as a price of his redemption yea his rich and precious life as man he might redeem man and inrich him again and so it is said Ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ one with his Father complying with and yielding to him in that design that he being rich became poor for your sakes that ye through his poverty might be made rich 2 Cor. 8 9. But how 1. He that made himself or became poor in man made man even the manhood in himself the man Christ Jesus infinitely rich in God by so great a price as so impoverished him having satisfied Justice fulfilled Truth paid the Debt of Man overcame and got the better of what impoverished him having wrought himself out of it as it were and being raised again he was taken up to the Throne of God and accounted of God his Father as he is also judged to be by Men and Angels worthy to receive and be filled with the unsearchable riches of God So in Rev. 5.11 12. The Angels about the Throne with the Beasts and Elders pronounce Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honour and glory and blessing Yea God and all his fulness is given wholly to him All the fulness of the God-head dwells bodily in him The Father is in him and he in the Father his God his Father the Spirit is upon him his Spirit the Spirit of Christ The Angels of God minister to him and attend upon him his Angels and the Angels of his might Heaven is his Throne yea the heaven and heaven of heavens is the Lords and the earth is his too and all the fulness thereof the world and all that dwell therein yea all power in heaven and upon the earth is given to him Mat. 28.19 The Father hath loved the Son and given him all things John 3.35 So that here we may say in the first place now Lord what is man that thou takest knowledge of him and the Son of man that thou makest such account of him and so the Apostle applies it Heb. 2.6 7 8. And so here in the first place as in the root and foundation all that God hath is mans and man is ever with him the Son of God 2. Through him God makes known himself to other men for he is the light of the world the true light enlightening every one coming thereinto and as God hath done all that he hath done to him in abasing and glorifying him for mans sake and ovt of love and pitty to man and desire of his good Oh the riches of his love and mercy to fallen man God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son and herein is love not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his only begotten Son to be the propitiation for our sins John 3.16 1 John 4.10 So he hath in him thus inriched and glorified having by his death and sufferings ransomed man from death and destruction into his dispose wonderfully provided for man even prepared all this infinite fulness in his Son as God-man as an infinite treasury for the inriching of man for the Grace the remission of Sins the redemption from Thrall the fulness of Spirit and all spiritual blessings in him and possession given him it is for us men and for our Salvation and inriching but so to be enjoyed as only in and with him to whom therefore God calls and draws men both by the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long-suffering leading men to repentance Rom. 2.4 5. and by the unsearchable riches of Christ as preached in the Gospel to men inviting and alluring them to him that they might be saved by him and inriched with him Ephes 3.8 with Rom. 1 16. 1 Cor. 1.23 2 Cor. 8 9. and they that hereby are begotten to receive him and knowing his name trust in him as they in and through him receive the priviledge of Sons so being made in him the sons of God they also by vertue of him and in him become the heirs of God both as their Father and as their Inheritance joynt heirs with Christ sayes Rom. 8.16 17. for as the Father hath loved the Son so he again loves his Disciples that believe in and follow him and makes and owns them as his Friends and Brethren And as God gave him all things that were and are his so he again gives all his things and they are all things to his brethren All things are yours 1 Cor. 3.21 22. and so the beggars are lifted out of the dust again and the needy from the dunghil and set upon the throne with Princes not the Princes of this world who perish but which is far more excellent with the Princes of his people whose Kingdom shall endure for ever James 2.5 Psal 113.7 8. praised be the Lord though oftentimes they be in appearance as Princes disguised in Beggars habit and state as having nothing and yet possessing all things 2. Cor. 6.10 going on foot while servants even to Sin and Satan ride on horseback Eccles 10.7 This indeed is a mystery that the world sees not because they have not faith and therefore not understanding of it they slight it but the holy Spirit of Truth asserts it All things are yours whether Paul or Apollo or Cephas or world or life or death or things present or things to come all are yours But how theirs 1. Not as to actual possession fruition and enjoyment of all in their own persons and comprehensions for the Kingdom is not yet received by them only prepared for and promised to them that love him but in that respect He that overcometh shall inherit all things and I will be his God and he shall be my Son sayes Revel 21.6 7. See 1 Corinthians 2.9 But 2. In Christ their Head they possess all things He possesses all things for them and
in the dishes and upon the trenchers if they had any and in their hands and mouths as they eat it and could they have needed to have eaten of it till this day might have grown upon them yet such this fatted Calf in the spirit and mystery of it unless we take it for some particular visit refreshing and chearing of the repentant sinners heart like to a Posset or a Caudle made by a tender Mother for her almost drowned Childe when being pulled out of the Pit and brought home she puts it to bed and should the other Children that kept themselves in the house and safe from the pit murmur at such a thing as that when they may at all times sit at meat with their Father and eat of his meat yea and if they please take part of that Posset too made for that escaped Childe take it in either sense the murmuring was unreasonable as the acts of envy and discontent all be It was a good saying of an ancient Doctor Tolle invidiam quod meum est tuum est si ego tollo invidiam quod tuum est meum est Take away envy and frowardness and what 's mine is thine too and if I put away envy from me that that is thine is mine with thee This is on the contrary to envy the excellency of Divine Love and Grace it makes all common that may be so lawfully or with expediency and as God gives us an interest in all that he hath leads us to say to our brethren too all that we have is yours for your usefulness as the Saints in the Primitive Church that said nothing that they had was their own they were so free to communicateâ— it to all others also Had this Brother said to his younger Brother as the Father to him welcome home Brother let us live lovingly together and as my Father gives me interest in and the use of all he hath so I freely give thee leave to take part with me in all I have with him and by his gift It had been an entertainment of him worthy such a condition of a Son of such a Father and that that may be proposable to us for imitation 3. This also shews the goodness of living at home with God or walking with him dutifully in his wayes seeing he that is so infinitely full is so infinitely free too to them that love him and keep his Commandments not only a Sun and a Shield but also gives grace and glory and withholds no good thing from them that walk uprightly with him therefore O Lord God of Hosts blessed is the man that trusteth in thee and so abides in thy courts alwayes Psal 84 10 11 12. Whither can we go from God to better our selves as Peter said Whither shall we go thou hast the words of eternal life John 6.68 All is ours if we be with and keep to God and we cannot have more then all by going from God or sinning against God Nay that 's the way to go from all for all is in and with God and without him nothing but sin emptiness vanity and vexation of spirit 4. Therefore also it may provoke us not to leave him but to keep close to him as David or Asaph saith Ps 73.28 It is good for me to draw nigh to or as the vulgar reads it to hold me fast by God seeing then we have all whether would this Elder Son go or what would he do that he will not come to his Fathers house and so to his Father Brother the rest therein what will he exclude himself from his Fathers house and so deprive himself of all and because his Father receives him in will he that is so angry at his Brothers naughtiness out of anger throw himself into his Brothers condition and divest himself of all because his Brother is admitted to a share with him surely he took the course thereto by so doing or would he turn his Father and Brother out of doors or at least his Brother to make room for himself as if the house was too little to hold them both and a Kings Estate too little to maintain them both sure it s better to submit to God and to resist the Devil from whom proceeds such a temptation and by living at home to keep possession of all rather then by standing out or departing to divest our selves of all But if we would keep at home with God we must take these helps and directions against discontent 1. Minde the goodness of God to us in Christ rather then our goodness or good doings for or towards him that was slipt out of this Sons eye when he stands thus at a distance and comes not in the minding his Fathers goodness would have given him such satisfaction as to have contented him in all his service with his Fathers dealings with him and made him thought himself happy that he might so live with and serve him still The application of the medicine informs us of the disease the Fathers minding him what he afforded him and what priviledges he enjoyed with him shews us that the Son had forgot them when he fell into this froward discontented passion 2. Consider the abundant fulness in God the abundant sufficiency in him together with his freeness to satisfie and content us and all others There is room enough saith Abraham to Lot in the land for us both therefore let us not fall out between our selves being brethren Gen. 13.8 9. Had this Brother minded how large his Fathers house was and how large his estate and how free he to communicate it it might have kept him from this murmuring 3. Be not hasty in our spirits but wait for Gods counsels inquire at his mouth and be swift to hear what he hath to say to us and slow to speak slow to wrath James 1.19 This Son was too hasty he should first have heard what his Father could say for his doings before he had given way to his anger 4. When the right eye offends pluck it out and cast it from thee and so when the right hand and foot offends cut them off and cast them from us Cast away the weight that presseth down and the sin that easily besets Keeping our eye single to what is set before us in the testimony of God It was this Brothers looking with an evil eye at his Fathers kindeness to his Brother made him sullen and the minding what his hand and foot had done for his Father how he had wrought and walked for him that puft him up with pride and caused him to think his Brother got too much love that had done worse and less then he Good and needful it is to cast away such considerations as draw to discontent and with draw us from him As it was also the Prodigals eying an excellency in his conceit in having a portion in his own hands and a sufficiency in himself to manage it distinct and apart from his Father that led him
and to that purpose of haunting walking or being yoaked up with them for they will prove snares to our souls and draw us away from God by their conversations Psal 1.1 Prov. 1.10 11. and 9.6 7. and 13.20 and 22.24 2 Cor. 6.14 15 16 17. 5. Of slothfulness in the way of God for that will cast into a deep sleep and lead to weariness and fainting Prov. 19.15 Be not slothful but follow their steps who through faith and patience have inherited the promises Heb. 6.12 6. Of giving way to our affections and passions Be sober be vigilant for our adversary the Devil goeth about like a roaring Lion seeking whom he may devour c. 1 Pet. 5.8 Mortifie we our Members that are upon the earth fornication uncleanness evil concupiscence inordinate affections and covetousness which is Idolatry put off also these things anger wrath malice blasphemy lying c. Col. 3.5 8. I might adde more as not to dally with temptations nor conceal but disclose them seasonably to some faithful friends c. But I forbear in reading and minding the Scriptures and calling upon God we may get such understanding as to discern and hate every false way Psal 119.104 Use 3. Think upon our wayes and bring them to the light of Gods truth and where we finde we have gone awry Turn we our feet to Gods testimonies searching and trying our wayes and turning to the Lord Psal 119.59 Lam. 3.40 Yea where we have turned out from God make haste to return and keep his Commandements again Let the wicked forsake his wayes and the unrighteous man his thoughts and turn to the Lord for he is gracious and to our God for he will abundantly pardon Isa 55.7 not continuing in sin to back-slide to a perpetual back-sliding refusing to return and holding fast deceit till there be no remedy but destruction not despairing of finding mercy and forgiveness with him upon returning to him for with him there is mercy and with him plenteousness of redemption in seeking to him that wounds for sin he will heal us yea he will revive and quicken us and the third day we shall live in his sight Hos 6.1 but that leads us to and springs from the third Branch viz. CHAP. IX The third state of Penitent Sinners in two Branches of it opened THE joyful and good estate of sinners that return to God after they have wandered from him and that 's signified in these expressions It was meet that we should make merry and be glad for this thy Brother was dead and is alive again was lost but is found in which are three expressions considerable as implying the goodness and joyfulness of such a state viz. 1. In that it is said He is alive again 2. In that it s said He is found 3. In that it s said It was meet that we should make merry and be glad Branch 1. First The converted repenting and returned sinner is alive again he is come to himself again ver 17. How comes that about 1. Not from himself he had no power while alive to keep himself of and by himself being with-drawn from his Father from dying None can keep alive his own Soul Psal 22.29 How much less when dead can any quicken himself again But 2. It was from and by the good Shepheard seeking him and restoring his soul Psal 23.3 Though sinners by departing from Christ in his Word and Spirit and so from God lose their life and dye Yet Christ from whom they depart loses not the life that 's in him for them in him yet is life as the root of mankinde or for mankinde to be enlivened by or as the fountain and spring of life and though the branch be dead yet this root can infuse life to it again and though the pipe being cut be dry yet the Fountain being a living Fountain can fetch in the pipe again and infuse living waters again into it Christ lives though the sinner dye and while he is not as a tree twice dead pluck't up by the roots and withered yea as a branch cut off from the stock withered gathered and cast into the fire and burnt such is the nature and excellency of this stock above all other stocks and of this root above all other roots that it can gather it into unity with himself again and infuse new life into it God is able to ingraft the cut off Branches in again Rom. 11.23 Yea some compared to trees twice dead may be pull'd out of the fire Jude 12,23 with Zech. 3.2 That is while a man is not wholly given up of God and rejected while the day of Grace is not wholly past and expired Christ hath life in himself for men and so as he can extend it to men to quicken them again and bring them back to himself and to the life in him for the Spirit is still upon him and is the Spirit of Life and the word is still in his mouth a living word and he can yet call to the dead and make them hear and hearing to live John 5.25 Adam when he was fallen and we in him he could not recover us again for he was but a living soul at first and being dead our root in him was dead and so we also irrecoverably lost and gone in him But this second Adam is not so he being dead for us raised himself again and he lives yet and hath the power or keyes of Hell and Death and can therefore revive us though dead therefore writing to the Angel of the Church of Sardis of whom he sayes That he had a name to live but yet was dead he saith Thus saith he that hath the seven Spirits and the seven Stars Having the seven Spirits of God though he that he speaks to be dead yet his speaking to him can put life into him and therefore he rationally enough bids him be watchful and strengthen the thing that be ready to dye and remember how thou hast heard and received and hold fast c Rev. 3.1 2 3. If he say Lazarus come forth though he was dead he lives because he is the Resurrection and the life and his giving forth this life by his Spirit in his word again brings in the nature and operations of life into the dead sinner though as rubbing and chafing men in a swoon often helps to revive them so here we may conceive Gods ordering the Prodigal to be so pinched with poverty might conduce to the receiving him See the like intimated Hos 5.15 with 6.1 but in the life infused was 1. An inward spiritual sense minde and remembrance of things that in the state of death were forgotten and not thought of or apprehended as we finde this dead Prodigal reviving calls to remembrance what he thought not on before at least with any livingness as that he had a Father and a Fathers House in which were many hired Servants and bread enough for them all and to spare and that he perisht there
expectations in all his wayes which is that he sayes in Hos 2.6 That he would hedge up the sinners way with thorns and make a wall that she shall not finde her paths and she shall follow after her lovers but shall not overtake them and shall seek them but shall not finde them then shall or will she say I will go and return to my first Husband c. Just as this Prodigal meeting with a Famine in one place and pined with hunger none giving him husks in the other place was that way found or brought to himself to say How many servants in my Fathers house have bread enough c. And I will arise and go to my Father c. And the way in which God usually doth this is exprest in the same place of Hosea namely by taking away his gifts or which is the same suffering them to be spent till they come to nothing and then discovering her lewdness in the sight of her lovers and pressing her so with his judgments that none deliver her out of his hand as the Prodigal was made so poor and vile that no man regarded him to give him husks with the Swine and so destroying all her former gifts and rewards from her lovers take away all her mirth and all that might support her c. 3. By presenting and bringing to the sinners minde in this sad lost condition himself in his goodness and grace in Christ drawing the soul out from its holes and caves its fields and bruitish swinish company into the wilderness a solitary mournful repenting state and there he is said properly to finde her as it is said Hos 13.5 I did know thee in the wilderness in the land of great drought which is in Deut. 32.10 He found him in a desert forsaken land in the waste howling Wilderness c. And in Jer. 2.24 The wilde Asse in the wilderness that snuffs up the winde at her pleasure and none can turn her away in her occasion with whom all that seek her will not weary themselves any longer yet in her moneth sayes he they shall finde her that is in the time of trouble when her pains come upon her and God is brought to her minde then she will say Arise and save us as ver 27. And indeed when this is hearty and earnest as here then he may be said to be found and in the next step to it for he is properly found 4. In Gods seeing or taking notice of him in his thinking on and returning to him for that 's it in which a thing is properly found when that that could not be espyed or seen any where before falls suddenly into the sight and is seen and discerned Now his eye is more properly set upon the creature when he mindes regards and notes it so as to observe it by way of gracious respect to it as in Isa 57.18 I have seen his wayes and I will heal him and so he is said to hear them then too Jer. 31.18 19 20. I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thou hast chastised me and I was chastised as a Bullock unaccustomed to the yoke turn thou me and I shall be turned for thou art the Lord my God Surely after I was returned I repented c. Then God sees and hears the sinner when he begins to bemoan himself and repent and look towards God and then Is Ephraim my dear Son is he a pleasant childe for since I spake against him I earnestly remember him still therefore my bowels are troubled for him I will sure have mercy upon him saith the Lord. And then a repenting sinner being thus found is and may be said to be a person found 1. In the way to God thinking of him in Christ desiring after him hoping that he may finde help and mercy with him resolving to return to him and putting such resolutions of repentance into practice humbling himself in the belief of his goodness and hope of mercy as is seen And herein 2. In the eye respect and gracious observance of the Lord having respect to him as Isa 66.2 To that man will I look that is poor and trembleth at my word He respecteth the lowly but the prond he knows afar off Psal 138.6 such as think they can live without him 3. In the heart or compassions of the Lord there he is found He saw him and had compassion upon him to pitty his misery hear his bemoanings help his infirmities I will sure have mercy upon him as before in Jer. 31.20 4. In the arms of the Lord who meets him speedily falls upon his neck and kisses or embraces him Now he is found indeed when he hath him in his arms in the inclosures of his grace gracious power and protection and promises 5. In his dear Son In whom he saw and thought upon his Fathers goodness and through whom he received life and motion towards him resolutions and actual performances of faith and repentance towards him and came to him but now is instated into him and declaredly accepted in him the beloved Made in Christ Jesus 1 Cor. 1.30 Ephes 1.6 found in him Phil. 3.8 9. and then he is more fully and formally found when in and through him accepted So was Cornelius before an actual positive and explicite knowledge of him and enwrapping him about as it were with an explicite discovery of him and giving in the justification forgiveness of sins life and peace in him as explicitly believed on by him his prayers and tears were accepted before through him and upon his account but then he was more properly found in him when he was so invested with the knowledge of him and righteousness in and by him in the actual receit of remission of sins and the Holy Ghost in his Name believed on and so the Prodigal here in the best robe put upon him and then 6. In his Fathers house received in by his Father set amongst his Children and having there liberty and room again to go in and out amongst them Now he is found indeed of God and his people too And thus a repenting returned sinner of a lost perisht man is found again yea found now safe because in his Fathers love acceptance approbation in Christ and in his Fathers house and tuition and sound because now healed of all hurts before-got by his Fathers compassion and goodness extended to him Whereupon follows CHAP. X. The third Branch opened and the whole applyed THAT his condition now is such as its meet to be rejoyced for and in It was meet that we should make merry and be glad for this thy Brother was dead and is alive again was lost and is found To be rejoyced for by making merry each other as it were and by being glad in inward heart and outward demonstration in entertaining him with a Feast and with Musick the voice of Thanksgiving and Melody and with Dancing Exulting leaping or orderly moving our selves in shewing our gladness and setting forth the
may be sorry also warning all to take heed of so doing yet in regard of God's goodnesse in general to repentant sinners and in particular to this or that to whom he gives repentance and restores and comforts we may make merry and be glad Especially seeing our heavenly and gracious God and Father calls upon us so to do joyning in himself with us saying Let us eat and be merry We may by good authority do so yea it 's unmannerlinesse and peevish frowardnesse like this elder Brothers in this Parable to be fullen and sad when God says Let us eat and be merry and its meet we should make merry and be glad Shall not the Children and Servants be merry and chearful to see their Father merry and chearful and in such a rejoycing temper Surely its meet then we should make merry and be glad Again CHAP. XII The third state and the Text further improved in some further usefulness 3. IT may teach us that God is a good God not a Spirit of sadness or that delights in our melancholly dumpish tempers but is a chearful though a most holy Spirit One of the fruits of the Spirit is joy but sadnesse is not reckoned amongst them Not but that the Spirit of God leads men to be sad sometimes or rather through sadnesse to gladnesse as of old his people through a wilderness to the land of promise and in most cases sorrow is better than laughter than a vain foolish worldly frothy laughter or affliction than prosperity for us because by the sadnesse of the countenance the heart is made better Yet sadness and sorrow are occasioned by and spring from another cause viz. sin and its fruits were it not for them in our selves or others the Spirit of God would scarce ever lead us to be sad His ways are ways of pleasantnesse and all his paths are peace Prov. 3.17 He is a chearful spirit and leads to chearfulnesse and loves not sullen sowre frames and dispositions Yet we poor foolish creatures as I prove sometimes my self are apt to be either carnally lightly wantonly and vainly merry or else on the other extream to espouse to our selves a sad glumpish spirit a melancholly rugged harsh disposition or Pharasaical face For they put on sowre sad countenances as too many yet do as a piece of religion Mat. 6.16 as if God delighted in such Cynick or Stoick frames formal bodily humilities a whining voice a head hanging down like a bul-rush and such like self-tormenting carriages No no God is a chearful Spirit as having infinite joy and delight in himself and in his Son and in his works and doings and He and his Spirit call for and lead to chearfulness in his service Whence he saith Make a joyful not a doleful sad lamentable noise to the Lord all ye lands serve the Lord with gladness he saith not with sadness and come before his presence with a song Not with a complaint as thinking hardly of him or being afraid of his harshnesse and aptnesse to be displeased with us Psal 100.1.2 He loves not to have his Altar covered with tears he accepts not such offerings at our hands except in case of sorrowing after God and for our sins Mal. 2.13 He loves a chearful server of him as well as a chearful giver 2 Cor 9.7 In his presence is fulnesse of joy and pleasures at his right hand for evermore And they are to reward his followers and worshippers Psal 16.11 Thence those many exhortations to the righteous his worshippers to rejoyce Finally my Brethren rejoyce in the Lord Philip. 3.1 and rejoyce in the Lord evermore and again I say rejoyce Phil. 4 4. and in 1 Thes 5.16 Rejoyce evermore See also Psal 32.11 33.1 as checking that aptness to be sad that is in his worshippers and signifying that it displeases him and well it may for its dishonorable to him occasioning people to be offended at his service and ways as affording nothing but sadnesse and melancholly to them that walk therein And as signifying the great goodnesse of God and the good and abundant cause that God's people have of rejoycing in him For as he is the only good God and infinitely better than any other god or object of trust and worship so there is infinitely more cause of gladness in and from him than any where else Nor have any people such cause of rejoycing and confidence and boldnesse as those that are God's and belong to him considering what they have in and with him and what a portion and happinesse he is to them All other things are muddy cisterns in point of causing or affording joy and chearfulness He is the free and full and perpetually running fountain of joy delight and consolation He gives everlasting consolation and good hope through grace 2 Thes 2.16 We have not found God then so as to know him indeed till we meet with and have in him yea under and notwithstanding all occasions of heaviness that befal us joy unspeakable and full of glorying 1 Pet 1.6 7 8. None may rejoyce so as the righteous they that are in Christ Jesus and walk with him such may boldly say The Lord is our helper Come what will come We will not fear what can man do unto us Oh! seek we him and the knowledge of him till we finde it so as to have rejoycing evermore in him Though we may have manifold occasions of sadnesse both from within us and from without us yet we have cause being in him and walking with him of a perpetual and evermore rejoycing Away away then with all hypocritical Pharasaical thoughts to please God in our demure looks and sowre countenances as if therein stood our being humble before him and let us take the advise and counsel of our Lord and Father and accept his exhortation Let us eat and be merry Make merry and be glad Quest But what must we do to make merry and be glad Answ Alas what can we do to make merry and be glad it must all come from God as the ground and Author of it He must go before and it s our parts to comply with him and follow after him If he frown upon us we have no cause to make merry but to mourn before him till he call us to mirth and further then he calls us to mirth and to make merry we shall do well to be sober and attend to him But when he calls us to joy and gladnesse as here and to make merry we may in the supplies of his grace do something as to say we may and let us 1. Hearken to the voice of God and his servants calling us thereto and opening the cause thereof and the grounds for it to us Such as be his mercy towards sinners and to us and our Brethren in what he hath done for and to both us and them As the Servants say here to the elder Son inquiring the cause of their mirth Thy Brother is come and thy Father
our meat and drink our drink that our heavenly Father hath provided for us we shall never be merry Fasting and mirth are not meet concomitants but feasting and mirth Our Father hath killed for us the fatted calf indeed he bid his Servants do it and so they do in a sort in their ministerial holding forth Christ crucified for us Yea all are his servants they that crucified Christ did but therein what his hand and counsel had determined to be done Act. 4.28 But the Son puts it upon the Father Thou hast killed for him the fatted calf God hath prepared him for us delivered him up for our sins and raised him again for our justification Sets him forth in the Gospel as a sacrifice offered up for our sins and gives him to us as the bread of life to eye and believe in exercise faith in and so feed upon him We are not put upon it or called upon in this feast to bring any dish with us but only to eat what he hath prepared and made ready for us It will make our Father's heart glad to see us accept his love and eat heartily of his meat and eat together like brethren lovingly He will not think his fatted calf ill bestowed on us if we will but eat heartily on it Yea therein he hath delighted its meat and drink to him his Sons obedience and righteousnesse and in and through him its as meat and drink to him to see us eat heartily on him too Do not look upon our meat only though its good to look on it too for it s so lovely and altogether pleasing to an enlightned eye that it will allure us to eat but also eat of it feed on it put it in our mouths let it go down into our bellies or hearts Cause our bellies to eat and fill our bowels with it Ezek. 3.3 If thou confesse with thy mouth Jesus the Lord and in thine heart believe that God hath raised him from the dead thou shalt be saved Rom. 10.10 But what have we no drink to our meat yes yes I warrant you our Father keeps a good bountiful house he hath a cup of good wine for us spiced wine the most choise wine the blood of the grape and yet it s but the fatted calf still For his flesh is meat indeed his being incarnate and made flesh for us his being delivered up to death for our ransome and redemption He as therein the way for us to God the mediator of God and us the receptacle for us and convayer of the grace and blessing of God to us This is our meat and its meat indeed And his blood is drink indeed his abasement and sufferings as obtaining for us and confirming to us the New Testament and its precious promises which are all in him by vertue of this his most pretious blood obtaining for us the continual pardon of our sins yea and Amen Affirmed and confirmed or ratified for and to us This this and the love herein testified is drink indeed Joh. 6.55 His love is better than wine will cause the lips of those that are asleep to speak Cant. 2.2 and 7.9 come then let us eat together of this meat this is better than to feed on the flesh of our own arms Isa 9.20 That 's pittiful stuff that is what we can do and gather up to and for our selves by our own strength our fastings prayers whinings pinings works of righteousnesse of our own doings our humblings and self abasements as reflected on by us The flesh and blood of this fatted calf is ten thousand times better it will make us strong to labour and work what is good and make us thankful to him that gives it to us and to acknowledge our selves infinitely unworthy such a dish to have been prepared for us but these things are the fruits and effects of it fed on not the meat we are to eat much lesse what is but the issue of our own power and strength Come then Brethren let us sit at it here and eat and drink heartily if we will be merry and glad and make our Father merry and glad and our Brethren merry and glad Let 's eat and drink and be merry here This will never make us Epicures nor drunkards nor riotous eaters of flesh Here is no excesse in this feast eat and drink of it what we can Eat we that that is good and let our souls delight themselves in fatnesse Hereto we are invited and called upon Isa 55.2 3. And here call we upon one another too as our Lord doth upon us all Eat oh friends yea drink yea drink abundantly of my love as some translate that Cant. 5.1 Our Father will never chide us or tax us for it as gluttonous eaters of flesh or drunkards I say for eating our fills here nor shall we need to spare this fatted calf is a living dish that will grow upon us in the eating it the more we eat the more we may eat and the more we eat of it the more welcome And the wine here will do like the oil in the miracle increase as we empty it or drink of it Here 's a Princely feast no law to limit us how much to eat or drink Oh! that all the Epicures drunkards and gluttons in the world would lay aside their epicurism in which they spend and wast God's creatures and break his laws and bring upon themselves misery and destruction and turn gluttons and drunkards here if they can Yea here its lawful and a priviledge to be drunken for so some read that in Cant. 5.1 Drink and be ye drunken oh my beloved or with my love And to be sure if Christ make men drunk he will never fault them for it if men drink here till they loose their own understanding reason senses it will never harm them for they loose them not for the worse as in bodily and sinful drunkennesse to be made like beasts but for the better to be made like Angels or conformable to Christ To be drunk into his Spirit his will mind judgment and to be carried above not beneath our selves Here we may call for cups and flagons too Stay me with flagons Cant. 2.5 be not drunk with wine then wherein is excesse but be filled with the spirit of love and of Christ there 's no excesse in that Eph. 5.18 19. This wine will exhilarate or chear us while it assures us of God's love in Christ and ascertains us of the injoyment of his promises yea and convays them to us This wine will indeed make glad our hearts Let 's eat drink and be merry then here not for tomorrow we shall dye but and we shall never dye We shall never drink our selves dead here as the drunkards of this world do but we shall drink our selves alive we shall drink death away and drink our selves into eternal life For whoso eateth my flesh saith our Lord and drinketh my blood hath eternal life Joh 6.56 And this will
at the Beautiful Gate of the Temple Act. 3.7 8 making him to leap up and stand and walk and to enter the Temple leaping and walking and praising God So doth his heavenly Name in which is this spiritual food this flesh and wine proposed strengthen us to dance Leaping o're the Mountains Skipping o're the Hills Capring to those Fountains Whence this liquor Drills Mounting up to Heaven And to Earth descending To shew unto Men Where 't is safe depending For this chear lifts up the heart above all fears droopings and discouragements and above all towring objects of inticing vanities and allurements to take a view and converse with heaven and then lets down again to men to shew forth the vertues and praises of Lord to them and guides in all to regular and heavenly ordered motions according to the instructions of the grace and operations of the Spirit of God and Christ No such dancing no such mirth as this which God allows his children in which they may spend their days and in a moment go up to heaven contrary to that of the wicked and their children Job 21.11 12 13. With this were the Epicures and Pleasure-mongers of this world acquainted they would leave their drinking and drabbing their dandling and dancing to come to this feast and would they come indeed hither this loving Lord and glorious feast-maker would intertain them as he did this Prodigal Yea and perswades the Pharasaical to agree with them therein letting go their own righteousnesse which is spiritual whoredome to adore however much they make of it and in the view of it look a squint at publicans and harlots received in while they stumble at the grace of God to sinners and keep out from this fatted calf they do but make golden calves of their own to delight in worship and dance about and commit adultery spiritual adultery as bad in the sight of God as bodily adultery with Though they think it their righteousnesse it s but stollen waters bread eaten in secret because they think the table of the Lord contemptible and his meat polluted by being exposed to and partook of by such unholy ones in their apprehension But I say God would perswade them relinquishing those their stollen waters and secret breads to come and joyn with their penitent Prodigal Brethren in this feast of love where they might eat and drink and sing and play and dance till they take a frisk at God's calling them out of the flesh into the heavens where they might everlastingly live and love in the bosome of their Father and embraces of the Lamb and sing Hallelujahs for ever and ever It is meet that we thus make merry and be glad for thi thy Brother was dead but is alive again was lost but is found Blessed be God CHAP. XIII The Conclusion in some Poems Psalm 23. THe Lord 's my Shephead I shan't want In pastures green he feeds me And there to lye down doth me grant And by still waters leads me My fainting Soul he doth restore And guides me in right ways For his own names sake I therefore To him sing laud and praise And though with death and grim despaire I grapple I 'le not care For thou art with me thy Scepter And staffe my comforts are Thou dost support me by thy power Thy strength is all my stay And by the same what would devour Thou drivest far away In midst of my disdainful foes My table thou dost spread My cup of comfort overflows Thy balm anoints my head Thy mercy and goodnesse alway Shall compasse me about And in thine house I 'le ever stay And never more go out Amen Finis 1. Spring up O well to it we 'l sing The praises of the Lord. Let each musitian strike his string And all herein accord 2. Oh Lord how wondrous is thy love What one is like to thee It doth exceed and goes above All things that we can see 3. The heaven above the earth beneath And all that is therein Do shew it yea it shines through death And gloryeth over sin 4 What is it thou hast done or said Ere since the world began Yea or before the world was made Wherein thou eyd'st not man 5. Didst thou not all things for him make And all things to him give Thou shew'dst the course that he should take That he might ever live 6. Nay when he heedless of the love Against thee did rebel Thy only goodness did thee move To care he might do well 7. When he forlorn and all undone Helpless and hopeless was Thou then sent'st forth thine only Son Thy will to bring to pass 8. Which was this wretched Man to raise Through his own Death and Blood Vnto a state more worthy praise Then that where first he stood 9 Him thou declar'st and to him call'st Thy very enemies By him thou heal'st their wounds and falls And Fools thou makest wise 10. They that obeying to him come To them thou dost impart Thy self and all things so great room Have they within thine heart 11. They that refuse or from him stray Thou dost not presently In wrath destroy or cast away Being loath that they should dy 12. Thou usest means them to reclaim By sweets and sowers as thou Who all things knowst dost see their frame And what may make them bow 13. When vilest Sinners worthiest Of Wrath to thee return Thou intertain'st them with the best Thou glad'st them when they mourn 14. Thou such a Feast for such hast made As shews thy love most dear To Mankind Oh it can't be said How vertuous is its chear 15. A fatted Calf thou hast prepar'd More than the world to thee Which to Men worthless of regard Thou giv'st their Meat to be 16. This fatted Calf help us to praise So long as we remain When we are down it doth us raise And make us strong again 17. His Flesh as meat the Soul doth feed His Blood Man's Heart doth chear He 's such a Robe as Sinners need None like it can we wear 18 With Songs and Musick here our hearts Rejoyce may and nothing Of worth there is but this imparts Vs unto bliss to bring 19. Dear Lord clear up our eyes that we More clearly may discern The vertues in this Food that be And cause us them to learn 20. Come all ye Sinners far and near Let go what doth you kill Come hither Tast this dainty chear And eat thereof your fill 21. Here you may eat and drink and sport And heavenly pleasures get Riches and honours and comforts Wherof none may you let 22 Here 's that will satisfie your hearts When all things else prove vain Here 's that will cure your wounds smarts And make you whole again 23. Come murmuring Momus too whose eye Doth grudge to see our Chear Let go disdain Pride and Envy Here 's room too for thee here 24. Think not thy self too good for those That intertain'd here be For that thy proud thought will thee