sound in love As faith must bee without hypocrisie 1 Tim. 1. 5. so must love Rom. 12. 9. It is dangerous to bee rotten in the faith it is also dangerous to be rotten in our love It therefore concernes a man as well to examine the truth of his love as of other graces Men may doe much and go far in the love of Gods people and yet not love them as they ought to be loved First they may hold an outward correspondency with them in outward peace and neighbourhood they may live quietly by them and with them bee free from quarrels suits contentions vexations and oppositions against them and in these respects may keepe faire quarter with them and yet for all this not love them as godly people are to be loved Abimelech and Phicol Gen. 26. 28 29. desire to live peaceably and quietly with Isaac that there may bee an oath and a covenant betweene them But yet these being heathens could not love Isaac as a godly man should be loved They departed from him in peace Vers 31. Peace is one thing and love is another 2 Secondly they may preferre dignifie advance and honour them and yet not love them as godly men should be loved Besides Gods sanctifying graces there are oftentimes in Gods children other gifts of wisdome prudence learning fidelity skill and activity in secular imployments All which may gaine them great respect in other mens hearts So Pharaoh honoured Ioseph and we see his ground Gen. 41. 38 39 40. So Nebuchadnezzar preferred Daniel and we see his ground Dan. 2. 47 48. So Laban set Iacob over his flocks and we see his ground Gen. 30. 27. So many a Master loves a godly servant not because he is a good man but because he is a good servant This is selfe-love they love them because they love themselves such men are for their ends of profit advantage c. and for their turnes and therefore out of a selfe-love and selfe-respect love and respect them That their love of them is not for their godlinesse appeares by this because though there were not one dram of grace and godlinesse in them yet for their other abilities should they be no lesse deere unto them then now they are with all their graces 3 Thirdly they may magnifie them highly commend and reverence them for good men and yet not love them as godly men should be loved Abimelech called Isaac The blessed of the Lord Gen. 26. Herod observed and reverenced Iohn Marke 6. The people magnified the beleevers Acts 5. 13. There were a great many that hated opposed and vilefied them but yet among the Iewes there were some that were of a more tolerable and equall temper and though they durst not goe so far as to joyne themselves with them yet thus farre they went that when others reproached scorned and calumniated them they were ready to commend and pleade for them They would haply thus speake Well you may say this and that and speake your pleasure of them but when you have said all that ever you can yet we see they be very good people very conscionable and godly men they are 〈◊〉 other but what you and we should â—â— Here was magnifying of them but yet not loving them as they should have beene loved because as the Text saies Of these no man durst joyne himselfe to them All this arises not from love but from the conviction of conscience upon the sight of the lustre and beauty of their shining graces and upon the experience of the integrity of their wayes Conscience convinced cannot but open the mouth to give godly men an honourable testimoniall in magnifying and reverencing them 4 Fourthly they may doe them many kinde offices courtesies and favours and yet for all this not love them as godly men are to be loved Ieroboâ—m may invite a Prophet to dinner The very Barbarians did shew courtesie to them Acts 28. 2. and yet were farre enough from this love Humanity civility good nature and good nurture may carry men farre in this kinde 5 Fifthly they may as honour their lives so desire their deaths and yet not love them as godly men should be loved Balaam desires the death of the righteous and that his latter end may be like unto his and yet Balaam that faine would have cursed Israel was farre enough from the love of a Saint Many when they see a godly mans end may speake honorably of him and wish Oh that my soule might rest with his oh that my soule might speed as his for I am perswaded he is in heaven and yet all this while not love a godly man as a godly man should be loved 6 Sixthly they may honour the memory of them when dead and gone and upon all occasions give them honourable testimonialls for their piety godlinesse c. and yet not love them as godly men should be loved The Pharisees Matth. 23. built up the Sepulchres of the Prophets and seemed to shew great love to their memorials and yet if they had beene alive they would have dealt no better by them than their Fathers did Thus much may be done and yet love wanting that love wanting wherewith a Saint is to be loved For with such a love must a man come to the Sacrament in which there is so speciall an exercise of the communion of Saints Since therefore all this is not enough let us see then what it is that is required more that our love may bee such as will qualifie us for the orderly receiving of the Sacrament True love then to the members of Christ to godly and gracious persons may bee thus knowne 1 First it loves them as Saints under the relation of brethren because they be brethren because they bee sons of God the same Father sons of the Church the same common mother and members of Christ our elder Brother When a man loves godly men not because they be great rich learned wise because they may doe or have done him a pleasure but meerely because they have Gods Image upon them in grace and holinesse he loves them as godly persons should be loved When Gods grace in them is the ground and Gods Image upon them is the Loadstone of our love when we love them not because we love our gaine respect c. but because we love God and see them to be his then is our love right 1 Iohn 5. 2. Hereby wee know that wee love the children of God and love them as the children of God bearing Gods Image upon them when wee love God That is true love of godly men when our love to them is grounded upon and flowes from our love to God On the contrary may it be said of many that they love not the children of God No not love the children of God Why I love such and such a man and you will not say but they are the deere children of God I but by this wee know that men love not the children of God
heaven then see what followeth Luke 15. 22 23. bring hither the fatted Calfe let us eate and bee merry Now that he repents he is fed and feasted with fat things the fat Calfe must be killed and prepared But look upon him in his impenitency whilest he is in his sinnes and how fares hee then alas he then eats husks feeds with the Swine and his belly not filled neither whilest he was in a Swinish condition he was fitter to feed at a Swines trough than to feed at his Fathers Table and then he is fed with nothing but with empty huskes It is just so here If men come to God and to his Table with confession and contrition of spirit with true and sound repentance then God sayes Come bring the fatted Calfe make a Feast give this repenting sinner my Sons flesh and bloud his spirit let him eat marrow glut his heart with the comforts of my spirit with the sweetnesse and goodnesse of Christ But when men come in their swinish and brutish lusts come no better than Swine without repentance for their sins then GOD sends them to the trough What doe you a company of swinish adulterers and drunkards at my Table get you to the trough the trough is fitter for you than the Communion-Table And though such persons in their impenitency will thrust and crowd in to the Lords Table yet they shall be fed but with husks Impenitent persons find their food in the issue no better they receive but the huske of the Sacrament bare Bread and Wine the naked Elements they never taste a whit of the fatted Calfe they eate not a whit of CHRISTS flesh and bloud God feeds Swine onely with huskes huskes are good enough for Hogges And what are impenitent persons better than Hogs to whom Pearles must not bee given Observe how the Prodigals father speakes to him after his re-repentance Come bring the fatted Calfe let us eate and bee merry A man can never so eate at the Sacrament as to bee merry till hee eat of the fat Nehemiah 8. 10. Goe your way eat the fat and drinke the sweet neither bee yee sorry that is be you merry and joyfull eating the fat and drinking the sweet cheeres and makes the heart merry But when sayes his father let us eat and bee merry Now after hee saw his Sonne to bee sorry when hee saw his soule humbled and afflicted with sorrow for his sinnes he saw him truly penitent Now let us eate and bee merry It is to little purpose to eate at the LORDS Table unlesse wee may so eate that wee may bee merry that wee may bee cheered refreshed rejoyced Now hee that would eate and bee merry at the LORDS Table Lords Table must weepe and be sorry in his owne private Chamber and Closset And when we have made our selves sorry God will make us merry when we have sadded our soules by repentance God will glad them with the comforts of his Spirit dispersed to us in the Sacrament And the greater our sorrow is before we come the greater will our mirth be when we be come But contrarily when we come to the Lords Table and have not beene sorry have not beene humbled have not repented then may we come and eate but we cannot eate and be merry we can have no comfort no joy in our receiving because GOD feeds us in such a case with nothing but huskes Huskie food will never make the heart merry and where repentance is wanting it makes the Sacrament proove to a man no better then an husky banquet Where repentance is wanting a man in receiving receives nothing but bare bread and bare wine neither is it any more with God then if a man did eate common bread and drinke ordinary wine at his owne Table It is in Sacraments as it was with sacrifices When men came to the sacrifices and offerings without repentance see how God esteemed of them Hos 9. 4. For their bread for their soule shall not come into the house of the Lord. Zanch. in Locum The bread for their soule that is the bread for their life their daily bread for the sustinance of their bodily life He speakes of that meate offering Levit. 2. 5. That meate offering was appointed of God for a spirituall use and yet it is called the bread for their life or livelihood Because they using those Ordinances without Repentance though the meate offering were appointed for a spirituall use God esteemed no other then common meate as their ordinary bodily bread they fed upon to susteyne bodily life In the same sense it is that Iere. 7. 21. the Lord in a kinde of scorne calls their sacrifices flesh Put your burnt offerings unto your sacrifices and eate flesh There wanted repentance in the offerers and therefore God reckons them but as other ordinary flesh in the Shambles And being so what had they more at their meate offerings then at their owne Tables what at their sacrifices more then might have beene had at the Shambles And no wonder for God intends not his Ordinance to such God calls not invites not such and he will not welcome those whom he invites not Consider those Canons which were for eating the Passeover Exod. 12. 43 44 45. This is the Ordinance of the Passeover there shall no stranger eate thereof But every mans servant that is bought for money when thou hast circumcised him then shall he eate thereof A forreyner and an hired servant shall not eate therof Here be three Canons First no stranger must eate thereof Suppose he had yet surely should he have had no Communion with God God would have beene a stranger to him Secondly no hired servant must eate thereof suppose he had certainly God would not have accepted his service Thirdly no uncircumcised one must eate thereof If an uncircumcised person had eaten thereof could he have looked for a blessing Now all these three Canons make against an impenitent sinners comming to the Sacrament For an impenitent sinner is all these He is a stranger to God Psal 58. 3. The wicked are estranged from the wombe And Psal 54. 3. David calls the Ziphims who were notwithstanding of Israel strangers for what so estranges a man from God as doth sinne He is an hyred servant a servant to Satan and his lusts Iohn 8. 34. Whosoever commiteth sinne is the servant of sinne 2 Pet. 2. 18. They themselves are servants to corruption for of whom a man is overcome of the same he is brought in bondage And who will set his servant at his Table with him The servant abides not in the house for ever Iohn 8. 35. and therefore sits not down at Table at any time He is an uncircumcised person Iere. 4. 3 4 Breake up the fallow ground circumcise your selves to the Lord and take away the fore skine of your heart What is the circumcision of the heart but the breaking up of the fallow ground verse 3. So that a repenting heart is a
place but to have him enter at the Sacrament at the Lords Table this is far more fearefull To rise up from the Lords Table with greater greedinesse and more eagernesse after our lusts to rise from the Lords Table with more strength and minde than before to do the divell service is wondrous fearefull And doth thine heart tremble at the thoughts of such going from the Sacrament then let thine heart tremble no lesse at the thoughts of such comming to the Sacrament of comming unpreparedly unto it Loth thou wouldest be to have Satan enter but into thine house be as loth to have him enter into thine heart especially in the use of the Sacrament and as thou wouldest be carefull to prevent Nâ—m Sacramentum sicut accipâ—t ad vitâ—m â—ignus sic ad judicium moâ—â—em propâ—â—â—m indignuâ— Sacramentum â—â— sine re Sacramenti mors est â—umenâ—â— Res vero Sacramenti praeter Sacramentum vita aeâ—â—rna est accipâ—enâ—â— Bern. in caen Dom. Ser. 2. so great a danger so dismall a case so look to it to come in due order duly prepared for the Sacrament 2 Instead of receiving that which might further our salvation we shall receive Iudgement and damnation We come to the Sacrament to further our salvation but comming unpreparedly further our damnation 1 Cor. 11. 29. He that eates and drinkes unworthily eates and drinkes his owne damnation The Paschall Lambe might not be eaten raw Exod. 12. 9. Eate not of it raw To teach that the Sacrament must not be eaten unpreparedly He that receives unpreparedly eates the Sacrament raw because hee comes rawly and eates it rawly and unpreparedly Now to have eaten the Pascall Lambe raw had beene both unwholesome and dangerous He that eates raw flesh never digests it kindly The eating of flesh that hath not been so well prepared as it should that hath bin somewhat too raw hath cost many a man his life As dangerous as eating of raw flesh is to the body so dangerous to the soule is the eating of the Sacrament rawly and unpreparedly It appeares by 2 Sam. 6. 6. That Vzzah put forth his hand to the Arke of God upon a good intention to save the Arke from a fall when the Oxen stumbled or shooke it But his good intention notwithstanding there was an error or a rashnesse in it And for that errour and rashnesse the anger of God was kindled against Vzzah and for that errour and rashnesse God smote him there and there he dyed by the Arke What is the Arke of God to the body and bloud of the Sonne of God And if God punisht him so severely for his errour that he rashly layde hold on the Arke which yet he did out of a sodaine feare of the Arkes comming to some hurt and miscarriage and without diliberation there being no place for deliberation in so sudden a chop if yet God was so severe against him how much more are they in danger to bee smitten for their errour that will rashly put forth their hand to lay hold on the body and bloud of CHRIST Especially not doing it rashly upon any suddaine occasion that puts them upon it but having time and liberty for deliberation yea and doing it against so many faire warnings as they continually have Every one that meddles with the Sacrament unpreparedly meddles with it rashly and he that meddles rashly is in danger of Gods stroake of a worse stroake then Vzzahs was of a stroake upon the soule for he that eates and drinkes unworthily eates and drinkes his owne damnation So strangely doth our unpreparednes pervert Gods Ordinance Ideoque alijs sunt haec munera odor vitae in vitam alijs odor mortis in mortem quia omnino justum est ut tanto pâ—â—ventur beneficio gratiae con emptores nec in â—â—dignis 〈◊〉 gâ—atiae puâ—â—â—â— faciâ—â— maâ—â—â—â—nem 〈◊〉 de â—oen dom and of an Ordinance of life makes it an Ordinance unto death That as they spake in that case 1 Reg. 4 40. Oh thou man of God death is in the pot So it may bee sayd unto an unprepared Communicant ôh thou unworthy receiver Death is in the cup. If thou drinke unpreparedly thou drinkest thine owne death And as God speakes of Ierusalem to the enemies of it Zech. 12. 2. Behold I will make Ierusalem a cup of poyson or a cup of trembling unto all the people round about so may it be sayd of the cup in the Sacrament to an unprepared receiver Inteâ—â—jâ— nefarie necatus veneno per infectum panem sacrum Beneconventi a Bernhardino Monachoâ—e familia fratrunâ— pradicatorum qui ad hoca Florentioâ—â— eâ—at conductus Carion Chronic. lib 5. Behold I will make the cup in the Sacrament a cup of poyson or a cup of trembling to all unprepared Communicants The Emperour Henry the seventh was poisoned in the bread by a Monk and Pope Victor the second was poysond by his Subdeacon in his challice and one of our Bishops of Yorke was poysond at the Sacrament by poyson put in the wine Now if poyson were mingled with the Sacramentall bread or if poyson were put into the cup would not men tremble to eate that bread would not that cup be a cup of trembling would not the very feare and suspicion of poyson make men tremble to drinke of it Assuredly if thou be an unprepared receiver there is poyson in thy bread in thy cup and it will poyson thy soule to death And therefore it should make men as much tremble to come unprepared as Medicus enim non daret venenum salutem medicus dedit sed indigne accipiendo ad perniciem accepit August they would tremble to go away with their soules poysoned If a sonne shall aske bread of any of you that is a Father will hee give him a stone sayes our Saviour Luk. 11. 11. We professe when we come to the Sacrament that wee come to seeke bread and foode for our soules And bread the true living bread that came down from heaven is there to be had but when we come unprepared it so falls out with us that in stead of bread we have a stone given us a stone that will choake us The Divell would have had our Saviour to have turned stones into bread but contrarily men comming unpreparedly turne the bread in the Sacrament into a stone so that not onely no more nourishment by it then by a stone but so much danger by it as by feeding on a stone which is no lesse then death I will sayes David Psal 116. 13. Take the cup of salvation How many in taking the cup in the Sacrament take the cup of damnation Either take it a cup of salvation or take it not at all 3 The third danger is bodily danger Vnprepared receiving brings bodily judgements upon men as sickenesse weakenesse yea and death it selfe 1 Cor. 11. 30. For this cause many are weake and sickely amongst you and many sleepe For what cause For receiving the
Son go work to day in my Vineyard here are neither wages promised nor anger threatned and yet hee went It was neither hope of wages nor feare of punishment that carried him but meerely a sonlike love and the dutifull affection he owed to his Father that wrought upon his heart and constrained him to goe though at first he refused it And such is true obedience unto God Love unto God is the weight that sets the wheeles on going Iohn 14. If ye love me keepe my commandements 1 Iohn 5. 3. This is the love of God that we keepe his commandements Try we our obedience by this What is it that moves to obedience If thou canst plainely say as the servant Exod. 21. 5. I love my Master I will not goe out free so I love my God I will not sweare c. I love my God therfore I will yeeld him all carefull obedience If love be the weight and the oile that makes the wheeles run thine obedience is such as it ought to bee But this discovers a great deale of false obedience Some men yeeld obedience for the love of themselves the love of their credit Such was the Pharisees obedience in their almes prayers and fastings onely to purchase credit with men Such is a civill mans obedience whose obedience is only to such commandements and onely to such branches of those commandements the breach whereof would blemish his reputation and blurre his credit in the world Some yeeld obedience and worke in the Vineyard for their penny such as doe all they doe with a conceipt of binding God to them and bringing him into their debt Some againe yeeld some obedience neither for love nor wages but for meere feare for feare either of the penall lawes of men which fence any commandement of God or for feare of a greater measure of wrath in Hell None of all these is filiall obedience rising from love These are obedient workemen obedient slaves that dread the whip but not obedient children It is love to the Father not wages from the Father that is the ground of a childes obedience The sonne of a poore man that hath not a penny to give or leave him yeelds his father obedience as cheerfully as the sonne of a rich man that lookes for a great inheritance If there were no heaven Gods children would obey him and though no hell yet would they doe their duty So powerfully doth the love of their Father constraine them 2 Secondly the end of obedience that is obedience indeed is the honour and glory of God 1 Cor. 10. Whatsoever ye doe let all be done to the glory of God Iohn 15. 8. Herein is my Father glorified that yee beare much fruit The maine end that true obedience propounds is the glory of him that commands When Christs people give him obedience it is the setting of the crowne upon his head what makes him more a King than obedience Cant. 3. 11. Behold King Salomon with the Crowne wherewith his mother crowned him Now this is the main end of right obedience that the Crown may be set on Christs head that it may bring him in the honour of the King the crowned King of the Church Phil. 1. 11. Filled with the fruits of righteousnes which are unto the glory and praise of God Let every man examine his owne heart what his end is in his obedience If wee have any other maine end but Gods glory it makes it obedience to our end and not to God How many yeeld that obedience they do not to set the Crowne on Christs head but to set the crown upon their owne heads So doe hypocrites that seeke their owne praise and credit or profit so doe all specially that doe any thing with a conceit of meriting at Gods hand Such obedience as hath squint respects at base and by ends is in Gods sight as base as the ends it lookes at 3 Thirdly the properties of obedience And they are these 1 First true obedience to God must bee universall And that in a three-fold respect 1 In regard of the subject or person that yeelds obedience he must do it with the strength of his whole man and all the faculties thereof Ps 119. 4. To bee kept exceedingly Psal 103. 1. All that is within me And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart c. 2 In regard of the object and of the commandements to be obeyed They must be all obeyed Deut. 6. 25. Psal 119. 128. The obedience to bee given to God is a filiall obedience 1 Pet. 1. 14. Now filiall obedience must be universall Col. 3. 20. Children obey your parents in all things for this is well pleasing unto the Lord. It is not well pleasing to God when children will obey their parents only in what they thinke good That is to yeeld obedience upon courtesie and not upon duty See what a filiall obedience the sons of Ionadab gave their father Ier. 35. 8 10. In all that he hath charged us According to all our father commanded It was but an homely businesse that Kish sent Saul about all considered Kish a man of great substance A mighty man of power 1 Sam. 9. 1. And Saul his son a choise young man and a goodly not a goodlier man amongst all the children of Israel and yet his father sends him with one of his servants to seeke the Asses And though it were but a meane service yet Saul yeelds him obedience Our obedience to God must be a child-like obedience a childe-like obedience is universall to all commandements without exceptions dispensations and reservations Here Saul failed 1 Sam. 15. 3 In regard of all time Obedience must not be for some times nor for a time Not for sometimes to bee sometimes on and sometimes off but it must be a constant setled even course of obedience that God lookes for Some men have their fits of goodnesse and have their good daies as men in an ague but are fickle and loose hearted hold not their hearts close to God and good duties Thus is that obedience which the Scripture calls walking with God Some take a turne or two with him go with him three or foure steps but that is not walking with him Walking with God implies a setled even course of obedience to him Neither must obedience be for a time but it must be continuall to our lives end Luk. 1. 75. All the dayes of our lives 2 King 17. 37. He shall observe to doe for ever more Phil. 2. 8. Christ became obedient unto death that is as Beza expounds it Vnto his dying day not onely obedient in his death but Christs obedience as it begun at his incarnation so it continued to his dying day on the crosse 2 Secondly true obedience is prompt and present ready and speedy without shucking and hucking without delayes and consults Psal 119. 60. I made hast and delayed not Mar. 1. 18. And immediately they forsooke their nets and followed him Zech. 5. 9. They