as the word imports He is pleased so to express his deep affection toward his Church He was held in the galleries and captivated with love to his People so that his eye was ever upon them he loved to behold them it satisfied his Soul as marrow and fatness to see them He shall see of the travel of his Soul and be satisfied 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Isai 53.11 And indeed he saith he cannot get his eyes off them Can a mother forget her child Isai 49.14 No more can I forget you And is Christ so tender in his love toward us that he ever minds us and shall our minds be so loose to him so fluttering and fleeting Shall there be no more care to bind our selves in cords of love to him that we may ever behold him who bears us in his brest before his Father always 4. This is our fault that whatsoever is done in sending bending and binding of our minds towards God yet with some at least O that it might not be true of all it 's not their course and trade Now and then they are awakened and get up into Heaven to see their Father but it is not dayly and here is their failing that it 's not their course as it was Davids Psalm 145 Every day will I praise thee And I am ever thee Psal 73. I beseech you consider it Is this now and then going to Heaven within the vail to live the life of Friends Is this to carry your selves as children to be so strange at home What now and then once a month or week seldom to be where you always should be You should ever dwell with God as the lovely Center and resting place of your Souls and you are seldom with him is this fair Is Christ and the Father of Christ objects that are not worth the looking after such mean things that a visit now and then should serve the turn What said the Queen of Sheba concerning Solomon Blessed are these thy servants that Always stand before thee and hear thy wisdom If she were so taken with Solomon remember that a greater then Solomon is here And will you deprive your selves of that blessedness which you might enjoy by standing always in the presence of your Father to hear his Wisdom and behold his Glory But if this be a fault as indeed it is what shall we say of that voluntary retention of our minds when the voyce of God within bids us go and visit Heaven but we sit still in a voluntary reluctancy to the voyce that speaks What shall we say to that voluntary diversion of mind when God sets himself in our eyes and our minds turn off from God and pitch on other things and have no content in beholding him But above all what shall we say to that voluntary effusion and vile expence of mind and strength of understanding upon vanities when we send out thoughts in whole troops towards vanities and do not spare one toward Heaven Certainly this is a crime of a very high nature You see in part what is your fault and to know that is a great advantage I have endevored to shew you it in the several degrees of it I shall now shew you the Causes of it CHAP. V. How the Soul comes to wander from God Of divine Permission in this Case Discouragements pretended The heart pleased with something else more then God 1. THe first is Divine Permission God pleaseth to leave his people much to themselves for ends best known to himself and oh what work is made when this wilde Boar is let into the Garden How doth he trample and tread down What spoil doth he make when he is got into the place where he most gladly would be How did God let him in upon Job so that his thoughts by visions in the night troubled him how was he tost in his spirit Solomon how did the Devil run away with his understanding and carry him almost into a total forgetfulness of God that no good man I think ever since the Creation did run so desperate a race as he did God was rooted out of his heart as it were he giving himself up to fulfil the lusts of his eyes and of his mind with all his might but in the end he cries out Vanity of vanities all is vanity and vexation of spirit Certainly it were better the Devil had power to run away with our estates and liberties then with our thoughts keeping them in captivity and as the steers-man of our minds ordering their motions at his pleasure Some mens understandings by the mighty workings of these principalities and powers are as swiftly carried to imaginations of evil as Eagles when they fly to dead bodies or as any creatures when they make haste to their prey You shall see a man when he is in this case all his thoughts are beneath Heaven and they roul up and down the world and pitch sometimes here sometimes there as things suit but are separated from God and he cannot get off but as Jael strook a nail into the head of Sisera and fastened him to the ground so mens thoughts and minds are fastened to something in the world that they cannot deliver themselves This is a woful day indeed when God will not be seen when God saith of a man as David of Absalom Let him not see my face Truly if this be the condition of any that their understandings are ridden by the Devil and carried away from God go to Christ confess and humble your selves seek his face who is the Father of spirits and hath command and power over Devils that as by permission he hath suffered the unclean Spirit to enter so by his commanding word he may say to them Come forth that your understandings may be free for their proper work for he only can cast down imaginations and every thing that exalteth it self against the knowledg of God and bring into captivity every thought into the obedience of Christ 2 Cor. 10.5 Many may complain as Job in another case Chap. 17.11 My days are passed my purposes are broken off even the thoughts of my heart or as it is in the Margin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the possessions of my heart are broken off as if a man should say I had thoughts of Jesus Christ I was wont to have sweet apprehensions of my Father which took me much God was wont to take up my Soul and my mind was wont to be contentfully possest with the meditation of him now these possessions are gone and broken off Pray then as David Psal 119.37 Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity or make mine eyes to pass 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that they be not held to gaze upon vanity but that I may run with freedom the Race that is set before me having God still in mine eyes 2. A second cause of this great fault not having our eyes bent and fixt on God is Discouragements Indeed Discouragements
God must needs be a very great Refreshing and Consolation CHAP. II. Interest in God of a perfect extent to all in God Gods love lasts is not broke off by offences is not hindered by distance Interest in God effectual to all good ends Divine friendship not burdensom THe Propriety that the Saints have in God is perfect I mean it extends throughout to all that God is Among friends and acquaintance this is the Law their friendship reacheth to some things not to all but the Interest of the wife and children reacheth to the full compass of the husbands estate Much more our Propriety in God reacheth to all that God is As the Law of Communion between the Father and the Son was this John 17.10 All mine are thine and thine are mine So is the Law of the Interest between Christ and his people 1 Cor. 3. ult All things are yours because all is Christs If there be enough in God for the spirits of just men made perfect whose capacities are greater then ours if there be enough in God for Angels whose capacities are greater then theirs if there be enough in God for Jesus Christ whose capacity is yet far wider if there be enough in God for God himself then there must needs be satisfaction to a man If he can say that God is his God he needs no more this will content and fill his spirit Fourthly This Propriety is that which will hold out All our interest in men and things is very fleeting experience shews it the Anchor comes home again because the ground was not firm All friends are but like flowers in the hand they are mine now anon they are good for nothing and are no bodies You have this given as a reason why we should not trust in Princes in Psal 146. Because they pass away and their thoughts perish What ever they intended and had contrived for your good all dye with them The Israelites that found favor in Egypt for Josephs sake suffered when another Pharaoh arose that knew not Joseph But if our friends live nothing is more common then to have an eclipse and a damp brought upon the love of friends But Christ loves to the end and if he loved his people when he was in this world how much more doth his love continue now he is in the other world Because here his love met with many difficulties but there he hath nothing hard to do his work lies plain and easie before him The affections of men are subject to a natural I may call it an unnatural mutability which is not only a torment to others but to themselves for that man that changeth his heart suffers as well as he from whom his heart is changed and this is help'd on by many things 1. By offences that ripen and quicken that fickle mutability of this poor frail mortal changeable creature Man You shall have him now like the Sun in his full shining and anon some cloud of offence darkens all his love We were the unhappiest creatures that could be if God should be so to us but he hath expressed himself in Isai 55.7 that he will abundantly pardon and that he will multiply pardons 2. Distance many times takes off the edg of love and friendship among friends friends oftentimes dye one to another while they live The child sometimes is forgotten of his Father and the wife of her husband But the eye of God is ever upon us and we cannot but be satisfied in his love whose eye is ever fixt upon us as you have his promise in the last of Matthew Lo I am with you always to the end of the world 3. There is a love that is fastened only by a short relation as between the Master and the servant and those that are in a Brotherhood for a time when the term of years is out that relation ceaseth But it is not so between Christ and the Saints In the fifth place This Propriety that the people of God have in him is most effectual because there is neither want of love nor power in God In Isai 48.14 All ye assemble your selves and hear which among them hath declared these things the Lord hath loved him he will do his pleasure on Babylon and his arm shall be on the Caldeans Whether we understand it of his love to his people or of his love to Cyrus it is not much material as to the setting forth the efficacy of this Propriety If we understand it of his love to Cyrus who perhaps was yet a stranger to God that notwithstanding this he would do so great things as he had spoken for him how much more effectual will his love be to those to whom he is engaged by relation He will stick at nothing because his love is so great no offences shall hinder because he hath engaged to pardon You are sure to speed when you come to God they that see this their Propriety in him therefore must needs rejoyce Sixthly This Propriety in God is not onerous and burdensom Indeed our relations to men and our propriety in them is oftentimes costly and not without charge can we either preserve or act our friendship toward them We usually lose by receiving A man accepts a benefit and loseth his liberty as a wise Heathen once said A man by his engagement is put oftentimes upon hard services he is made to do every thing that receives every thing the more you take from a friend the more he is discharged and he things he owes you the less and that you owe him the more But indeed whatsoever God doth is an engagement upon him to do more for you Expressions of friendship from friends come many times mingled with much bitterness harshness and rigidness But when God dischargeth the part of a Father and a Friend he doth it like himself it comes pure like water out of a pure fountain no sadness no bitterness mingled with it He doth it with all his heart as in Jer. 32.41 I 'le rejoyce over them to do them good and with my whole Heart and with my whole Soul Oh when kindness comes so it comes sweetly What refreshing is it then to Beleevers in all their conditions to look upon divine Love that 's sweet and clear and pure All these joyn'd together make but one head of Arguments from that Excellency that is in God CHAP. III. Saints engaged to live upon God by the Law of Nature Love and Judgment Spiritual Relation is mutual True Resignation hath Conscience with Love A divine Power in and over Saints The grace and peace of Saints furthered as they mind their Interest in God ANother Argument is this We have nothing else to live upon we must either live here or no where If we live not upon what we have in God we are dead men for God is our life The life of every creature is maintain'd proportionably by a threefold Law 1. Some by the Law of Nature so fishes live not
my self from thee Hast thou who art so great done all this for me and shall I stand out against thee He will willingly acknowledg himself to be his the Saints often do this David above twenty times comes with this acknowledgment in this Psalm and in Psal 116.16 I am thy servant I am thy servant To say it once was not enough he saith it again to shew the sincerity of his spirit and to witness that his heart was fully pleased with this that he was not his own but the Lords 2. There must be a perfecting and compleating of our Resignment All beginnings are but cold yet there are some excellencies in our primitive and first resigning of our selves to God which without great wariness are not preserved till after times In the day of love when God first comes with terms of peace O how freely doth the Soul go out and how willingly doth it offer it self to him The flower and beauty of this first love how hardly are they maintained But what ever spirit there is in our first love it is certain that it 's imperfect and we therefore live to make it compleat Compleat extensively as our spirits and minds come to be enlarged in the knowledg of the Will of God as God makes himself more known I saith the Soul I will do that and that too And so intensively the heart and Soul cleaves unto God in more height and vigor of affection as it is said of Jehosaphat who walked with God before and was the Lords yet in 2 Chron. 13.6 Jehosaphats heart was lifted up in the ways of God His spirit was raised before towards God but now raised to an higher pitch and greater strength he did encourage and fortifie himself in the ways of God A third thing that must be done is this After any unfaithfulness treachery or base departing from God there must be a renovation of our Resignation We must again give our selves to him Having offered this injury to God to deny him his right we cannot again come to him but we must restore it and acknowledg our selves to be his It was good counsel given Job by that friend of his Job 34.31 Surely it is meet to be said unto God I have born chastisement I will not offend any more that which I see not teach thou me and if I have done iniquity I 'le do no more With such a spirit you must come to God I confess I have offered violence to that right thou hast in me but I 'le do so no more and here I am a straying sheep I have a foolish rebellious heart I offer my self again to thy Government and to the Conduct and and Command of thy spirit There must be in those that have given themselves to God a resigning and giving up of themselves in prayer Consider it in vain else do we pray God hath given us leave to come to him and hath engaged himself to hear us but upon condition there must be a hearing on both sides He hath said that if any man come to him in the stoutness of his spirit he will not regard him he hath abundantly in the Scripture disliked such and their prayers he hates In Jer. 11.13 14. you have a full expression of this Concerning this resigning of our selves to God it cannot be dispensed with God hath sworn this shall be done Rom. 14.11 As I live saith the Lord Every knee shall bow before me God will have it done He hath put conditions upon prayer partly because he loves his people he knows there is no greater happiness to them then to cease to be their own and become his As a father pities his child that wanders abroad in the desart and tells him Except he will submit himself to him he will never take him into his house He doth this because he knows the happiness of his child lies in a subâ—rdination to his father Again God doth it to put his people into a capacity of having and enjoying the things they ask For what art thou fit for O man If thou comest to God as a petitioner and come with thy heart lifted up against him either the good thou desirest cannot come to thee or it will come as a rod and a snare at the best it will be be bitterness to thy Soul Consider Not to come in sincerity to yield your selves to God is not to come after the Law of Prayer When you come to ask of God God then asks of you the requests are mutual and reciprocal when you come to God it is not your business alone but God hath something to treat with you about It is fit if you ask and would have God hear you to have God grant your things but you should grant him his especially considering he is free He needs not give what thou askest but thou art bound to give what he asketh there is no proportion between that which thou askest of God and that he asks of thee God asks of thee to give up thy self and what art thou fit for A creature more contemptible then a rotten Carkass that lies in a ditch Wel saith God as bad as thou art let me have thee give up thy self to me And what dost thou ask of God Pardon and eternal life Besides God spake first You come indeed and ask but God spake first Thou sayst Lord hear my prayer but saith God My words are gone out first hear me God prevents thee with requests and hath been long waiting upon thee that thou wouldst come in and give up thy self to him Consider what it is that you come for what do you plead with God for You would have God to be yours to do you good to the utmost not to withhold any good thing from you then will you grant God this one request when you ask so many of him You ask a thousand things of God God asks but this one of you Give up your selves to him You would have God to be yours for ever if you ask so great things is it not meet that you should restore God his ancient Right Surely God is full of grace and mercy unto his people they can set their seals to this that he is a God hearing prayer See what an ingenuous acknowledgment the Apostle makes of the goodness of God 1 Joh. 5.15 We know that he hears us what ever we ask of him and we know that we have the petition that we desire of him It 's in effect as much as this we can have what we will of God You that walk with him what is it that you may not get of him You never come for any thing and go away empty he hath not denyed you even to himself therefore it much concerns you when you come to God to give up your selves to him Certainly this Resignation is a work of a sad import we must resign our selves we must be Gods we were his before this imports that dreadful violence that man hath exercised upon Gods
THREE TREATISES Being the Substance of sundry DISCOURSES VIZ. I. The Fixed Eye or the Mindful Heart on Psal 25.15 II. The Principal Interest or the Propriety of the Saints in God on Micah 7.7 III. Gods Interest in Man Natural and Acquired on Psal 119.4 By that Judicious and Pious Preacher of the Gospel Mr JOSEPH SYMONDS M. A. late Vice-provost of Eaton Colledg LONDON Printed by J Macock for LUKE FAVVN and are to be sold at his Shop at the sign of the Parrot in Pauls Church-yard M.DC.LIII The Pourtraiture of Mr. Joseph Symonds Late Vice Prouost of Eaton Colledge Aetat Suae 50. To all that desire to live godly in CHRIST JESUS IT is not unknown to very many of Gods people in this Nation with what entire affection and happy success the pious Authour of these Meditations now asleep in Jesus laid out himself in the service of the Gospel Divers of you sate somtimes under the shadow of his Ministry with great delight And of those who had not the enjoyment of him but in more removed distances what serious eye ever read as it ought that truly incomparable piece The Deserted Souls Case and Cure and was not thereby enlightned startled humbled lifted up nearer to God Or what good heart for that end that it might be better duly perused his later piece Of Faith and Sight but it was by increased faith and its just appendages more fitted for sight The Holy Spirit was his spring and plentiful emanations from thence filled his Cistern and made him free to communication He dwelt in the presence of Christ d so was at home in Heavenly Negotiations and the content that he had there made him delight to stand still between Christ and his people to receive and give though he gave away his own life withall And when he perceived the shadow of the evening to be stretched forth upon him they did nothing to him but only provoke him to make more haste in the finishing of his work Those holy Tapers which receive their light from the golden Lamp of the Sanctuary shine and burn down to the socket and are burning and shining lights thereto In his wearinesses and weaknesses grown constant in his later time when the effects of his pains made strong sollicitations to desist it was an expression which he often used with pleasance to his friends Yet praying and preaching is too good work to be weary of In the continuance of it he poured forth himself as a drink-offering to Christ upon the service of his Saints and so passed to eternal life through the best forms of death And indeed that way as is roported of Moses God doth kiss away the souls of his Servants But that he might prevent death he took much pains with his own pen besides constant expence of mony for the assistance of another that his love in permanent testimonies might out-live his life and the first neglects of his hearers He knew well how precious discourses are lost to the inconsiderate part of men and women who either do not give due heed while a Sermon is preached and so take it not into their understandings and hearts or else cannot remember it having heard it but once Of his good will to such he hath left many evidences which will be produced if God pleases as soon as time health and other work will give leave to make up the Chasin's and mend other errours of the writer in those copies which were taken from the Pulpit and were not corrected by himselfe For the present it was judged meet to print these three small Tracts The first touching Spiritual remembrance of God as a most seasonable praelibation This being a time when a careless Devil hath after too eminent a manner possessed a multitude of Professours and many Christians have recklesly lost Jesus Christ in the crowd of worldly affections designes diversions The aim of this is to quicken all that have the root of eternal life in them to more frequent Addresses of Soul to God and to rivet them in contentful abode and holy reposes in him The Second is an excellent discovery of the Saints interest in God in which all holy souls may see how happy they are or may be in God their God The Third holds forth Gods interest in us by which as by a true glass we may learn to reflect upon God all his goodness and love contained in the former Treatise if it be also revealed in our hearts and so God will be to us as he is to all true Christians the beginning and end of our life All which Discourses the Godly Reader will find enrich'd with many clear descriptions of heavenly truths many rational considerations which in way of Exhortation do strike fitly and weightily upon those capable principles which God hath put into the soul as Ears for him to take hold of both with very lovely representations and right dreadful terrours and as he goes up and down he will meet methodicall and sure directions like benigne Guides telling the way of happy life to all the children of wisdom and truth So you have a short account of what you may find in these papers Be their Patronage the living influence of the all-quickning Spirit who only is able to make these and all other well-ordered tendencies effectual to their desirable ends and who can protect them from unprofitable reading and forgetful neglects which are the wrongful abuses and unjust imprisonment of the most useful truths I who in this matter do only carry the staff of Elisha which he hath left behind do and shall pray that it may not only be laid upon the child which is ready to dye but that this Spirit would joyn himself to it and make it the ministration of life even the beauty and bands of God upon the spirits of his own That the misplaced eye of some Reader may be set right and then fixed that some heart may be undeceived And Oh that the time were come when no Child of God would write his name in the earth which to do is to be cursed and to make the Divels sport Alas whil'st we through their false representations and cozening impulses sell our comfort our life our soul for cheap things at easie rates do they not laugh do they not insult Though it is a poor sport and proper only to Divels to rejoyce in the follies and sorrows of humanity The Lord Jesus who came to break the power of spiritual wickednesses drive them out of the souls of men and women and if they must have leave to enter any where let it be onely into swine The Lord appear more to the Inhabitants of this world that they may see the glory of truth and be transformed into its Image delivered into the spirit and life of truth and out of the power of detaining falshoods and seducing vanities the chains of evil spirits Then the capacity of the children of men so empty hungry and sore distressed though
some are sensless and therefore perceive it not will be filled with God Then a Strand will be set to that deplorable forgetfulness of God which hath swell'd to such unreasonable heights that it hath left the tops of very few mountains discernable above it Then those which have pure minds will be stirred up to run after their Lord The Children of the Kingdom will enjoy more of the promises and by them partake of a Divine nature in greater measures inherit more of the holy Land trade in true life be tyed in Heavenly Galleries having their eyes set continually upon Christ who with his will take away their hearts and keep them with himself and be a Covering of the eyes to them from all false ones for ever I have no more to adde but the continuance of these wishes and prayers humbly begging a remembrance also in yours for From my Study in Eton Colledg June 1. 1653. Your weak Fellow-servant in the hopes of the Gospel Nathanael Ingelo THE CONTENTS Of the Ensuing TREATISES I. The Fixed Eye or the Mindful Heart on PSAL. 25.15 Chap. 1. EYes of Saints set upon God In what sence Ever and how many ways Pag. 1. Chap. 2. The Way of Eying God in heavenly Meditation Thoughts setled upon God include much choyce and pleasantness Pag. 5 Chap. 3. Holy thoughts of God are mixed with awful love leave deep impressions transform the spirit and are the Trade of good Souls Pag. 13 Chap. 4. Disconformity to the forementioned Principles a great fault in Christians The Discovery of it Slumbering Eyes and wandering Hearts Pag. 18 Chap. 5. How the Soul comes to wander from God of divine Permission in this Case Discouragements pretended The heart pleased with something else more then God Pag. 28 Chap. 6. False Meditation subdueth not the heart A wicked heart hath no joy in the thoughts of God What 's done and not according to Rule is as if it were undone The heart which mindeth not God in a constant course is not right Pag. 33 Chap. 7. Man wanders from God having lost the government of his spirit Thoughts of God suit not perverted Souls are above them and against them Satan lord of the imaginations and master of the affections in those which forget God Pag. 43 Chap. 8. Perswasions to frequent Emanations and contentful abode of Soul with God Minding of God a work possible to Christians A work of the most exellent power Spiritual actions easier then bodily Contemplative life everlasting Natural propensity of Soul to God renewed in Saints A blessing of love in true mindfulness of God Pag. 51 Chap. 9. Jesus Christ a Pattern of Eying the Father Greatest mindfulness of God due God our best Friend All we have is in his hands and af his gift All Religion founded upon a due mindfulness of God Anguish awails wandering hearts Pag. 62 Chap. 10. Directions cencerning Eying of God Truths to be received in their power Saints are to keep in their hearts a meetness for their work Saints are to preserve their capacities for God Saints must maintain a deep sense of divine engagements A lively sense of necessities is useful Pure hearts are meet for divine converse The mind will'd without Sanctification Pag. 69 Chap. 11. Advantages that come by minding of God are to be duly considered The more we mind God the more we may Those which eye God most know themselves best Those which eye God most have most of God Forgetfulness of God cuts the nerves of Holiness Forgetfulness of God betrays to Apostacy Pag. 86 II. The Principal Interest or the Propriety of Saints in God on MICAH 7.7 Chap. 1. Interest in God the true Spring of Consolation How it is Propriety with Community Best because God is best by a Confluence of all Excellencies Pag. 92 Chap. 2. Interest in God of a perfect extent to all in God Gods love lasts is not broke off by offences is not hindred by distance Interest in God effectual to all good ends Divine friendship not burdensom Pag. 97 Chap. 3. Saints engaged to live upon God by the Law of Nature Love and Judgment Spiritual Relation is mutual True Resignation hath Conscience with Love A divine Power in and over Saints The grace and peace of Saints furthered as they mind their Interest in God Pag. 102 Chap. 4. Saints have not only the Portion but the Spirit of Children Ingenious walking greatly requisite in those who pretend Interest in God God more easily pleased with his people then with others Tastes of Gods sweetness are obligatory Carless walking weakens hope in prayer Pag. 110 Chap. 5. Saints Interest is through great Condescension Conjunction of God and his people very intimate A Priviledg restored and how by Jesus Christ Pag. 116 Chap. 6. God content to be ours though we had disowned him and depraved our selves Gods Interest in us chargeable to him God owns not all but some Peculiar frowns upon those which walk unworthy of God Pag. 124 Chap. 7. The Absolute Necessity of Interest in God God is either with or against his Creatures Whosoever hath not God hath no true Interest in any thing Pag. 128 Chap. 8. Interest in God most attainable Goodness and Fulness the Springs of Communication Desire easily and with most success revealed to God Poor strangers impotent persons not bar'd from God as from men Interest in God incomparable in the enjoyment Pag. 133 Chap. 9. Christians ought to clear their hopes from their Uncertainties Beleevers doubt through their own fault They that seek God must pursue their end Pag. 142 Chap. 10. God hath fully made known whom he loves Christians able to know themselves Gods Spirit strengthens the testimony of our spirits Christians hindered by Slothfulness and Discouragements Pag. 148 Chap. 11. Encouragements to endeavor the clearing of our Interest in God Love cannot hide it self Love will not deny what may be easily granted and is much needed Pag. 159 Chap. 12. They are not right who are careless to clear their Evidence Wisdom and Love make the Saints seek after full satisfaction Two sorts of Content in the want of God Pag. 164 Chap. 13. Those which seek not to clear their Interest offer inexpressible violence to their own Souls How the sense of divine Love gives strength to two useful Principles of holy life Pag. 171 Chap. 14. The Evil of Doubting as it is a denyal of the Truth of God a diminution of his Love and Favors and a mis-interpretation of his Dispensations The vexation of doubting to enlightened persons in an evil day Pag. 177 Chap. 15. Interest in God more knowable then any other and yet unknown to most The Reasons of both Pag. 183 Chap. 16. How the knowledg of blessed Interest in God may be attained Desires to have the question determined A spirit free to yield to the determination Arguments proper for the deciding of the question Those that have an Interest in God are much in holy resignation Of taking answers when they are
given Pag. 190 Chap. 17. What it is to live upon God as our God No other life appointed for Saints The fulness beauty and satisfaction of this life How Christians offer violence to their relation Pag. 199 Chap. 18. Heavenly life nearest at hand Christians are to live up to the height of it and to maintain it in every condition Pag. 208 Chap. 19. Further Considerations to promote the forementioned life of its incomparable worth Those that will not live the life of Faith shall not A firm belief of the Gospel the foundation of this Life Pag. 214 Chap. 20. Our Apostacy hath made us unapt for divine Life and Converse with God through a Mediator and willing to conform to the lowest Patterns Pag. 222 Chap. 21. Several Questions concerning the forementioned Doctrine answered Saints not always equally strong Some afflictions sweetened more then others Sometimes God will have his Rod smart Pag. 230 Chap. 22. How it comes to pass that deformities creep into the Conversation of Christians since they have so high a principle of life Whence it is that those which enjoy not God seem to go through afflictions with strength Pag. 239 Chap. 23. A Comparison of Interest and Enjoyment and the excellency of Enjoyment evinced from Interest What is requisite to make full Enjoyment An affectionate Close to all the foregoing Discourses Pag. 251 III. Treatise on PSALM 119. vers 4. Chap. 1. Gods Interest in man natural and acquired this latter twofold Of holy Resignation Of true and false Mourning Pag. 1 Chap. 2. The Will of God is the Bounds and Rule of a Resigned Spirit Pag. 21 Chap. 3. Resignation necessary in Prayer Prayer without it hath no truth in it is non-sence and imposeth upon God absurdly The true Advantage of a spirit of Resignation as to Prayer Pag. 34 Chap. 4. Wicked mens prayers not to be dreaded The sins of those that pray greatest Some out-live the contests of the Spirit Three things to be still done by those who have resigned themselves to God Pag. 41 Chap. 5. The knowledg of Interest in God doth much further our approaches to God It begets propensions carries the spirit in a due frame fits it for all divine determinations Pag. 67 Chap. 6. How the knowledg of divine Interest doth promote Holiness sets Judgment and Nature against Sin keeps the heart from inordinate reaching after and holding fast present things Faith binds the Soul and keeps it bound makes all a Christians ways easie Assurance gives a double advantage to our great meeting with God Pag. 82 THE FIXED EYE OR THE Mindful Heart PSAL. 25.15 Mine Eyes are Ever towards the Lord. CHAP. I. Eyes of Saints set upon God In what sence Ever and how many ways THis Psalm is a Psalm of speciall excellency and hath this mark on it that as some others its form'd in Verses of it according to the Hebrew Alphabet David was a man of a heavenly spirit and truly he breaths much life in every word This Psalm is a Prayer David complains of Enemies good men shal never want them but this is their advantage that as the world wil be sure to be their enemie so God wil be more sure to be their friend He had one to go to and could tel him how it was with him and how men dealt with him and that 's but a bad business to the world but it s a great relief to the Spirits of the Saints that they can go to God and speak their hearts And in his Prayer observe his spirit He doth not after the manner of the world breathe out Affections moved meerly from the smart of the stroke without sense of the cause but cries out more of his sin then of his suffering and speaks more against himself then against his enemies and begs more that he might walk in the sight of Gods countenance and have his favor then to be delivered from his enemies And as all Prayer the more spiritual the more argumentative it is Prayer that is full of Affection is full of Arguments so this But while David was drawing down mercy upon himself he was catcht up Love fires in Prayer His Faith is quickened in Prayer and then Love 's inflam'd In the midst of his Prayer he breaks out and tells God in the words of the Text that his eyes were ever towards him While he was begging the eye of God toward him he tells God Mine eyes are ever towards the Lord. Ever You cannot understand that actually and uncessantly his thoughts and heart were towards God and his mind taken up with him for by the necessity of this life and the Law of it he was sometimes to be taken up with other things But when he says Mine eyes are ever towards the Lord he means these three things 1. That the disposition of his Soul was such that he could be always looking upon God he could wish that when he is departed out of himself and got up that he might never come down more and never have any other work in the world but this to behold God Thus always is taken in the Scriptures In Acts 10.2 Cornelius is said to pray always that is he had a disposition his heart was ready to pray always Acts 7.51 It 's said of the Jews They were stiff-necked and hard-hearted always to resist the Holy Ghost this was their temper like a stone that resists the hand of the workman takes in no impression but is wholly shut up to it self 2. When he saith Mine eyes are always towards the Lord he means this That upon all occasions in every condition in all places his eyes were towards God In Luke 18.1 Christ teacheth to watch and pray always that is upon all occasions when ever Prayer is called for watch to see the season and have your hearts open Making mention of you Always in my prayer saith the Apostle Rom. 1.9 and not seldom elsewhere that is as I have occasion I do intercede for you as I pray for my self it s my dayly work So in Psal 88.9 Every day will I praise thee Psal 145.2 Every day will I bless thee So here Mine eyes are ever towards the Lord that is it 's my every days work 3. Mine eyes are ever toward the Lord that is continually it is not only my ordinary work and dayly course but it 's a work that shall last while I live a work for life 2 Sam. 9.10 David saith concerning Mephibosheth He shall Always eat bread at my table that is while he lives he shall sit at my table And in Psal 146.2 While I live he speaks in the sence of the Text I will praise thee So that now here you have the temper and practise of a godly man his eyes are Ever toward the Lord. The Text holds forth these three things to us 1. What it is upon which the eyes of Saints are set upon what they are terminated upon God 2. Their great diligence and assiduity in this work
is in the Original 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Redire faciam ad cor and in the Margin This I made return to my heart Things are apt to be gone with most men they are apt to lose the sight of God but he did recall again the thoughts that were vanisht and sunk This then is one thing that belongs to the work That Eying of God is not onely a turning of the minde towards God and setting it upon God but a fastening and holding it towards him 2. Minding of God is a willing work the will is in it there be many thoughts fly at random they get out of the Mind but are not sent out The Mind of a Man is a most profuse thing and nothing in the world spreadeth it self into so many actings as the Mind doth The Sun is not so full of beams as the Mind is full of thoughts which spreads it self more then a thousand Suns But these acts of the Mind which flow forth as Bees from their hive are not this work but when the Mind is sent out upon this errand the heart putting forth the understanding upon advice and makes it mind God when the heart puts the mind upon the wing to fly upwards within the vail to see him that fits upon the Throne this is somewhat And it 's a chearful minding of God a man is pleased in it when he is himself It 's good for me to draw near to thee Psal 73. ult Good how good better then perfume My meditation of him shall be sweet Psal 104.34 My meditation 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or my word of thee is sweet it signifies a word secretly spoken the heart speaks of God and those words are musick in the Soul the word imports a sweetness with mixture like compound Spices or many flowers such a sweetness this thought of God yields to him whose heart is towards him every thought is pleasant and the whole working of the Mind makes up a sweet delight Again It 's better then wine Cant. 1.4 We remember his love more then wine There is more content in contemplating on God more refreshing to the spirit then wine gives to the body Psal 63.5 My Soul is filled as with marrow and fatness when or if I remember thee upon my bed and meditate on thee in the night watches When I do this I am as one satisfied with marrow and fatness Psal 139.17 David tells you there is a preciousness in the thoughts of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The word signifieth to be of weight authority or in honor that word signifies precious in every sence Look in what kind soever you account a thing precious so precious are the thoughts of God to a man whose heart is in a right frame Some thoughts are driven out toward God as a messenger sent and driven out upon an unwelcome message in a way and to a person whom he loves not Many cast an eye sometime upon God because they think they must not always live in forgetfulness of him they do it as a duty not a refreshment to them as a work not wages because they must do it not because they love it Yet by some men God will be thought on though they would not The Devils cannot forget God God hath made such a stamp of himself upon their natures that they cannot forget him that 's their unhappiness they wish they could be out of Gods sight and God out of theirs and if it could be their misery would be the less So God will be in the eyes of some men that they cannot cast him out of their thoughts but the impression of God fastens and abides upon their Souls so the sight of God followed Judas to a continual amazement and distraction of his mind But the more a man that is right finds a conjunction of God and his mind the more sweet it is to him he reckons this like the gate of Heaven such a day is as one of the days of Heaven When the Soul is thus taken with God it loves every glance of God the more it sees the more it loves Abraham saw my day afar off and was glad 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 It signifies a rejoycing with gesticulation as much as Luke 6.13 Rejoyce and leap or highly rejoyced Joh. 8.56 This work then of eying and minding of God is a willing work not a work whereto the heart is drawn and driven and wherein it hath no content but such a work that is both work and wages CHAP. III. Holy thoughts of God are mixed with awful love leave deep impressions transform the spirit and are the Trade of good Souls IT 's not only a serious setling of the mind toward and upon God but a holy pointing and fastening of the mind upon him holy in the manner and holy in the end of it 1. In the manner not like the bold practise of men that know not God who cast an eye upon him with as little regard as upon a post or pillar This minding of God must be according to the nature of God You cannot look upon a friend a stranger and a Prince with one and the same eye You cannot look upon God as he is god but you will love him nor as powerfl but you will fear him nor as he is excellent but you will admire him c. These things will work with you either in a way of assimilation or delectation or admiration c. 2. Holy in the end of it a man may do think much of God and yet do no work of holiness There is a meditation of God that we may call the meditation of a Student who studies God as he studies other things by which means he heaps together many notions concerning God but hath no impression of the holiness of God upon his heart but is a stranger to God and hath no communion with him But this work is holy in the end of it A man eyes God that he may have more of God He that minds God truly hunts and seeks after something of God he would have more of his presence light favor and Image he is seeking the beloved of his Soul and the love of his beloved therefore would fain be near him and looks toward him that he may receive that from him which his Soul so much prizeth he minds God and as one that desires to present as an offering to him those fruits of his love which by the love of God are begotten in his heart so that this work is holy 4. This minding of God is a work of course not to be done now and then and layd down again but it 's the trade of that man that doth it right It is his every days work and his constant employment to be mindful of God David describes the good man thus Psal 1.2 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Et adhuc His meditation is in the Law of the Lord day and night Psal 139.17 When I awake I
command over his spirit which he should have so that his mind either stands still as a lake or if it move it runs at waste as indeed a mans mind doth if it be not toward God and for God A great fault it is when men take not pains with themselves as the Prophet complains Isai 64.7 No man stirs up himself to take hold on God It 's said in Exod. 35.28 They came every one whose heart stir'd him up Your hearts had need be stir'd up else they will not do their work Is it fit that so noble a faculty then which there is none under Heaven more glorious as that understanding which God hath entrusted you withall should be no more improved Was this golden Candlestick given you for any other light then that which is from above that may shew you the way to union with God and enjoyment of him Were these golden Cabinets given you and have you the keys of them that you should keep them empty when you might fill them with heavenly treasure which is invaluable David calls his Soul his glory you stain the crown of your glory when you make such glorious creatures to lacquey after every creature which should be in attendance upon God like Angels in the presence of their Father When the mind runs after vanity you become vain Jer. 2. What iniquity have your fathers found in me that they run far from me and walk after vanity and are become vain The vain out-goings of your minds and spirits will make you vain yea worse then nothing What injury do you do your selves that have such nimble winged messengers that can mount up to the highest Heavens can walk with Angels can lodg themselves in the bosom of the glorious God can present all your Cases to him can bring back again reports of mercy to you if you use them not Do you not see how God is sending out to you continually The thoughts of his heart are Love eternal Love and the fruits of his Love are always sent out like the beams of the Sun He hath sent out his own Son and will not you send out your thoughts towards him Will not you order your thoughts toward him who hath directed his greatest Love towards you What is your life but a continual emanation and emission of divine Love And is God thus flowing forth to you and will you stand still and not have your minds runing out to him 2. In the next place As this is a fault that there is not that sending out of the thoughts toward God and that setting of the mind to this work so this is another fault that there is not a bending of the mind in this work Oftentimes the mind looks up but it 's so feeble that a mans thoughts are like an arrow shot from a Bow weakly bent which reacheth not the mark It 's wise counsel that the Wise-man gives Whatsoever thine hand findeth to do do it with all thy might I am sure in nothing more it concerns us to act with all our might then when we act towards God in whom all our life is 1 Chron. 22.19 Now set your hearts and souls to seek the Lord your God This is our work 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 give your hearts to act with life and vigor when you go to take into your eyes the greatness of that glory which you hear of God The Apostle's phrase is Have the loyns of your mind girt when you are upon this work I ask you that question which Christ put to some in another case What went you out to see When you crawl and move as if you had no heart nor spirits whom go you forth to see What him that is the Lord of Glory the only Potentate What are such heavy and lazy aspects to take in such a Glory You see in what large streams your thoughts fly forth to other things and are you only languishing weak and feeble in things of so great concernment Mal. 1.14 Cursed be the deceiver that hath in his flock the sound and the strong but offers the blind and lame Certainly this is the way to procure a curse to be so exceeding remiss in your addresses to God hence it is you get no more Then God comes most to the heart when the eyes are most set upon him The child that draws with strength is soonest filled The Brests of Consolation are full but therefore you are empty and complain because you bend not your selves to draw from the Wells of Salvation You take not pains with your selves to make your way to God lively 3. As this is a fault not to send our your minds toward God and not to bend your minds to the work so this is another the not binding of your minds to it You should not only go to God but stay with him The right minding of God is not a transient glance and sudden cast of the eye that is presently wheel'd off from God again Psal 143.5 I remember the days of old I meditate on all thy works I remember them and not only bring them to remembrance but I meditate on them my mind talks of them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is the force of the word I muse and stand looking on the works of thy hands this is that which fires the heart when a mans eye is fixed on God Psal 39.4 5. My heart was hot within me while I was musing the fire kindled then spake I with my tongue c. Indeed that is a season of kindling when the mind is musing but when the mind is fleeting and floating little impression is made little good comes of it There are many days at Court wherein strangers come to see and are soon gone and what get they Nothing But they that abide in the presence of the Prince live by him It 's not a pointing and casting of your eye towards Heaven that makes God your portion If you do not dwell with him he useth you like strangers Think well of it Certainly where the Eye abides not it 's because either the thing displeaseth or there is some better thing that draws away your hearts What is there in Heaven or in Earth should draw away your minds from these Visions When you look upon him who is most glorious is he not worthy on whom your Souls should dwell and your minds rest themselves with all their might Certainly what we love that will hold us that will be in our thoughts we need not call out our minds and if once the eye be set upon it it holds as the Loadstone having drawn the Iron keeps it fast to it self Christ himself acknowledgeth such an operation of love upon himself Cant. 6.5 Turn away thine eyes Or taken away mine heart 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 excordiasti me for they have overcome me And in Cant. 4.9 Thou hast ravisht my heart my Sister my Spouse with one of thine eyes Christ was as one that had lost his heart
sight So men love not God therefore they bury him out of their sight and God buries such out of his sight Jer. 15.1 I will cast you out of my sight as I have cast out your brethren the whole seed of David c. Man as he is in his depraved state hates his being and wishes himself rather to be nothing then to behold such an one as God that is everlasting burnings and hath an unchangeable Will eternally and severely to punish sinners 3. A strong cause of mans unmindfulness of God is that distance into which the nature of man is sunk from all good especially from the greatest good and as any thing lies near that and hath most tendency to it so the heart of man draws back most from it As a man that is renewed loves that best that is best and then that which is next to it so an unregenerate man loves that best which is worse and hence they give themselves up to all vanity setting open their Souls and prostituting themselves to every thing that is evil and become a common habitation and resting place for every thing that is not good and the more unlike any thing is to God the better entertainment the heart of man gives it By this voluntary tradition of himself he is so captivated to those things that he had once a power over and his back so bowed down and he so held under that he cannot come out of this state except God bring him out That in Mark 6. doth something resemble the state of these men They were in the desart where were many comers and goers and they had no leasure to eat It 's so with worldly men they have many thoughts coming and going that they have no leasure to do that which is best for them 4. The last Cause is this God doth sometimes give men up and leave them to be at the will of Satan to raign and order their motion as he pleaseth so that he is master of their affections and lord of their imaginations and he calls back and sends them out hither and thither as he pleaseth He is called the strong man and as he is strong so he works strongly He is said Eph. 2.2 to work effectually in the children of disobedience Where he hath possession of the mind he picks up the seed sown that it may take no root nor spring up he prepossesseth the mind and holds it in perpetual employment like Sampson that was made to serve in a mill so Satan makes the Soul to run a round which way pleaseth him that it hath no time nor leasure to look towards God which is a very sad thing Joh. 13.2 It 's said of Judas The Devil having put into his heart to betray Christ c. When once the Devil hath got the regiment of a poor creature in that kind he puts in and puts out at pleasure and the truth is when he put this thought into Judas Satan himself entered into him vers 27. he came in with those thoughts he entered when they entered and then the man was perpetually and mightily employed by him The mind of man is naturally fruitful in thoughts tending from God Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts Mat. 15.19 It is with the nature of man as 't is with some ground that brings forth some things of it self but if it be drest by a skilful man it abounds much more When Satan becomes the Gardiner of the Soul every plant there multiplies and fructifies exceedingly and there will be a mighty encrease Hence it is that man lives in a course of forgetfulness of God because by a voluntary diverting of himself from God at length God is provoked to divert from him and then Satan takes possession of the heart and thoughts he enters and commands the man at his pleasure This may suffice to set before you the Causes of that unnatural and that hateful forgetfulness of God wherein most in the world live I beseech you mind it it 's a business of exceeding great weight My next work is to perswade you to practise the Duty held forth That you would always have your eyes toward God CHAP. VIII Perswasions to frequent Emanations and contentful abode of Soul with God Minding of God a work possible to Christians A work of the most excellent power Spiritual actions easier then bodily Contemplative life everlasting Natural propensity of Soul to God renewed in Saints A blessing of love in true mindfulness of God LIve in a more close attendance upon God You never live rightly till you live in the world as in a place consecrated to God It 's an extream wrong to the end of our Being when we let our minds loose unto vanity To be extravagant and open to vanity is worse then that the Temple should have been opened to all abominations This work is little regarded in the world little of it is done The Children of the night are altogether in the dark and shut out from God the Children of the light very much found in forgetfulness of him And truly these days in special manner abound with this fault men stand more remote from God now then ever Forgetfulness of him from whom all our Being is and upon whom we all depend reigns yea much of it is there where men think themselves to be raised most unto God and brought into more conformity to him and communion with him My counsel to you is to look to your eyes My eye saith David is ever towards the Lord And oh that all our eyes were so fixed The work that I now call for is the willing holy and frequent emanation and outgoing of your minds towards God and contentful and effectual abode with him I shall give you a few Arguments to press this Duty and indeed we had need have Arguments urg'd with all force and it 's well if a hundred Arguments draw one man the most argumentative discourse in the world is not strong enough alone to prevail with men 1. The first Argument is from the nature of the work it 's that which you may do it 's a work possible it 's a work that you have power to do When God calls for your eyes it supposeth your eyes are not so set and fastened in your heads not so fixt and immovable but you may look up to him you may eye him and mind him God never gave a Command impossible But here is this threefold fault which I 'le but touch That men having understandings to mind God their minds stand still like standing water or like a clock whose wheels move not at all which fault however sometimes it may be from a meer distemper yet oftentimes it is from a sinful principle There is no list in mens hearts to look to God nay there is a withdrawing from God and rather then the understanding shall be employ'd upon God it shall run at waste like water or stand still and not move Men sometimes do look
to God but as it 's not their dayly course so they do it not with strength but weakly and faintly Slight visions leave but very shallow impressions These men live according to the sight they have of God Slight men are of poor spirits because they do not enoble themselves in a vigorous beholding God A third fault which is worst of all when men send out their thoughts and lay out their understandings in an ill way when the matter of their thoughts and imaginations is evil There are thoughts of good that are evil thoughts and thoughts of evil that are good When a mans mind looks on God but the heart withdraws when it looks upon God with contradictions and quarrellings at him these are evil thoughts of God There are thoughts of evil that are good as when a man looks on evil but his end is the separation of his heart from it and that he may destroy it But when a man looks upon evil with affections and desires after it when his mind is employed 〈◊〉 the bellows to the fire when he is conâ—â—â—ing and devising how he may compass 〈◊〉 â—vil this is most notorious wickedness 〈◊〉 doth mightily habituate and root the Soul in a deplorable elongation from God He that thinks and deviseth evil makes haste to it with all the strength he hath Prov. 24.8 He that deviseth evil shall be called a mischievous person a Master of evil * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 so some read it this is the fruit a man by employing his understanding in a sinful way he becomes to be a sinner in grain a Master sinner a Leader of others a man transcendent going beyond others as Saul was higher then the people by the head and shoulders David describeth such an one Psal 36.3 The words of his mouth are iniquity and deceit he hath left off to be wise and to do good He deviseth mischief upon his bed he sets himself in a way that is not good he abhors not evil that is he loves it as those phrases import verbs negative are put for their contrary affirmative Prov. 30.32 If thou hast thought evil lay thy hand upon thy mouth for as the churning of milk brings forth butter and the wringing of the nose brings forth blood so the forcing of wrath brings forth strife It 's but to shew what degrees sin hath When a man hath thought an injurious thought against another it 's time for him to lay his hand upon his mouth and stifle it there for if the thought be entertained it inflameth the tongue and then much evil comes into act As the churning of milk brings forth butter and the wringing of the nose blood so saith Solomon the Forcing of wrath brings forth strife As Vipers dye by the young ones bred in them so do men dye by the evil thoughts bred in their minds The Apostle Peter speaks of some men 2 Pet. 2.14 so sunk in sin by the exercise of their understanding and senses about it that they could not cease from sin * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This I am sure of the more you wander from God the more you run into sin and every thought you have of evil this way is a step from God Stop betimes before you go so far that there can be no return that you be not held in the cords of your own iniquity pray that the thoughts of thine heart may be forgiven thee which was the Apostle's counsel to Simon Magus Acts 8.22 Men come to be in a remediless state by giving way to evil thoughts Isa 44.20 it is said of Ephraim A deceived heart hath turned him aside that he cannot deliver his Soul nor say Is there not a lye in my right hand Now a man is in a woful state when he is so turned aside by his deceitful heart that he cannot extricate himself You have a power and may do something and by how much more you are enabled to it by so much the greater your sin is if you neglect it When God calls on you for this work if you can be profuse on other things in a great expence of your minds and thoughts towards them and you will not mind him in all your ways your sin is the greater 2 Argu. 2. This work is a work of the noblest power and faculty you have and as any thing is more excellent so it stands in the greater obligation towards God for as a man receives so he owes we owe much that receive much Seeing then you have received so noble a faculty from God you are more engaged to lay it out when called for according to the Will of him that gave it You have other faculties that are not under such a tye you have a power of breathing a power of motion in all your members you have many powers but these lie not under that obligation as this because this excels all the more careless and unfaithful you are in improving it for God the greater your sin and fault is This faculty is as one calls it Divinae particulam aurae a divine breath a beam of the immortal Light the very Image of God Nothing comes nearer unto God then the mind of Man and Angels When you suffer therefore your understandings to run from God you debase your glory your excellency is now deflowred and dishonored It 's recorded as a reproach upon Domitian the Emperor that he would be spending his time to catch and kill flies too childish a work for a man in so high a place It is much worse for you to employ that excellent faculty your understanding about flies and trifles that was made to behold God and in beholding him to be filled with him It 's the most excellent and highest faculty and the workings of it are so much the more easie The works of the Soul are more easie then those of the body therefore you should be encouraged to put your selves on the exercise of it The eyes of the body can by one glance reach the stars and see further in a moment then the body can move in all its time The mind is quicker then the eye and in a moment can glance into Heaven to the beholding of God therefore this should be a motive to prevail with you to the practise of this Duty because it 's a thing whereunto you are so enabled O dulcis confabulatio Dei in anima cum anima quae sine linguae labiorum formatur strepitâ— sine aure percipitur subsilentio solus qui loquitur cui loquitur audit illum omnis alienus excluditur Ber. Opusc c. 5. Vita contemplativa incipit in hoc seculo perficitur in futuro Bern. It 's a most excellent power conducing most to your life the actions of the body do more weakly and remotely conduce to your life This faculty is spiritual and herein differs much from the actions of the body which have their seasons their proper time and
means indeed the means lie in the way to the end yea they are the way it self and the end is in them I will therefore offer some means to you First Entertain the Rule in the power of it When any Command of God comes armed with his own strength it makes man weak he cannot make resistance but falls down conquered in the assault The heart naturally stands out against and is estranged to every voyce of God it will give him the hearing and admit the sound but not the strength it will keep the Word at a distance either by non-attending or by voluntary diversions and forgetfulness Indeed the things of God are very strange to us though they were our best and nearest acquaintance in our primitive state and therefore now we are hardly brought to own them and receive them The not entertaining of the Truth in the power of it is that which frustrates so many thousand Sermons so that though everyday one thing or other is called for and pressed yet matters are as they were God speaks but few regard he cals but few answer He saith Do this and do that but all is undone still Then the Word and Counsel of God is received in its power when a man doth acknowledg it and hath the sense of the weight and efficacy of it and this was the commendation of them 1 Thes 1.5 that they receive the Gospel not in word only but in power and what was the effect of it see vers 6. And they became followers of us and of the Lord having received the word in much affliction And observe John 8.37 what the Reason was that the Jews were in so desperate a course against Christ that they sought to slay him Christ himself gives the Answer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 My word hath no place in you Christ had preached unto them as he doth unto us but that word which he then spake had little entrance or little abode at least in the spirits of men And so at this day either the door is shut against the Word or it is soon cast out of doors again It is not a faint yielding of your spirits unto the call of God when he speaks of such a thing as this is The thorny ground had much of this When the Gospel came and call'd on them to look to God and Jesus Christ they were very yielding there was a sprouting of many affections and great appearances of the efficacious working of the Word on them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but all came to nothing Many while they are under the ministration of the Word are under some operation of the Spirit that attends it and they are ready to say as they in Exod. 19. We will do whatsoever the Lord saith But I may take up that wish O that there were such a heart to do even this one thing now call'd for to walk in more mindfulness of God and that it might be said of you as it is of them Rom. 6.17 Thanks be to God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that you have obeyed from the heart that form of Doctrine into which you were delivered The receiving of the Counsels of God in their power is not as you may think only a present entertaining of them nor is it the present taste of the sweetness and vigor of them in your spirits but it is the abiding of this Word in the power of it upon your hearts There are many that are much struck in their spirits by the Word but yet what saith the Scripture of them They cast the Word of God behind their backs and no more look after it therefore they are unfruitful hearers of it all their days 1 John 2.24 see what the Apostle John saith Let that therefore abide in you which ye have heard from the beginning if that which ye have heard from the beginning shall remain in you ye shall also continue in the Son and in the Father Men know not what they do when they let their hearts depart from the Word many invaluable Counsels from Heaven in which their Souls are bound up are lost and made nothing of as to them This is Satans gathering of the Corn that is sowed before it come to maturity Those whom God carries through obedience to eternal life he doth cause to lay up his Word to be their companion and unto them as the Covenant that was layd up in the Ark of God I have hid thy Word in my heart saith David Psal 119.11 It is such a hiding as men are wont to use when they hide their treasure that by no means it may be lost God writes on the minds of those whom he loves his Law and he leaves impressions of himself that he will be minded He that is our Pattern hath said that the Law of God was in his heart Psal 40.9 And it is the name that the Prophet gives unto the people of God Isa 51.7 that they are such in whose heart is his Law This then you should do lay up the Word and have often recourse to it and lay your selves and your practises to this Rule and often say Where am I where is my mind whither is my understanding wandering what path hath my Soul been treading in have I been walking with God have I been minding him have I been serious in my spirit in the contemplation of him Thus often have recourse unto the Word it is a dangerous thing to let our minds go far without a check It was the great fault charged upon those that were near to destruction Jer. 6.8 No man repented saying What have I done This Commandment of minding God is a Commandment backed not only with Authority and Reason from the equity and excellency of it which all Precepts have but it is also accompanied with special Ordinances besides the natural Ordinance of the Creation which is a memorial of God that you may be ever promped unto the fountain of it There are special instituted Ordinances appointed to this end that you may remember him What is Baptism and what is the Lords Supper but the representation of Jesus Christ to us memorials of him that in the celebration of them you might remember him Therefore labour to make your hearts sensible of the Authority and Majesty that is in this Command when God speaks from Heaven unto you that you would walk in all mindfulness of him and that is the first thing The second thing that I would commend to you is this To get and keep your hearts in a meetness and fitness for this work As God hath put work on his people so he doth expect that there should be a fitness in them for it as the Apostle speaks 2 Tim. 2.21 A vessel made meet for his Masters use and service I will express this meetness in a few particulars One is to keep the mind as free as you can Our understandings though they are mighty things yet they are limited When they are held much
God Sanctification is a great thing What is the body until Sanctification comes but an untamed monster as a wilde beast O with what numberless outragious passions doth it blind and carry away the Soul Until it be sanctified it puts a man into an incapacity of conversing with God it lies not only open to all temptations but it snatcheth after them it 's a weight that lies upon the spirit of a man Pray for Sanctification which is the sequestration of the spirit of a man from vanity and the consecration of it unto God it is the putting of it into his possession the planting in it a new disposition to move towards God and to converse with God this the Apostle calls the renewing of the mind CHAP. XI Advantages that come by minding of God are to be duly considered The more we mind God the more we may Those which eye God most know themselves best Those which eye God most have most of God Forgetfulness of God cuts the nerves of Holiness Forgetfulness of God betrays to Apostacy NOw let me add another Help Weigh well with a deep sense the high Advantages which a due discharge of this work doth bring upon you this will facilitate the work The more you mind God the better you may Men cry out the work is hard It is good and sweet but hardest to those that do it least easiest to those that do it most Living in this work doth advantage and enlarge your spiritual strength and put you into more meetness and fitness into more proportion of ability for the discharge of it That as the Apostle speaks of the sinful use of the eye and of the sinful effusions of the spirit in way of evil that it works unto a necessity of sinning so that they have eyes full of adultery 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that cannot cease to sin 2 Pet. 2.14 So the more you live in mindfulness of God the more are you wrought into a most excellent and sweet necessity of living in this course Gods entertainment is very gracious unto a friend that minds him that he cannot long have God out of his eye De coelo descendit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This advantage you will also have by it the discovery of your self and truly that is a great matter for a man to know himself We are therefore so little our selves because we know our selves so little all that monstrous pride and self-love that foolish indulgence that is usual toward our selves is because we know not what we are This will make you know your selves more for when your eye is on God it is upon your Rule the Rule of all perfection the most absolute Pattern of all spiritual beauty therefore you may see what proportion and similitude there is between God and you This will breed a self abhorrency because of that infinite disagreement that is in the spirit of a man and his ways to the holy God Job in the sight of God abhor'd himself in dust and ashes Job 42.4 Here you may see how your hearts and the Rule agree Now also you may observe what impressions the sight of God leaveth upon you You say you mind God Well and I pray what comes of it what fear what faith what hope what tenderness What watchfulness is there wrought in your spirits by your minding of God What a hard heart is that which is layd under the very beams of the Sun of Righteousness and melts not What an obdurate spirit is that which in the sight of God yields no more We should come to see better what we are if we were more in this work This advantage too you shall have you shall be filled more with God What is the moaning of your Souls O saith the Saint that I might enjoy him O that God might be my God! and that his presence might be with me where ever I am All spiritual life hath its birth and growth in this work the first sight of God lays the foundation all after-sights do superstruct The first sight of God is the planting of holiness in the Soul after-sights are waterings unto more encrease and fruitfulness at the first sight of God God enters into the Soul but the after-sights of God fills and fills until they fill up the Soul If therefore it be so great an advantage consider it and let it provoke you unto this work One Rule more to help unto this work Possess your selves deeply with the apprehensions of the great sinfulness of the neglect of this Therefore men and their sins are so near together because they see not their sins more sinful When sin appears out of measure sinful then it sets the heart at the greatest distance from it Look on the sinfulness of it in the Cause of it Whence is it thou wandering Soul thou sleeping spirit thou man possessed with the world that thou sayst thou breathest after God and yet shuttest thy eye from him It is from a most woful frame of spirit Faith is dead and love dead all principles of life are put into a state of astonishment it is deep night all the spiritual powers are asleep bound up hence it is thou mindest God no more Poor Creature thou art not thy self thy heart is gone other things have born it away thou art like the Prodigal until God brings thee unto thy wits and right mind again Now see what the state of that man is by the true original of the sin of neglecting to remember God and look a little further into this matter to see it in the Effect of it Forgetting of God dissolves the bond between the Soul and God and sets it free from God It is the minding of God that doth beget and preserve a capacity of him and propensity toward him then forgeting of God shuts up thy heart from him and doth byass thy Soul unto a contrary motion to a departing from him puts thee into a state wherein thou canst not be according to the calling whereunto thou art called Thou canst not walk in the place of a servant toward thy Lord for how canst thou do his Will whom thou rememberest not If all the Reason of holy walking lies in this then the nerves and sinews of Holiness are cut in sunder when forgetfulness of God raigns in men There is this evil also thou betrayest thy Soul as much as in thee lies into the state of the Devils themselves What makes Hell but want of God and what makes the unhappiness of Devils but separation from God And this thou dost practise upon thy own self I could give a notorious and sad Instance of this truth to every one that doth voluntarily forget God in an Apostate Professor whom I knew who said The turning point and first beginning of his declining from God was his neglect of communion with Jesus Christ Therefore when you give your selves to a voluntary forgetfulness of God you betray your selves into a state of Apostacy and backsliding from
ask the possession of it You cannot ask more then he is intended to give you He takes more contentment in giving I do not say then you can take in asking though that be much but then you can have in enjoying The Propriety you have in God is by a Mediator so that he by whose means you come by this Propriety hath all things put into his hand and he is in stead of God to you as it is said of Joseph that he was in stead of God to his Brethren He that hath obliged us to be whatsoever we can to those that are ours hath much more obliged himself to be all that he can for us Christ was made so great not for his own sake but for our sakes if he be set on the Throne it is for our sakes What shall we need to fear when we come to ask any thing of him He stands more obliged to us then we can be to ours because it is easier for him to do what his place calls upon him for then it is for us for the engagement is strongest where the performance is easiest and because we are dearer to him then ours are to us the dearest child is not so dear to its mother as we are dear to him and the hurt that would come to those that are beloved of God if he should fail them is greater then can come to children by the neglect of their parents Again The honor that Christ hath engaged is of infinite more concernment If a father be unnatural that is a stain upon him but what is a spot of dishonor upon a piece of dirt But if the Prince of Glory should be unnatural this would highly reflect dishonor upon him How may we walk with confidence and security and account our selves richer then Princes and stronger then Armies Though all this nothing concerns those that stand out and are as strangers and aliens that will call God Father whether he will or no that are not taught it from above but have learned it of themselves If a man cannot call God his Father and his God upon good grounds what a miserable state is that man in He is nothing he hath nothing and there is nothing between him and everlasting misery but a moment of time He goes up and down pleasing himself with vain shews pleasing himself with painted Butterflies but hath nothing to live on he is utterly unprovided for Eternity CHAP. IV. Saints have not only the Portion but the Spirit of Children Ingenious walking greatly requisite in those who pretend Interest in God God more easily pleased with his people then with others Tastes of Gods sweetness are obligatory Careless walking weakens hope in prayer Vse 2d IF the sight of our Interest in God be the life of Saints then let those who plead an Interest in God walk worthy of it It is precious for it is their life it is worth all that is required of you That which God calls for at your hands takes nothing from your happiness but adds much to it It is the Apostle's exhortation Col. 1.10 Walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing Let me propound to your Considerations a few things to put you on to this First You are deeply obliged to please God and thereby to walk worthy of him for being in so near relation to him you have not only the portion but the spirit of children Because you are sons therefore he hath sent the Spirit of Adoption into your hearts Gal. 4. Other relations This was touched in the foregoing Sermon because they want strength are not always beautified and sweetened with a convenient spirit The relation of a husband cannot communicate a meek spirit to his wife nor the relation of a parent to the child because of their impotency their will is strong but their hand is short But God in that gracious relation wherin he stands unto his own gives them a Spirit like unto himself that so he may have Children answerable to himself and to his Will In Rom. 8.9 If any man have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of his He that is joyned to the Lord saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 6.7 is one Spirit As persons conjoyned in marriage are one flesh so he that is married to the Lord that is brought into that near relation unto him is one Spirit they are one in their affections propensions dispositions and designs As we say of a multitude they are of one heart and of one spirit when they conspire in one so God and his people are one Spirit because they center in one he in governing them and they in subjection and subordination to him so one as things ruled and the Rule is one This argument the Apostle urgeth in 2 Tim. 1.7 God hath not given us the Spirit of Fear but of Power Love and of a Sound Mind He had in the words before exhorted to this Therefore saith he I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God that is in thee by the putting on of my hands But Timothy might say How can I do that Why saith the Apostle we have received not the spirit of fear but of power It is a time of danger indeed and a hard work to preach the Gospel in such days as these but he that is gifted and fitted by Christ to that work hath received a spirit of courage and power by which he is able to mannage the things that he hath received of God Then I say having received the Spirit of children the obligation lyes the stronger upon you to walk as children This is a Rule The more proportionably a man hath received strength and ability to his work the more he is bound to it therefore the more of the Spirit you have received the more you are obliged And this Spirit of Christ in his people acts according to its primitive original Pattern as it wrought in Christ so it will work in you according to your proportion This moving will be strong because it moves upon the highest grounds that which is most taking and prevailing it moves upon hopes and sense of eternal life If you walk not so as to please God you walk with much frowardness of heart and your sin is the greater It 's true though you have received this Spirit yet there is much of the spirit of this world in your hearts but this is our duty and our work not to suffer the better Spirit to be quel'd and damp'd by the other But yet again that you may see it more fully remember if you please not God you act against your own Interest and advantage for your life is bound up in the favor of God when you therefore act against God you act against your selves The Apostle useth such an argument in Ephes 5. where he exhorts husbands to love their wives for no man ever hated his own flesh He means this that they being one the husband cannot cease to love his wife
themselves and clears them it leaves them without doubt it strengthens and fixeth fast the Soul in the knowledg of its Interest in God God stands obliged for this unto his people for their comfort lies in it and that makes to the fulfilling of his last end which is his glory for how shall we give him praise if we know not that God is ours Besides he hath given us visible Seals to ratifie all the Promises to us He hath given the earnest of his Spirit to his He hath set Christ on the Throne for us an indubitable Pawn of his Love and many other which are still with us Secondly A second Consideration is this That the people of God in the want of this knowledg and assurance do not what they may they do not improve that ability and those means which God hath put into their hands and so they spin out their days in heaviness mourning and anxiety Either there is slothfulness of spirit or some discouragement of spirit upon them Slothfulness and so they are careless idle and vain having lost the sweetness of the enjoyment of God their hearts are poured out upon vanities they have gone a whoring after other things and have placed their Souls upon things that will not profit and are not industrious to seek after God When the Soul is thus gone out from God then it commits folly under every green tree there 's no plant that may yield any kind of refreshing but they will suck something from it Whilest the Soul is busied about other Interests and securing them the other great business lies by Another sort are under discouragement they say The work is hard it 's a very hard thing to find out this matter to do that whereby it should be found Saith another I have endevored and sought and done all I can and cannot compass it Consider you that say it is hard what a vain thing is it for a man to plead that a thing is difficult which must be done Will you plead difficulty against necessity You must do it or your life will be as death you will lose the comfort of all Promises of all Performances the Promises will be as a sealed Fountain that you cannot drink of them But again It is false to say it is hard That false Prophet within us communicates of his own spirit to us and we oftentimes speak untruths against God Is it hard to walk in the way of life Is it hard to enquire after God Is it easie to be hunting after the world and getting something in this life Is it hard to reach after the fruit of the Tree of Life When you seek after God you are in that very way of Life wherein they now are that shall enjoy God to all Eternity Another Discouragement is this I have endevored but it is a fruitless thing I see I shall never be satisfied Poor Soul Wilt thou indulge that remissness of spirit that is in thee to a contradiction against the God of Truth He hath said If thou seek him thou shalt find him He hath said he will comfort the mourners He hath spoken as much as can be desired What would you have God to do more Rather blame your seeking then your success Say not It is in vain to seek because I have not found nay rather say Because I have not found therefore I must seek more and seek better What saith Christ in Joh. 14.23 If any man love me he will keep my words and my Father will love him and we will come unto him and make our abode with him If any man love me be he what he will be though he hath been a notorious wretch though he hath been a grief and burden to me and offended me days without number yet if he love me my Father will love him and we will come and make our abode with him Will you rather blame the truth of the Promise then your selves The fault must be layd on us Let God be true and every man a lyar It is manifest that we do not what we might do in these particulars 1. We do not call our minds in and bend them to this work of enquiring after God and setling this great question of our Interest in God for ever And indeed if we do not call in and bend our minds and use some enforcements upon them they will never do their work There is upon our minds anatural fluidness and dulness they go out easily to all things but unto God The mind must be summoned prest bound and buckled to this work Saith the Apostle 2 Pet. 3.1 2. This second Epistle Beloved I now write unto you to stir up your pure minds To stir up your pure minds The Apostle was afraid of them lest dulness and sluggishness should fall upon their minds If you do not stir up your selves to the work and gird up the loyns of your minds the work will not be done Another fault is That as men do not bend their minds to the work so they do not hold them in a way of beleeving and cheerful expectation of what they seek for Saith the Church in Micah 7.9 I will bear the indignation of the Lord until he plead my cause So long as I seek the Lord I will wait and expect that he will hear me and answer my desires In Hos 10.12 saith the Prophet Sow to your selves in righteousness reap in mercy break up your fallow ground for it is time to seek the Lord till he come and rain righteousness upon you You must seek the Lord till he come In Isai 62.7 This is the counsel of God by his Prophet That you give him no rest until he establish and till he make Jerusalem a praise Again There may be this fault We do not bring things to an effectual judgment Many queries are raised about this business but there is not a full hearing and determining of them but either the Court breaks up before things are concluded and so the Soul is left to hang upon a poor thred of a feeble hope I hope God is my God or else the Soul is contented to bear the burden of many fears and sorrows not stirring up it self as it ought to get free of them So that doubtless it 's our fault that we have not so clear a knowledg of our Interest in God as to make us to triumph or glory therein One way or other we are defective either in our seeking of God or in our not receiving what God gives unto us Thirdly A third Consideration is That we have often offended and sinned against the Spirit and then God weakens his Testimony towards us and doth not so make himself known to us as we desire David by his sin brought himself into that sad condition that he knew not what to make of himself as appears by that prayer of his in Psal 51. He lookt on himself almost as one in bonds estranged from God a man without spirit In Isai
and empty And will you suffer your Souls against Nature to live out of God when you are called to live on him who is the Fountain of Life I may say unto you as Eliphaz spake in Job 15. Are the Consolations of God small to you And is it so light a matter to have the knowledg of the love of God and your Interest in him In Jer. 14.18 the Prophet speaks of spoiling and wasting but if it doth come saith he thy ways and thy sins have procured these things unto thee therefore know that it is an evil thing and bitter to forsake the Lord. You may thank your selves if a day come wherein there will be bitterness to your hearts and the pangs of death upon you because you know not that God is your God know that this is your wickedness because you will not now look after it and so you rob your Souls That is one thing 2dly When you are not sedulous and industrious in this thing to make sure that God is your God you leave your selves in the high way of Apostacy What is that which will make us able to stand the Apostle Peter tells us 2 Pet. 1.10 Give all diligence to make your Calling and Election sure for if you do these things you shall never fall You expose your selves to offences to stumbling and falling when you are content to live in the dark not knowing what Interest you have in God For consider you are now out of the shine of the Sun you are in the cold evening shade your life is much weakened and your strength abated It is the knowledg of divine Love that is the spirit and strength of our love this lays bonds upon our spirits by which we become one with God it is the wing of our Souls the spring of our activity by which we are born up to an enjoyment of God The joy of the Lord is your strength saith Nehemiah And by this Paul was more then a Conqueror yet Paul had many Enemies Through this Abraham was able to do so great things by this Moses was able to despise the wrath and favor of Pharaoh and all the pleasures and riches of his Court While a man walks in the shine and sense of divine Love he will feel a strength in two Principles of great use 1. To cleave fast to the chief good now that chief good is God to that man that enjoys him he hath the truest taste that sees God to be his God and no man else hath such a taste as he this will hold him to God Where the Creatures have but a Judgment of Sense they will not depart from what they find good A Beast will not change his pasture for gold that is best for him It 's the astonishment of the world that the Angels should fall from their state of Glory and it 's matter of amazement that man should fall from his Creator when he had a full enjoyment of him It 's that which God calls Heaven and Earth to tremble at Jer. 2.13 That men should depart from him the Fountain of living Water c. The sense of acceptation with God makes a man that he cannot go from God Whither shall we go saith Peter Joh. 6. Thou hast the words of eternal life That Soul that lives under the influence of divine Comforts cannot but say Lord it 's good for me to be here he desires no change it cannot be better with him Change proceeds from want for if want were not the creature would not change That Soul that enjoys God is pleased and he saith with David Psal 16. He hath a good portion and his lines are fallen in a good place Nothing is dear to that man to part with that he may enjoy God he bids all things stand by and saith I charge you wife and friends estate and all things do not molest me in my enjoyment of the light of Gods face let all the world go which way it will let me enjoy this blessedness to know assuredly that God is my God When a man lives without this knowledg his life is but a poor shadow of life all without God is but a dead thing to him Another Principle receiving strength from the knowledg of Gods Love and our Interest in him is That a man should be friendly to his friend that he should walk with an harmony of spirit to his friends desire Love pleaseth not it self Now when a man enjoys the sweetness of friendship with God this makes him true to his Maker and to cleave close to God as to his Father Indeed the sense of this constrains the Apostle 2 Cor. 5.14 saith The love of Christ constrains us How can I do this evil saith Joseph and sin against my God But now if thou be careless and canst make a shift to live I know not how a dull stupid dark sensless kind of life thy heart not witnessing that thou endeavorest to make good thy Interest in God thou art not under the bond of Love and then what art thou under Other Lovers have taken away thy heart but as for God thou art a stranger to him and art contented to be without him this is a woful state And as a man that lives out of the shine of divine Love starves and wastes away so fears in this case are apt to turn into hatred when the Soul is gall'd and tormented with fears of the displeasure of God against him this is apt to turn to hatred Naturally whom we fear we hate and naturally the stronger fear is the more men hate The Devils hate God to the full being past doubting of his displeasure What the Soul fears it flies from and what is the flight of the Soul but hatred Judas would chuse rather to go out of the world and sink into nothing then endure his condition when he saw God not to be his God I 'l shut up this Argument with these few things All that is in a Christian makes to this that he would get a clear knowledg of his Interest in God Hath he Faith why by that he believes God to be his Happiness and that will put him on Hath he Love Love is restless but in clear enjoyment Hath he desire and thirst what are they but the Souls sickness till it hath health and life in the enjoyment of God Hath he Fear what is that but the Soul seeking to be secure and safe in God Hath he Reason what 's that but the voyce of God calling him unto God Hath he a sense of the sweetness of God what 's that but the comfort of divine Love drawing the Soul to himself So that all that is in a Christian puts him on to this to make this clear that God is his God And therefore they that can rub out their days and make a shift to busie themselves in other things without the knowledg of God to be their God have great cause to pronounce this heavy sentence upon themselves that surely
Reasons of both BEfore I propound the Directions how they who are sincere and ingenious toward God and indeed have him for their God may know that they have a sure Interest and Propriety in him I will premise two things of moment First That our Interest in God is more knowable then any other Interest in the world There is no Interest that a man hath which is so discernable Whatsoever it is that belongs to an Interest in any thing or any friend and doth discover it is much more here Examine it in a few particulars 1. Where there is an Interest with men there is a mutual closing of their spirits by which they know one another and come to rest secure in each others good intentions and hearty wishes Here also is this mutual closing and in a far more high and excellent degree then is or can be with any creature For that affection and love which God discovers to his people and which he doth act upon them is a Love that is transcendent that is not only beyond all other love but beyond all understanding That entire closing that is between a Beleever and God in Jesus Christ is above all that which can be found in any other his whole Soul runs this way In Psal 119.10 I have sought thee saith David with my whole heart That is the proportion which God hath cut out for himself Deut. 6.5 Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart with all thy Soul and with all thy might Christ challenges the same proportion and indeed it should not be less less would not fulfil his end which is the solid peace and satisfaction of his people in the enjoyment of him and also the subjecting and subduing of their spirits to his government No proportion of love loss then the greatest could work these things But besides this there is such a through change by reason of this Interest as no Interest in the world doth work though the closest and the nearest For the habit and disposition of the spirit of a man is altered in closing with God and he becomes a new creature he is not what he was It is true that in all friendship that is with men there is a kind of change on both sides because there must be a due and necessary application of themselves to each others spirits but that change is unspeakably inferior to this in those who have been wrought upon to beleeve and have obtained this mercy to close with God for they are changed to the proportion of as great a distance as death is distant from life and darkness from light for they are brought off from the love of all that on which their hearts were set even to a hatred of it and are subjected subordinate and conformed to the Will of God There is another thing in this Interest which belongs to the nature of it and so discovers it and that is a mutual conversing with each other with contentment Jonathan and David had much pleasure in their mutual conversings with each other and in drawing forth their spirits one to another This is much more strong in Beleevers then can be in any relation between husband and wife or between the father and child This must needs be so For first The love wherewith they love God is the highest love Therefore many will not go for Christians that pretend to be such because their hearts are not brought up to this The highest Love acts highest it takes the highest delight and contentment in its Object In Cant. 2.3 As the Apple trees among the trees of the Forrest so is my Beloved among the sons I sat down under his shadow with great delight c. In Psal 73. saith David It is good for me to draw near to God That look as others find contentment in the things they love and draw near to them so the Saints find much more contentment with God and therefore draw near to him Again Friends cannot always enjoy these Converses Oftentimes they are parted and so cannot have this felicity of expressing mutual love but God is ever with them In Psal 73. Thou art my strong habitation to whom I may have a continual resort I may always come to thee 3. There is a third thing in Interest and that is mutual Communication Love is a spring which flows forth it doth enjoy what it hath rather for its friend then for it self Gods Love hath this excellency more abundantly and transcendently Take the dearest friends that live at the highest rate of love they cannot maintain a constant Communication partly because there is not always an equal necessity and capacity partly because there is not always the same power to give forth But our necessities are always very great and vast and Gods power is always the same so that here is always a perfect Communication of Love that ceaseth not but flows forth as beams of light from the Sun Now as effects discover their causes so then especially when they are most full and perfect As you may better know any tree by its fruit then when it is in the bud and blossoms and you may better know it when the fruit is in its fulness and in more abundance then when there are but a few if there be but one or two upon a tree they may be hid but when there are many the testimony is the more abundant Abundant are the testimonies of the fruits of Gods Love in what he hath done for his So that upon this account no Interest is more knowable then that of a Beleever in his God Secondly A second thing to be propounded is this That though no Interest be more knowable yet ordinarily no Interest is less known then this This we need not prove I think it 's a Question out of question with us all The unevenness of the holiness of Beleevers in their walkings the inconstancy of their rejoycing are two strong demonstrations of this that they do know but little of their Interest in God It springs from such unhappy Causes as these That abiding Unbelief that bitter root that hath taken such strong hold of the nature of man that till the whole house be pull'd down it will not be wholly eradicated and destroyed This is that weight the Apostle speaks of in Heb. 12. that hangs on us so fast as is manifest by the Apostle's scope who perswading unto faith and the workings of faith this is that saith he that so suppresseth and bears us down from those heights of heavenly joy from that sweet contentment and rest of spirit whereto we are called Beleeving is the first stone that is layd in a Christian He that comes to God must beleeve that he is and that he is a Rewarder of those that seek him Hebr. 12. And as there is a spirit in all Beleevers that tends to the setling of them upon a sure foundation that they may stedfastly beleeve so there is a spirit that works
to unbelief perplexity and dissettlement While unbelief works in us it must needs be that there will be a great want of that through knowledg of Interest Another Cause of this great misery of man is That Gods communications of himself to us and entertainments of us are not always in intelligible forms so that we cannot presently take them up and understand the meaning and good-will of God in them The fault is in our minds The print is good but cannot be read because the eye is dull and dark Sometimes God comes to us wrapt up in Clouds and indeed he varies his dispensations that he may attain his End His End is this that he may work his people to a strength of Faith and Love mixt with Fear that 's the proper constitution of a Christian and the truest temper of one that is marked out to eternal life Therefore God sometimes displays his greatness in the sight of his people far above all the manifestations of the sweetness of his mercy that the spirit of a poor man is overborn shakes and trembles at the presence of God So it was with Moses Heb. 12.21 The sight was so terrible though God meant no ill to Moses that Moses shakes and quakes for fear he was sore afraid Sometimes God comes with the manifestations of his fatherly displeasure and dislike and then how can it be but the Soul must dwell in bitterness mourning heaviness and trembling must needs possess us A third Cause why so little is known of this Interest that God is our God though he be so is our unhappy diversions We are oftentimes turned off from that one thing necessary and our spirits run otherways out of light into darkness Alas Solomon minded not this matter or to little purpose when he poured out his Soul after vanities and for this God pleaded with him 1 King 11.9 that he had departed from him The Lord was wrath with Solomon because his heart was turned from the Lord God of Israel who had appeared to him twice CHAP. XVI How the knowledg of blessed Interest in God may be attained Desires to have the question determined A spirit free to yield to the determination Arguments proper for the deciding of the question Those that have an Interest in God are much in holy resignation Of taking answers when they are given THese things being premised now I come to shew you how we may attain this blessed knowledg that God is ours and so quiet our hearts in this assurance that he is our Portion First Let it be the true desire of thy Soul to have this question determined and concluded that God is thy God Certainly many are careless concerning this business that never much debate the matter whether God be their God or no. Others there are that have care enough but it is a perplexed care a care sowred with unbelief there is a desire indeed raised but it 's mixed with perturbation the Soul is indeed in motion after it but it is a very disorderly motion working with fretting and such disturbing fears that they leave themselves without judgment Exod. 6.9 It is said concerning the Children of Israel that when Moses spake to them they would not hear him for their anguish of spirit and for their cruel bondage for the shortness and straitness of their spirits Fears do straiten Secondly A second Means is this Come with a spirit free to yield to the determination of truth one way or other take your answer from God as he shall give it Certainly there are a generation that know that they are very partial and foolish in this business that fly from the decision and determination of this question from a secret strong suspicion that all is not well with them and therefore they will rather flatter themselves with the uncertainty of their own estate then affright themselves with the clear knowledg of their unhappy condition As a guilty prisoner fears to think of the time of Judgment because he knows there is just cause of suspicion that it shall go ill with him Poor man what shall it profit thee to carry things thus If God be not thy God what hurt is it for thee to know it He that lives thus refuseth the judgment of God and as much as in him lies hates the judgment of God There can be no greater evidence of a right spirit then for a man to put the question home whether God be his for that man is not willing to be the Lords that is not willing to have it determined whether he be his or no. Some again are so possessed and overcome with fears so ready to self-condemnation to what ever may afflict and oppress them that they wrap themselves up in thick clouds lest any light should spring forth upon them These are like unjust Judges that are precipitant in their proceedings that hear only one party It is a dangerous thing for a man to mistake in Judgment as the Wise-man speaks concerning Civil Judgment Prov. 17.15 He that justifies the wicked and condemns the just even they both are an abomination unto God You displease God and sin against Truth and Righteousness when you bear down your selves and pronounce a sentence of death upon your own Souls when God hath passed the sentence of life and peace upon you You cross the design of Jesus Christ which is a design of love and peace You offer violence to that light reason and spirit which God hath set up in you You tempt God to say as you do and to make good your words Be therefore willing to hear what God shall say to you as they in Acts 10. said to Peter We are all here ready to hear the things that are commanded thee of God Thirdly A third Means is To proceed and argue by proper Mediums by such Arguments as are proper to the Question Some work themselves into a good opinion by false discourses concluding upon insufficient grounds that God is their God either from an empty appearance of good or else from a real presence of the life of such things as may flow from other principles then the spirit of Adoption as the fear of God mourning for sin subjection of spirit to the Commands of God which things indeed are good but may flow from another spring then the spirit of Adoption But if you would conclude in a right way of reasoning that God is your God argue then by such things as are proper to that state and relation wherein you suppose your selves to be toward God and that is in one word a spirit of true Love You shall find that working thus it will carry thy Soul in propensions towards God equal to thy consolations The Soul that loves is carried unto God with desires equal to its refreshings yea and more for when it cannot taste the comforts of the Almighty yet it is carried after him in desires and saith Lord I will love thee though thou wilt not love me This love
other life appointed for Saints The fulness beauty and satisfaction of this life How Christians offer violence to their relation IN this Chapter I would make Exhortation to all that have Interest in God to live upon it Only first I will shew what it is to live upon God as our God And it is First To cleave to God with joy of heart to live in the affectionate embraces of God in Christ and delightful conversings with him to have God for our life as it is said of Jacob concerning Benjamin His Soul his life was bound up in the life of the child Gen. 44.13 that is they had one lot if one lived the other lived their joys were the same they could not be severed or parted they were but as one So we should be towards God our lives should be so bound up in him we should be one with him Secondly To live upon God is to contract all our desires into God to have none but what are for him and according to him This is the way of life indeed when God is a mans all when the language of his Soul is Whom have I in Heaven but Thee Thus to have desires to God that he rests not in any thing beneath God nor seek any thing besides God that is to live in God Thirdly To live in a faithful real resignation of ones self unto God If you be his you know that he hath taken chosen and set apart the good man for himself Psal 4. And so must we live as sequestred persons as those that are his that as the holy things of the Temple were for no other use so must we be only for God In Hos 3.3 't is said Thou shalt abide with me many days thou shalt not play the harlot thou shalt not be for another man but shalt be unto me so will I also be for thee God will stand close to that spirit and be the comfort stay and life of it that reserves it self for him Fourthly It is to contract and draw all your expectations upon God to lay all your weight there If there be any thing thou promisest thine own heart let it be from the bosom of God if there be any answer that thou makest to the fears doubts and troubles of thy spirit let it be from the voyce of the Lord. Thus David in Psal 62.2 He only is my Rock and my Salvation he is my defence I shall not be greatly moved And he saith at vers 5. My Soul wait thou only upon God for my expectation is from him He tells you what God is to him and what indeed he looks for from God What God is to him He is my Rock and my Salvation in God is my Salvation and my Glory he is the Rock of my strength He tells you also what he expects from God My Refuge is from him so that if I need safety or refreshing and supply of any good mine eye is upon him and from him I look for all This is to live upon God Having expressed in a few words what it is to live upon God Now take those Considerations which perswade to live such a life as this First There is no other life for you This is appointed for you to this you are called for this you are fitted Fishes may as well live in the ayr as you live in the world You may try and weary out your selves in vain but God is your life This be sure of if you neglect this life either dulness and benumedness will fall upon you so that you will grow sensual brutish and earthly strangers to the joy activity and tenderness of holy Christians or you shall fall into a dis-rest an unsufferable unquietness of spirit while you are as a rouling thing in the wind having no consistence because you are out of your place You shall be afflicted within and this will be your great evil that you lived not in God And now because you seek life in other things you shall dig for your own death And if you have any reason it will work to your own affliction vex and torment your Souls night and day because you did not walk in the counsels of the Most high and the embracements of his Love Your sweetest enjoyments will be all sowred like the waters of Jericho bitterness will be in them not to be endured Secondly This is a life that should be most pleasing and amiable unto our spirits and certainly we are dead and alienated from God if there be not an incomparable sweetness to us in it For 1. It is the fullest life The life of all other things hath something mixed with it the life of your enjoyments your pleasures and relations is a mixt life there is death in all your comforts and you taste it and are sick of it many times you know it well It is true there is nothing that God hath made and appointed for our use but brings in some portion of life our garments give a little and our food a little and friends give something but how little do all these give But now this life is all life the life you have from other things is a short poor narrow life but this life is more compleat Take the life of a man that hath whatsoever his heart can wish his comforts strike but upon his sense or at best have but some light touch upon his spirit Alas the Souls of men cannot drink at these Cisterns Life that comes from these things hath not immortality in it such things are as far from immortality as they are from sufficiency The wisest the richest and most honorable that have the fullest life dye because the life they have by such things cannot hold pace with the Soul nor communicate a life of consistency But the life we have with God extends to the whole course and capacity of the Soul it fills up every corner and leaves no want 2. It is a life that gives perfect satisfaction he can ask no more that hath it 3. It is a life that beautifies the Soul Mens complexions usually are as their dyet is Oh he that feeds on God what a rare complexion is his Soul of It makes him like to God it reduceth a Soul from a miserable separation into a blessed and orderly union Our life being in one God one Good which is all Good he that lives this life would dye ten thousand deaths rather then part with it Thou well knewest Peter what thou saidst in Joh. 6. When Christ said to his Disciples Will ye also go away then Simon Peter answered To whom shall we go Lord Thou hast the words of eternal life Whither dost thou think we can go when we knew thee not we could indeed be without thee but now we know thee whither shall we go When Nature comes to a state of Consistency it rests it seeks no more That man is in such a state that is in God that enjoys him and his Love and rests in him
he lives in an holy contentment and a glorious rest in all things that are according to God and in a hatred of all things that are in opposition to God If any thing come into the ballance with God if it be like God he loves it but if it be contrary to God he hates it having once drunk of the new wine he desires not the old harsh spiritless wine You may remember the Catalogue of Saints in Hebr. 11. when you are come to their pitch then God will be dear to you and there will be a flatness upon all things else The life of every thing is according to its compass and the thing by which it is maintained Men have a better life then beasts for they have better things to live on Princes live better lives then beggers and Angels then men because they have better things to live on Now then if your life be in God you have the best and sweetest life We judg of lives in the world by the contentment they have that live in them now in this life you find innumerable Angels the spirits of just men made perfect Jesus Christ lives this life and thinks it enough he desires no better life God himself lives this life he lives in himself Thirdly A third thing is That if you do not maintain this life you offer unspeakable violence to that blessed station and happy relation wherein God hath set you One of these two things you must needs acknowledg 1. If you live not on God God is not your portion you have not taken him for your God you have not clos'd with him and then you are undone 2. Or this must be granted If you have closed with him you wrong God and your selves extreamly because you live not on him Hath God taken you and have you taken him Hath he said to thee My Spouse and hath thy Soul said to him My Lord and my Husband And shall we live upon other things and not upon our Husband Shall the child live on strangers bread and not upon his Father Shall the son of a Prince hang as a begger upon others doors and be a stranger to his Fathers love to his Fathers house and fulness This is certain that so far as you do this you are not children but Prodigals in Luke 15. last dead and lost While you are out of God and your hearts set on other things you are in a state of dead men in an absolute indisposedness and incapacity either to the fulfilling of that which lies upon you as the Law of your relation unto God or to the enjoyment of that which is the sweetness priviledg and comfort of your relation unto God Is she a wife think you or doth she not offer violence to the Law of her Relation that refuseth bed and board with her husband You should drink water out of your own Cistern from your own Head and Spring who is that but your Lord and Head whom you have chosen God will not endure that you should wander He will hedg up your way as he speaks in Hos 2. and those hedges will teer you He is pleased with you when you lean on him and take of his Love and then his joy is fulfilled in you you do what he loves he takes contentment in it Other comforts are stoln sweet they may be in the taste but they will be bitterness in your bowels it must be so for when you live any where but in God you cross his great design which is to make himself your Center wherein your Souls should rest He hath appointed no place for thy Soul to rest in but his own bosom You despise him when you suffer the joys of your Souls to be clouded If Elkanah could say to his wife Am not I better to thee then ten sons Surely God may say much more Am not I better to thee then ten such things as these that thou art troubled at So that if your hearts go out any other way it is against all reason Christ in John 4.10 made account that the Soul hath enough that tastes of this for he saith he shall never thirst more Go no more then to the hedges and high ways thou that hast such a God and such a Friend be quiet and rest in his Love He rests in his love to you Zech. 3.17 And will not you rest in it and lie down in his arms and embracements and say It is sweet it is enough Is not he always embracing you and cheering you and holding forth the brests of his consolation to you wooing and winning you and using all means to fill your Souls with himself and to make you blessed in the enjoyment of him If then you have any fear of his displeasure if you have any sweetness and comfort of the Love of God if you have tasted and known how good the Lord is then keep fast to him and maintain your Souls in a constant living communion with him If you keep near him you shall find that there is life in him Psal 69.32 They shall live that seek the Lord. CHAP. XVIII Heavenly life nearest at hand Christians are to live up to the height of it and to maintain it in every condition A Fourth Argument is That this life we speak of is most present it is nearest at hand most attainable being wholly mental and spiritual and those works are quickest done All other life comes in by parcels and pieces If a man would live in honor what a deal ado is there what a compass must he fetch to maintain good thoughts with this man and with that man and his honor riseth by degrees The like may be said concerning pleasures and riches Nay naturally what a course doth the Soul take to bring in that meat which supplies our life in eating concocting and digesting it and carrying it to every part The labour of Nature is great But this life is maintained by a sweet and silent working of Spirit it is a life that is got kept and cherished by the sweetest actings of the Soul In Psal 63.6 saith David I shall be fill'd as with marrow and fatness when I remember thee upon my bed And in Psal 20.7 you have this exprest by the like words Some trust in Charets and some in Horses Great preparations they make but what is his trust I will remember the Name of the Lord our God This is life to remember the Name of the Lord our God It is the best exercise of the most noble part of a man towards the most excellent Object And what should we love more to look upon and to remember then God Do not you find how a few affectionate thoughts of him come down in showres of spiritual blessing and consolation Both the Goodness of God and the Love of God makes this work sweet He that seeks to live this way hath not only sweetness in his end but in the way to it Remember how successful you have found this
course What unspeakable effusions of inward refreshing have you found upon turning of your spirits unto God upon the very cast of your eye upon the Father of Mercies Alas for those poor Souls those wandering Beggers even all men that do not come in and that have not God for their God in Christ It is pity and grief to see what a poor life they live and they know it not How do they sweat and toyl for that which they never get They get but the image of what they aim at For what do they work For life they think but they work themselves out of life not into life they are knocking always at that door where nothing is where vanity and emptiness dwells they are digging pits that will hold no water they are seeking grapes on thorns and figs on thistles But this way is sure and sweet you are sure to find and your sweetness is as well in seeking as in finding Let Christians then endeavor to live this life How can we without shame complain that we are dead and broken in spirit that a weight lies upon our Souls that we are empty when life is so near us when the Well is not deep and we might take of the water of Life and drink freely Men will not improve the activity and nimbleness of their Souls to enrich themselves We oftentimes charge God with hiding his face from us but wrongfully he turns not away his face from us we turn from him we go out of the Sun-shine into the cold shade and then we shake by reason of cold But those looks of God which are easily had in Jesus Christ warm and chear the Soul Have not such a thought in your hearts that holy Consolations are hardly gotten You wrong the Fountain of Life if you think that you may draw and find nothing or that you may let down your bucket and bring it up empty these are blasphemies which our unbeleeving hearts form against God Certainly God is easie to be entreated and to be found of those that seek him David in Psal 32. had hard thoughts of him but when he once tryed him though he came in the blackness and dread of his Soul covered over with shame and confusion yet he found God to be to him according to all his Name and according to all his Word his tears were wiped away and his broken bones were set again and he was satisfied I would yet a little more clearly express this thing and winde up the Exhortation to its just height in two words 1. That we endevor to live this life in the highest degree that is to live very much in God not only to have a true life but a life proportionable to our relation unto him Princes should feed as Princes and their life should be like their place So should Christians have their life proportionable to what God is What God is in himself he is to us if we have accepted Salvation by Jesus Christ Meer peace is too low a temper for a Christian he is never like himself except he live in joy his principles reach to all joy and for that the Apostle Paul pray'd Col. 1.11 Saints might as well live like Princes in faith and joy as with feeble hopes some weak consolations they might as well drink a full draught as taste of the goodness and kindness of God Who straitens you What is your life but a continual espousing of your selves unto God and should not there be much joy on the Marriage day Therefore the Apostle prays in Rom. 15. The God of peace fill you with all peace and joy always All peace and always 2. A second word is That you maintain this life in every state No variation of our outward estate in this life should be any diminution of the glory of this life The rejoycing you have by Faith and spiritual enjoyments should not be dampt by any thing Is our fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ Can we say so Then what should all the turnings of this world be to us How unsuitable to this Communion is it to have our spirits turned and our joys changed with outward things Suppose it be well with us in the world and we be pleased yet is it fit for the Expectants of eternal life who have also a sense of the sweetness of enjoying God to be much taken with these things Is there not a Crown prepared for us Is not God our God Can we be content to be so taken with the dishes at a feast as to forget our friend at the table and that our best friend Suppose it be ill with us as we commonly account ill though the truth is it is never ill with a good man it doth but appear ill it seems ill but it is all good and well for all is from goodness and love therefore though it be ill with us in this sence yet let us be in our own temper that is rejoyce in God Though nothing be the same yet if God be the same let us be the same Meditate upon that famous place Habak 3.17 Although the fig-tree shall not blossom neither shall fruit be in the vines the labour of the Olive shall fail and the fields shall yield no meat the flock shall be cut off from the fold and there shall be no herd in the stalls Yet I will rejoyce in the Lord I will joy in the God of my Salvation This is that which God calls for that you live in him always Whatsoever fails say as the Psalmist Psal 73.26 God is my portion for ever I have a Father in Heaven and so though I find things bad enough here yet it is well it is well well above and well within CHAP. XIX Further Considerations to promote the forementioned life of its incomparable worth Those that will not live the life of Faith shall not A firm belief of the Gospel the foundation of this Life LEt us now take a few things more into consideration to promote our living in God for we have need of all cords to draw us and bind us to this life 1. The first is the unutterable difference that is between this life and any other attainable or imaginable Harken to all that can judg every thing speaks in the Case especially take the testimony of God and of those whom he hath blessed with the best enjoyment of himself You know what God saith of himself and what glorious descriptions he hath made of that absoluteness and incomprehensible goodness which is in him You know what he hath said of all things else that they are broken Cisterns Ask the Saints also and the spirits of just men made perfect take the Angels too they live in God and are confined in that life they go no further yet their confinement is no imprisonment but it 's a confinement of love and liberty it 's from the satisfaction of their Souls You know that perfect rest is from a perfection of
Thou hast made me glad with thy Countenance The sense of the good presence and favour and love of God doth fill the Soul with pleasure and when it can hold no more it hath enough Let the issue of all this Discourse be to set our hearts a longing and wishing O that I were blessed with a full enjoyment of God! O that I had as much of him as ever I shall or can have The Soul that is thus in travel travels without pain The Mind reaching after other things oftentimes out-stretcheth it self There are usually if not always pains with desires especially in desires after the Creature because that oftentimes there is a frustration of our desires or an elongation of the things the things are far off hard to come by our desires oftentimes are mute they speak not or the things that we desire know not our minds but our desires after God always speak they are open unto God he heareth their voyce All my desires are before Thee saith David Psal 38.8 and my groanings are not hid from Thee Therfore it must needs be sweet when the Soul lies thus open unto God Other desires do not assure and secure a man in the things he desires a man may wish this and wish that and go without both but the Soul that thus longs after God is instated in his wish hath a present enjoyment and certainly shall have a full enjoyment of him He will fulfil the desire of them that fear him God will hear them Psal 145.16 They that long most receive most it 's the hungry spirit that feeds best and fares best When the Church was sick of love being very much taken with what she had and much longing after what she wanted then she could say I am my Beloveds and my Beloved is mine his desire is towards me in Cant. 7.10 That refreshed her the Greek reads it his Conversion is towards me indeed God will turn to those that go out toward him In Isai 64.5 He meets those that work righteousness and seek him in his ways Again Consider this That longing after a full enjoyment is the natural effect of a known Interest in God Look through all the Orders of the Creation and you shall find that every thing seeks the enjoyment of its Interest Angels do Men do Beasts do they seek their own their own pastures their own young their own mates Can you imagine that we should be the Children of God and account him our Father and not long to enjoy him A child hears from his father and receives tokens from his father but he is not contented he would be with his father So it is truly with a Child of God so far as he hath received of that Spirit he longs to enjoy God Interest in God works by a power of its own and God works in it too God pursues his Interest in us to the utmost therefore he is working us to himself by all means all ways by good and evil by life by mortality and death by the senses by Ordinances by his Spirit He is always at work to bring us home that we may be in his possession and enjoy him And to make it the more full he hath appointed the breaking of these bodies that our spirits may come more full to him nay and he hath appointed a day of Resurrection that our bodies may come full to him and this is one great end of Christs coming again in Joh. 14. that we may be with him in his Fathers house If God so drives on his Interest to make us perfect with him let us drive on our Interest to make God fully ours in the enjoyment of him Lastly There is nothing to hinder in this Case that you should not drive on to a full and perfect enjoyment of him Are you full in this world should your full enjoyments of the world hinder your full enjoyments of God Is not God better then these things Are you scanted in this world The more need you have then of the fullest enjoyments of God Have you much of God You know the more what God is and can you chuse but desire him Have you little of God Then you need more and should drive on to get more Are you sure of your Interest Where Interest is most sure there is most love and where the Soul loves most thither it drives most Do you fear your Interest You have so much the more reason to seek after a full enjoyment of God to the satisfaction of your Souls What do you think should stand in the way You must part with the world What is this world to your Fathers house and to God himself You must dye What is death Cannot that everlasting life recompence you infinitely Therefore there is nothing to hinder you Then seeing God invites you and provokes you to seek more of him in this world though you cannot have all I conjure you by all the sweetness that is in God and that you have found in God that you obey his Word herein and drive on more diligently and strongly to a more full enjoyment of God FINIS PSAL. 119. vers 4. I am thine save me for I have sought thy Precepts CHAP. I. Gods Interest in man natural and acquired this latter twofold Of holy Resignation Of true and false Mourning I Have chosen this excellent Pattern to propose to you and to my self of an ingenuous spirit David a man after Gods own heart would be saved but not after the manner of the men of this world that would be saved to be their own and to enjoy themselves at their own wills but he in being saved would be Gods and at his disposing I am thine save me There are three things here that would be thought on 1. What David means when he saith I am thine 2. What the Reason should be that we should use such an acknowledgment of our selves to be Gods when we pray to him 3. What force there is in this argument to be pleaded with God I am thine save me Thine We are said to be Gods either by way of affection as the Church Cant. 2.16 I am my well-beloveds and my well-beloved is mine Or in respect of that Interest that God hath in us The Interest of God in man is upon a twofold Foundation and Account 1. Upon account of the Law of Nature the natural Law which doth set God as Lord over all and acknowledg him supreme Commander of every thing because he is the Original and glorious Fountain of all Being Upon that account it is that in Psal 89.11 it is said The Heavens are thine and the Earth also is thine as for the world and the fulness thereof thou hast founded them There is the ground of that Dominion which God hath over all things they are his off-spring things that himself hath made And in Psal 50.12 God owns himself in this Soveraignty The Heavens are mine and the Earth is mine and all that in them is
To be able no otherwise to say I am thine is but sad In a family the meanest things that are scarce fit to be retained in the house are his to whom the house belongs All things are Gods even the meanest creatures and to have no other relation to God then this is but to be in the condition of things most contemptible In Deut. 10.14 God speaks of a better relation to his people Behold the Heavens and the Heaven of Heavens is the Lord thy Gods the Earth also with all that therein is Now the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them and chose his seed after them even you above all people as appeareth this day We must be his upon a better account then that of Creation There is a second Interest that God hath in man and that is acquired and that partly by Redemption God having redeemed both by price and power a certain number to himself out of the lump of mankind these in an especial manner are his So Isai 43.1 Thus saith the Lord that created thee O Jacob and formed thee O Israel Fear not I have redeemed thee I have called thee by name thou art mine I have redeemed thee that is I have delivered thee from the great power of the mighty Ones that bare Rule over thee and under whom thou sufferedst hard things Therefore thou art mine This we know is a Law that is amongst men That those that are conquered and saved from the sword become his by whom they are so subdued There is a second acquired Interest that God hath in man and that is by Contract wherein man engageth himself to a resignation of himself to God In which sence David spake also when he said I am thine The Contract between God and man which is the foundation of this Interest is a mutual engaging to be each others according to their capacities I 'le not insist upon opening this description but will a little hint at some of those strange things that are in this Contract between God and man And First A word as to Gods part It 's a Contract where there is the greatest disparity that is imaginable between the two parties For here is he that is the highest and the other party that is lower then the lowest and meanest creature more contemptible then the worm Princes do not make contracts with beggers and yet they may have need of such though not for their assistance yet as theaters to display their bounty and goodness on God needs not the whole Creation to set forth his glory who is absolute in himself God al sufficient To this add that disparity that is between the things which God requires of man and the things which God engageth himself to do for man Was there ever such a Contract made Saith God Do you but your part which is not a thousand part of what is due and I 'le do my part What is that More then he did at first indent for I 'le give you an eternal immutable life and that in my own Presence and Kingdom You may cast your eyes from that again and wonder more at the Mediator by whom and through whom this Covenant this Contract was made God sends his own Son into the world both to bespeak man to be willing to enter into this Contract and to seal up the Contract with his own blood That part which concerns man his resigning of himself unto God which is an absolute parting with himself and putting himself everlastingly under the power wisdom and soveraignty of God to be commanded ordered and disposed in all things by him according to his Will I shall now set before you certain peculiar things that are proper to this engagement of man and resignation of himself unto God 1. In resigning of our selves to God there is an act springing from the greatest necessity and wherein there is the greatest liberty and freedom of spirit It was ill done to put these two into a contrariety and opposition Necessity and Freedom which do most perfectly agree By how much the more any creature is excellent by so much the more he is necessarily what he is and yet most freely such The Angels love God necessarily and yet most freely Nay God himself is good most necessarily and yet is so and doth good most freely This might be manifested in sundry Instances where there is some degree of necessity and also a very excellent freedom and willingness As for example Take two friends fully suited to each other their hearts are necessarily carried to mutual embraces and yet most freely It is in this case as in flying from evil a man flies from evil by a kind of enforcement and yet freely especially from some great evil when he sees there is a necessity to fly he cannot but fly and yet doth it freely In resigning of our selves to God that which is the fundamental reason of it lays upon the Spirit of a man a strong necessity and yet leaves that spirit in a very sweet and excellent freedome Psal 110.10 You have both these exprest Thy people shal be willing in the day of thy power in the day when thou putest forth thy power who wilt rule in the midst of thine enemies and raise up to thy self a Kingdome not onely among strangers but Rebels in this day of thy power thy people shal be willing yea willingnesses very willing they shall come to thee with all earnestness The will of a man may truly and in good fence be subject to compulsion and yet not limited in its freedom it may be compel'd how Not by meer physicall power acting upon the Spirit of a man but by a moral power by force of Arguments and Reasons proposed and set on the soul so Sauls servants compel'd him to eat bread 1 Sam. 28. And they were sent to command and to compell them to come to the Feast Indeed this inforcing and commanding reason is the great instrument of the power of God whereby he commands the spirits of those whom he loves into obedience to himself This is the key that opens the heart as it is said Acts 16.14 God opened the heart of Lydia Resignation of a mans self to God is from the efficacie of Gods mighty appearance and manifestation of himself to the soul of a man by which he is over powr'd and cannot deny God but notwithstanding this necessity he doth most freely fall under the power that acts upon him 2. A second thing concerning Resignation is that Self is saved by being destroyed it lives â—y death A man finds himself by losing himself and doth best enjoy himself by parting with himself There is a great mistake and it is the fascination and witchery of the powers of darkness upon the spirits of men that by Nature corrupt nature we are apt to think that the giving of our selves to God is the giving of our selves away to our loss whereas it is our making it 's not the straitning
but the perfecting of our freedom Take it in this Similitude A poor woman that lives in rags hath the honor and happiness of being wife to a great Prince offered her for her now to give up her self is no way to straiten her freedom or diminish her happiness for she will enjoy her self better as a Queen then as a Begger So by resigning our selves unto God we lose no liberty nor any thing that is good but enjoy our selves in greater amplitude and fulness of all happiness So that for a man to give himself to God is self-love in the height of it and there is no true self-love but this for a man to think to love himself in ways of separation from God or in opposition to God is to hate himself in the appearance of love but this is true self-love that makes me give my self to God and be subject to him 3. Resigning of our selves to God is an act of the greatest joy and the greatest grief Of the greatest joy and contentment for when once the Soul is blest with such a life from above as over-powers a man and makes him surrender himself to God now he is in his first and proper Center The whole state of men out of God is nothing but a constant course of confusion and restless motion who by reason of darkness and want of judgment by reason of hardness and want of sense may think they are well may think they are at home when they are not but are like men fallen asleep in a strange place so is every man that is out of God But when the heart is brought home to God it is in its place Do you think the Prodigal had not more rest in his Fathers house then among the Swine Now a man sees what a blessed change is wrought in his condition that he is come now into a state of Reconciliation with God and of unspeakable advancement of his nature that he is advanced to the greatest freedom to the greatest honor and riches to the best life every way and so this Resignation is an act of the greatest Joy It 's likewise such a work as is with the greatest grief These two will stand together neither can they be parted every mans grief is as his joy is Consider these two things 1. That when a man is brought to God he is put into a state of Judgment and Ingenuity so that now he sees things as they are and looks upon the wrongs he hath done against God with another eye an ingenuous spirit can no more forbear mourning then a stone can forbear falling to the Center 2. Think on this also that Gods end in bringing back the creature is such as cannot be accomplished without this mourning For his end is the Exaltation of his Grace Grace is no grace to an unbroken spirit Sermons of mercy are but empty sounds to a man that knows not what sorrow is God intends to make Christ precious but what is a salve a plaister though the best in the world to a man that is whole Christ came indeed to save the miserable but that man that is not brought to see his misery and mourn over it cares not for Christ Gods end is the engaging of the Creature to himself but that man will never think himself beholding to God that knows not what he hath done against God But when he sees what a wretch he hath been and his heart is stricken within him and he lies melting in sorrow and clothed with shame before God now he thinks body and Soul too little for God now if he had a thousand lives they should all go for God now he saith What can I render to the Lord c. Gods end is to bring his people in so that they may be fast when they are in that they may not go forth again But he that thinks himself off from sins that he never mourn'd for and thinks he hath escaped evil courses that he hath not been broken for will return again A mourning spirit makes a Christian stedfast in his course and this will be a bar between him and his lust He that knows not to mourn knows nor to stand fast Certainly where there is not a spirit of mourning that man hath not resign'd himself to God to this day For that which is the principle of such self-resignation doth by its vertue also work mourning abasement and brokenness of heart If the sight of God in all his goodness be that which moves and draws the Soul as with a cord unto God that very goodness of God which is so apprehended will also break and melt the Soul In Jer. 8.6 saith God I harkened and heard but they spake not aright no man repented of his wickedness saying What have I done Every one turned to his course as the horse rusheth into the battel This people made many promises that they would walk better with God but being not touch'd with an effectual sense of their injurious dealings with God they repented not Therefore they returned every man to his own ways c. If any one now should say I have little of this sorrow and therefore do suspect my self I answer 1. There is a passionate mourning which lies in weeping crying and howling and this every one hath not 2. There is a mental mourning where a man sees the things to be mourned for and where he hath such a spirit that carries him against his way and against himself and is full of wishes O that I had never been so against God and O that I might never do so again and makes the Soul walk humbly it cannot be proud now nor lift up it self because it remembers what it hath been and done against God Canst thou find these things in thy self 3. Again There is a mourning of pure necessity not willingly and contentfully but so as a man cannot avoyd it God presents himself angry and shews sin in its colour and then not an Ahab nor a Judas can forbear mourning but this mourning is bitterness But true mourning is sweet sweeter then all the comforts in the world A right spirit puts the sweetness of Heaven in mourning God cannot please him better with any thing then by touching his spirit and laying it low before him If then thine heart be touched of God and thou love him and feel some meltings thou rejoycest and purst not off this sorrow but bids it welcome and when God as a Father rebukes thee thou blessest him and lovest him 4. There is a mourning that is by fits not habitual The veriest hypocrite in the world you may find sometimes in his closet before God and he will be weeping and mourning and taking on heavily by fits but take him a while after and he is like the dry ground after a Land flood hard as a stone True mourning is another frame of spirit wherein the spirit in an usual course is carried with abasement and a secret lamenting within O
wretch that I am how have I lived thus and thus have I done He mingles the comforts of this world with these sorrows and will have place for this mourning in the midst of all things and cannot but oftentimes have his eye upon himself like Paul I was a Persecuter and a Blasphemer c. 5. Again There is a mourning that is afflicting but not changing Many trouble and vex themselves upon the remembrance of their ways a fire burns in their bowels that they cannot extinguish but it doth not purge them from their dross their tears be salt and brinish but not healing they hang down their heads and walk sadly but carry the same spirit still against God so Ahab so they in 1 Sam. 7.6 Upon Samuels counsel to them they gathered together at Mizpeh and drew water and poured out before the Lord and fasted and said We have sinned against the Lord. They drew water It 's conceived that this drawing of water is an expression of their mourning and their exceeding mourning and they fasted which is an addition and confessed saying We have sinned against the Lord But it came to little as you may see in the eighth Chapter Thou mournest aright when thine heart is changed and when thy mourning tends to the killing of thy sin A fourth thing concerning this Resignation is that it is but in part and yet is certainly in the whole It is in part for no man hath actually perfectly given himself to God in this very gift and holy act of Resignation there is imperfection and something wanting and much more in the execution of this engagement all along Yet notwithstanding this Resignation is whole and entire partly in Gods acceptance God is pleased to take it so to take a part for the whole as much as man can do as if all were done And it is whole and entire in mans intention and desire Though the desire be not perfect and the intent not perfect as to the degree yet both reach to the extent of of that which God calls for Less then this cannot be in a good man and a man beloved of God A man cannot say I am thine if he come not to this For consider God treating with man about this work when he comes to plead for a Resignation he treats not for part but for all Besides when man comes to plead with God he pleads not for part but for all he would be saved not in body alone but in Soul too he would be perfectly saved And take this also that God gives himself wholly unto man if he did not give him his Wisdom and Power and Love man could not love him for how could we love him if his Wisdom Power or any of his glorious Attributes were against us God gives himself to man wholly Again God cannot take less then all for to accept of a partial resignment and to indulge a man a right and power over himself to live according to his own will is to act against those very Laws of his which Nature cannot dispense with As to take that which is the first and fundamental Law Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart with all thy Soul and with all thy might If any now upon the apprehension of the truth of this should say This makes me fear and suspect my self because I do not find that this giving up of my self is so entire and compleat I would have such consider that Resignation lies not so much in doing and being all that God requires as in willingness to be and to do all It is necessary to be and to do all that God requires and we are obliged to this but this Resignation lies chiefly in this in being willing to be and to do so that is a speech methinks that falls pat with the condition of the people of God Neh. 1.11 O Lord let thine ear be attentive to the prayer of thy servants who desire to fear thy Name But let there be no mistake for when I say Resignation lies chiefly in a willingness to be and to do all that God requires mark what kind of willingness it is it must be such as is vigorous as puts on to endevors so that it sets the Soul down mourning when it finds shortness of power I add this lest any as the world oftentimes doth should hurt himself by such an excuse as this I confess I do not but I would do well my ways are not good but I like them not my heart is better The world will one day see how destructive and fallacious these pleas are Again There is a great difference between sin dwelling in us and sin entertained by us between sin remaining and sin reserved Reservation of sin is against the nature of this absolute Resignation but a man that truly resigns himself may and doth want power to cast forth of doors every sin and every degree of it No man that hath resigned himself to God doth entertain it he doth not like it nor comply with it he doth not plot conspire or devise how he may save and enjoy his sin he lives not in the purposes of it this is against the nature of resigning our selves to God 5. This work of Resignation is a work once done and yet always doing When God hath so wrought upon the heart by effectual perswasions and his mighty power God saith I am thy God and the Soul answers in truth And I am thine Now is the Resignation actually made But though this be done yet it is still always doing while we are in this world nay to Eternity for it 's a thing that consists of an iteration of multiplied acts As Wedlock is not one single act of giving of persons each to other but if they live like married persons as they should there is a dayly giving of themselves each to other their hearts go out every day with complaceney and delight rejoycing in renewing the bond and making the league yet firmer and firmer It 's so between God and us 6. This Resignation is such a thing as when 't is once done is never undone Herein this Contract of man with God differs from all others in the world for all other Contracts have a time to cease By Contract one becomes another mans servant for a time The most durable Contract is that of Marriage yet it admits of a double breach by death or by divorce But here neither of these take place there 's no divorce after marriage with God and no death comes unto that Soul which becomes his for these two things hold such a man 1. The infinite goodness of God with which the Soul is so satisfied and contented that it cannot in any constant course and stay continue and give up it self to any other thing no more then a man can be willing to leave the light of the Sun to go to live where there is no light but of a Candle or to forsake Paradise if he were
patience that should humble us and forward the work when we come to resign our selves because we were before his Let me shut up all with this Exhortation That when you have been with God and made this acknowledgment that you are his and have dealt in truth with God and when God hath shew'd you the mercy you came for now stand fast in your own word and perform it break not your word with him to whom you have thus engag'd your selves If you mind you may have a true description of your own spirits you shall see the right face of them upon change of seasons Hast thou been a begger in the day of thy distress Art thou enlarged Is the mercy come Now observe thy spirit now see what frame thy spirit is in towards God when thy way is made smooth and storms are layd and thou art at rest Observe it Men are very apt to promise in a day of trouble Oh upon a sick bed if God would restore me I would walk more exactly with him in a day of fear what is more common then to say so And as in Deut. 27. when they heard the Word of God repeated to them they shut up all with a professed willingness to submit and when the Curse was read all the people said Amen so be it but it was not so In 2 Chron. 12. you have that wicked King coming to God crouching before God and offering himself before him but it was not done effectually what ever thoughts he had at that time that he would be the Lords they went off again Men come to God by the enforcement of distress and say much but are the same afterwards they take up new words but their hearts are what they were before Jer. 2.20 I have planted thee a noble vine I have broken the yoke and burst the bonds thou saidst I will not transgress But what was the temper and frame what was the spirit of this people indeed When under every high hill and every green tree thou playest the harlot She had a whorish and a wicked spirit even then when she said to God I 'le not transgress So in 2 Chron. 34.29 you see what a fair appearance there was Josiah being stir'd in spirit to think that the Lord God should be so far out of sight and mind and knowledg and knowing what danger they were in because of neglecting the Commandment of God He humbled himself and the people joyned with him and engaged themselves unto God and there was great joy and alacrity among them and there was such an appearance such a Passover as never had been Notwithstanding at Chap. 26.16 it 's said that they mocked the Messengers of God and despised his Word and misused his Prophets So false are the hearts of men It concerns you therefore to look to your intentions in this thing Consider That the word is gone out of thy mouth thou hast promised to God that thou wilt be his if thou hast not done it formally thou hast done it virtually There is of the nature of a promise in all prayers No man can come to God as a petitioner but he comes with an acknowledgment of him as his Lord therefore having promised thou oughtst to stand to it a promise binds always but chiefly in such cases as these 1. Where the thing we promised was due before it was promised so was this if thou hast said thou wouldst give thy self to God that was due before 2. Where the performance of the promise brings no loss or detriment if thou fulfil thy promise thou losest not by it thou partest with nothing that will do thee good in that thou thy self becomest the Lords it is thy perfection and thy happiness it is a coming to the very state of Angels No creature can possibly be happy but in a subordination to him that is the supream God blessed for ever Having promised therefore make good thy word 2. Consider That by being with God and having obtained the things you sought for you have now an advantage to walk as the Lords to make good your word Partly because your way is enlarged It 's a hard thing to walk with God in ways full of bryars and thorns it 's hard to walk through Seas of blood and mighty storms and tempests But now when God smooths thy way and removes thy fears and gives thy spirit more composedness it 's a mighty advantage in thy hand and therefore to be improved David was of this spirit Psal 119.32 I will run the ways of thy Commandments when thou shalt enlarge my heart The meaning is Fears and sorrows compress and burden me and make me walk heavily as a man under a weight but if thou wilt scatter these clouds and deliver me from these straits and comfort my Soul if thou wilt cheer refresh and enlarge me then I will run thy ways I 'le not only walk in them but walk with all alacrity and celerity I entered upon these words when the sword was upon the march and fear was upon us terribly Hath God appeared delivered and saved you yea are the clouds of blood scattered and fallen upon the heads of our enemies You have the desire of your Souls the bryars are removed your way is plain now walk with God fulfil your word to him to whom you have given up your selves This advantage also you have from the greatness of the mercy Great mercies do awaken the Soul renew refresh and enliven the Souls of men Now if God hath put thee upon the wing defer not but now up and be doing pay thy vows before thy heart grow cold It is a great thing to lose impressions when they are lost they are hardly regained David lay long before he was the same that he was before his fall it cost him much pains It may be if thou grow cold again that God will heat thee in a fiery furnace He hath ways enough to visit upon thee the neglects of the seasons of grace You may see how he expresseth himself in anger against his people Hos 7.13 Wo to thee for thou hast fled from me destruction unto thee because thou hast transgressed against me though I have redeemed them they have spoken lyes against me though I have strengthened their arm yet they have imagined evil against me When a people are bound by mercies and yet obey not it displeaseth God was very angry with Hezekiah for what because he did not return according to the mercies he had received Surely the mercy you have received is great it must be measured by years and ages it is not one mercy but a multitude a heap of mercies Look how many mischiefs the wrath of malicious men would have heaped upon you look how many evils your own fearing hearts could devise and suggest so many mercies are in this one If therefore thou hast sought God and God hath heard thee remember when thou didst come to God thou didst come upon such terms not to
in his heart an inward inclination and strong propension to make his addresses to God and converse with him Secondly The knowledg of this Interest carries the spirit of a man to God in a due frame and posture that is it maintains the Soul in its addresses to God in joy and confidence cheerfulness and hope yet with intermixtures of awful fear A man that knows God to be his God when he goes to him he goes not as he to whom Augustus said What dost thou come to me as to a Lion He comes not with that astonishment dread and amazement that men do when their Consciences are defiled and in whose spirits the fire of Hell is He is not afraid notwithstanding the infinite distance between God and him to lift up his face before the Almighty He comes with boldness and confidence when once he is in the sight of this that his name is written in the Book of Life and that God hath taken him into the number of those whom he hath chosen out of the world He comes and speaks to God and his language is as to one with whom he hath power Psal 104.6 I will say unto the Lord Thou art my God hear the voyce of my supplication O Lord. He tells you what language he useth to God I said Thou art my God therefore hear me when I come unto thee and this argument is very strong So in Micah 7.7 you have the Church expressing her self thus Therefore will I look to the Lord and wait for the God of my Salvation my God will hear me The conclusion is very strong So in Psal 67.6 God even our own God shall bless us When a man once comes to know that God hath taken him into the number of his into his flock and fold now saith he God is mine my own God shall bless me That faith which makes a man see his Interest in God makes him see that it 's more to have an Interest in him then to obtain all things from him he therefore goes with courage to God because he hath obtained that already which is more then all comes to that he shall have by asking It was a greater favor for God to give us himself to be ours then for him to give us a portion among the Angels in the glory of Heaven God being our God stands engaged he is not his own but ours also therefore when a man sees this he comes to God for all things as to his own and he comes for his own As a child that is in want speaks to his father for supplies he speaks to him as one in whom he hath Interest and pleads with such a spirit as knowing that he likewise hath interest in his fathers estate Indeed this Interest is the best of all it 's founded upon all Reason Which ways soever a man comes to have Interest in another so many ways hath God exprest our Interest to be in him and more also By Creation He hath made us we are not our own Psal 100.3 or He hath made us we are his It 's founded in Redemption in Isai 43.1 Thus saith the Lord that formed thee O Jacob and created thee O Israel Fear not I have redeemed thee I have called thee by name thou art mine I have made thee and I have bought thee It 's likewise founded in that Union that we have with Jesus Christ God is become ours because Christ is become ours The Sons Wife calls his Father her Father he is become a Father to her in his Son If God takes notice of Israel upon this account that they were the seed of Abraham his friend how much more will he own his people that are members of the body of his own Son In Isai 41.8 Thou Israel art my servant whom I have chosen the seed of Abraham my friend We become his and he ours by his actual admission of us into the number of those that are his own and of the houshold of God Ephes 2.19 They are said to be a people near unto him Psal 148.14 All Souls are mine saith God in Ezek. 18.4 But those whom he admits into his family he takes peculiar notice of and they are in a more especial manner his And also by actual Communion he becomes ours As the wife becomes the husband's not only by contract and marriage and receiving her to his habitation but by actual communion so we are the Lords because of that actual converse that we have with God and by his communication of those fruits of his Love which he reserves for his own Thus then the knowledg of our Interest with God clothes the spirit with fit dispositions and affections in addresses unto God as to joy and confidence Now on the other side it works also in the Soul an awful reverential respect such as becomes the relation of a poor creature to his Maker and that infinite distance that is between the high and holy One and a lump of dust which also belongs to the true temper of a man in communion with God Serve the Lord with fear and rejoyce with trembling Psal 2. And Mal. 1.6 If I be a Master where is my fear It 's a dangerous thing for a man upon presumption of his Interest in God to have a boldness without a mixture of this fear and awfulness Such joys are not from above nor is it the Spirit of Truth that bears witness to them when they do not lay the Soul much under God Of all men they come with the greatest fear of God that have the fullest knowledg of their Interest in God and who have their hearts most spread with joy and gladness because God is become their Portion In Heb. 12.28 Wherefore receiving a Kingdom which cannot be moved let us have grace whereby to serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear That seems a strange Inference Having received a Kingdom therefore serve God with fear I saith the Apostle therefore and God looks for it and know if it be not done there will be hazard in it for our God is a consuming fire A stranger passeth by a man and takes no notice of him but a child that knows him to be his father comes toward him with respect and honour the very interest he hath in him and the relation wherein he stands strikes on his spirit an awe towards his father So it is with those that call God Father See what account Nehemiah gives of his just walking in Nehem. 5.15 Other Rulers did so and so but I did not for I feared God The assurance of the Love of God and of a mans eternal life begets fear not that fear which hath torment as the Apostle speaks but it begets an awful caution and wariness as is meet in a business of so great concernment He is more afraid to offend God that knows God to be his God then that man is whom God threatens every day with everlasting death Mark that of the Prophet Hos 3.5
It is spoken concerning the time when they should be restored to a better state Afterwards shall the children of Israel return and seek the Lord their God and David their King and shall fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days Shall fear the Lord and his goodness No father is more feared of his child then the best father that walks towards his child in the greatest wisdom goodness meekness and bounty So that the kindness of God and tastes of his Love do not lift up the Soul and make it proud That man is the most humble man in the world that hath the most knowledg of the Love of God towards him in Jesus Christ This Fear and Faith do so stand together that they cannot be separated In Act. 9.31 They walked in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost It 's the right temper of a true Christian to have the comforts of God in his Soul and yet to be with fear and trembling It 's a fear that doth inevitably arise upon a rectified nature from a sight of the disproportion that is between God and us This is in Heaven it self where the Angels in glory beholding God so infinitely lifted up above them cannot but have reverence fear and dread in their Souls towards him And it 's a fear likewise of danger not the danger of eternal death for from that they are saved the knowledg of the Love of God assures them for that but from the danger of other things which to them are as bitter as death is to the world and those are the frowns of God the rebukes of God the suspensions of Love and estrangedness of God towards them the stripes of God these things when God doth as a Father to his that know him they are most grievous and smarting and their Souls groan under these more then worldly men under worldly danger Therefore he that knows God and what it is to be in the light of his Countenance he that hath tasted the bitterness of the loss of this lives in fear lest he should provoke God as a Father to deal thus in severity with him And I speak all this the rather because some do blaspheme that which is the spring of life and peace to the Saints saying That for a man to have the knowledg of God to be his God and everlasting Portion is a snare to bring that man into a forgetfulness of God and his Duty and to blow up the spirit with pride and lull him into a sinful sleep Such like things as these have been and still are not without much cause of grief cast upon this blessed Doctrine of the knowledg of our abode with God Whereas the true knowledg of God being ours is that which doth effectually and firmly work the heart to all diligent watchfulness tenderness and sedulity Thirdly It disposeth a mans spirit to the best entertainment of all divine Determinations that are upon a mans addresses to God upon any occasion Let the answer be what it may be what seems good to God that man that knows God to be his God is best enabled to receive his answer be it I or No whether his prayer succeed or not he is put into such a frame that he can say Amen to the Will and Word of God and go from God without murmuring and repining If God hear him he is glad but yet not so glad of the thing as of his Interest he is not so taken with any thing he obtains but God takes him more If therefore he receives any thing he rejoyceth in it as the fruit of Love and makes a grateful return to God again In Psal 119.137 Save my Soul and it shall praise thee He rejoyceth in this to see how welcome he is to God and that his prayer is accepted others come and are not regarded but he hath audience The things that God gives out to him have another form and taste then to the world they come all with tastes of love to him In love to my Soul saith Hezekiah hast thou delivered me in Isai 38.17 And whatsoever he hath he hath a better enjoyment of it then others by reason of his Interest in God he hath nothing from God as a meer gift but he hath God with it God saith to that man that hath Interest in him There take that which thou askedst for and me with it that is thine and I am thine and the enjoyment of God is more to him then all the world This spirit is upon all that he hath My Father gave me it it is the fruit of the love of the God of my life therefore I must use it in order according to order from him and not after my mind only All things are best enjoyed when they are enjoyed according to Rule We spoil the sweetest things when we take them according to our wills and so use them then they become another thing When a man can sit in his enjoyment of all things and see God this is a drop from the Fountain of Life and it is more then they have that seem to enjoy a thousand times more of the things of this life whose corn and oyl increase And if he be denyed if God see it not good to give him the things he desires yet he is satisfied he doth not contend with God nor doth his spirit rise up against his Maker he hath a word ready in his spirit Not my will but thy Will be done he saith If my God will not give me this it is well that he will give me himself I may be without this but I could not be without him and seeing he hath given himself to be my Portion I will wait with patience and be content all the days of my life In Eccless 5. ult saith Solomon If God give a man the joy of his Soul he shall not much remember the days of his vanity When God denies him any thing he remembers that he comes not to God for this particular thing but for the best good We come not to God for any thing but that which is for our good A good man saith If I had this thing it may be it would not do me good and herein his spirit is satisfied he saith God knows better then I what is good for me and if he thinks not such a thing meet for me I must think so too So you see how the knowledg of a mans Interest furthers his approaches to God and helps him in these three respects that we have mentioned CHAP. VI. How the knowledg of divine Interest doth promote Holiness sets Judgment and Nature against Sin keeps the heart from inordinate reaching after and holding fast present things Faith binds the Soul and keeps it bound makes all a Christians ways easie Assurance gives a double advantage to our great meeting with God IN this Chapter I shall in some particulars shew how the knowledg of our Interest in God doth promote and
to be separated from this world in his affections that he can steer through the world untouched that he may be in the use of creatures but not come in bonds under the power government and force of them Now when a man sees God to be his God this makes him to be as Christ speaks of his They are not of this world as I am not of this world Joh. 17. This comfort dissolves all bonds and sets free from a confederacy with other things and now the whole world is of little force with him Moses is a pregnant example of 〈…〉 this in Hebr. 11.24 By faith Moses when he was come to years or when he became great refused to be called the Son of Pharaohs daughter chusing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God then to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season What was the Reason The Text gives you these Reasons that he had respect to the recompence of reward at the twenty sixth Verse and because he had seen him who was invisible at the 27. Verse So that the sight of God and the sight of our Interest in him lays the world dead casts a darkness upon the glory of it and the soul is taken with nothing in comparison of him Thirdly The sight of our Interest holds the soul in bonds unto God it doth not onely bind it but hold it bound The love of Christ saith the Apostle constrains us 2 Cor. 5.14 It holds us to God that though there be something in us that makes us apt to excursions to go out from him yet we are held in by bonds of love This Interest must needs be of a mighty force to those that see it because its the highest Interest in the sweetest way God gives us such an Interest in himself as a child hath in his Father and as a Spouse hath in her husband which are Interests of greatest Love It s an Interest of constant communion there are constant effluxes out-flowings of the kindness of God upon that soul that knows God to be his which do bind him every day more and more and leave him less his own This is the nature of the Spirit of Adoption that makes a man cry Abba Father it makes him more a child as willing to acknowledg himself in that state of subordination as a child as he is to look up to God in a way of hope as he is the Father of mercies The assurance of the love of God as it comforts so it conquers the soul It doth not work it into a strange kind of mad rejoycing such as the Spirit that is gone forth begets in the hearts of many at this day who are strangers to the life of God yet boast as if they had drunk deep of the cup of consolation whereas they are loose and careless and can do all evil against God and be free from him and not have their hearts touch'd with it at all But now true Gospel comfort that which he who is the God of all comfort gives by the manifestation of himself in conjunction with the creature doth overcome the heart and put it into a willing necessity and strengthens it to walk in all well-pleasing before him so that the soul cannot go from him In Psalm 63. v. 7. David expresseth this Because thou hast been my help therefore in the shadow of thy wings will I rejoyce my soul cleaveth unto thee for thy right hand upholdeth me As if he should say Thou hast done me good and thine hand hath supported me else I should fall at every step I live upon thee therefore my soul followeth after thee or is glued to thee the expression of thy love and constant goodness towards me is that which binds my soul unto thee Fourthly When a man knows God to be his God and there is no more remembrance of sin against him and that he is received into the inheritance of the Saints and of Christ himself and that God is become his Father Now all his ways are made easie this facilitates all For what are those things that are wont to burden a mans spirit in the race which is set before him It is either because there are such sad things in his way or because a man fears whether his work and service shall be accepted or because he doth not like his work or because he is not satisfied about his wages Now it is manifest that the knowledg of this that God is our God removes all these things he cannot dislike his way that sees God in it he cannot dislike that work which God sets him about he cannot but think he is accepted and that his wages is more then sufficient recompence that knows God to be his God 1 Joh. 5.3 4. the Apostle saith That to him that loves the Commandment is not grievous It is no burthen in comparison so far as a man loves so far his work is easie and sweet to him What 's the reason It s given in the next words follwing Because he hath overcome the world for there is nothing except darkness upon a mans spirit which is a spring of fear and doubt concerning his acceptance with God that clogs a mans spirit in the ways of God that sharpens and imbitters the things which we must grapple withall I say nothing can hurt him but this Now a man that sees God to be his God hath overcome the world And if his case be dangerous such wherein he is tempted on the right hand he saith with Paul I pass not I care not for all these things as Moses cared not for all the riches of Pharaohs Court And as Paul when he was tempted upon the left hand I pass not for all these things neither shame trouble reproach stripes imprisonments and the like And Esth 4.16 In that service for the people of God I see saith she it 's the will of God I should do it I le go and If I perish I perish such an impression doth the sight of God leave upon the Spirit that nothing can stop the soul in its course no more then the Sun in the firmament Others go heavy and are soon tyred as God complains in Mal. 1.13 They say also What a weariness is it that is to attend upon God in his worship And they snuff at it in way of dislike or as men that would blow away something which lies in their way and which they dislike Upon all these Considerations nothing promotes holiness more then the knowledg of this that God is ours To that which hath been said I will only add a double advantage that this assurance gives to our meeting with God 1. That it doth allay that unquietness that is ready to rise upon the thoughts of dissolution and the remembrance of that day of Doom when one word determines a mans estate to all Eternity To know that a man is going to his God and Father to be able to say as Christ said I go to my Father