ingredient in thy Cup of Judgment for it is the greatest Aggravation of thy sin for through it Gods Name is Blasphemed If they had not known they had not had sin Pagans sin is no sin in respect of Christians If ye consider Christs Sermon Matth. 11. Ye will say Isaiah is a meak and moderate man in regard of him Isaiah calls them people of Gomorrah but Christ will have them worse and their Judgment more intolerable then theirs And that not only the profane of them but the civil and Religious like who believed not in him VVell then here is the advantage ye get of your Name of Christianity of your priviledge of hearing his VVord dayly Ye who never ponder it to tremble at it or to rejoyce in it who cannot be moved either to joy or grief for Spiritual things Neither Law nor Gospel moves the most part of you I say here is all your gain ye shall receive a reward with Gentiles and Pagans Yea ye shall be in a worse case nor they in the Day of the Lord. The civil Christian shall be worse then the profane Turke and ye shall not then boast that ye were Christians but shall desire that ye had dwelt in the place where the Gospel had never been preached It is a Character of the Nations that they call not on God and of Heathen Families that they pray not to him Jer. 10. 25. And wrath must be poured on them VVhat then are the most part of you Ye neither bow a Knee in secret nor in your Families to God your time is otherwayes employed ye have no leisure to pray twice or thrice a day alone except when ye put on your Cloathes ye utter some ordinary bâ—blings Ye cannot be driven to Family worship shall not God rank you in Judgement with these Heathen Families Or shall it not be more tolerable for them nor for you And are not the most part of you every one given to Covetousnesse your heart and eye after it seeking Gain and Advantage more then the Kingdome of Heaven Doth not every one of you as you have power in your hand oppresse one another wrong one another Now our end in speaking thus to you is not to drive you to desparation No indeed but as there was a word of the Lord sent to such by Isaiah so we bring a word unto you That which ruines you is your carnal confidence Ye are presumptuous as this people and cryes the Temple of the Lord the VVork of the Lord c. as if these would save you Know therefore that all these will never cover you in the day of wrath Know there is a necessity to make peace with God and your righteousnesse must exceed the righteousnesse of a profession and external priviledges and duties or else ye shall be as far from the Kingdome of Heaven as Sodom and Gomorrah VVe speak of Rulers sins that ye may mourn for them lest ye be Judged with them If ye do not mourn for them in secret know that they are your sins Ye are Companions with them Many fret grudge and cry out against Oppression but who weeps in secret Who prayes and deprecats Gods wrath least it come upon them And while it is so The Oppression of Rulelers becomes the sin of the oppressed themselves Hear the Word of the Lord It were a suitable preparation for any Word that is spoken to make it take imprâ—ssion if it were looked on as the Word of the Lord and Law of our God And truely no man can hâ—ar aright unlesse he hear it so Why doth not this Word of the Lord return with more Fruit Why doth not men tremble or rejoyce at it Certainly because it is not received as Gods Word There is a practical Heresie in our hearts which rather may be called Atheism VVe do not believe the Scriptures I do not say men call it in question but I say ye believe them not It is one thing to believe with the heart another thing not to doubt of it Ye doubt not of it not because ye do indeed believe it but because ye do not at all consider it It is one thing to confesse with the Mouth and another thing to believe with the Heart For ye confesse the Scriptures to be Gods VVord not because ye believe them but because ye have received such a Tradition from your Fathers have heard it from the womb unquestioned Oh that this were engraven on your Heart thaâ— these Commands these Curses these Promises are Divine Truthes the VVords and thâ— Oath of the Holy One. If every word oâ— Truth came stamped with his Authority and were received in the Name of God himself what influence would it have on the Spirits and the practices of men This would be a great Reformer would Reform more in a Moneth then Church and Staâ—e hath done these many Years VVhy are Rulers and People not Converted and Healed for all that is spoken Here it is Who believes our report VVho believes that our report is thy own Testimony O Lord When Ministers threaten you in Gods Name if his Authority were stamped on the Threatning if men did seriously apprehend it were Gods own Voice would they not tremble When the Gospel and the joyful Sound comes forth if ye apprehended that same Authority upon it which ye who are Convinced believes in the Law would ye not be comforted Finally I may fay it is this point of Atheisme of Inconsideration and Brutishnesse that destroys the multitude makes all Means Ineffectual to them and retards the progresse of Christians Men do not consider that this word is the word of the Eternal and True and Faithful God and that not one Jot of it will faill Here is a Poynt of Reformation I would put you to If ye mind indeed to Reform let this enter into your Hearts and sink down that the Law and Gospel is the Word of God and resolve to come and hear Preachings so as the Voice of Jesus Christ the true and faithful witnesse If ye do not take it so now yet God will Judge you so at the end He that despiseth you despiseth me and he that hears not you heares not me If ye thought ye had to do with God every Sabbath would ye come so carelesly and be so stupid and inconsiderate before the Judge of all the Earth But ye will find in the end that it was God whom ye knew not SERMON IX Isai 1. 11. To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me saith the Lord c. THis is the Word he calls them to hear and a strange Word Isaiah asks what means your sacrifices God will not have them I think the people would say in their own hearts what means the Prophet What would the Lord be at Do we any thing but what he Commanded us Is he angry at us for Obeying him What means this Word Is he not repealing the Statute and Ordinance he had made in Israel If
the Thessalonians 1 Thes 4. 3. This is the wiil of God even your sanctification And these two make up this text so that it units both Gospel and Law The Commandment of the Law comes forth and it is found that we have broken and are guilty that we cannot answer for one of a thousand the Law entring makes sin abound our inability yea impossibility of obedience is more discovered well then the Gospel proclames the Lord Jesus Christ for the Saviour of sinners and commands us under pain of damnation to believe in him to cast our souls on him as one able to save as one who hath obeyed the Law for us so that this command of believing in Christ is answerable to all the breaches of the Law and tends to make them up in Christ When he proclaimed the Law on Mount Sinai with terrour that which ye hear exprest is not his first Comandment which ye are in the first instance to obey for all these we have broken but it hath a Gospel-command in its bosome it leads to Jesus Christ and if ye could read the mind of God in it ye would resolve all these commands which condemn you and curse you into one command of believing in the Son that ye may be saved from that condemnation And if ye obey this command which is his last command and most perremptory then are the breaches of all the rest made up the intent of all the rest is fulfilled though not in your obedience yet in Christs which is better then ours Believing in Christ presents God with a perfect righteousness with an obedience even to the death of the Cross When a sinner hears the holy and spiritual sense of the Law and sees it in the light of Gods holiness O how vile must he appear to himself and how must he abhor himself What original pollution what actual pollution what a fountain within what uncleanness in streams without will discover it self Now when the most part of men get any sight of this presently they fall a washing and cleansing themselves or hiding their filthiness And what water take they Their own tears or sorrows their own resolutions their own reformations But alas we are still more plunged in our own filthiness that is still marked before him because all that is al 's foul as that we would have washen away What garment do men take to hide themselves ordinarily Is it not their own righteousness Is it not a shirt of some duty that is spread over transgressions Do not men think their sins hid if they can mourn and pray for a time Their consciences are eased by reflection upon this But alas thine iniquity is still marked Shall filthiness hide filthiness Thy righteousness is as a vile garment as a menstruous cloth Isa 64. 6. as well as thine unrighteousness how then shall it cover thy nakedness Seing it is so then what is the Lords mind concerning our cleansing seing stretched out hands and many prayers will not do it what shall I do The Lord hath shewed thee what thou shalt do and that is that thou do nothing in relation to that end that thou shouldst undertake to wash away the least spot by all thy repentance yet must thou wash and make clean and the water is brought new unto you even the blood of Jesus Christ that cleanseth from all sin wash in this blood and ye shall be clean And what is it to wash in this blood It is to believe in Christ Jesus to lay hold on the all-sufficient vertue of it to trust our souls to it as a sufficient ransome for all our sins to spread the covering of Christ his righteousness over all our righteousneses and unrighteousness as having both alike need to be hid from his holy eys Jesus Christ came by water and by blood 1 Jo. 5. 6. by water to Sanctifie and by blood to Justifie by the power and cleansing vertue of the Holy Ghost to take away sin in the beeing of it and by the vertue of his blood to take away sin in the guilt and condemnation of it Now I conceive he presses a twofold exercise upon them in this washing and both have relation to the blood of Jesus Christ to wit repentance and faith If they be not all one yet they are in this point inseparably conjoyned Repentance waters and saps the roots of believing which otherwise would dry up Therefore in stead of outward forms and ceremonies of Religion he presseth them to inward sorrow and contrition of heart for sin that they might present an acceptable sacrifice to God a contrite heart This is more pleasing then many specious duties of men without Psal 50. 7 c. But when I press upon you repentance do not conceive that we would have it preparatory to faith that ye should sit down and mourn for your sins for a time till your hearts be so far humbled and then ye might come as prepared and fitted to Jesus Christ This is the mistake of many Christians which keeps them from solid settling We find it ordinary souls making scruples and objections against coming to Jesus Christ because of want of such preparations of measures of humiliation and contrition which they prescribe to themselves or do behold in others and so they sit down and apply themselves to such a work applyes their consciences to the Law and curse and they find in stead of softning hardness in stead of contrition of spirit more dulness and security At least they cannot get satisfaction to themselves in that they seek and thus they hang their head over their impenitent hearts and lament not so much that repentance is not as that they cannot find it in themselves Alas there are many diseases in this one malady If it were imbowelled unto you ye would not believe that such a way were so contradictory to the Gospel For first ye who are so have this principle in your hearts which is the foundation of it I cannot come to Christ so unclean I must be a little washen ere I come the most gross uncleanness and hardness of my heart must be taken away and so I shall be accepted Alas what derogation is this to the blessed Saviour What absurdity is it I am too unclean to come to the fountain I must be a little purged before I come to this fountain that cleanseth from all Sin I pray you why was the fountain opened was it not for sin and uncleanness And this thou sayes by interpretation If I were so and so humbled then I might come and be worthy to come when the want of such a measure debars thee as unworthy Doth not the having of it in thy estimation make the worthy And so ye come with a present in your hand to Jesus Christ with a price and reward to him who gives freely Again thou denyest Christ to be the only fountain of all Grace and so it is most dishonourable to him If thou would have repentance before
each striving for the place and were it not better to be under one settled Government If there be any tendernesse of God in your hearts or light it your Consciences they cannot but testifie againsâ— your lusts these strange Lords Your lusts again they drive you on against your Conscience Thus ye are divided and tormented betwixt two your own Conscience and Affections You have thus the pain of Religion and know not the true pleasure of it You are marred in the pleasures of sin Conscience and the love of God is a worm to eat that Gourd it is Gall and Vinegar mixed in with them Were it not more wisdom to be either one thing or another If ye will have the pleasures of sin for a season take them wholly and renounce God and see if your heart can endure that If your heart cannot condescend to that I pray you renounce them wholly and ye shall find more exquisit and sure pleasures in godlinesse at his Right Hand O what a noble entertainment hath the Soul in God The Peace and Joy of the Holy Ghost is a Kingdom indeed SERMON XII Isai 26. 3. Thou shalt keep him in perfect Peace whose mind is stayed on thee because he trusteth in thee ALL men love to have priviledges above others Every one is upon the designe and search after some well-being since Adam lost that which was true happinesse We all agree upon the general notion of it but presently men divide in the following of particulars Here all men united in seeking after some good something to satisfie their Souls and satiat their desires Nay but they scatter presently in the prosecution of it because according to every mans fancy and corrupt humour they attribute that good unto diverse things And when they meet with disappointment they change their opinion of that but are made no wiser for they turn from one to another of that same kind in which their imagination hath supposed blessednesse to be And therefore they will return to that which they first loathed and rejected Is there then no such thing in the world as blessednesse Is it not to be found among men Are all mens unsatiable desires in vain Is a Creature made up and composed of desires to keep it in continuall torment and vexation of spirit No certainly it is and it is found by some All the world strive about it but the man only who trusts and believs in God he it is who carries it away from them who hath this priviledge beyond the world And why do so many misse it Because they do not see nor suspect that it is blessednesse indeed which he injoyes But on the contrair their corrupted imaginations represent godlinesse and a godly mans self-indigency and dependance on God as the greatest misery and shame The godly man hids not his blessednesse from the world No he proclaimes it when he hath found it He would that all enjoyed it with him And if there were no more to declare that it doth not consist in worldly things this might suffice they are not communicable to many without the prejudice and losse of every one But none will believe his report of his own Estate If ye would consider here is that which men toyl for compasse Sea and Land for here it is near thee in thy mouth It is not in Heaven that thou should say How shall I ascend to it It is not in Hell below that thou shouldest say Who shall descend It is not in the ends of the Earth No it is near thee in thy mouth It is not beyond the Sea but it is near in thy mouth even the word of faith which Christ preached Rom. 10. 6 7 8. And what sayes that word Believe with thy heart and thou shalt be saved Trust in God and depend on him and ye shall have peace and that perfect peace and this peace shall be kept by God himself Blessed then is the man that trusts in the Lord Psal 40. 4. Ye make a long journey in vain ye spend your Labour and Money in vain all the pains might be saved it is not where ye seek it ye travel about many creatures ye go to many doors and enquire for Happinesse and Peace but ye go too far off ye need not search so many Coasts it is nearer hand in this word of the Gospel the joyful sound It is this that proclaimes peace Peace is a comprehensive word especially in Scripture It was the Jews salutation Peace be to you meaning happinesse and all good things It is Christs salutation Grace and Peace Grace is Holinesse Peace is Happinesse and these are either one or inseparably conjoyned as one This was the Angels Song Glory to God peace on earth Luk. 2. 14. Bleslednesse was restored or brought near to be restored to miserable man by Jesus Christ and upon the apprehension of this Angels Sing It was this Christ came in the world with and when he went away he left this Legacy to his Children My peace I leave you Jo. 14 27. We lost happinesse and all men are on a vain pursuit of it since but it is found and found by one of our Kin our Lord Jesus our Elder Brother he hath found it or made it and brought it near us in the Gospel for the receiving and who so receives him by Faith and trusting in him receives that priviledge that peace He endured much trouble to gain our peace he behoved to undergo misery to purchase our Blessednesse and so it is his own and who so receives him receives it also The newes of such a peace might be seasonable in the time of warr and trouble if we apprehended our need of it It is not a peace from warr and trouble but a peace in warr and trouble My peace I leave you in the world ye shall have trouble Jo. 14. 27. and 16. at the end What a blessed Message is it that there is a peace and a perfect peace attainable in the midst of warrs confusions and calamities of the times publick and personal a perfect peace a compleat peace even compleat without the accession of outward and worldly peace that needs it not nay appears most perfect and intire in it self when it is striped naked of them all Behold what a priviledge the Gospel offers unto you Ye need not be made miserable but if you please This is more then all the world can afford you there is no man can promise to himself immunity from publick dangers or personal from many griefs and disappointments But the Gospel bids you reckon up all your troubles and miseries that ye can meet with in the world and yet in such a case if ye hearken to wisdom there is a peace that will make you forget that trouble Her wayes are wayes of pleasantness and all her pathes are peace Pro. 3. 17. I will undertake to make thee blessed says Wisdom the Fathers Wisdom When all the world hath given thee over for miserable when
as the â—â—n you would wash by it Secondly the uncleannesse of mens practice maketh unclean performances unclean hands make unclean prayers Isai 1. 15. When men go on in sin and use their members as instruments of unrighteousnesse against God and guiltinesse is above their head unrepented of and unpardoned then whatever the members act for God in religious Duties it must be also abominable for will God take prayers from such a mouth thaâ— cursing cometh out of Isai 3. 10 11 12 Shall sweet water come out of one Fountain with bitter Or can a Fig Tree bear both Thistles and Graps Certainly profane Conversation must make unclean profession And therefore your coming to the Church and Ordinances your praying in your Families or such like must of necessity be defiled since out of the same mouth cometh cursing railing lying filthy speeches Your tongues are so often imployed in Gods dishonour to blaspheme his Name to slander your Neighbours to reproach the Saints that all your prayers must be of the same stamp and al 's bitter as the other stream of your actions When you stretch forth your hands to make many prayers to take the Bread and Wine shall not God hide his Face from such hands as are unclean with many abominations some murdering some abusing their Neighbours some Sabbath-breaking some filthinesse how oft have your hands and feet served you to evil turns And therefore your good turns will never come in remembrance Nay believe it you cannot be heard of God while you cover any offence And this I may say in general even to the Saints any known sin given way to and intertained without controlment without wrestling against it hindereth the acceptation of your solemn approaches If your heart regard iniquity shall God hear Ps 66. 18. No believe it the least sin that you may judge at first venial and then give it toleration and indulgence shall separat between Gods Face and you Your prayers are abomination because of such an idol perked up in the heart beside God that getteth the Honour and Worship due to him and God must answer you according to it Ezek. 19. 1 3 4. God will not be enquired of such as give allowance to sin Ezek. 14. 2 3 4. And on the other hand no sin how great and hainous soever can hinder Gods gracious acceptation when Souls fly unto Jesus and turn their back upon sin or giveth it no heart allowance And to the multitude I say all that you do or touch in a Duty must be defiled because your whole way is unclean Hag. 2. 12 13 14. Think you to sin all the week thorow and worship God on the Sabbath will you lie swear commit adultery rail and curse and come and stand before me saith the Lord No certainly you cannot be accepted And will you hate reformation in your lives and yet take his Covenant in your mouth and call your selves by his Name Christians And shall not God challenge you for that al 's much as for your swearing and cursing and lying c. Indeed the Lord putteth all in one Roll and you need not please your selves in such things Psal 50. 16. Jer. 7. 9 10. For it is all one to you to go to Tavern to drink and come to the Sermon to blaspheme Gods Name and call on it because the profanity of the one defileth the other and the holiness of the other cannot make you holy Thirdly the natural mans performances want the uprightness reality and sincerity that is required it is but a painted Tomb full of rottenness within it is but a shadow without substance for he wanteth the spiritual part of worship which God careth for who will be worshiped in spirit and truth Joh. 4. 23. Now what is it that the most part of you can speak of but an outside of some few duties soon numbered You hear the preaching and your hearts wander about your business You hear and are not so much affected as you would be to hear some old story or fable told you A stage play acted before this generation would move them more then the Gospel doth So that Christ may take up this Lamentation We have piped to you and you have not danâ—ed lamented to you and you have not mourned You use to tell over some words in your prayers and are not so serious in any approach to God as in twenty other things of the world Whatever you plead of your hearts rightness and have recourse to it when your conversation cannot defend you yet your hearts are the worst of all and have no uprightness towards God for you know that what Duties you go about it is not from an inward principle but from Education or Custome or constraint Are you upright when you are forced for fear of censure to come here or to pray at home Is that sincerity and spiritual worship And for the more polished and refined professors you have this moth in your performances and this flea to make your Oyntment to stink that you do much to be seen of men therefore what little fervour of spirit is in secret Duties There you may measure your altitude and your life And O how wearisome how lifeless are secret approaches you would not have many errands to God if you thought no body looked upon you And for spirituality it is a Mystery in all mens practice Who directeth his Duty to Gods Glory If you get some flash of liberty you have your desire But who misseth Gods presence in Duties which a world will approve Who go mourning as without the Sun even when you have the Sun-shine of Ordinances and walketh in the light of them And fourthly though your performances had uprightness of heart going alongs and much affection in them yet all are filthy because of want of Faith in Jesus Christ When you make your Duties a covering of your sins and think to satisfy Gods Justice for the rest of your faults by doing some point of your Duty then it cannot choose but be polluted in his sight And this very thing was the cause of Gods rejecting the Jews righteousness even because they did not look to the end of the Mystery Christ Jesus Did not pull by the vail of Ceremonies to see the Immaculat Lamb of God slain for sin And therefore doth the Lord so quarrel with them as if he had never commanded them to do such things Isai 1. 12 13. Who hath required these things at your hands bring no more vain oblations all is Abomination Even as God should say to you when you come to the Church who required you to come Who commanded you to come to hear the Preaching What have you to do to pray What warrand have you to communicat All your Praying Hearing Communicating is Abomination who commanded you to do these things Would you not think it a foolish Question You would soon answer that God himself commanded you and will he not let us do his bidding Indeed this
tree yet behold the wind of the Lord may arise that shall drive you away take your soul from these things and then whose shall they be If you will not fear temporal judgements yet I pray you fear eternal fear hell May not the Lord shake you off this tree of time and take you out of the land of the living to receive your portion There is not only an universal deadness of spirit on the land but a prophane spirit Iniquities abominable sins abound Every Congregation is overgrown with scandals and for you None may more justly complain we are all unclean sin is not in corners but men declare their sin as Sodom sin is come to the Maturity Defection and Apostacy is the temper of all Spirits and above all the general contempt and slighting of this glorious gospel is the iniquity of Scotland so that we wonder that the withered leaves yet stick to that the storm is not yet raised and we blown away Now you are like stones your hearts as Adamants and cannot be moved with his threatnings the voice of the Lords word doth not once move you you sin and are not afraid Nay but when Gods anger shall joyn with iniquity and the voice of his rod and displeasure roar this shall make the mountains to tremble the rocks to move and how much more shall it drive away a leaf You seem now mountains but when God shall plead you shall be like the chaff driven too and fro O how easy a matter shall it be to God to blow a man out of his dwelling place sin hath prepared you for it he needeth no more but blow by his Spirit or look upon you and you will not be You who now are lofty and proud and maintain your self against the word when you come to reckon with God and he entereth in judgement you shall not stand you will consume as before the moth your hearts will fail you Who may abide the day of his coming It will be so terrible and so much the more terrible that you never dreamed of it If the example of this people will not move you do but cast your eyes on Ireland who all do fade as a leaf and their iniquities have taken them away out of their own Land Shall not the seeing of the eye nor the hearing of the ear teach you What security do you promise to your selves Have not we sinned as much as they Were not they his people as we Certainly since God waiteth longer on you the stroak must be the greater provoked patience must turn fury If you would then prevent this peoples complaint go about such a serious acknowledgement of your sins search your wayes and turn again to the Lord. And let not every man sit down in a general notion of sin but unbowel it until you see uncleanness go up to the fountain head Original corruption go down to all the streams even the iniquity of holy things let every man be particular in the search of his own provocations personal and every one be publick in the general sins of the Land that you may confesse out of knowledge and sense we are all unclean c. SERMON XVIII Isai 64. 7. And there is none that calleth upon thy Name that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee c. THey go on in the Confession of their sins Many a man hath soon done with that A general notion of sin is the highest advancement in repentance that many attain to You may see here Sin and Judgement mixed in thorow other in their complaint They do not so fix their eyes upon their desolat estate of captivity as to forget their provocations Many a man would spend more affection and be more pathetick in the expression of his misery when it is pungent nor he can do when he speaketh of his sins We would observe from the nature of this confession something to be a patern of your repentance And it is this When the spirit convinceth and men are serious in repentance then the soul is more searching more universal more particular in acknowledgement of sins These are characters of the Spirits work First The Spirit discovereth unto men not only sin but the loathsomeness of sin its hainous nature how offensive it is to Gods holy eye Many of you know abundance of evil deeds and call them sins but you have never taken up sins ugly face never seen it in the glasse of the holy Law uncleannesse it self because you do not abhore your selves poor and low thoughts of God maketh mean and shallow thoughts of sin You would be as Job vile ch 40. 4. And abhore your selves in dust and ashes ch 42. 6. As Gods holiness grew great in your eyes Sins uncleanness would grow proportionably Is 6. 3. 5. And here your repentance halteth in the very entry But Secondly The Spirit discovereth not only the uncleanness of mens natures and leadeth them up to original corruption but the Spirit also leadeth men alongs all the streams not only these that break out but those who go under ground and have a more secret and subtil conveyance It concludeth not only open breaches of the command under filthiness but also all a mans own righteousness though never so refined it concludeth it also a defiled garment so that the Soul can look no where but see sin and uncleanness in its ornaments and duties And thus it appeareth before God without such a covering openeth up its Soul hideth not sin with the covering of duties but seeth a necessity of another covering for all Now therefore let the most part of you conclude that you have never yet gotteh your eyes open to see sin or confesse it because when you sit down to compt your sins there are many things that you call not sin you use not to reckon your praying and repentance among sins Nay because you have so much confidence in your repentance and confession you have never repented you must see a necessity of a covering of Christs righteousness above all Faith in Jesus must cover repentance and it self both with the glorious object of it But alas how soon are many at an end of confession some particular grosse actions may come in remembrance but no more Sum up al your confessions they have never yet pitched on the thousand part of your guiltiness no not in kinds let be in number But thirdly The Spirit convinceth spiritually and particularly both it convinceth of Spiritual sins as we said last of the iniquity of holy things and especially of the most substantial duties faith and prayer John 16. 8 9. there are not many of you have come this length to see your want of prayer No your own words do witness against you for you use to say I pray day and night I believe in God with all my heart Now therefore out of your own mouth shall you be condemned when the spirit convinceth you of Sin you will see no faith no prayer at the first
God himself laid hold upon and made ours is more nor removing a temporal Calamitv It is an eternal weight to weigh down all Crosses and Disapointments For what can present things be Is there not in the favour of his countenance that which may drown them in Oblivion Are ye like to sink here Is not God a sure Anchor to hold by And if you do not this your trouble is nothing in respect of the danger of your Soul Secure and loose lying out of God not putting this matter to a full poynt is worse nor all your outward fading Therefore we exhort you in the Lords Name to fly in to this Name of the Lord as a strong tower to run to and be safe When the Lord seemeth now to be angry with us run not away from him though he should yet cloath himself with vengeance as a Garment But First O ye poor people who have never asked this Question whether have I any Interest in Jesus Ask it now and resolve it in time If trouble come on if scattering and desolation come on and our Land fade as a Leaf certainly the Lords anger will drive you away What will ye do in the time of his Indignation All of you put this to the tryal how matters stand between God and you And Secondly if ye find all wrong do not sink in discouragement All may be amended while it is seen wrong in time Nay God taketh away outward Accomodation to make you more serious in this And it is the very voice of Rods every one fly in to your hold every one make peace with me You may take hold and do it feckfully Thirdly You who have fled to Jesus take more hold of him you are called also to renew your Faith and begin again Make peace with God let your confidence be kept fast and thus shall ye be immoveable because he changeth not God will not go from you if ye believe hold him by Faith Christ could not do great things in Galilee because of their unbelief and so be departed from them As unbelief maketh an evil heart to depart from the God of all Life and Consolation So doth it make Goâ— depart from us But Faith casteth a knot upoâ— him to speak with reverence it fasteneth hiâ— by his own Word and Promise and he cannot go by it It is a violent hand laid oâ— God I will not let thee go till thou blesâ— me Fourthly Faith and Prayer or holding oâ— God by believing in him and much imploying him needeth much stirring up unto and awaking That stirreth up himself to take hold oâ— thee Security is the moth of both these and eateth out the life of Faith and Supplication It maketh Prayer so coldrife that it it cannoâ— prevail and Faith so weake that it cannot usâ— violence Fâ—â—st security apprehendeth no evil no need A secure condition is a dream that one is eating and yet his Soul is empty Looâ— how the people of Laish were quiet and secure apprehending no evil Destruction cometh then on as an armed man Always it is much necessity that administers fewel to a mans Faith and Supplication David Psal 30. 7. I saiâ— in my prosperity I shall not be moved Nay but many say in adversity and cry peace peace where no peace is Security pleadeth innocency and then believeth immunity I am innocent therefore shall his anger turn away Jer. 2. 35. Security applyeth not sin and so refuseth the curse of sin and wages of it And thus is a man in his own eyes a lord and then he will come no more to God Jer. 2. 31. It is almost impossible to awake men by general Judgments â—o apprehend personal danger and men never stirr out of their nest till it be on fire We can behold or hear of our neighbours spoyling and violence done to them but till the voice of a cry be heard in our own Streets and Fields no body will take the Judgement to themselves It is well said that which is spoken to all is spoken to none so what is done to all in generall is done to hone The voice of a general Rod speaketh not particularly and maketh not men apprehensive of sad things and thus men are not pressed unto prayer are not put out of themselves It is onely necessity that sapps the roots of it and makes it green Secondly Security is lazy and not active putteth not forth its hand to work and so dieth a beggar for onely the hand of the diligent maketh rich Laying hold on God is a duty that requireth much spirit in it Men do not grip things well in their slumbering There is no Duty that needeth so spiritual and lively Principles If a man do not put on such a peece of resolution and edge upon him he cannot come to the wrestling of Prayer and violence of Faith Although the exercise and acting of Grace dependeth more upon the Spirit of God his present Influence then upon the Soul of man yet this is the way the Lord communicateth his Influence by stirring up and exciting the Creature to its duty as if it could do it alone Grace is one thing and the stirring up of it is another thing For when we ly by and sleep over our time and go not about tâ— matter so seriously as it were life aâ— death it is but a weak hold we can takeâ— God According to the measure of a mâ— apprehending necessity and according the measure of his seriousness in these thinâ— so will the hand of Faith grip and lay hoâ— with more or lesse violence As a mâ— drowning will be put from sleeping aâ— when one is in extreem hazard all his strengâ— will unite together in one to do that whiâ— at any ordinary time it could not do so ougâ— it to be here A Christian assaulted wiâ— many temptations should unite his strengâ— and try the yondmost O but your whoâ— spirits would run together to the saving â— your self if ye were very apprehensive of necessity The exercise of Faith is a dead griâ— that cannot part with what it grippetâ— Therefore first we must say to you it is 〈◊〉 so easy a thing as you believe to lay hold â— God there must be stirring up to it Aâ— when the Lord speaketh of our stirring our selves certainly he meaneth this like wayeâ— that he must stirr us ere we stirr our selveâ— Secondly above all be afraid of a secure condition It is the enemy of Communioâ— with God and spiritual Life therefore look about you and apprehend more your necessity and then give no rest and quietness to your self till you have imployed and engaged him Be as men flying to lay hold on the refuge set before you Thirdly It must be a time of little accesse to God and little Faith when we are all secure and no body goeth about Religion as their work and business We allow our self in it Therefore we do exhort you first to purpose this as your end to aim at and
Workmanship a vail of darknesse for a season and who can behold him when he hides himself sayes Job and though he withdraw the Covering yet what am I Who can by searching find out God If I shall examine his way what rule shall I take to try it by If I measure by my shallow capacity or by my crooked way shall I have any just account of it will my Arm measure the Heavens as his doth If I examine it or try it by himself He is high as Heaven and unsearchable Therefore it becomes us to hearken to his Word and believe its sentence of his Work when reason cannot comprehend it One thing if it were deeply engraven on our hearts would be a principle of setling our spirits in all the mysteries and riddles of providence the knowledge and faith of his Soveraignty of his Highnesse and of his Wisdome should he give account of his Matters to us He is wise and knowes his Works but is he bound to make us know them His wayes are above our thoughts and wayes as Heaven above the Earth Is 55. And therefore O Grashopper in the Earth that dwells in Tabernacles of Clay do not presume to model his ways according to thy conceptions One thing is certain this is enough for Faith all his wayes are mercy and truth to these that keep his Covenant and his Testimonies Psal 25. 10. And there is no Way or Path of God so far above our reach and unsearchable as his Mercy in pardoning sin and this is only the satisfying answer to all your objections and scruples in these ye do but vent your own thoughts but sayes the Lord my thoughts are above youâ— thoughts as Heaven above Earth Ye but speak of your own wayes but my wayes are far above yours they are not measured by your iniquity and therefore David subjoyns Psal 25. Verse 11. pardon my iniquity for it is great SERMON III. Deuter. 32. 4 5. He is the Rock his work is perfect for all his ways are Judgement a God of truth and without iniquity Just and Right is he 5. They have corrupted themselves their spot is not the spot of his Children they are a perverse and crooked generation ALL his wayes are Judgement both the wayes of his Commandments and the ways of his Providence both his Word which he hath given as a Lanthorn to mens paths and his Works among men And this were the blessednesse of men to be found both walking in his wayes and waiting on him in his wayes having respect to all his Commandments and respect to himself in all his Works We all know in general that he doth all well â—nd that all his Comandments are Holy and Just â—ay but our practice and affections belie our knowledge and for the most part we stand crosse in our humours and affections and conversation both to his Word and Providence and this is our misery Great peace have they that love thy Law VVhat peace then can keep that heart and mind that is dayly at variance with his Statuts and Judgements when the heart would wish such a Command were not when it is an eye sore to look upon it Blessed are the meek it is good for a man both quietly to wait and hope and keep silence How then must that spirit be miserable that stands crosse unto Gods Dispensations and would limit the Holy One Do not often our hearts say I do well to be angry why is it thus with me But who hath hardened himself against him and prospered his counsel must stand and you may vex your self and disquiet your soul in the mean time by impatience but you cannot by your thought add one cubit to your stature you may make your case worse nor Providence hath made it but you cannot make it better by so doing so that at length you must bow to him or be broken Oh then that this were engraven on our hearts with the point of a Diamond All his wayes are Judgement that ye might be overcome with the equity of his Command and Dispensation and your heart and tongue might not move against them It was enough of old with the Saints It is the Lord let him do what seems good in hâ—s eyes Gods Soveraignty alone pondered may stop our mouth but if ye withal consider it is perfect Equity that rules all it is Divinâ— Wisdome thaâ— is the square of his Works theâ— how ought we to stoop chearfully unto them One thing ye would remember his wayes and paths are Judgement and if ye judge aright of him ye must judge his Way and not his single Footsteps ye will not discern Equity and Judgement in one step or two but consider his Way joyn adversity with prosperity humbleing with exalting take along the Threed of his Providence and one part shall help you to understand another There is reason in all but the reason is not visible to us in so small parts of his Way and Work A God of Truth Strange it is that his Majesty is pleased to cloath himself with so many Titles and Names for us He considers what our necessity is and accordingly expresses his own Name I think nothing doth more hold forth the unbelief of men and Atheism of our hearts nor the many several Titles God takes in Scripture There is a necessity of a multitude of them to make us take up God because we staying upon a general notion of God rather frame in our imaginations an Idol then the true God As there is nothing doth more lively represent the unbelief of our hearts then the multitude of Promises Men that consider such frequent repetitions of one thing in Scripture so many diverse expressions of one God may retire into their own hearts and find the cause of it even the necessity of it But while we look so slightly on these we must judge it superfluous and vain Needed there any more to be said but I am your God I am God if our spirits were not so far degenerated unto Atheism and unbelief Certainly that word Jehovah holds forth more to Angels then all the inculcated Names and Titles of God to us because we are dull and slow of heart Therefore wonder at these two when ye read the Scriptures Gods Condescendency to us and our Atheism and Unbelief of him they are both mysteries and exceeding broad There is not a Name of God but it gives us a Name and that of reproach and dishonour so that for every one some evil may be written down and it is to this purpose Moses draws them out in length that in the Glasse of his glorious Name the people might behold their own ugly face This Name is clear He is a God of Truth not only a true God but Truth it self to note his Excellency and Eminency in it It is Christs Name I am the Truth the substantial Truth in whom all the Promises are Truth are Yea and Amen His Truth is his Faithfulnesse in performing his Promises
the rest of the world in their conversation from whom God had separated them in profession and priviledges Lev. 18. 24 But behold what unlikenesse there is between God and his people If ye were to paint out to the life a heathen people you needed no other image or patern to coppy at but this same description of this people It is this that makes Moses in the preface turn to the heavens and earth and call them to hear his song And Isaiah beginneth his Preaching thus Hear O Heavens and give ear O Earth c. A strange thing it must be that senselesse creatures are called to wonder at It must surpasse all the wonders and prodigies of nature and art And what is that I have nourished and brought up children and they have rebelled against me c. If we consider what this people seemed once to be and thought themselves to be we may easily know how they corrupted themselves If ye look on them at one time Exod. 19. 8. and Deut. 5. 27. Ye would call them Children There was never a fairer undertaking of obedience then this All that the Lord hath spoken we will do So that the Lord commends them for speaking well v. 28. They have well said all that they have spoken v. 29. O that there were such an heart in them But compare all this peoples practice with this profession and you shall find it exceeding contrary they indeed corrupted themselves though they got warning to take heed of it Take ye therefore good heed unto your selves lest ye corrupt your selves Deut. 4. 15. 16. But alas it was within them that destroyed them there was not such a heart in them as to hear obey but they undertake being ignorant of their own deceitful hearts which were desperatly wicked And therefore behold what corruption ensued and followed upon such a professed resolution They never sooner promised obedience but they disobeyed they did abominable works and did no good and this is to corrupt their way Psa 14. 1 c. we need not instance this longer in this people we our selves are a sufficient proof of it We may make this song our own we have corrupted our selves Once we had a fair shew of zeal for God of love and desire of reformation of life many solemn undertakings were that we should amend our wayes and doings But what is the fruit of all Alas we have corrupted our selves more nor they Israel promised but we vowed and swore to the most high Reformation and amendment of life in our conversations and callings Lay this Rule to our practises and are we not a perverse and crooked generation Oh that we were more affected with our corruptions and were more sensible of them then we could not choose out mourn for our own and the lands departing from God Did not every man vow and swear to the most high God to endeavour reformation of his life even a personal reformation But alas where is it He that is filthy is filthy still nay which is worse the evil man waxeth worse and worse There is a great noise of a publick reformation of ordinances and worship but alas the deformation of life and practice outcryes all that noise Nay certainly all that is donâ— in the publick must come to no accompâ— before God since our practices outcry it Publick reformation is abomination where peâ—â—onal â—orruptions do not cease This made the Jeâ—â—s soâ—emn dayes hateful their hands were full of blood Isai 1. all that ye have spent on the publick will never be reckoned since ye will not consecrat your lives to God will not give your lusts up to him Ye are his enemies in the mean time though you accompt your selves Religions friends I beseech you consider your wayes would any of us have thought to have seen such prosanity mocking of Godliness and ignorance in Scotland in so short a time Nay it is to be feared that the day is not far off when ye will corrupt your selves and do abominable things yea defile your selves as ill as the nations that know not God Every man useth to impute his faults to something beside himself ere men take with their own iniquity they will charge God that gave no more grace But if men knew themselves they would deduce their corruption and destruction both from one fountain that is from themselves Ignorance of our selves maketh us oft undertake fair and promise so well on our own head What was the fountain of this peoples corruption and apostarizing from their professions The Lord hints at it Deut. 5. 25 c. Oh that they bad such a heart Alas poor people ye know not your selves that speak so well I know thee better then thou doest thy self I will declare unto thee thy own thought thou hast not such a heart as to do what thou sayest there is a desperat wicked heart within thee that will destroy thee by lying unto thee If thou knewest this fountain of origâ—â—al corruption thou would despair of doing and say I cannot serve the Lord. Now here is the fountain of the Lands corruption this day why is our way corrupted because our hearts within were not cleansed and because they were not known If we had dryed up the fountain the streams had ceased but we did only damn it up and cut off some streams for a season we set up our resolutions and purposeâ— as an hedge to hold it in but the sea of the heartâ— iniquity that is above all things hath overflowed it and defiled our way more then in former times Ye thought upon no other thing but that presently ye would be all changed people and would reform without more adoe And thus it is with you in all your publick repentances But alas you know not your selves it iâ— still within you which will yet corrupt you and it was within us that hath undone us Wâ— were too confident of our selves and it is nâ— wonder that the Lord suffer us to prove our selves that we may know what is in our heart Now therefore since ye have so often tryed it I beseech you follow not such a way again Ye are called to deny your selves and to follow Christ and this is a great part of it that ye may never expect for any good within your selves or the helping of any evil In me is thy help found Look to the fountain of Life Jesus Christ and despair of your own hearts for they are desperatly wicked so wicked that if ye knew them ye would despair of them and give them over to another hand who can creaâ— a new heart within you Ye use to impute youâ— back-slidings to the times to temptations tâ— company and such like This is the way thaâ— men shift the challenges of sin The drunkarâ— puts it on his companion the servant on his master that led him wrong ye people put Rulers in the fault and absolve themselves and Rulers put one another in the wrong and absolve themselves But
narrow bounds of time So that now all his Providence is to lay up some perishing things for some few revolutions of the Sun for some few morrows after which though an endlesse morrow ensue yet he perceives it not and provides not for it And all his Glorying and Boasting is only upon some presumptuous confidence and ungrounded assurance of the stability of these things for the time to come which the Wise Man finding much folly in he leaves us this Counsel Boast not thy self of to morrow with a most pungent reason taken partly from the instability and inconstancy of all these outward things in which men fancy an Eternity of Joy and partly from the Ignorance we have of the future events For thou knowest not what a day may bring forth This Boasting is an evil so predominant among men that I know not any more universal in its Dominion or more hurtful to us or displeasing to God If it could be so emboweled unto you as that you might truely discern the many monstrous conceptions of Atheism and Irreligion that are in it it were worth the while But I shall not digresse upon the general head I had rather keep within the limits of the Text. Self-boasting you see is that which is here condemned and the very Name is almost enough to condemn the Nature of it But there is another particular added to restrict that Of to morrow Of all Boastings the most irrational and groundlesse is that which arises from presumption of future things which are so uncertain both in themselves and to us It is worth the observation that whatever be the immediat and particular matter and occasion of mens Gloriation yet Self is the great and ultimat Object of it It is Self that men Glory into whatsoever created thing be the reason or occasion of it Boast not thy self of to-morrow Here we might stand and take a look of the crookednesse and perversnesse of mans Spirit since his departure from God Self-love and Pride were the first poyson that the malice of Satan dropped into mans Nature and this is so strong and pestilent that it hath spread through the whole of mankind and the whole in every man Every one is infected and all in every one What are all the disordered affections in men but so many Streams from this Fountain And from these do mens Affections flow next So that there is nothing left uncorrupted and free of this abominable and vile ingredient All flowing from Self and returning to it again which is both sacrilegious and unnatural There is heinous Sacriledge in it the spoyling of the Glorious Divine Majesty of his Indubitable Prerogative and Incommunicable Right of all the Glory and Honour of his Creature There is no usurpation like this for the Worm that crawls on the Footstool to creep up to the Throne and as it were to King it there to Deifie and Adore it self and gather in all the Tribute of Praise and Glory and Love that is only due to the Lord God Almighty and invert and unpropriat these to our selves which is as if the Axe should boast it self as if it were no Iron or the Staff as if it were no Timber Hence it is that of all evils in mans Nature God hath the most perfect Antipathy and direct Opposition against Pride and Self-love because it is Sacriledge and Idolatry in the highest manner it striks at the Soveraignty and Honour of Gods Name which is dear to him as himself it sets up a vile Idol in the choicest Temple of God that is in the Heart And this is the Abomination of Desolation Other evils strike against his Holy Will But this peculiarly points at the very Nature and Beeing of the most High God and so it is with Child of Blasphemy Atheism is the very heart and life of it And then it is most unnatural and so monstrous and deformed For consider all the Creation though every one of them have particular Inclinations towards their own proper ends and so a Happinesse suitable to their own Nature yet how diverse how contrary soever they be there is no selfishnesse in them They all concurre and conspire to the good of the whole and the mutual help of each other If once that Poyson should infect the Material World which hath spoyled the Spiritual let once such a selfish disposition or inclination possesse any part of the World and presently the Order Harmony Beauty Pleasure and Profite of the whole World should be Interrupted Defaced and Destroyed Let the Sun be supposed to boast it self of its Light and Influence and so disdain to impart it to the lower World and all would run into confusion Again I desire you but to take a view of this Humour in anothers Person For we are more ready to see others evils then our own and how deformed is it So vile is self-seeking and self-boasting that all men loath it in others and hide it from others It disgraces all Actions how beautiful soever It is the very bane of Humane Society that which looses all the Linkes of it and makes them crosse and thwart one another But alas how much more easie is it to paint out such an evil in a deformed Visage then to discern it in our selves And how many will hate it in the Picture who love and entertain it in their own persons such deceitfulnesse is intermingled with most desperat wickednesse I verily believe that is the predominant of every man good and bad except in as far as it is mortified by Grace O! the turnings and windings of the Heart upon it self in all the most apparently direct Motions towards God and the good of men What serpentine and crooked Circumgyrations and reflections are there in the Soul of man when the outward Action and Expression seems most regular and directed towards Gods Glory and others Edification Whoever of you have any acquaintance with your own Spirits cannot but know this and be ashamed and confounded at the very thought of it Self-boasting Self-complacency self-seeking all those being of Kin one to another are insinuated into your best Notions and in fect them with more Atheism before God then the strongest pious Affection can instill of goodnesse into them How often will mens Actions and Expressions be outwaâ—â—ly cloathed with a habit of Condescendency and Self-denyal And many may declaim with such Zeal and Vehemency against this evil and yet Latet anguis The Serpent is in the bosome and his venome may be diffused into the Heart and the poyson of Self-seeking and Self-boasting may run thorow the Veines of humble like Carriage and Passionate Discourses for Self-denyal Oh that we could above all things establish that Fundamental Principle of Christianity in our Hearts even as we would be his Disciples truely and sincerely and not in outward resemblance to deny our selves to renounce our selves and our lusts to make a whole Resignation of our Love Will Glory and all to him in
his Creature as these are and no more Isai 66. 3. Noâ— that they looked never beyond the Ceremonies it is evident because they boasted in them theâ— used to find out these as a remedy of their sins and a mean to pacifie Gods Wrath Micah 6. 6. Paul bears witnesse of it 2 Cor. 13. 14. Moses had a Vail of Ceremonies over his Face and the Children of Israel could not stedfastly look to the end of that Mystery Christ Jesus but their minds were blinded and is so to this day in the reading of the Scriptures And this Vail of hardness of heart shall be done away when Christ returnes them again Now I say it is just so with us there was never a people liker other nor we are like the Jews We have many external Ordinances Preaching Hearing Baptism Communion Reading Singing Praying in publick Extraordinary Solemnities of Fasting and Thanksgiving Works of Discipline and Government publick Reproof to sinners Confessions and Absolutions What would ye think if we should change the terms of Sacrifices and new Moons and speak all this to you To what purpose is the multitude of your Fasts and Feasts of your Preachings and Communions of your Praying in secret and in your Families of Conference and Prayer with others of running to and fro to hear Preaching â—o partake of the Lords Table I am full of them â— delight not in them When ye come here on â—he Sabbath who required at your hand to read my Courts Come no more to hear the Word run no more after Communions seek â—o more Baptism to your Children call no â—ore Solemn Assemblies it is all iniquity Oh â—ay ye that is a strange Preaching indeed must â—e Pray no more Hear no more Sing no more Did not God command these Why do ye discharge them We do not mean so that these should not be but they should be in another way All these want the Soul and Life of them which is Jesus Christ in them Do ye not think your selves religious because ye frequent these The multitude of the people think that these please God and pacifie his Wrath Ye have no other thing in your mind but these If ye can attain any sorrow or grief for sin or any tears to signify it presently you absolve your selves for your repentance The scandalous who appear in publick thinks the paying of a penalty to the Judge and bowing the knee before the Congregation satisfies God Ye miss nothing when ye have these I speak to the professors of Religion also who pretend to more knowledge then others when ye have gone about so many Duties ye are well satisfied if ye get liberty in them If ye can satisfy your self ye doubt not of Gods satisfaction And if ye do not satisfy your selves in your Duties ye cannot believe his satisfaction Ye get the Ordinance and misses nothing Now I say in all this ye do not reacâ— to the end of this Ministry Jesâ—s Christ ye dâ— not stedfastly behold him to empty your selveâ— in his bosom to turn over all the unrighteousness of your holy things upon him who bearâ— it That which pleaseth you is not he in whom the Father is well pleased but the measure oâ— your own Duty O! the Establishing of ouâ— own Righteousness is the ruine of the Visiblâ— Church This is the grand Idol and all Sacrifice to it Know therefore that the most part of your performances are abomination and iniquity because ye have so much confidence in them and puts them not upon Christ as filthy raggs or do not cover them with his Righteousness as well as your wickedness I know ye will say that ye are not satisfied with them and that is still the matter of your Exercise Well I affirm in the Lords Name from that ground that ye have confidence in them for if your diffidence and disquietness arise from it your confidence and peace must come from it also Is there any almost that maintains Faith except when their own conditions please them well And that Faith I may call no Faith at least not pure and cleanly entire Faith As for the multitude of you you must know this that God is not pleased with your prayers and fasting and hearing c. Because ye have such an esteem of them because ye can settle your selves against all Threatnings and never once remember of Jesus Christ or consider the end of his coming into the world Because ye find no necessity of pardon for your prayers and righteousness but stretches the garment of these over the uncleanness of your practices What delight hath the Lord in them when they are put in his Sons place Will he not be jealous that his Sons Glory be not given to another In the second place the Lord rejects their performances because there was nothing but a meer shadow of service and no worshipping of God in the Spirit Ye know what Christ saith God is a Spirit and he that worships him must do it in spirit and truth Jo. 4. 24. It is thâ— Heart and Soul that God delights into Mâ— son give me thy heart for if thou give not hy heart I care for nothing else The heart iâ— the whole man What a mans Affection is that he is Light is not so it brings not thâ— man alongs with it Christ Jesus hath giveâ— himself for us and he requires that we offer ouâ— selves to him If we offer a Body to frequenâ— his House our Feet to tread in his Courts ouâ— Ears to hear his Word what cares he for it aâ— long as the Soul doth not offer it self up in Prayer or Hearing And this was the sin of thiâ— people Isai 29. 13. They draw near with thâ— lips and their heart is far from the Lord. Now are not we their Children and have succeeded to this Is there any thing almost in our publick Services but what is publick Is therâ— any thing but what is seen of men Ye comâ— to hear ye sit and hear and is there any more The most part have their minds wandering no thoughts present for your thoughtâ— are removed about your Barns and Corns oâ— some business in your head And if any havâ— their Thoughts present yet where are Affections Which are the Soul and Spirit of Religion without which it is no true fire but wildâ— fire if it be not both burning and shinning Are ye serious in these Ordinances Or ratheâ— are ye not more serious in any thing beside And now especially when Gods Providencâ— calls you to earnest thoughts when it crys to alâ— men to enter into consideration of their owâ— ways I pray you is there any Soul-affliction in your Fasts even for a day Is there any real grief or token of it Not a Fast in Scripture without weeping We have kept many and have never advanced so far Shall the Lord then be pacified Will not his Soul abhore them How shall they appease him for your other provocations when they are as Oyl to
particular antipathy against and refuse others But the Lord will not be so served As he will not share with the world and divide the Soul and service of man with Creatures so as Mâ—mmon should get part and he his part No if we choose the one we must refuse the other for so will he not suffer his Word and Commands to be divided There must be some universality in respect of the Gospel and the Law and a conjunction of these two or we cannot please him If Religion do not include the Gospel we are yet upon the old Covenant of Works according to which none can be justified If it do not include the Law in the Hands of a Mediator then we turn the Grace of god unto wantonness If it shut out Jesus Christ and have no use of him how can either we or our performances stand or be accepted before his holy eyes If it exclude the Law that Christ came to establish how can he be pleased with our religion Both of these offer an indignity to the Son of God The Sum then of Christian Religion is Believing and Sanctification of the spirit unto obedience that is the root and fountain this is the fruit and stream Justification of our persons and sanctification of our lives and hearts This is pure Religion and undefiled And therefore Isaiah sayes Wash you make you clean Cleanse in the only true fountain of Christs blood It is not your purifications of the Law your many washings with water and hysope It is not the blood of buls and goats can purge your consciences from dead works they do but purify your flesh but cannot wash your souls worse defiled This blood of Jâ—sus Christ is that clean water that he must sprinkle on you if you would be clean If you take any other water any other righteousness but his and wash thy self therewith suppose it be snow water that washeth cleanest thy most exact conversation yet he will plunge thee in the mire till thy own cloaths abhore thee Job 9. 30 31. Now when ye have washed your persons ye need not save to wash your feet sayes Christ your dayly conversation reform it in the vertue of that blood for we are not called to uncleanness but unto holiness And therefore Put away the evil of yoor doings c. God hath put away the guilt of your doings by Justification now put ye away the evil of your doings by Sanctification c. And if ye would know what Sanctification is Cease to do evil do not return to the old puddle to wallow in it Ye that are cleansed by this blood O! think how unbeseeming it is to you to defile your selves again with these things ye are cleansed from But now learn to do well ye are given up to Christ ye must be his Disciples and he will teach you Learn of me sayes Christ you need no other law almost but his example he is a visible and speaking law yet seek Judgement As ye ought to look on my example so especially ponder that word and rule of practice and behaviour that I have left behind me and given out as the law-giver of the redeemed have I redeemed you And should not I be the redeemmed and ransomed ones King Is there any society in the world wants a law order and government neither must ye who are delivered from bondage enfranchised and made free indeed Now ye should of all men most live by a law And when ye know that rule then apply it to your several vocations and callings let the Magistrat act according to it and every man according to it Religion consists not in a general notion but condescends to our particular practice to reform it You see then what we would presse upon your Consciences It is true religion that we would have you perswaded unto All men have some kind of Religion even Heathens who worship Idols but the true religion respects the true and living God Now what is it to worship the true and living God what is the service of him that may be called Religion indeed Should we be the prescrivers of it No certainly he must carve solely in that or else it cannot please him Therefore To the Law and to the Testemony if ye speak not according to this and worship not according to this word of God it is because there is no light into you Ye may have a religion before men pure and undefiled but if it be not so before God and the father I pray you to what purpose is it I am sure it is all lost labour nay it is labour with loss instead of gain O that ye were perswaded to look and search the Scriptures Think ye to have eternal life out of them and think ye to have eternal life by them who do not labour to know the way of it set down there Every on of you have a different model of religion according to your fancies and breedings according as your lusts will suffer you The rule that the most part walk by is the course and example of the world Is not this darknesse and grosse darkness Others model their duties according to their ability they will do all they can do with ease and without troubling themselves and they think God may be well pleased with that I pray you consider and hear the word of the Lord and Law of your God hath he set down here the rule and perfect patern of true Religion and will ye never so much own it as to examine yours according to it the scriptures are the touch-stone If you would not have a counterfeit Religion deceiving you in the end when ye have trusted to it I pray you try it by the word of God Oh that this principle were once sunk into your hearts I may not walk at randome if I please my self and satisfy my own will if that be not also Gods will I shall have neither gain nor comfort of it his will is manifested in his word I will search and find what God hath required of me for if I be not certain of his will I may be doing all my dayes and sweating out my life and yet losse my pains and oyl I say this word of the Lord that Isaiah calls to the people to hear V. 10. will at length judge you Your Religion will be tryed in the day of accompts according to it not according to your rules and methods ye have prescribed unto your selves Now if ye in the mean time shall judge your selves according to another rule and abâ—olve your selves and in the end God shall judge you according to this word and condemn you were ye not fools in neglecting this word The whole will of God concerning your duty may be summed up in two John hath one of them 1 Jo. 3. 23. And this is his Commandment that we shoud believe on the Name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another as he gave us Commandment And Paul hath another to
thou come to him where shall thou have it will thou find it in thy heart which is desperatly wicked will thou seek it of God and not seek it in the Mediator Jesus Christ God out of a Mediator will not hear thee In a word there is both extream sin and extream folly in this way great sin because it contradicts the tenure of the Gospel it dishonours the Lord Jesus the exalted Prince as if he were not the fountain of all grace it is contrary both to the freedom of his grace and to the fulness of it also it is great folly for thou leaves the living fountain and goes seeking water in a wilderness thou leaves the Garden where all herbs grow and wanders abroad to the wild Mountains And because thou canst not find what thou seeks thou sits down and weeps beside it Repentance is in Christ and no repentance so pleasing to God as the mournings and relentings of a pardoned sinner but thou seeks it far from him yea refuseth him for want of that which thou may have by choosing him Therefore we declare this unto you that whatever ye be whatever ye want if ye think ye stand in need of Jesus Christ embrace him If ye be exceeding vile in your own eyes and cannot get repentance as ye would to cleanse your selves here is the fountain opened and ready to wash into Yet this we must tell you that no sinner can believe but he that repents not because repentance is required as a preparation to give a man a warrand and right to believe I know no ground of faith but our necessity and the Lords promise and command unto us but because no soul can truly flie in to Jesus Christ to escape sins guilt but he that desites to be delivered from sin it self And therefore the most part of you fancy a faith which you have not because there is no possibility that men will come out of themselves till they be pressed out by discovered sin and misery within your woulds and wishes after Christ and salvation that many of you have are not the real exercises of your souls flying unto him for salvation If ye did indeed turn in to Jesus Christ your hearts would turn the back upon sin and these sins ye seek remission of Now all the defire that many men have of Christ is this I would fain have his salvation if I might keep my Sin I would gladly be delivered from the guilt of sin if he would let me keep still the sin But will Christ make any such bargain Iâ— this blood only wash from sin oh how many ly in their sins and wallow in their filthiness There is a generation clean in their own eyes and yet are not washed from their filthiness Prov. 30. 12. Oh that ye believed this If ye be not now washed eternity shall find you unclean And woe to the Soul that enters eternity with all the pollution of its sins Can such a soul enter into the high and Holy place the clean City No certainly it must be without among the Dogs and Swine it must be kept in darkness for ever It is then of great importance that ye be washen from your filthiness Now I ask you Is it so or not are ye made clean and washen from the guilt of your sins every one of your almost will say so and think so and yet sayes the Scripture There is a generation pure in their own eyes and yet are not washed Is there a generation such Is there any such Oh then think its possible you may be mistaken in the opinion of your own cleanness do any conceive themselves pardoned and yet are not so think it is possible you may have deceived your selves espccially since ye have never examined it but are there so many so a whole generation the most part of mâ—n then as you love your souls try for it is certain that most part of you must be deceived Is there a generation in the visible Church not washen and yet every one thinks himself clean then certainly the most part are in a great delusion will ye then once examine whether or not ye be deluded with them It shall be your peace to know it while it may be amended But how comes it to pass that so many hearing of the Gospel and lying near this fountain are not cleansed I think ccrtainly because they will not have a through cleansing they get none at all All men would love Christs blood well to pardon sin but who will accept of the water to sanctifie them from sin but Christ came with both Shall this Blood be spent upon numbers of you who have no respect to it but would still wallow in your filthiness Would ye have God pardoning these sins ye never throughly resolve to quite But how is it that so many men are clean in their own eyes and yet not washed I think indeed the reason of it is they make a kind of washing which they apprehend sufficient and yet knows not the true Fountain We find men taking much Sope and Nitre when convinced of sin or charged with it and thereupon soon absolving themselves If ye ask their grounds they will tell you they â—epent and are sorry for it they purpose to make a mends and they think amendment a gooâ— compensation for the past wrong They wilâ— it may be vow to drink no more for a year afteâ— they have been drunk They will confess theiâ— sin in publick and all this they do without having any thought of Jesus Christ or the end oâ— his coming and can absolve themselves froâ— such grounds though in the mean time Chrisâ— come not so much as in their mind And therefore are they not really washed All thy righteousness is unclean before God and thy repentances defile thee and yet because of some sucâ— Duties thou deceivest thy self and art clean iâ— thine own eyes These have some beauty in thâ— eyes and thou puts them between thy filthinesâ— and thy eye and so conceives that thou aâ— clean I think a reason also why many meâ— are clean in their own eyes and conceive thaâ— God hath pardoned their sin is because they have forgotten it It is not recent in their memory and makes no present wound in their Conscience And therefore they apprehend God such as themselves they think he hath forgotten it also But Oh! how terrible shall it be when God brings to remembrance and sets our sins in order before us Ye think God cares not for your sins that he forgives them because he is silent at them Psal 50. 21. But the Lord shall one day set them before thee and thou shalt know they were still marked beforâ— him Ye who have washen in this Blood ye may rejoyce for it shall make you clean every whit Your iniquities that so defiled you shall not be found O! the precious vertue of that Blood that can purge away a souls spots All the Art of Men and
Angels could not reach this This Redemption and Cleansing was precious and would have ceased for ever But this Blood is the Ransome this Blood cleanseth and so perfectly that it shall not appear not only to mens eyes but also Gods peircing Eye Sinners quite your own righteousness why defile ye your selves more When your eyes are opened ye will find it so here is washing apply your selves to this Fountain And if ye do indeed so if ye expect cleansing from Jesus Christ I pray you return not to the puddle Ye are not washen from sin to sin more and defile your self more If ye think ye have liberty to do so ye have no part in this Blood SERMON XI Isai 1. 16. Wash ye make you clean put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes cease to do evil c. THere are two evils in sin one is the Nature of it another the Fruit and sad Effect of it In it self it is filthiness and contrair to Gods Holiness and abasing of the immortal soul a spot in the face of the Lord of the Creatures that hath far debased him under them all Though it be so unnatural to us yet it is now in our fallen estate become as it were natural so that men agree with it as if it were sunk and drunk into the very soul of man The other is the guilt and desert of punishment and obligation to it All man hate this but they cannot hold it off They eat the Tree and Fruit of Death they must eat Death also They must have the wages of sin who have wrought for it Now the Gospel hath found a remedy for lost man in Jesus Christ He comes in the Gospel with a twofold blessing a twofold vertue a pardoning vertue and a sanctifying vertue VVater and Blood 1 Jo. 5. 6. He comes to forgive sin and to subdue sin To remove the guilt of it and then the self of it Gods appointment had inseparably joyned them And Christ came not to dissolve the Law but to establish it If he had taken away the punishment and left the sin in its being he had weakened the Law and the Prophets That conjunction of sin and wrath which is both by divine appointment and suitable also unto their own natures must stand that Divine Justice may be intire And therefore he that comes to redeem us from the curse of the Law hath also this Commission to redeem from sin and all transgressions of the Law Rom. 11. 26. and Gal. 3. 13. He that turns away the wrath of God from men turns also ungodliness from them which provoked his wrath And so he is a compleat Redeemer and a compleat Redeemer he had not been otherwayes If he had removed Wrath only and left us under the bondage of sin it had not been half redemption he that commits sin is the servant of sin But this is perfect freedom and liberty to be made free from sin for it was sin that subjected us to wrath and so was the first Tyrant and the greatest The Gospel then comes with a joyful sound unto you but many of you mistake it and apprehends it to be a Doctrine of Liberty and Peace and that unto sin But if it were so it were no joyful sound If there were proclaimed a liberty to all men to do as they list no punishment no wrath to be feared I would think that Doctrine no glade news it were but the perpetuating of the bondage of a reasonable soul But this is glade news a delivery and freedom proclaimed in the Gospel but what Not unto sin but from sin and this is to be free indeed We ought more to Jesus Christ for this then for redemption from Wrath because sin is a greater evil then wrath Yea wrath were not so if sin were not Therefore he exhorts to wash and wash so that they may make clean Take Jesus Christ for Justification and Sanctification imploy both the Water and the Blood that he hath come with But because all men pretend a willingness to have Christ their Saviour and their sins pardoned through his Blood who notwithstanding hate to be reformed and would seek no more of Christ Therefore he branches out that part of the Exhortation in several particulars All men have a general likeing of remission of sins but renouncing of it is to many a hard Doctrine they would be glade that God put their evils out of his sight by passing them by and forgetting them But they will not be at the pains of putting away their evils from his sight And therefore the Gospel which comprehends these two united is not really received by many who pretend to be followers of it This is his Command that ye believe Some pretend to obey this and yet hath no regard of that other part of his Will even their Sanctification And therefore their Faith is dead it is a fancy If ye did indeed believe and receive Christ for pardon of sin it were noâ— possible but your Souls would be ingaged and constrained to indeavour to walk in all well-pleasing But it is an evident token of one that is not washed from his sin and believes not in Christ if he conceive within his heart a greater latitude and liberty to walk after the flesh and be imboldened to continue in sin because of his Grace and Mercy And yet such are the most part of you Upon what ground do ye delay repentance Upon what presumption do ye continue in your sins and puts over the serious study of holiness till a more fit time Is it not from an apprehension of the Grace and Mercy of God that ye think ye may return any time and be accepted and so ye may in the mean time take as much pleasure in sin as ye can seing ye may get leave also for Gods Mercy I pray you consider that you have never apprehended Gods Mercy aright ye are yet in your sins and certainly as yet are not washed from them Put away the evil c. When the Spirit convinces a Soul he convinces a man not only of evil doings but of the evil of his doings Not only of sin but of the sinfulness of sin And not only of those actions which are in themselves sinful but also of the iniquity of Holy things I think no man will come to wash in Christs Blood till this be discovered If he see much wickedness many evil doings yet he will labour to wash away these by his own tears and repentance and well doing As long as he hath any good Actions as Prayers Fasting and such like he will cover his evil doings by them He will spread the skirts of such righteousness over his uncleannesse and when he hath hid it from his own eyes he apprehends that he hath hid it from Gods also He will wash his bloody hands with many Prayers and thinks they may be clean enough We see blasphemers of Gods Name use to joyn a prayer for forgivenesse
with their oath and curse and they never trouble themselves more Oh what mocking of God is this Now al 's long as it is thus there is no imployment for the Son of Gods Blood they can do their own turn Men will not come to Christ because it is the best way if they see any else beside None will come till he see it is the only way None can wash in Christ except they wash all If ye have any thing that needs not washing his Blood is not for you his righteousnesse is not known when ye establish all or a part of your own I fear the most part of you have no imployment for Christ Ye have extream need of him but ye know it not For there are many things which ye will not number among your sins your Prayers your Hearing Reading Singing publick and private Worship giving Alms c. How many of you were never convinced of any sin in these Do ye not conceive God is well pleased with you for them Your Conscience hath convinced you it may be of grosse sins as drunkennesse filthinesse swearing c. But ye are not convinced for your well doing Ye find not a necessity of a Mediator for these I think many of you never confessed any such thing except in a general notion Alas how ignorant are men of themselves We are unclean how can any thing we do cleanse us Are not we unclean and do not our hands touch our own works Shall not then our own uncleannesse defile our good Actions more then they can cleanse us Hag. 2. 13. The ignorance of this makes men go about to build up their old ruined righteousnesse and still seek something in themselves to make up wants in themselves Always when the Light of God hath discovered you to your selves so that ye can turn your eye no where but uncleannesse fills it though your Conversation be blamelesse in the world so as men can challenge nothing yet ye have found within and without nothing but matter of mourning I say this is an evidence that the Spirit hath shined and inlightened thy darknesse Now when thou hath fled unto Jesus Christ for a covering to thy righteousnesse al 's well as unrighteousnesse it remains that thou now put away the evil of thy doings Put not away thy doings but the evil of them We challenge your Prayers Services and publick Duties even as the Prophet did We declare unto you that God is as evil pleased with them as your drunkennesse whoreing intemperance c. The most part of you are no more acceptable when ye come to the Church then when ye go to the Tavern your praying and cursing is almost all one What shall we do then say ye Shall we pray no more and hear no more No say I put not away your Prayers and Ordinances but put away the evil of them from before his sight Rather multiplie your doings but destroy the evil and iniquity of your doings And there is one evil or two above all that makes them hateful to him Ye trust to much in them Here is the iniquitie ye idol of jealousie set up ye make your doings your righteousnesse and in that notion they are abomination There is nothing makes your worship of God so hateful as this ye think so much of it and justifies your self by it And then God knows what it is that ye so magnifie and makes the ground of your claim to Salvation it is even an empty ceremony a shadow without substance a body without a Soul You speak and look and hear you exercise some outward Senses but no inward Affections And what should that be to him who is a Spirit They did not observe the Iniquity of their Holy things and therefore are they marked by him they are in his sight They did not see so many faults in their Prayers and Services They wondered why God did chide them so much But God marks what we misse he remembers when we forget We cover our selves with a Vail of External Duties and think to hide all the Rottennesse of our Hearts but it will not be hid from him before whom Hell hath no covering all hearts are open and naked before him Your secret sins are in the sight of his Countenance Men hear you Pray see you present at Worship they know no more at least they see no more Nay but the formâ—lity of thy Worship the wanderings of thy Mind are in his sight And O! how excellent a Rule of walking were this to do all in his sight and presence Oh that ye were perswaded in your hearts of his All-seing All-searching Eye and All-knowing Mind VVould ye not be more sollicitous and anxious anent the frame of your hearts then the liberty of your speech or External gesture Oh how would men retire within themselves to fashion their Spirits before this All-searching and All-knowing Spirit If ye do not observe the evils of your hearts and ways they are in his sight and this will spoil all acceptance of the good of them If ye observe the evils of your well doing and bring these also to the Fountain to wash them and be about this earnest indeavour of perfecting Holinesse of perfecting well-doings in the Power and Fear of God then certainly he will not set your sins in the Light of his Countenance the good of your way shall come before him and the evil of it Christ shall take away Cease to do evil c. These are the two Leggs a Christian walks on if he want any of them he is lame and cannot go equally ceasing from evil and doing good Nay they are so united that the one cannot subsist without the other If a man do not cease from evil and his former lusts he cannot do well or perfite Holiness There are many different Dispositions and Conditions of men There are generally one of two Some have a kind of abstinence from many grosse sins and are called civil honest men they can abide an inquest and censure of all their Neighbours they can say no ill of them But alas there is al 's little good to be said He drinks not swears not whores not steals not Nay but what doth he well Alas the World cannot tell what he doth for he prays not in secret nor in his family he is void of some offences towards men but there are many duties called to towards both God and men he is a stranger to He oppresses not the poor nay but he is not charitable either to give to them He defrauds no man but whom helps he by his means Again there are others they will boast of some things done they pray they keep the Church well they do many good turns and yet for all that they do not cease to do evil They were drunkards so they are They can swear for all their prayers are given to contention to lying to filthiness c. Now I say neither of these Religions is pure and undefiled Religion
peace within you and say that ye have peace with God Yet certainly the Lord thy God is against thee and will not spare thee Deut. 29. 19. Many of you blesse your selves in your own hearts when ye hear the Curse and Threatning of the Law ye say God forbid or all that were true Well thus saith the Lord all these Curses that are written in this book shall ly upon thee and the Lord shall separate thee unto evil because ye take not with your enimity there can be no treaty a Mediator can have no imployment from you How shall the breach of peace be made up Since the first Covenant cannot be made up again where shall the remedy be found God is just and righteous Men are rebellious and sinful Can these meet and the one not be consumed Will not God be a consuming Fire and men as Stubble before the Lords presence Therefore there must be a Mediator between them a Peace-maker to make of two one to take up the difference And this Mediator must be like both and yet neither wholly the one nor the other He must therefore be God and Man that he may be a fit Days man betwixt God and man And this is our Lord Jesus Christ In his Divinity he comes near to God in his Humanity he comes near to man In his Person he is between both and he is fit to make peace And therefore he is a Prince of Peace Isa 9. 6. And that he may be a Prince of Peace he must be both An Everlasting Father like God and a young Child like unto man God to prevail with God and a man to engage for man And therefore he is called our Peace Eph. 2. 14. Our Lord Jesus Christ enters in a Covenant with the Father wherein he undertakes to bear our Curse and the chastisement of our Peace he is content to be dealt with as the Rebel upon me upon me be the iniquity and so there comes an interruption as it were of that blessed peace he had with the Father he is content that there should be a Covering of Wrath spread over the Fathers Love that he should handle the Son as an Enemy And therefore it is that sinners are admitted as Friends his Obedience takes away our Rebellion The Cloud of the Lords Displeasure powers down upon him that it might be fair weather to us The Armies of Curses that were against us Encounter him and he by being overcome overcometh By being slain by Justice Satan and Sin overcometh all those and killeth the enmity on the cross making peace by his Blood Col. 2. 14 15. Eph. 2 15. And it is this Sacrifice that hath pacified Heaven the sweet smell of it hath gone above and made peace in the High places Here then is the priviledge of a Believer to be at peace with God to be one with him And this indeed is Life Eternal to be united unto the Fountain of Life in whose favour is Life and whose loving kindnesse is better then Life Is not this a blessed Estate Whatever a man hath done against God it is all forgiven and forgotten shall never come in remembrance Are not Angels blessed who are friends with God Such is the Soul whose sins are pardoned through Christ their sins are as if they never had been The Soul is not only escaped that terrible wrath of God but being at peace with God all the goodnesse that is communicable to Creatures it shall partake of That they may be one as we are one that they may be perfect in one Joh. 17. This Christ prayed for and this was the end of his Death to make of two one So then the Glory that Christ is partaker of with the Father we must be partakers of with him and all this by vertue of that peace with God by him Oh if ye knew what enimity with God is how would it indear and make precious peace with him The one engageth all that is in God to be against a man the other engageth all that is in him to be for a man And is not he then a great One whither he be a Friend or an Enemy Is he not the best Friend and worst Enemy Who hath most power yea all power to employ for whom he will and against whom he will What a blessed change is it to have God of a consuming Fire made a Sun with Healing and Consolation That the Righteous Holy and Just God before whom no flesh can stand should accept so rebellious sinners and dwell among them He had not only power to destroy but Law against us also What a perfect peace is it then that the Judge becometh a merciful Father and the Law of Ordinances is cancelled and that power imployed to keep Salvation to us and us to Salvation Ye who have made Peace and Atonement through Christs Blood rejoyce in the Hope of the Glory of God There wants nothing to make you compleatly blessed but the clear and perfect sight and knowledge of your Estate before God Now when this peace which is made up in Heaven is intimated unto the Conscience then all the Tempests and Clouds of it evanish and this is the peace of believing which is the Souls resting and quieting it self upon the believed favour of God There may be a great Calm above goodwill in God tomards men and yet great Tempests in this lower Region no peace on earth There is a peace of Conscience which is a disease of Conscience a benumednesse of Conscience or a sleep of Conscience when men walk in the imagination of their own hearts and flatter themselves in their own eyes will not trouble themselves with the apprehension of the wrath of God when Souls will not suffer their sin or the curse to enter in This is that no peace which the Lord speaks often of it is but a dream and when a man awaketh alas what a dreadful sight meets he with first sudden destruction Sin enters in the Conscience and the Law the strength of sin and so that peace endeth in an eternal disquietnesse But what is the reason that notwithstanding of Gods Justice and mens Sins so many are not affraid of him so many passe the time without fear of Wrath and Hell Is it not because they have taken hold of his Strength and made peace with him No indeed but because they know not the power of his Anger to fear him according to his Wrath Who will spend one hour in the examination of his own ways in searching out sins in counting his debt till he find it past payment No men intertain the thoughts of sin and hell and wrath as if it were coals in their bosom they shake them out they like and love any diversion from them Oh ignorance maketh much peace I would say security which is so much worse then fear because it is so far from the remedy that it knoweth not the evil and danger It is not the rising of the Sun of Righteousnesse
ingageth both to give a shelter and refuge to the poor sinner Would a Soul be any more tossed would there be any place for wavering and doubting if Souls considered his excellent loveing kindness and great goodness laid up and treasured with him for these that trust in him Psal 36. 7. Who would not put their trust under the shadow of his wings and think themselves safe Again if his eternal power were pondered how he is able to effectuat whatever he pleaseth what everlasting Armes he hath that by a word supports the frame of the world what he can do if he stretch out his Arm And then if these two immutable things Heb. 6. 18. His Promise and his Oath were looked upon how he hath ingaged himself in his Truth and sworn in his Holiness Would not a Soul ly safely between these three what strong consolation would such a threefold consideration yield Would any wind or tempest blow within these Walls mounted up to Heaven Stayedness on God is nothing else but the fixedness of believing and trusting Psal 112. 7 8. His heart is fixed trusting in God hiâ—â—eart is established It is even the mature and ripe age of Faith Fâ—ith while it is yet in infancy in its tender years it neither can endure storms nor can it confirm us in them But when it hath sprung up and grown in that root of Jesse wheâ— it is rooted and established in Jesus Christ then it establisheth the Soul Faith abiding in him and taking root groweth confirmed as a Tree that cannot easily be moved and if you establish Faith you shall be established There are two particulars which I conceive the trusting Soul is stayed on First in the meditation of God Secondly in expectation from him of all good things When I say the Meditation of God I take in both Contemplation and Affection The most part of men have but few thoughts of God at all even those who trust in him do not consider sufficiently what a One he is in whom they believe If Faith were vigorous and lively it would put men to often thinking on him seeking to know him in his glorious Names the mind would be stayed upon this glorious object as the most Mysterious and Wonderful One How throng are mens minds with their vanities When they awake they are not still with God The Meditation of him is a burden to them Any other thing geteth more time and thoughts But Meditation addeth Affection to Contemplation Men may think long upon the Heavens and their Course but their Affections are not ravished with them But this is the Soul stayed on God when the Souls desires are towards the remembrance of his Name then Affection stayeth the mind upon what it pitcheth one And certainly the mind giveth but passing looks constrained thoughts where the heart is not Here is Davids Meditation Psal 1. My delight is in the law of the Lord. The Soul of a Believer should be constant and fixed in the consideration of God till he be wholly ingaged to admiration and wondering O Lord how excellent is thy Name Ps 8. 1. And who is like unto thee You all say that you believe in God and know his Power you know he is Good he is Merciful Just Long suffering Faithful c. But what is all this knowledge but ignorance and your light darkness when it doth not press you to put your trust in his Name You know Nay but you consider not what you know This is trusting when the mind is stayed on what it knoweth when all the scattered thoughts and affections are called home and united in one to be exercised about this comprehensive Object The Lord our God It is not want of knowledge destroyeth you but want of consideration of what you know and this is brutishness Mens hearts do not carry Seal and Stamp of their knowledge because thoughts of God and his word are but as passengers that go thorow a Land as lightning going thorow the mind but warms it not And so their practice carrieth no impression of it either How base is it for those who have God for their God to be so ignorant of him Would not any man willingly travel about his own possessions Have you such a large portion Believers and should you be taken up with other vanities Should your hearts minds be stayed on them more then the living God There is a great vanity and levity in mens minds The Lord knoweth the thoughts of men that they are vanity There is aâ— unsetledness of Spirit we cannot pitch upon that on which we may be stayed And so all the spirits of men are in a continual motion from one thing to another for nothing giveth compleat satisfaction and therefore it must go and try one after another to see if it can find in it what iâ— found not in the former And such is the inconstancy of the Spirit that it licketh up its vomit and what thing it refused it eateth it up as itâ— meat The time is spent in choosing and refusing rejecting one thing and taking another and again returning to what you have rejected Thus are men tossed up and down and unstablâ— in all their ways as a Ship without ballasting Now Faith and trusting in God is the ballasâ— and weight of this inconstant Ship It is the Anchor to stay it from being driven to and fro once men would pitch upon this one Lord wiâ— hath in himself eminently all the scattered perfections of Creatures and infinitely more if you would consider him and meditate on him till your Souls loved him would you not be ravished with him Would you not build your house beside him and dwell in the meditation of his Name This would fix and establish you in duties when I awake I am still with thee A little searching and experience discovereth emptiness in all beside and therefore is it that the Soul removeth sooner from such a particular Creature then it expected but here is one that is past finding out The more I search and find I find him the more above what I can search and find The Creatures are but painted and fair in mens apprehension and at a distance but the near injoyment of them discovereth the delusion and sendeth a man away ashamed because he trusted But the Lord God is and there is no other he is not as waters that fail no liar he is an everlasting Fountain the more you dig and draw it runs the faster he will never send any away ashamed that trust in him because they shall find more then they expected Therefore the Soul that is stayed on meditation of God and knoweth him certainly will be fixed in expectation from him Our expectation from the Creatures changeth because it is oft frustrat disappoyntment meets it it is above what is in the Creature and so it must meet with disappoyntment But as he is above our meditation so is he far above our expectation And if a mans experience answer
and a resolution of amending this then is all your covering and ornament something done by you as many will make the wings of two good works stretch themselves out so far as to cover and hide a multitude of offences between them Therefore I declare in the Lord Jesus his Name unto you whose Conscience must go alongs in the acknowledgment and owning of your case that you have covered your selves with your own righteousnesse that you have taken as filthy rags to cover your nakednesse and sin with as your sins are and so you have made an addition to your uncleanness you are more unclean by your prayers and repentance then before And so God is of more pure eyes then to look graciously on such as you are You have gone about to establish your own righteousnesse and hath not known the righteousnesse of God and so you have come short of it you are yet persons in a state of enmity God is your Judge you are rebels It concerns you much to heed this well to judge of your own actions and persons as God judgeth of them for if God shall judge one way and you judge another way you may be far mistaken in the end If you have so good an opinion of your selves and your duties that you can plead interest in God for them and absolve your selves from such grounds And if God have not the same judgement but rather think as evil of your prayers as of your cursing and abhor the thing that satisfieth you will it not be dreadful in the end For his judgement shall stand and you will succumb in judgement since you crossed Gods mind Therefore we would have you solidly drink in this principle of Religion That man is so unclean and God so abhorreth him that whatever he doth or can do it cannot make him righteous that no good action can make him acceptable and take away the uncleanness of the evil actions and that any sinful action taketh away all the cleanness of the good actions Once believe this If I should sweat out my life in serving God and never rise off my knees If I should give my body to the fire for the truth If I should melt away in tears for sin all this is but filthy raggs and I can never be accepted of God for all that but the matter of my condemnation groweth If I justifie my self my own mouth proves me perverse God needeth no more but my good deeds to condemn me for in all justice And therefore it is a thing impossible I will never put forth a hand or open a mouth upon that account any more I will serve God because it is my duty but life I will not expect by my service when I have done all it is wholly mercy that I am accepted my good works shall never come in remembrance I resolve to be found not having my own righteousnesse I will appear among the ungodly sinners as one that hath no righteousnesse that I may be justified only by faith in Jesus Christ I say drink in this truth and let it settle in your hearts and then we would hear numbers cry O what shall I do to be saved Now as for you who have fled unto Christs righteousnesse only have cast away your own as dung and dross as filthy raggs as you have done right in the point of Justification judge so likewise after it We would exhort you to judge so of your best actions that are the fruits of the Spirit judge so of them as you have a hand in them All our righteousness Mark Isaiah a holy Prophet joyneth himself in with the multitude And the truth is the more holiness the more humility and self-abasing for what is holiness I pray you but self-denial the abasing of the creature and exalting of Christ Jesus This is the Cross that the Saints must all bear Deny your self and follow me Grace doth not swell men above others it is gifts such as Knowledge that puffeth up Charity or Love puffeth not up Men are naturally high-minded for pride was the first sin of Adam and grace cometh to level men to make the high mountains valleys for Christs Chariot It maketh men stoop low to enter the door of the Kingdome Therefore if you have attained any measure beyond others if you would prove it real grace and holinesse do not exalt your selves above others be not high minded come down and sit among the ungodly among the unclean and let not grace given diminish the low estimation of your self in your self There is a growing that is but a fancy and mens conceit when men grow above Ordinances above other Christians and can see none or few Christians but themselves such a growth is not real it s but fancy it s but swelling and wind and must be pricked to let it out A holy Prophet came in among an unclean people he did not say Stand by I am bolier then thou Such a man as can find no Christian about him even though to the judgement of all others they seek God more then he such a man hath not real solid grace his holiness is profane holiness and proud holiness for true holiness is humble holiness and in honour prâ—ferreth others There is a great fault among those who have fled to Christs righteousness in Justification that they use to come full from duties as a stomach from a honey comb Oft times we make our liberty and access to God the ground of our acceptation and according to the ebbings and flowings of our inherent righteousness so doth the faith and confidence of Justification ebb and flow Christians this ought not to be In so doing you make your own righteousness your righteousness before God for when the unsatisfaction in the point of duty maketh you question your interest so often is not the satisfaction of your minds in duties made the ground of your pleading interest Give you liberty and access you can believe any thing remove it and you can believe nothing Certainly this is a sandy foundation you ought to build nothing on performances you should be as vile in your own eyes and think your nakedness as open when you come nearest God when you have most liveliness as when he hideth his face duty withereth will filthy raggs be your ornament No Christians be more acquaint with the unspotted righteousness of the Immaculat Lamb of God and find as great necessity of covering your cleanest duties with it as your foulest faults and thus shall you be kept still humble and vile in your own eyes and have continual imployment for Christ Jesus your best estate should not puff you up and your worst estate should not cast you down Therefore be much in the search of the filthiness of your holy actions This were a spiritual study a noble discovery to unbowel your duties to divide them and give unto God what is Gods and take unto your selves what is your own The discovery of filthiness in them
your prayers a delight be upright in the thing you seek and see that you intertain no known sin give it no heart allowance Thirdly There are many prayers not heard not known because the mouth outcryeth the heart It is the sacrifice of the contrite heart that God despiseth not The prayers of this people were such Isai 29. 13. They drew near with the mouth but the heaâ—t was far away It is worship in spirit and truth that God loveth Joh 4. 23. Since Prayer is a communion of God with the Creature a meeting of one with God and speaking face to face God who is a Spirit and immortal must have a spirit to meet with a soul to speak to him Now do you not find your hearts gading abroad even in duty Is it not most about your Corns and Lands in the time of solemn worship Therefore God getteth no more but a carcasse to keep communion with He may have as much fellowship with the stones of the wall and timber of the house as he can have with your ears and mouths while you remove your hearts to attend other things And I would say more if your mind be present yet your heart is gone sometimes yea often both are gone abroad Sometimes the mind and thought stayeth but the affection and heart is not with it and so the minds residence is not constant Your thought may come in as a wayfaring man but tarrieth not all night dwelleth not Now speak to it even Christians may not your Prayers often have a contrary interpretation to what they pretend You pray so coldrifely and formally as God will interpret you have no mind to it we ask as we seemed indifferent whether our petition be granted or not Should the Lord be affected with your petitions when you your selves are not affected much Should his bowels of zeal sound within him when yours are silent It is fervent prayer availeth much Isai 5. 16. A heart sent out with the petition and gone up to Heaven cannot but bring back an answer If Prayer carry not the seal of the heart and soul in it God cannot own it or send it back with his seal of acceptation Fourthly Many Prayers are not calling on Gods Name And no wonder that when people pray yet the Spirit say None calleth on thy Name for Prayer is made as to an unknown God and God is not taken up according to his Name which are his glorious Attributes whereby he manifesteth himself in his Word To call on Gods Name is so to pray to God as to take him up as he hath revealed himself And what is the Lords Name Hear himself speak to Moses Exod. 33. 19. and 34. 6 7. The Lord the Lord God merciful and gracious long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth keeping mercy for thousands forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin and that will by no means clear the guilty Now to call on this Name is for the soul in Prayer to have a suitable stamp on it every Attribute of God taking deep impression in the heart And so Gods Name to be written on the very petitions And shortly we may say the Spirit should have the impression of Gods greatnesse and Majesty of his goodnesse and mercy of his terriblenesse and justice This is the order that God proclaimeth his Name into In the entry the supplicant should behold the glorious Soveraignty and infinite distance between God and the Creature that he may have the stamp of reverence and abasement upon his spirit and may speak out of the dust as it becometh the dust of the ballance and footstool to do to him who sitteth on the circle of the Heaven as his Throne And this I must say there is little Religion and Godlinesse among us because every man is ignorant of God Even Gods children do more study themselves and their condition then Gods greatnesse and absolutenesse Who searches Gods infinitnesse in his Word and Works till he behold a wonder and be drowned in a mystery O but the Saints of old did take up God at a greater distance from the Creatures they waded far into this boundlesse Ocean of Gods Majesty till they were over head and ears and werâ— forced to cry out Who can find out the Almighty to perfection All these are but parts of him his back-parts There is more real Divinity and knowledge of God in one of Jobs friends discourses one of Davids prayerâ— then now in twenty Sermons of gracious men or many prayers or conferences of Saints But withal you must study his goodnesse and mercy and this maketh up the most part of his Name The definition of God hath most of this so that it may be said truly that mercy is his delight mercy as it were swelleth over the rest God were not accessible unlesse mercy did temper it Behold then greatnesse to humble and goodness to make bold that you may have accesse As greatness should leave the stamp of reverence on your petitions so should mercy and goodnesse imprint them with faith and confidence And that the rather because as Christ is said to be the Fathers Face and tâ— image of his Person 2 Cor. 4. 6. and Heb. 1. â— So may he be called the Fathers Name and â— doth God himself call him Exod. 23. 20 21. Tâ— Angel that went before them in the wilderness wâ—â— voice they ought to obey his Name is in him aâ— this Angel is Christ Jesus Acts 7. 37 38. â— then Christ Jesus is Gods Name God as â— revealeth himself in the Word is God in Châ— reconciling the world unto himself 2 Cor. 5. â— And therefore Christians you ought to prâ— alwayes in Christs Name and this is to call â— his Name Not only encourage your selves â— come to God because of a Mediator becaâ— he is God in Christ but also offer up all yoâ— prayers in Jesus his Name that his Name caâ—led on them may sanctifie them otherwise yoâ— affection at prayers cannot be acceptable â— God for he loveth nothing but what comâ— thorow the Son Prayer must have an evil sâ—vour when it is not put in the Golden Censâ— that this Angel hath to offâ—r up incense with tâ— prayers of the Saints And likewise you woâ— know Gods justice and wrath that you mâ— serve in fear and trembling And when treâ—bling is joyned with the rejoycing of faith thâ— is acceptable service You ought to fear to â—fend his holiness while you are before him Lâ— Gods terribleness have a deep impression â— your spirit both to make sin bitter and to maâ— mercy more sweet Thus should Prayer asceâ— with the seal of Gods Attributes and then is a calling on his Name Now is there any câ—ling on his Name among us Who maketh â—udy to take up God in his glorious Names â—herefore you call not on a known God and â—nnot name him Now all of you take this â—le to judge your prayers by Think you not â—at you make many prayers You both think and