said Cornelius do this or that as to say Send for Peter and he shall tell thee what to do Acts 10. 6. But God sends him to Peter and Peter must come and direct him in a set Sermon that God might keep up the credit of his Messengers and his standing Ordinances There are special promises to this purpose to be fulfilled to the people of God in publick Assemblies of the Church Isai 56. 7. I wil make them joyful saith God but where in my House of Prayer which was among the Jews the Temple and among the Gentiles any place of publick Worship Isai 60. 7. I will glorifie the House of my glory And 't is remarkable that in both places the Promises are made to the Gentiles when they should be converted as appears by the Context God would have an house of Prayer places of publick Assemblies in the Gentile Church and in them God hath promised to make his people joyful Come forth here all ye old Disciples experienced Christians and give in evidence from your experience Cannot you say that the banner of love which God hath spread over your souls was lifted up in these Banquetting Houses Hath he not here stayed your souls with flagons and comforted you with apples Cant. 2. 2 Prayer There is an holy Conference and Dialogue between God and the soul in holy Duties This of Prayer is the Duty in which we speak and the Word and Seals are the wayes in which God speaks Wee ask Counsel in Prayer God answers in them We ask strength and peace in this God returnes answers of peace in them and we reply in thanksgiving again God in the Word tells us what he is offended at in us we confesse it in Prayer he assures us we are pardoned in the Word c. We returne thanks in prayer again And indeed this is the way how to know Gods mind as we know mans mind by desiring a conference and proposing our doubts or dissatisfactions and receiving his answers when he gives them or pressing for them when he denyes or estrangeth himself Thus David used to enquire of the Lord. Psal 27. 4. And when he had enquired in prayer then he holds his peace and waits to hear what God will say Psalm 85 8. 1 Neglect not this way of conference with God Especially in the set seasons thereof They have a fancy among the Philosophers of two needles touched with the same Loadstone which being set in two Compasses written round with the letters of the Alphabet will conveigh intelligence from one friend to another at the greatest distance Thus each friend having recourse to his own Compass at fixed times shall find that as his friend at distance moves his needle to any letter his own without any touch of his will turne to the same so that by putting together those letters he may read his friends mind I have not faith enough to believe the conceit but I can make a good use of it in Spirituals wherein I am sure it is true Gods heart and thine are touched with the same Loadstone of love and if thou at seasons of conference shalt have recourse to the needle 1 John 4. 19 of thy heart and by the experience of holy affections in prayer shalt point out to God thy wants and burthens the heart of God by a sacred sympathy will work the same way and copy out thy case in his own bosome and then it cannot be long ere his fatherly compassions set the needle of his affections a turning towards thee again to produce a reciprocal assurance in thy heart by a like secret sympathy This the Scripture holdeth forth clearly See Jer 31 18 19 20. There Ephraims needle first turnes in confession Thou hast chastised me c. Then Gods needle falls to work presently to give him intelligence of Ephraims complaint Surely I have heard Ephraim bemoaning himself And when Ephraims story is done then God falls to turning his needle by way of answer to Ephraim My bowels are troubled for him Is Ephraim my dear son Yes that he is and he shall know it too For since I spake against him I do earnestly remember him still Then comes the answer to Ephraims heart I will surely have mercy upon him saith the Lord. Thence in the Text the Spirit that is the witnesse from God to us is the Sollicitour within us to God The same Messenger that carries our Letters brings our Answer ver 16. Oh Friends you know not what mischief Satan doth to you by cooling your hearts in prayer nay by prevailing with you onely to neglect a set time of prayer publick or private If you appoint a friend a set time of meeting and conference so often every day and you fail him twice or thrice together especially when he knowes you have none but trifling businesses to hinder you how can you expect but that he should serve you in the same kind True a man may lay bonds upon himself in appointment of times of duty which as he may order the matter that is if he lay them so upon himself as to pronounce it absolutely unlawful upon any occasion to over-slip that very time may prove but snares to entangle his conscience but yet on the other side to set apart appointed hours for this duty as a convenient means to keep our heart from framing petty occasions from hour to hour to put off the duty and that with resolution not to fail at the appointed time but upon very weighty occasions and upon such failing at any time to resolve to make up that defect doubly as soon as the occasion is over sure is a very profitable way for the getting and keeping acquaintance with God And no question if God find as he knowes that very slight occasions divert us from meeting him at fit or set times but he will be out of the way at other times when our leasure will serve us to seek him But this by the way concerning set times of prayer 2. 2. A soul that wants the witnesse of Gods Spirit though he neglect not those yet he will not content himself with them but he must now and then visit the Throne of Grace in extraordinary wayes of duty adding fasting to prayer and spending whole dayes in following hard after God Certainly this duty is much neglected among Christians in these dayes to what it hath been formerly both in private and publick Surely when Gods Saints were more acquainted with it there was far more acquaintance with God then I fear if I may ghess at others condition by mine owne there now is There be some Divels saith our Saviour that wil not be cast out without prayer and fasting Mar. 9. 29. so may I say in this case there be some doubts that will not be cast out of the soul till a man try this way Not that fasting adds any thing to prayer in it selfe or by any proper efficiency of its own but it disposeth a man to
thorow fear or temptation as at other times moving it to conceale the Devils counsell but out of distraction and oppression of spirit Now if this same soul find it selfe in the same condition before God when it sets to prayer it may lay the blame hereof on the greatnesse of its burthen and content it selfe in the assurance of as kind an acceptance of its sighs and groans as if they were drawn out in long prayers But if the straightnesse be not towards men or other imployments but only in duties to God-ward then enquire after farther causes whereof take these following 2. The admission of some late grievous sinne that yet is unrepented of Guilt is a tongue-tying thing When the man in the Gospel was taken without a wedding garment the Text sayes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 he was speechlesse Mat. 22. 12. his mouth was stopped with a gagge Great sins are great gaggs And 't is not only so with the unregenerate but with the Saints also See it in Davids example Psalm 51. 14 15. Deliver me saith he from blouds O Lord then my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousnesse Open my mouth c. Davids lips had a padlock upon them guilt had locked them up He dared not speak to God whom he had so grievously offended And no wonder if Saints dare not speak where they are sure not to speed if they be dumb when they know God is deaf David knew well enough that sinnes make Gods ear heavy as he informes us Psalm 66. 18. If I regard iniquity in my heart God will not hear my prayer and the Prophet Isaiah tells us no lesse Isai 59. 1 2. The Spirit of prayer also will be grieved and depart from us if we defile his lodging he is a pure an holy Spirit Eph. 4. 30. In this case the counsel of Zophar to Job 11. 13 14. is very good If thou prepare thine heart and stretch out thy hands towards God If iniquity be in thy hand put it far away c. So shalt thou lift up thy face confidently c. Search out the sinne and remove it by renewed repentance and the fresh application of the bloud of Christ by faith which is the fountain of Evangelical repentance and then try again the Spirit of Grace that enables thee to mourne will bee a Spirit of Supplication too Zech. 12. 10. 3. Sometimes Gods glory is the cause of thy restaints of spirit God intending to teach thee that all thy enlargements are from him alone We often pray in the strength of natural parts or gifts at the best and it may be we idolize these last in our selves and others Now God may in his wisedome leave us to straightenednesse of spirit in prayer to make us lesse depending upon those helps And this he will do to choose at such a time when afflictions are heavy upon us because that is a time if any be when it may be supposed necessity will enlarge parts and gifts to the utmost Afflictions are usually incitements and occasions of enlargement in prayer God makes account that at that time he shall hear from his people Hos 5. 15. and in our straits commonly we give God many faire words are rhetorical more then ordinary flatter with our lips Psalm 78. 36. A Scholar at the Vniversity that seldome writes and it may be if he do oftner then ordinary yet writes curtell'd letters to his friends at other times yet against Quarter-day when hee needs his pension will be sure not to fayle of a large letter and a bill of expences annexed Hence oftentimes the people of God are very fondly conceited of afflictions and under deadnesse of spirit are too apt to wish them out of a conceit that when they come they are able to make great use of them to quicken their hearts to prayer But the Lord chasteneth their foolish expectations divers times by stopping their mouths under those very troubles whence they hoped for great improvements and enlargements hereby teaching them that the Spirit of supplication as well as the Spirit of sanctification bloweth where and when he listeth John 3. 8. This case whenever it befalls any as we may ghesse when it doth so by our former valuation of gifts and conceits of improving afflictions c. calls upon such persons to give God the glory of his own peculiar attribute the preparer of the heart and the Spirit of its own office the Spirit of Supplication and call for and rely on divine assistance meerly in that work 4. Sometimes misapprehensions of God may be the cause of straightnesse in duty Thoughts that God is our enemy c. And then we deale with God as we do with our best friends many times in an humour we have a conceit that they have done us a discourtesie or are fallen out with us it may be upon slight reports or other as slender evidence and then our stomacks presently swell so bigge that we cannot so much as speak to them Pride and discontent will so swell a mans stomack like spleen winds up to a mans mouth that he cannot speak except to belch out the language of discontent and passion Sometimes we conceive God so offended at us that he casts away our prayer Lam. 3. 8. And where a man hath little hope to speed he will have very little heart to speak whereas hope to prevaile is the most fluent fountain of Rhetorick that can bee thus want of Faith makes the voyce of prayer stick in the teeth as we use to say The Spirit of Adoption only is the Spirit of Supplication and a man cannot pray so much to the purpose as when he can call God Father Then we cry 't is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom 8. 15. When David was in that grievous trouble Psalm 116. What lets his tongue loose in prayer I believed saith he therefore I spake v. 10. Friends prayer is the child of Faith not Fancy not the voyce of Invention but Affection begotten not in the brain of an Oratour but in the heart of a child A child is very copious and fluent in expression commonly when he complains to a Father but will lye still and cry it out in a sullen mood and say never a word if a stranger aske what ayles it The cure in this case is Look over all your evidences remember dayes past and the years of the right hand of the most high thy songs in the night and his mercy and lovingkindnesse in the day Call to mind promises of everlasting love in and notwithstanding the heaviest afflictions apply them and labor to urge them Challenge God upon old acquaintance as Christ My God my God why hast thou forsaken me Mat. 27. 46. O Lord how comes it to passe now that I have lost my acquaintance with thee Lord return and visit me with thy ancient loving kindnesses Psal 25. 6. 2 After discovery and removal of the impediments and obstructions aforesaid Study your own case distinctly and clearly
dyed in Egypt How often have we longed for quails for our lust bin discontented at Gods allowance and thought all we had even precious manna gracious meltings for sin a tender fear of offending God an holy importunity in following after God c. nothing if we were not presently assured of his love and kissed with the kisses of his mouth Think how much of unbeliefe impatience pride peevishnesse unthankfulnesse despaire hard thoughts against God wearinesse of his service unjust censures against your selves blasphemous murtherous thoughts c. hath God past by and in all these provocations kept you from falling off from your present convictions and the benefit of them and held you in his hand and conducted you through the wild and roaring wildernesse till he hath brought you to Canaan 4. The multitude of those who perish under convictions and notwithstanding them nay perish the deeper for them When a man considers that the same troubles of spirit which drove Judas to the Gallowes and Cain to despair and to many thousands under the means of grace become barely means of hardening the heart and increasing their condemnation prove to him the throws of a new birth the rough passage to a Kingdom of liberty and glory the straight doore to a pallace of spiritual peace and comfort Distinguishing mercy is engaging mercy And distinguishing mercy is greatest when to the persons distinguished every thing is common but that very distinction As if in a common guilt some are pardoned whiles others dye and in a common disease some perish and others are preserved so here in common soul troubles one man despairs and sends himself to hell the sooner another presumes and fends himself thither the surer c. Others are effectually converted and eternally saved Oh what a deep engagement to thankfulnesse is this 4. Pitifulnesse and tendernesse to other persons in that condition Our own experience may tell us what grievous burthens soul troubles are and how much need there is that those that are with young should be gently led Our Saviour was pleased to submit to temptation for that very reason that he might be a mercifull high Priest able to succour them that are tempted Heb. 2. 18. But I have spoken to this also before CHAP. XXII Several considerations to humble such as have gone through this work ineffectually II. HEnce also let all those be exhorted that have been under these troubles of spirit and have gotten over them without any real work of conversion or saving grace attained by them to 1. Labour seriously to bewail the inefficacy of such hopefull means for their good O friends 't is a sad thing to come out of any trouble muâ—h more such a trouble as this is and get nothing by it What a complaint do the Church make in relation to their temporal afflictions Isay 26. 17 18. We have been with child we have been in pain we have brrught forth wind c. That that comforts a woman in her throws is the hope of a child and this is that that makes her forget it when it is over John 16. 21. But if a woman fall into grievous pains and all proves but a Tympany or an abortive conception or a monster this will not quit the cost of such throws and therefore when shee thinkss on this time she bewails it ever after Much more should such an affection as this possesse a man when he considers how near he was to the Kingdom of God as Christ saith to the Scribe Mar. 12. 34. To perish within sight of the harbour and so to come within a stride of the goale and misse it O how vexing a thought should this be 'T were well if it were so with most men in this World whiles they have time to repaire their losses Hereafter 't will be a trouble to eternity irremediable and that irremediablenesse will be the greatest part of the trouble Here to help this work may be considered that hereby 1. The Spirit of God is disappointed quenched resisted 'T is Gods Spirit that hath contested with thy proud obstinate rebellious heart and 't is that Spirit whom thou hast so often repulsed That Spirit is a free spirit and is not bound to move any more Psal 51. 't is a Spirit of grace and if he move not Zach. 12. 10. thou canst never recover again and when he hath been so repulsed how canst thou expect his farther attempts God doth justly resolve many times concerning such persons as Gen. 6. 3. That his spirit shall strive no more 2. Your hearts are hardened Believe this for a certain truth that the more the heart is melted and softened if it grow hard again it grows the harder for it Thence 't is it may be for I am not certain the sin against the Holy Ghost is there meant that the Apostle saith it is impossible to renew such to repentance when they fall away Heb. 6. 6. impossible that is as to the strength and power of ordinary means that work on other men and if God convert such an one it is by an act of his absolute power besides the ordinary regulated way of his proceedings So is the word taken Mat. 19. 26. that that is impossible with men i. e. which is beyond the reach of men to conceive how it can be done is possible to God Now for such a man to be converted is impossible to men not only in that he hath no power in nature to effect it for so is every mans conversion impossible but in that a man cannot rationally judge him capable of benefit by any of the ordinary supernatural means of conversion The Word of God and whatever other means of conversion will grow so familiar with such a man that all that was affecting in them will through acquaintance grow contemptible and sinnes which at first view and in a mans first convictions appeared fearful and terrible having once or twice affrighted the soul and done no more will afterwards lose their monstrousnesse by a frequent fruitlesse view of them nay hell it selfe as bug hears to children after they begin to find that there is nothing in them but the name will appear but an old wives fable and its fire but a painted flame such as scares more then it hurts and so no wonder if all these restraints removed such an one 's latter end be worse then the beginning 2 Pet. 2. ult Sins before softenings are like weeds in a ground which before plowing and harrowing wee hope to root out thereby but afterwards they are like invincible weeds that no plough or harrow will tear up and therefore such ground is nigh unto cursing 3. Conscience is checked and discouraged That tendernesse which before possessed it upon every sinne is in a great measure lost and whereas it before passed a right censure concerning thy estate now it is grown partial and flattering For there is no man can get out of soul troubles without the leave of his
The longer you go without the Spirits testimony the more difficultly will you obtaine it the more will your hearts be instructed in Satans Sophistry to elude Arguments of comfort if you be such as look towards God the more experience wil you have of your own hearts deceitfulnesse so-that you will deal with them as we ordinarily do with common lyars hardly be perswaded to believe their Testimony when they speak the truth concerning you If you be such as neglect both grace and assurance know that the more difficultly will you bring your selves to accept of grace the longer you delay it the heart will be hardned by the deceitfulnesse of sin Heb. 3. 13. The Spirit grived c. And if you get grace a thousand to one if you get the witnesse of the Spirit to testifie that you have it Though God give such men grace as put it off to the last yet it were too great an encouragement to others to delay in like manner if he should ordinarily let them know it 'T is no easie matter at any time to get it much more difficult when delayed Many souls for many years together eat no pleasant bread and when they drink mingle their drink with weeping their sleep departeth from them and all the comforts of their lives are overcast with a sad cloud of darkness they go from sea to sea to wait on the Ordinances rise many a night to pray when others sleep chasten their souls with fasting and go heavily all the day long and this as I said for divers years together and this in the flower of their years and strength and yet with much ado can get little more then some flashes of comfort now and then some gleams of light as I told you before to save them at a desperate pinch and after long exercise in a doubtful medly of hope and fear a sad twilight of sorrowes and supports at last recover this testimony in and to their hearts that they are the children of God And therefore 't is not to be thought that persons who out of wilfulnesse or spiritual sloath put off the procuring this blessed certainty to themselves till old age or the approaches of death should suddenly leap out of a certain damnable estate into an assured certainty of salvation Sure the stream of Promises in the Word is least favourable to such persons and it is a thing most righteous in the eyes of reason it self that God should be as slow in giving as they are in seeking this assuring testimony CHAP. XI Certain Hindrances of getting Assurance of our Adoption removed Quest BUt how shall I get the testimony of the Spirit and thereby be assured of my Justification and Adoption Answ 1. There are divers Hindrances to be temoved and then divers Directions to be followed Hinderances are 1 A secret murmuring frame of spirit against Gods present dispensations towards thee as if God dealt very hardly and contrary to his wonted course with thee As if God had set thee up as the only mark of his displeasure which discontent is secretly augmented by the enjoyments and attainments of others Such and such have attained such and such comforts and walk cheerfully but God keeps me in the dark like them that art dead long ago And then as the children of Israel in the wilderness the soul many times quarrels at God for doing what he hath done and wishes any change even to what it was or the worst that can be Would God say they we had dyed in Egypt nay would God we were out of the world any way rather then to be thus tossed up and down in these tempests of spirit to be made Satans Tennis-bals the gazing stocks of the world and a terrour to our selves c. Friend who ever thou art that art in this frame of spirit know the Holy Spirit wil not be wrought to smile on thy heart by these means Such a dogged sullen frame of spirit will but procure thee the more lashes and continue thee the longer in the wilderness Israels murmurings kept them forty years in the wildernesse hereby they vexed Gods holy Spirit Isai 63. 10 and so dost thou and thou maist expect a proportionable dealing at Gods hands 2 A kind of delight in complaining against thy self and taking Satans part many times in bearing false witness against thy own soul Sometimes a kind of sinful humility sometimes an apprehension of ease in venting the causes of their trouble and sometimes a designe of provoking others to humor them in applying those corrasives and terrors to them which they think are their portion makes many persons liberal in charging themselves in this sort And somtimes Satan helping them they are apt to lay more load upon themselves then indeed belongs to them aggravating their sins beyond measure and condemning themselves for the vilest creatures upon the face of the earth And by constant use I know not what kind of pleasure grows out of such libelling themselves and they are never so well as when they are in that tune I grant a serious moderate and discreet complaining of our sins and wants to such from whose advice and prayers we may expect good and for this reason that we may get their advice and prayers they knowing our condition particularly and being thereby enabled to help us by such a through knowledge of our case is not onely lawfull and expedient but necessary But to be always in season and out of season urging these indictments against ones selfe and meerly for this reason that we may put from our selves those comfortable truths which are indeavoured to be fastened upon us doth but more indispose us to peace and satisfaction of spirit and teach Satan an art of troubling us everlastingly with our own liking and approbation Take this for a certain rule That soul that will not open to the Spirit of Adoption till he can find no matter of complaint against himselfe may go mourning all his days and thank himself for it 3. An unthankful denyal of the works of Gods sanctifying spirit in the heart Which are the material ground of all regular assurance from the Spirit of Adoption or at least mitigating qualifying and extenuating them This ordinarily accompanies the former A soul that delights it self in picking quarrels against its own peace will not bee easily brought to own any good concerning it self Tell a man in this frame Sir you are one of Gods called ones for you have had experience of a gracious change upon your heart You now hate sin count it your greatest burthen which once you loved and judged it your greatest comfort you have an unsatisfiable longing after Christ not only in his merits but in his graces and the communication of his holinesse and all the World will not satisfy you without him you have an heart perfectly broken off from all your old company and all your delight is in the Saints that are upon earth and them that excell in vertue
of such a temptation before hand as a Physician keeps that body low in flesh which he sees inclined to evil humours though it be not actually distempered by them Now if thou cooperate with God in this designe as possibly it may be this he aimes at surely thou wilt hasten thy deliverance from thy present darkness 6. Labour to live by faith in the mean time For as I told you before in the directions to the getting of Assurance so I tell you now in the way of recovering lost Assurance the main work is to exercise an holy reliance upon God in a condition so sad and uncomfortable as this must needs be This we find hath been the practice of the Saints of God in the like cases Psal 27. 13. David had been in a great straight not only in regard of his Exclusion from Ordinances but even in the sad conclusions which he drew thence to the distempering of his spirit See how he closeth all I had fainted saith he except I had believed to see the goodnesse of the Lord in the Land of the living Job speaks bigger words Though hee kill me I will trust in him Job 13. 15. q. d. Satan tels me and my own misgiving heart many times seconds him that these troubles will make an end of me I shall never come alive out of them Well saith Job be it so lot him kill me if he will if I were now a dying and dropping into Hell yet I will hold fast for all that he shall not be rid of me so If I goe to hel I 'll pul him after Our Saviour Christ also in his Agony cryes My God though he were a forsaking God This is a sweet frame of Spirit when God seemes to hold loose and man holds the faster for it God spurns at a poor soule and he layes hold of his foot God sayes Jacob let me goe and Jacob saith no I will not let thee goe except thou bless me Gen. 32. 26. The advice is plaine Isa 50. 10. I urged this place before in the directions for procuring Assurance and there told you that there is a parity of cases and so a proportion in the means which are to be used for recovery in the soule that never had and the soule that hath lost assurance This must needs be a special way For 1. This frame of Spirit speaks strength of faith A small strength will serve to hold one that is willing to stay but when a strong man putteth out all his strength to wrest himselfe out of a friends importunate embraces it had need be more strength then ordinary that holds him or fetcheth him back then This is that by which the strength of Abrahams faith is discovered in another case he was saith the Apostle strong in faith he was mightily enabled by faith what to 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 doe to believe he should have a Sonne when he was past all probable hopes of one Rom. 4. 18 19 20. And thus it is in thee it is an evidence of strong faith when thou canst say let my heart tell me never so much God hath cast me off and there is no help for me in God yet I will not let goe my confidence and the hold that thereby I have upon him here is strong faith See Mat. 15. 24 25 26. The womans faith was admired by Christ upon this account that she would play the dogg and fall at his feet when he rated her away O woman saith he great is thy Faith Persons are apt to think that Assurance of Gods love when a soule walks in the clear light of Gods countenance and lives high thereupon is a strong faith But I tell thee friend there is more strength by far in that faith that depends upon God in darknesse and desertion that trusts when a man can see no light The truth is the life of Assurance is in a sort a life of sense and feeling and it is rather a life above faith a life of enjoyment Faith is the evidence of things not seen saith the author to the Hebrews Heb. 11 1. Assurance in proper speech is the first fruits of heaven and it's life is a life of sense and fruition not of faith As the Apostle saith of hope in this Chapter Hope that is seen is not hope ver 24. So say I of faith faith that is seen is not faith Faith is a friend made especially for a time of distance between the soul and its comforts and is appointed as a meanes to derive the benefit of them to the soul during that state of distance 2 Besides 't is no wonder if God be taken with the actings of faith in such a season seeing strength of faith gives glory to God Rom. 4. 20. And he cannot long withdraw from a soul that so much glorifies him upon so little encouragement I may say to thee as Christ to Thomas Hold this course and thou art a blessed man Others see and believe But blessed are they that have not seen and yet believe Joh. 20. 20. 3. Besides lastly this frame of spirit must needs keep down many of those murmuring despairing and in a sort blasphemous misapprehensions concerning God and his promises which length of soul-troubles is apt to plunge a man into And certainly the lesse iniquity there is breaking forth in our desertions the sooner they will be over Now faith in such a season maintaines good thoughts of God and defends him and takes his part against the calumnies of Satan And God that sees and knows this therefore how can he but take this kindly If an husband absent himselfe a while from a wife and she be ready upon every whisper of slanderous gossips to suspect her husbands fidelity in his absence and give out speeches tending that way can it be expected that any husband should take pleasure in such a wife Wil he not rather chuse to stay away stil and be suspected for somthing as we say rather then live under constant suspicions for no cause But when the heart of an husband may be secure of this that his wife is confident of his faithfulnesse and her heart quietly rests in him absent as well as present let suspicion suggest what it will surely he cannot but be exceeding tender of such a wife and much taken with her company God sees your jealousies of him in darknesse and observes how apt you are to censure him in his absence Doe not thinke this is the way to bring him back againe He will make you entertain better thoughts of him ere he returne Quest But how shall I exercise faith in desertions What shall I believe A. Believe in general most things that seem most contrary to thy present sense and moral probabilities For in soul-troubles the fancy is the principal part possest by distrustful imaginations and Satan in that fortifies himselfe against all the power of those truths that might be means of consolation to the soul And therefore the way to
againe to an assured soul would not be a sure and infallible Testimony contrary to the truth of the preceding Doctrine When a man is found in two contrary tales we know not which of them we may believe A man could never this supposed have solid comfort from the Testimony of the Spirit seeing he knowes not how soon hee may recant it and testifie the quite contrary CHAP. XXXV The causes of Legal Terrours in Saints Quest WHat then is the cause of those Legal terrours which after Conversion and Assurance many times surprize the hearts of Gods people Answ The main and principal cause is Satan who combining with our own suspitious and distrustful or melancholy spirits or by divine permission or lastly by taking the work of Gods Spirit out of his hand brings us into this darknesse Psal 143. 3. The enemy hath persecuted my soul he hath made me to dwell in darknesse like those that have been long dead I have long ago buried all my comforts and they are almost quite out of remembrance And the great cause of all this is the enemy of my soul called the enemy by a special Emphasis because the most deadly malicious enemy the Saints have He sowes all manner of Tares of corruptions tentations doubts in Gods field the hearts of Saints Now this he doth as but now I hinted 1 Partly by combining with our owne suspicious hearts and increasing jealousies when there is no cause of sadnesse as many times he doth The heart that knowes its own wickednesse and deceitfulnesse many times rejects sound and solid joy in the Holy Ghost as a delusion meerly upon suspicion and warinesse occasioned by its former experienced liablenesse to self-deception Now here Satan strikes in and increaseth the jealousie that the heart hath of it self As a malicious tale-bearer that finds suspicions ready to break out ever and anon between friends is at hand perpetually to blow the coals and hinting to them both severally such and such presumptions of each other till at last he have weakned all mutual confidence and made an irreparable breach between them Fie fie saith the old Serpent wilt thou believe these comforts and joyes are real and from the Holy Ghost Dost thou know thy owne heart no better Dost thou not remember how it spake peace to thee heretofore and all the Ministers in the Countrey could not perswade thee that thy condition was not safe then and since dost thou not remember how when thou wentest to examine and search thy self it hid sins by pretences and excuses and Apologies And why should it not deceive thee now as well as then Now here many times the soul gives up and yeilds to Satans suggestions and damns all its comforts for meer fantasies and dreams and all its Assurance for an imposture Nay it may be if the soul plead the marks and tokens of the Spirits concurrence in that Testimony then Satan begins to take the matter upon himselfe Alas saith he and dost thou not know that Satan can turne himself into an Angel of Light and by 2 Cor. 11. 14. consequence easily cheat a credulous heart into a belief that his delusions are the testimonies of the Spirit of God c. Sic not us Ulysses Art thou so unacquainted with that subtil enemy that thou canst take every fair pretence of his for Gospel and adventure thy soul upon it 2 Partly by combining with a meer melancholy distemper Melancholy is musing and thoughtful 'T is a temper of body which is the Divels Anvil whereon he hammereth all manner of temptations all manner of deadly weapons to wound the soul He hath a mighty power upon the fantasie and can suggest things to it as he pleaseth The phantasie or imagination is the Looking-glass of the soul in which all things by reflection are first discovered to it Now 't is easie for Satan to represent in this glass what bugbear shapes he pleaseth to affright the soul withal by a kind of fixed entertainment of the thoughts with such objects of terror and affrightment to make such strong impressions upon the whole soul abused by meer phantasies as no reasonings or perswasions whatsoever can remove That strange affection of the phantasie which some say perswaded Nebuchadnezzar that he was a real beast Dan. 4. and the frequent parallels to this in Wierus de praestigiis Virg. Eclog. 8. humane Writings render such an Interpretation not incredible many times is the infirmity of good souls that dwell as was said of Galba's wit in the bodies of the most Ingenium Galbae malè habitat dreggy part of living earth of a melancholy constitution So that 't is no wonder if Satan acting the phantasie many times the soul really be perswaded into horrid apprehensions of its owne condition And to strengthen the belief of the soul in such delusions he can present strange spectra images and representations of terrour to the very outward senses by which such inward apprehensions are oftentimes fortified and increased He doth like a cunning Fisher mud the water that his nets may be lesse discerned And thence in such cases persons under such a condition are 1 Many times to believe others more then themselves as suspecting such delusions of their own fancies 2 To labour after means of removing bodily distempers that the soul may be more it self being lesse clogged with a distempered body the body in such a case is the souls prison 3 To admit of lawful avocations from the continued meditation of such subjects as by their fixing on the fantasie are hard to be removed The very humor of melancholy is a dull heavy humour that must be stirred as much by exercise as Physick And so must the fantasies that it begets be cured by avocations 3 Partly by the permission and allowance of God God giving the soul over in some cases into his hands as he did Job once to do with him what he will only sparing his Job 2. 6. life for some notorious affronts offered to his Spirit and abuses of his favour to some bold intrenchments upon his Majesty and Authority or some other like cause And in such a case God withdrawing it is no hard matter for Satan to improve such a sensible defect and decay of influence to infer a souls utter rejection by God The truth is we live much by sense as well as fantasie not only in humane affairs but even in Divine And when faith is at low water as ordinarily it is upon Gods with-drawings then is sense most predominant Now the Divel can make strange conclusions appear undeniable in such cases if you will allow him to argue from what you feel Dost not perceive will he say to the soul that God casts out all thy prayers regards not the voice of thy groanings how he will not be perswaded to give thee one smile though thou wooe him never so much And wilt thou contrary to all sense and experience still believe that he
in himself before he presumed to testifie of 1 John 5. 1. 6 10. the most eminent Works of the Spirit in the heirs of Heaven He hath shewn Believers that their right by the Gospel is good in Law when it is sealed by the Oath of God by the Spirit of God and by the heart bloud of Christ who is the end of the Law for righteousness to them that believe Ephes 1. 13. Rom. 9. 1. 1 Joh. 2. 20 27. 1 John 5. 13. 19. 20. Rom. 8. 16 17. 2 Cor. 3. 3. Rom. 10. The single testimony of a deceived heart is no Authority but when the Spirit hath inlightned and renewed a soul he leaves an Impresse upon the heart and a Certificate in the conscience which cannot deceive Let the Reader beg the Spirit of Grace and Supplication that he may read this excellent Treatise with the same spirit wherewith it was written And let them that cry down Learning and Vniversities see and confess that the Spirit breathes upon learned souls and makes their Learning instrumental to discover the Mysteries of godliness even the deep things of the Spirit with more glory and advantage then when he works upon duller souls who have not Learning enough to prize Learning or grace enough to blesse God for sanctifying of that learning which discovers the danger of their ignorance The Lord blesse the Labours of this practical Preacher and teach us to grow in knowledg and grace that we may not be led away with the error of lawlesse or * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 boundlesse men nor fall from our own stedfastnesse so prayes Your Servant in the Gospel FR. CHEYNELL REader the Authors distance from the Presse must plead for him and it Thy indulgence it is hoped will pardon the rest which in this review are overseen and correct these Errata's before thou readest ERRATA Page 22. l. 10. r. this for the first p. 28. l. 22. r. him in p. 34. l 27 r. with a guard p. 59. l. 32. r. had your p. 61. l. 30 blot out may p. 78. l. 10. r. read and amend the Title of the Chapter according to the Contents after the Book p. 83. l. 26. r. Saint p. 96. l. 10 r. never leaves it p. 104. l. 12. r. nest p. 116. l. 6. r. the wound sleight p. 130. l. 8. r. that is p. 145. l. 21. r. hope p. 145. l. 5. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 l. 28. r. your patience p. 152. l. 8. r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 more cutting beyond p. 189. l. 5. r. Scripture p. 203. l. 7. r. all lay p. 216. read the whole sentence following For although c. after 1. Immediatly in the next page p. 229. l. 19. r. to them p. 252. l. 8. r. seal p. 278. l. 25. r. measures p. 289. l. 23. r. wrought p. 298. l. 16. r. exercise p. 339. l. 2 3. r. particular to p. 343. l. 12. r. bought p. 367 l. 6. r. hasitancy p 397. l. 15. r. manner p 419 l. 15. for them r. it p. 438. l. 25 26. r. the real p. 497 l. 22. r. accompanied p. 579. mar r. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 p. 589. l. 18. r. wrings I might add p. 87. l. 8. r. expectation l. 31. r. peccatur p. 179 l. 6. r. occasions p. 234. l. 8 r. possible p. 237. l. 10. r. a crown p. 245. Title r. this evidence p. 301. l. 4. r. humiliation p. 321 l. 10. r. As in p. 324 l. 12. for them r. it p 352. l. 24. r. yet p. 450. l. 28. r. is p. 456. l. 24 dele the. p. 516. l. 15. r. to p. 526 l. 2. r. Spirit in CONCERNING THE SPIRIT OF BONDAGE CHAP. I. What it is in the Apostles sense BEing resolved by Gods assistance to handle Theologically and practically those two grand mysteries of godlinesse the souls spiritual trouble and peace in their nature manner of working proper differences from any other workes and the several cases arising from the practical view of those heads we will first begin with that work which in the Elect of God is usually first wrought viz. Spiritual trouble Now because the consideration of a work as it relates to the efficient and other causes and that of a condition or state as it relates to the subject in whom it is wrought are both in notion and practise distinct and seeing both of these considerations will frequently offer themselves to us in the course of this Treatise with relation to the subject in hand therefore I have taken the rise and spring of my Meditations from such a Scripture as affords us both conjoyned viz. that of the Apostle Paul Rom. 8. 15. Where the Apostle as it is a work or effect by a metonimy calls it the Spirit that works to fear as it is a condition or state he calls it Bondage And being to consider it as a work or impression of such a cause upon such a subject and reducing that subject to such a condition he very fitly joyns both notions and considerations into this one character or description The reception of the Spirit of Bondage to fear whence we will take our rise for a brief view of these heads 1. The efficient cause the Spirit 2. The effect of that Spirit which is the inward condition or state of the soul in which it is Bondage 3. The impression wrought by this effect in the subject reduced thereby to this condition fear 4. The way or manner of this work and communication of influence from the efficient whereby it is effected Receiving 5. The persons in whom this operation is wrought and who thereby are reduced to this condition and feel the impression thereof Ye 6. The time of this work of the Spirit and condition of the patients in whom it is wrought implied in the whole frame of the verse which is during the time of Transition from Nature to Grace from alienation and enmity to adoption and friendship 1. What this Spirit is who is the efficient cause of this work hath not a little perplexed Interpreters Chrysostome and out of him Oecumenius and Augustine and divers modern Writers both Popish and Reformed understand this whole clause concerning Jewish Pedagogy or discipline under which God held them under the Law of Moses The two Spirits here received saith Augustine are suted to the times of the two Testaments Evidentissimè duoruÌ„ Testamentorum distinct a sunt tempora illud enim ad timorem pertinet novum autem ad charitatem Aug. in locum the Old pertains to a season or work of fear the Now to that of love So says Calvin he calls the Old Tastament Vetus Testamentum Calv. Inst Gua. in loc a spirit of Bondage because it begets fear in mens minds And with him joyns Gualther So Chrysostome who goes â—arther then any 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Oecum in â—ocum 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Chrys in locum Logem prâ—ponit nud aÌ„
conscience Now conscience in some persons is silenced by main force in others disheartened by a sleighting carriage in others bribed by a forme of godlinesse and so it is brought to give way to a delusive and undoing peace and either to flatter a man in the way to hel or not to give him a plain information of his condition Now it is a very dangerous thing to quiet conscience with any thing in the World but the bloud of Jesus When an unsprinkled Heb. 10. 22. conscience is at peace this is a dangerous and undoing peace Conscience is the soules faithful watchman and will if it bee not blind when it 's let alone in its duty give faithfull intelligence of its danger in time that it may be avoided Now when conscience is discouraged herein and prevailed withal to speak nothing but pleasing things how soon and how suddenly will such persons souls be surprized and ruined before they are aware of it A thousand times better to have a roaring conscience then a sleeping conscience and a sullen conscience that will never speak a good word to a man then a fawning conscience that wil never although there be never so great cause speak a bad one Hereby doth Satan secure a soul against saving conversion for the future See Acts 28. 27. and God sayes Amen to it Isai 6 9. John 12. 40. 4 Possibly hereby thou maist be brought farther then all this Thou hast not only laid all tongues within door but thou wilt begin to silence the cocks without door also that thou mayest sleep securely for the future Gods faithful Embassadors that speak too loud and home to thy spiritual condition must be enjoyned or flattered or scared into a deep silence as to all such points as may trouble thee lest conscience newly laid to rest should startle again This was in another case the frame of Ahab he was resolved upon his war and then all the Court-Chaplains are taught their Lesson that they must all prophesie good success to the Kings design and Micaiah because he will not say as they do hath much ado to get a hearing 1 Kiâ—gs 22 and when he is heard gets an imprisonment for delivering his Message So it is with men in this case when they are resolved to be at peace with their defiled consciences upon any termes they wilfully turne their backs upon such Ministers as say not what they will have them and if it were in their power would use them no better then Ahab used Micaiah and Herod John the Baptist And now I have mentioned Herod me thinks I see him just such a man as I am now discoursing of a man convinced and very likely to become a convert one that heard John gladly a great while and sure he was much wrought on that could please himself in so austere and sowre a Preacher as John was but when he had prevailed with conscience to wink at his sinful pleasure with Herodias then because John made so much noise of the businesse that both the King and his Minion were afraid he would make that tell-tale awake and look abroad againe and stare them in the face the Preacher must be laid in prison and his head must be cut off to keep his tongue quiet Now when a man hath brought himself to such a passe as to all ordinary and likely meanes of conversion he is desperate 5. Possibly thou maist grow into a grosse neglect of duties and Ordinances An un-grounded peace often carries men to this for as it was gotten without these meanes so it is maintained without them And the soul thus set at liberty is afraid of coming within the reach of those meanes that may reduce it back again to its old condition And therefore seeing these are the meanes to work conversion a soul prejudiced against these is in a most unlikely way of ever being savingly wrought upon The man that under this delusion being even upon this very account prejudiced against them because whiles he was under them he could never be quiet and since he hath left them all things are in peace whence it appears that he is resolved though it cost him his salvation not to break if possibly he can prevent it his corrupt and unwarrantable security and peace He is asleep and not willing to be disturbed though he be on the top of a Mâ—st Prov 23. 34. 6 After all this it is a thousand to one if thou do not become a more desperate enemy to and Persecuter of the wayes of God then any other and so by degrees fall into the unpardonable sin Convinced men come neer the Kingdom of God and then their hopes are high from God and all this while they flatter him with their lips and are much in prayer and hearing c. until by their desperate Apostacies from these beginnings they have the sentence of condemnâ—tion in their own hearts which they bear about with them still though not alwayes with the same raging and raving clamours and this consciousnesse of being cast off by God and utterly deserted by the spirit of grace turnes all their love into hatred and no men in the world prove more bloudy Persecuters then they Truly Beloved it is not for nothing that we find troubled consciences that are made graciously tender to complain so often of their own hearts that they are afraid they have sinned the sin against the Holy Ghost for though every Apostacy from a mans convictions be not that sin yet every Apostacy from strong and deep workings of the Spirit of Bondage is a great step towards it And although it be sure that no man hath committed that sin who can mourn upon supposition that he hath committed it yet it is no lesse sure that many who have been before great Mourners under the sense of other sins may fall into it and be rendred uncapable of ever mourning for sin any more but in Hell CHAP. XXIII Such are exhorted to endeavour to recover those lost impressions A Question discussed hereupon and Objections answered 2. A Second Duty incumbent upon such persons is to labour to reduce again those lost impressions of the Spirit of Bondage I confesse it is a very hard matter to recover a spirit of conviction and compunction again when it is once lost yet it may be had the soul being first made deeply sensible as was before required of the evil and danger of checking and losing it and following God in all his Ordinances conscienciously for its recovery But truly 't is a very rare thing without very extraordinary Grace for such impressions to be at least effectually renewed As in dangerous relapses nature having made many attempts to cast out her enemy and failing is ordinarily so wearyed out that it is an extreme difficult thing to apply any Physick strong enough to conquer the disease and yet not too strong for nature to manage and therefore it requires the more labor with our hearts to effect Object
to eternity But 2. That thou acknowledgest the Justice of God herein gives good hope of thee To accept of the punishment of our iniquity and to acquit God is one good sign of the truth and soundnesse of humiliation When a man is humbled as low as hell takes it for his portion and deserved too sure God useth not to be deaf to such an acknowledgment as this The Judg at the Bench is never more inclined to mercy then when an Offendor takes his guilt on him and acquits the Bench and the Jury and confesseth his condemnation is and execution will be just 3. We may possibly offend in bringing down God to the line of men in this case and therefore there are Promises of acceptance to such as thou art Hos 14. 4. Jer. 3. 22. Though thou canst not go to God upon meer grounds of probability yet thou maist upon his own Promises and Engagements Object But possibly I have sinned against the Holy Ghost Answ 1. Every sin against the Holy Ghost is not the sin against the Holy Ghost the emphatical sin against the Holy Ghost Every Apostasie is not that sin then Peter had sinn'd unpardonably and Cranmer and divers others in the late times that have recanted the Truth and have returned againe to their stedfastnesse and dyed for it Every wilful sin against convictions is not that sin then had David no doubt in his plotted murder and adultery sinned against the Holy Ghost in this unpardonable way So had Abraham in denying his wife and Peter also in denying his Master sure they knew such acts were sins That sin is all these but you must add to make up the full nature of it that it must be a total Apostacy against full light ending in a malicious persecution of the knowne Truth and wayes of holinesse The Pharisees were such Persecutors and Reproachers of the Doctrine and Works of Christ as coming from Satan which by the miracles that accompanied him they could not but in their consciences believe came from God and therefore Christ chargeth them justly with that sin Malice there must be for persecution out of ignorance in Pauls example is pardonable 1 Tim. 1. 17 18. And in an heat of passion one godly man hath persecuted another So Asa 2 Chron. 16. 10. Lastly That thou hast not sinned that sin is clear in that thou art affraid of it and that fear is thy greatest grief and burthen c. That sinne carries with it an heart that cannot repent a seared conscience However look on thy present condition as very dangerous although not desperate Penal hardnesse of heart and the fore-mentioned attendants of it are a rode way to it Timely caution may prevent thy falling so far Please not thy selfe in such sins with this conceit that yet thou hast not sinned the sin against the Holy Ghost and therefore mayst yet go on in them with hope of mercy Presumptuous sinnes are the ushers to the great transgression Psalm 19. 13. as we render the word CHAP. XXV An exhortation to certain duties proper to this condition of bondage HEre is also an Exhortation to such as are under this condition 1. Be patient under the present hand of the Spirit A man will bear a great trouble patiently when he can see likelyhood of a good issue in it A sick man is contented to be made sicker for healths sake Finis confert amabilitatem mediis say the Schoolmen and a man that hath a gangrened arm or legge will endure the sawing it off willingly to save the whole body Troubles of conscience are grievous troubles But so long as they are in the hand of the spirit as instrumental means to facilitate conversion how patiently shouldest thou undergo them If they were to thy eternal confusion patience were meet partly as to a punishment deserved and of thy own choice partly as to a condition which repining at it may augment but never remedy How much more when these troubles are converting saving troubles or are used by the spirit to that end The good ground brought forth its fruit with patience Luke 8. 15. And if ever thou wilt see fruit of thy soul troubles thou must stay the time 2. Keep up hope under all discouragements I know a thousand discouragements are ready upon every occasion to beat thee off thy hold and hopes And against them set those promises which Scripture is every where full of to persons in thy condition together with the examples of others recorded there and to these add thy own experience both in the persons of others and thine own Think how many such sad souls in all ages Gods Spirit hath conducted through the wildernesse and caused them to rest in the full assurance and undoubted evidence of his love Read over the sad complaints of David in his convictions and soul troubles and how God at last compassed him about with songs of deliverance set in joynt all his broken bones and bestowed on him the joy of his salvation Nay how many of those Saints that you dayly do or may converse withall can speak no lesse from their own experience Thou art under a condition of hope whiles thou art under this work it is the method of the Spirit in conversion as was before shewed It is with thee as with the people Ezra 10. 2. though thy case be sad yet now God hath affected thy heart with thy sinne and misery and made thee confesse and bewail thy sinnes before him now there is hope in Israel concerning this as Shechaniah saith after the humiliation of the people for their strange wives in the preceding Chapter Thou art yet a prisoner but a prisoner of hope Zech. 9. 12. See what advice and encouragement the Church from her own experience gives Lam. 3. 26 27 28 c. It is good for a man to hope for the salvation of the Lord why so See verse 31 32. For the Lord will not cast off for Lam. 3. ever but though he cause grief yet will hee have compassion according to the multitude of his tender mercies O saith the soul what is my strength that I should hope as Job 6. 11. alas the Lord hath cast me off for ever I see my present agony and distresse of spirit that he intends to break all my bones and send me ver 4. to hell with all my bones broken on the wheele of his displeasure The more I cry ver 8. the more deaf he seems to be unto my prayer ver 4 6. he hath brought me into darknesse and made my skin old he hath builded against me fortified ver 5. his kingdome against all my attempts by a resolution that I shall not enter into his rest he hath compassed me with gall and travel hee ver 5. 6. 7. 8. 10. 11. 12. 13. 15. 16. hath set me in dark places he hath hedged me about and made my chain heavie he shuts out my prayer he is a bear and a lion
bondage and shall enable you to set your feet on his neck c. More clearly Isai 61. 1 2 3. He gave Christ and annointed and sent him for that end to proclaim liberty to the Captives and the opening of the prison to them that are bound and not only to proclaim it by the Word but to apply it by the Spirit ver 3. To appoint to them beauty for ashes the oyl of joy for mourning and the garment of joy for the spirit of heaviness or the Spirit of Adoption for the Spirit of Bondage So Psal 126. 5 6. They that sow in tears shall reap in joy c. And Isai 57 15. a remarkable Promise I dwell with the contrite and humble spirit wherefore To revive the spirit of the humble and the heart of the contrite ones For I will not contend for ever lest the soul should fail before me and the spirit which I have made See v. 18 19. The Spirit that is promised by Christ is called the Comforter Why so if not to denote the principall part of his work the comforting of the hearts of Gods people John 14. 26. Arg. 2. The Designe of God in troubling the conscience Soul-troubles are not brought on us meerly for their owne sakes for God afflicts not willingly nor grieves the Lam. 3. 33. children of men but they are ordinary Prologues of Comfort and Peace and therefore ordained to fit us to receive and prize it Hos 2. 14. I wil bring her into the Wilderness and speak comfortably unto her to her heart Heb. Into the Wildernesse i. e. a maze and wood of troubles that she shall know no way out of into such a condition in which a dram of comfort will be dearer then all the world and then I will speak to her heart when she is quite out of heart Gods usages to his people in this world are like Tragi-Comedies sad beginnings divers times that put all the Spectators into a maze to think what will come of them that so he may come off the more gloriously at the last by giving a comfortable close beside all mens expectations He sets off as Painters do a light colour by the neighborhood of a dark He caused light at the first to shine out of darknesse not before it or 2 Cor. 4. 6 without it but out of it And as he doth in conversion so in comfort First darknesse in conversion then light Ye were darkness Ephes 5. 8 c. so he doth in the work of consolation When I sit in darknesse the Lord shall be a light to me saith the Church Micah 7. 8. So in the Apostles experience We had the sentence of death in our selves that we might trust not in our selves but in him that raiseth the dead 2 Cor. 1. 9. And as Christ would not keep Lazarus from dying when he could have done so but rather chose to raise him from the dead by a miracle so will Christ deal with his people quite bring them to the grave that then he may get the glory of a kind of miracle and say Return ye sons Psalm 90. 3 and daughters of men Now can we think that God will lose the glory of his grace when he so aimes at it in those troubles that work it And surely he will do so if his people perish under them Thence the Spirit of God teacheth the Saints in darkness to urge that as an Argument Wilt thou shew wonders to the dead c. What remembrance of thee is there in the grave where all things are forgotten Psalm 88. 10 11 and 6. 5. q. d. I know thy aim in all these dark nights that I undergo is to make thy glory shine the clearer and is this the way to let a poor soul that would fain praise thee to drop into the grave and for ought he knowes into hell in darknesse without the least smile from thee c. Arg. 3. The duties God expects of his Saints which cannot be so perfectly and ingenuously performed by any as by an assured spirit Indeed the truth of them may proceed from a soul that is not assured but such high and noble measures cannot 1 Love to him again A man may and every Saint doth love God by a holy sympathy as soon as he is regenerated whether he know it or no and the demonstration of that love in the Saints when they come to discerne it becomes a means of assurance to them As in Antipathies sometimes they are strong in nature and no reason can be given for them Non amo te Sabidi nec possum dicere quare c So in sympathies founded in the nature of the things Why doth Iron love the Load-stone and cleave to it or the needle touched with it point Northward This I constantly affirm that where the soul loves God Gods love is the cause of that love to him and so it is whether it be manifested to his conscience or no because every grace is a fruit of Gods eternal love This I am sure is held out in that excellent place 1 John 4. 19. though I shall not grant it a fruit thereof only when knowne 'T is not said Because we are assured he loved us first but Because he loved us first But yet the love that is without assurance is not so strong so rational so active as that that proceeds from assurance when the love of God is shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost for this will enable a soul to love much Luke 7. 47. to rejoice in tribulation Rom. 5. 3 5 and do many other difficult duties with more vigor and activity A young child may truly love the Father when it is unable to reason it selfe into the duty of love from experience of the Fathers love but the love that a growne child shews to the father after his experience of many acts of love for many years is more strong solid and rational So when a soul can say as David I love the Lord for c. Psal 116 1 Now God requires his children should grow up into an ingenuous filial love upon grounds of thankfulnesse and reciprocation Ephes 1. 16 17 18 19 He would have them be rooted and grounded in the experimental knowledg of the love of Christ and thence to draw strength to obey him in all things And therefore it must needs be his ordinary way to those Saints from whom he expects this fruit to give them the Spirit of Adoption to testifie this Love to them And there is a Promise that love of good will to Christ shall be seconded with manifestation of love from Christ Joh. 14. 21. 2 Joy in the Holy Ghost and that alwayes 1 Thes 5. 16 Now although a soul may have some sprinklings of joy upon the general hopes which it gathers to it self from general Promises yet it is nothing to that whicâ— particular assurance gives Now God will have the joy of his Saints full joy John 15. 11. And
fight for it Satan and Numb 13. 23 a mans corrupt heart are apt to discourage a soul under Bondage from hence What profit Job 21. 14 Lam. 3. 8. is there in serving God c. Thou prayest and he casteth out thy prayer thou hearest and art in trouble still Now God props up his people against such temptations by such Promises to all and performances to most of his Saints Reas 5 God doth it to wean his people from this world Now Lord lettest thou thy servant depart in peace for mine eyes have seen thy salvation sayes Simeon when he had seen Christ in the flesh Luke 2. 29. And when a soul after long troubles of spirit recovers the assurance of Gods love O what poor things are all the treasures of the world to him Lord saith David lift up the light of thy countenance upon me and then take corn and wine and oyl who will Psal 4. 6. And then let the eyes of wicked men be even ready to strut out with sat and let them have all that they can wish yet saith he in another place I will not change portion with them for the Lord is the strength of my heart c. Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel and bring me to glory Psal 73. 25 26 27 28 A man that is called to be a Favourite to a King will quickly grow into a dis-esteem of his shop and retaile Trade his sheepfold or cow-stal Take no care for your stuff saith Joseph for all the fat of the Land of Egypt is yours Gen. 45. 20. So saith God to an assured soul Take no care for these earthly things thou hast in heaven a richer and more enduring substance Reas 6. Because God delights to hear from his Saints often Not only as a Master from a Servant nor as a rich man from a beggar nor as a Conqueror from a Captive but as a Father from a child as a husband from a Spouse Cant. 2. 14. The voyce of a Spouse of Christ in the cleft of the Rock i. e. relying on him upon assurance of his love is sweet Joseph could not abide long under the mis-apprehensions his brethren had of him My Lord and Thy servants Joseph thought were strange Titles to that of Brother hee longed to hear them call him by a name of relation so saith God Hosea 2. 16. to an afflicted Church CHAP. VI. A Question concerning the mediate and immediate Testimony of the Spirit HOw doth the Spirit testifie our Adoption For although divers godly Divines are of a different judgement in the point of immediate evidence yet I cannot be perswaded but that there is something in the work of the Spirits testimony which may deserve to be so expressed Ans Two wayes 1 Immediately 2 Mediately I. Immediately wherein the Spirit acts as in illumination and infusion of good motions into us by his secret influence upon the heart quieting and calming all those waves of distrust and diffidence concerning its condition by his own immediate power without the present application of any Scripture grounds to convince a mans reason that his testimony is true I shall parallel it with the motions of the Spirit thus As the Spirit many times excites a man to such or such a duty by laying his hand immediately upon the heart and therewithal a kind of secret force and power inclining the heart to obey those motions and as it many times opens the heart to such and such spiritual impressions by a physical injection of holy motions into it and warming the heart to receive them so in this case when a poor soul sits in darknesse and sees no light sometimes upon a sudden a light from heaven compasseth it about and it is it knowes not how in a moment as it were taken up into the third heaven its fears are banished by a soft whisper from the Spirit of God in the heart Thy sins are forgiven thee and this is in such a way that though the spirit of a man really believes it and is immediately calmed by it yet it cannot tell how it comes to passe And so it is sometimes in overcoming temptations a soule some other times is enabled to knock them to the ground by a scriptum est as Christ did Matth. 4. but sometimes it is stirred up to decline them and abhorre them by a secret rising of the spirit against them and to club them downe by meere force setting the bent of the will and affections against them without any present direct recourse of the soule to the written word And of this kinde is that worke of the Spirit stirring up in us sighes and groans in prayer that cannot bee uttered whereas at other times it furnisheth us with abundant matter of prayer from the promises and other straines of Scripture useful thereunto And thus as I said in conveying the evidences of Gods love the Spirit can and surely oftentimes doth alter the whole frame of a mans Spirit by a secret irradiation of comfort a man cannot tell how for as there is a kind of spiritual instinct in the soul by which it doth the things that are pleasing to God after conversion though many times it knowes not the principles upon which it acts so is there a secret and spiritual faculty in the divine nature that is infused unto us by which when the Spirit speakes peace to the soule it closeth with it without any reasoning or recourse to evidences as at other times As saith a learned man there is in the eye lumen innatum Rutherf on Jo. 12. p. 100. and in the eare aer internus a certaine imbred light to make the eye see lights and colours without and a sound and air in the eare within to make it discerne the sounds that are without so is there grace a new nature and habitual instinct of heaven to discerne the consolation of Gods spirit immediately testifying that wee are the sons of God There are some secret and unexpressible lineaments of the Fathers countenance in this child that the renewed soul at first blush knowes and ownes it But for the understanding of this you must observe with mee these few particulars for explication of this secret of experimentall godlinesse 1. That although the Spirit may testifie this immediately without any expresse and formall application of a word yet he never testifies but according to the word i. e. to subjects capable thereof and in such wayes as they are discovered to be capable by the word so that the Lords speaking peace to the soul being in the Scripture bound up to persons under certain qualifications the Spirit never speaks peace but where those qualities are real though not alwaies visible in the soule As for example if a man that feels not sin a burden heavyer then all the world that throwes away all duties of religion never prayes reads heares meditates nay goes on in some sinful way without remorse be filled with joy and peace and assurance
conscience Mat. 16. 18 19. And this I cal conviction of a gracious and happy estate which is opposite to that conviction of a wicked and wretched estate discovered in the conclusion of the legal Syllogism before mentioned 4 The Effects of this Testimony when it is finished are quite contrary to the former of the Spirit of Bondage 1. Calmnesse and sedation of spirit by the allaying of those boysterous winds of temptation that raised the waves This is contrary to that soul confounding horror that soul-ague soul-quake that I spake of formerly and is called in the Scripture Peace Isai 57. 19 21. and 't is opposed to the horrible confusions that are in a wicked mans awakened conscience ver 20. But the wicked are like the troubled sea when it cannot rest therefore the godly mans pacified conscience is like the calmed sea that hath not a wrinkle in its face not a blast to stir any there no wind breathing on it except that of the Spirit of God to excite it to love and thankfulnesse 2. Joy and sweetnesse and self complacency in the heart Which is opposed to that second fruit of the Spirit of Bondage within a man which is before mentioned viz. Soul distressing anguish A man that was before not only a terror but a burthen to himself and was weary of living through his anguish of heart now begins to take pleasure in himself and begins to eat his bread with joy and goes about his businesse rejoycing as 't is said of the Primitive Saints Acts 2. 46. 8 39. This is called Joy in the Holy Ghost Rom. 14. 17. and 1 Thess 1. 6. Of the Holy Ghost because proceeding from this Testimony of the Holy Ghost It is like the content a man takes in viewing a great deal of wealth heaped up together and a man can â—ay This is mine when a Miser doth sibi plaudere applaud himself in the language of the Poet and blesse his soul in the Horace language of the Psalmist Psal 49. 18. such a soul can go through the whole Treasury of the Word and wallow on the Promises as oâ— so many heaps of gold and cry out rejoycing All this is mine Can look abroad among all the providences of God and say All these are mine and look upward to heaven and to crown of glory and an innumerable company of Angels c. and say All this shall be mine too in possession as it is now in Title This is like the tryumph after a peace and expressed by the Apostle 1 Cor. 15. 55 56 57. in some such height of actual assurance of Gods love and his own happinesse Such a soul looks as God promised Davids house should be like the grass springing up by 2 Sam. 23. 4 clear shining after rain 3 Soul supporting hope And this I set against soul-distracting Despair which was reckoned in the former point among the fruits of the Spirit of Bondage This is not that hope which is the ground of justifying dependance upon Christ of which I have spoken before but that which is the daughter of assurance and differs from the other as I told you as Negative and Positive as rational and spiritual differ That hope is the daughter of notional knowledg this of Experimental Experience produceth this hope Rom. 5. 4. This is that that raiseth a man to a certain and patient expectation of and waiting for the things which faith of evidence assures him he hath a title unto and shall certainly enjoy We through the Spirit wait for the hope of Righteousnesse by Faith Where waiting sets out the nature of this hope 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 we do look out for and expect with earnestnesse as the mother of Sisera is said to do Judges 5. the hope i. e. the matter of the hope which is Of righteousness by faith which justifying faith assures us of and this is By the Spirit the Spirits testimony is the ground of this hope and his assistance the cause of it This is called the Anchor of the soul that stayes him from being carryed away with waves of despaire upon the rocks of certaine ruine And this is that that is the Helmet of our salvation guards all blowes from our heads all the blowes of temptations Heb. 6. 19 20. 1 Thes 5. 8. CHAP. VIII A Case concerning Absolute Promises and general offers of the the Gospel and conditional Promises in reference to the Spirits Evidence BUt here ariseth another Question Quest Doth the Spirit in its mediate testimony witness from absolute Promises or from Conditional Promises From general Offers or special Marks Ans By Absolute Promises I here understand such as suppose no preceding grace infused into and acted in us to the fulfilling of them as the Promises of the first grace and of the price and purchase of it the bloud of Christ c. which suppose no gracious condition at all in us required to the performance of them If at least these may in a tolerable sense be called Promises By Conditional Promises I meane those which expresse such and such qualifications in us as disposing us to receive the benefit of such a Promise as when Christ is promised John 3. 16 Matth. 5. 4 John 14. 21 to believers comfort to them that mourne acquaintance with God to them that keep his Commandments c. By general offers I mean such Promises in Scripture as tender Christ to every one excluding none by special Marks such characters in Scripture as discover who they be that have received him Next I shall distinguish between a supporting testimony of the Spirit and an assuring testimony of the Spirit 1 The supporting testimony of the Spirit is such a witnesse in a mans heart as in a grievous plunge of temptation keeps him from sinking a plank in a desperate shipwrack that saves him from drowning And it is ordinarily the last refuge of a soul when Satan hath quite conquered Assurance then the Spirit acts that soul by a faith of relyance wherein he doth petere principium in a good sense acts faith as at first in Justification Well saith the soul if I am no Believer if I am no lover of God if I be a Formalist an hypocrite yet there is faith repentance love sincerity for me in Christ and God offers it freely and unconditionately I will stay my self upon those Promises or gracious declarations Thus Absolute Promises may be and are the ground of the Spirits supporting testimony 2 But secondly There is an assuring testimony of the Spirit that that a Christian lives by in calm and clear times and trades by that whereby we are said to know that God dwells in us and we in him 1 John 4. 13. Therein the Holy Ghost is said to come in the Gospel in much Assurance 1 Thess 1. 5. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with a full sail of peace and spiritual satisfaction so that not only all doubtings are removed but all the grounds on which a man doubts are
you have a tender heart that is deeply affected with every known sinne c. O sir will such a person often-times say I find no such things in me and if there were I fear it is all in hypocrisie Friend you do well in fearing hypocrisie but you do not well in not owning what God hath wrought in you for fear of hypocrisie Indeed it is not good to boast of the good that is in us when wee have temptations from the approbation of others to glory in it neither is it good to deny what is in us when we have a call thereunto by those who are sent by God to examine our estate which they can never do nor can they know how to deal with us if we deal not plainly in confessing what we know and find in our selves And it falls out too often that such denyalls as I said before are the fruit of unthankfulnesse which oftentimes causeth us to overlook and in a kind of comparative way to deny what we have received because we have not as much as we would have As it falls out in the covetous men of the world and there is a sinful spiritual covetousnesse too that are ever complaining they have no money no bread to put in their mouths c. whereas indeed they mean they have not so much as they would have This is an unthankful denyal of Gods providence towards them in bestowing on them what they have And thou maist judg the like of thy self in this case Saint Paul was of another temper Rom. 7. he makes many sad complaints of himself I am carnal sold under sin in me there dwelleth no good thing how to perform that that is good I find not when I would do good evil is present with me I see a Law in my members warring against the Law of my mind c. O wretched man that I am c. yet still he mixeth acknowledgments of the grace that he hath received I am carnal saith he sold under sin yet saith he I blesse God my judgment goes with the Law I think it holy just and good whence though I am over-byassed many times unto evil yet I allow it not I would do better then I do and I hate the evil that I am captived unto In me there dwelleth no good thing but mark the Epanorthosis or correction of himself as if he had spoken a word too large What said I there is no good dwelling in me let me not be mistaken I mean in my flesh for so much the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ver 18. will bear for though I have no power to do yet I have some good in my spiritual part I can will that that is good and that will 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is alwayes at hand I have good wishes and desires in readinesse upon all occasions I do not the good that I ought to do yet I would do it I delight in the Law of God in the inward man Sin lawes it and lords it in my members but I have another Law in my mind so that with my mind i. e. in my judgment and resolved bent of will I serve the Law of God and there is a special Emphasis in that Pronoune my self that followes ver 25. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I my selfe serve the Law of God that is even I though I complain so against my self yet must needs say so much for my self to the praise of God I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Here is an excellent example for thee that sittest in darknesse and art ever complaining against and defying thy self do not deny the grace of God that is not so much a denyal of thy self as Gods goodnesse and the Spirit of Grace If thou witnesse against the Spirit dost thou think the Spirit will witnesse for thee Thou denyest the Spirit the very medium by which he would testifie to thy good condition Take notice also of the peevishnesse of thy spirit Thou hast long wooed Christ to accept of thee and be married to thee and Christ hath sent thee Love-tokens by his Spirit to assure thee that he owns himself to be thy busband Now Christ expects the duties of a wife from thee now thou questionest whether thou art married or no and not only questionest but peremptorily denyest all his Love-tokens or at least extenuatest them and settest light by them Think what a sin this is No wonder now if the Spirit that Messenger that brought them take offence at such dealing and refuse to testifie to thee who art resolved to question his testimony bee it never so cleare 4. An unwarrantable thrusting off those Promises and comfortable truths which God in the Ministry of the Word or otherwise brings home to our condition and snatching greedily at all the terrible places of Scripture and denunciations of wrath as our portion I have knowne those that have thrust away with both hands all that might make for their comfort as that that belongs not to them O the cursed pride of our hearts When will men leave prescribing to the infinite wise God When people please themselves in their sins then they will hear no Minister except he sing a cursed requiem to their spirits preach pleasing things and cry Peace peace And when the soul is under trouble for sin then God must denounce judgments in every Sermon speak to them in thunders and lightning from Mount Sinai answer them cut of the whirlewind or else they will not hear him Believe it no soul receiveth good by the Word but that soul that thinks every Word of the Lord good and labours as it is proper to its condition to apply it Satan in times of unregeneracy hath an Art to make the Word unfruitful by causing a mans heart to stand loose from the Law to rub off the eating corroding plaister and say This concernes such an one and such an one but not me And after our conversion he keeps the Word from fastning comfort to the soul and assuring the heart by a like Artifice True these are comfortable truths and concern such and such but not me This was the Psalmists case in desertion and is thine in the present darknesse My sore ran in the night my soul refused to be comforted Psal 77. 2. Indeed friends if you refuse to receive comfort when the Spirit offers it no wonder if when you would have it the Spirit refuse to offer it None of Gods offers are refused by the creature gratis God will stand upon other termes when we come to his shop after wee have once refused a good bargain once offered 5 A groundlesse surmising of an irrecoverablenesse in our condition from such and such threatnings of Scripture as concerne us not This followes from the former When a soul is willing to hear all Thunder and Cannon shot from the Word ordinarily the divel hath two or three places of Scripture from whence he playes thick upon the soul Those are two places in the
it Ephes 1. 13. In whom after ye heard ye trusted and after ye believed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aor 1. Postquā credidisseti◠not 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dum credidistis or trusted ye were sealed with the holy Spirit of Promise and received its earnest See also 1 Joh. 5. 13. Now coming to Christ receiving Christ applying Christ for Justification is sufficient qualification to enable a man to receive the Sacrament with profit Because where spiritual life is there is a right to all such food as may strengthen it 2. The Sacrament is a Seal of the Covenant in all its promises Now Promises become mine by claim and relyance If then I have right only to one Promise nay if I can but lay claim to one I may come to the Sacrament to have that sealed to me Suppose this I find my heart made weary of sin and account it the greatest burthen in the world I apply my self to Christ to ease me of it hereupon I lay claim to the Promise thus Lord Jesus thou hast done thus for me blessed be thy name whereas I accounted sin a pleasure once now I account it a burthen make good thy Promise to me ease me I claim this on the credit of thy Promise Mat. 11. 28. If hereupon I come to the Sacrament desiring God to seal to this Promise which I lay hold upon I cannot be said to come unworthily though I have no witnesse in my heart from the Spirit that I belong to Christ I told you before that it is the claiming of Christ and standing to that claim and being resolved to adventure my soul upon it that entitles me to him and that that entitles me to Christ gives me a right to the Sacrament as I said but now upon the former head Object But let this faith be what it will I must know that I have it ere I come else it is in vain to require Examination before I come And if so then 't is all one for substance to be assured that I am in Christ and to be assured that I believe in him because believing in him necessarily implies being in him Answ Sacramental Examination doth not presuppose a necessity of a certain or assured knowledg that I have the graces which I examine my self for But only a finding those acts in my self which ordinarily those graces appear in my heart dealing plainly and faithfully with it self in the search and my earnest desire and endeavour that they may be true though at present I see not that they are true supposing that I see nothing of weight according to the rule of the Word to judg them false Nay if I should see cause to condemne those former acts which I took for gracious as false and unsound yet upon that conviction if I seriously labour to set them right now I ought not to keep from the Sacrament for that but to draw nigh and from thence to expect strength to prosper my endeavours and give me evidence in Gods time of the reality of them If this were not true then every Christian under desertion and doubting must be excluded from the Sacrament And surely if so the fittest persons that can be will be debarred there being none more fit for a strengthning Ordinance then such souls To exemplifie the present case A man examines his faith repentance c. he finds some such acts as look like the acts of those graces yet he doubts whether they were true or no he therefore examines faith by the rule of the Word purifying the heart working by love over-coming the world Repentance by hatred of sin of all sin sincere endeavors of future obedience some such things as these he sees no sufficient ground to conclude he hath not and yet he thinks he may deceive himself in thinking that he hath them Here is his case What shall this man do Shall he come to the Supper or no I answer Yes For I am fit for the Sacrament when my heart doth not upon good grounds condemn me Unwarrantable Scruples do not unfit me it is not required that my heart do alwayes clearly absolve me See what John faith in this case 1 Joh. 3. 20. If our hearts condemne us not he doth not say if they actually absolve us many needlesse Scruples may hinder that but if they condemn us not it must be meant of the conscience enlightned by the Word An ignorant wordlesse conscience its absolution or condemnation is nothing in this case but an enlightned conscience then have we confidence i. e. ground of confidence towards God And by consequence ground of approach to those Seals in which this confidence is bestowed and encreased 2 It is not necessary to a worthy participation of the Lords Supper that I be able satisfactorily to evidence to my owne heart the truth of every grace required thereunto One grace sometimes may be more conspicuous then another And it is sufficient it I can see any thing in my self of the new creature though I know not how to improve it by Argument to prove such or such a grace thereby For example sometimes repentance may be more conspicuous to a man then faith sometimes love more visible then both sometimes a man may be able to see neither of them all distinctly yet he sees something which he cannot but acknowledg is a fruit of a mighty and supernatural change and this change he finds he cannot rest till it be increased and improved to greater perfection If he can see nothing else yet he finds earnest and hearty desires after Christ not only as a fountaine of pardoning but also of purging grace These desires as far as he can judg are not counterfeit though many times weak Now in such a case as this the soul must consider that Christ hath promised not to break the bruised reed nor quench the smoaking flax Though a mans grace be very infirm if it be not a staff but a reed and a reed too not firm but bruised and though the kindlings of grace be but in smoaking flax a Metaphor taken from those that kindle a fire that put some pilled stalks of flax or straw or some such combustible thing under the wood to make it burn which if it be moist will not flame out by and by but smoak a while and then kindle though grace be but yet an embryo as fire in smoaking flax which a man can scarce tel whether it wil burn or no yet God will not quench that is he will make much of it as a servant doth of a little spark of fire in a wisp of straw and gently blow it up till it flame Isai 42. 3. He is to consider moreover that he ought to conclude from these smal measures as far as he is groundedly perswaded that they are true that though he cannot see faith repentance love yet where these desires are they are good signes of a gracious change though yet but in the beginning and a gracious change
are yea amen sure and firm in Christ by vertue of his purchase propter pretium solutum as a bargâ—n is to the purchaser upon consideration of the price whether any man think them so or no but 't is the Spirit that makes them sure to the parties for whom they are purchased per possessionem inchoatam by an inchoated possession as the Jewes were put in possession of the lard of Canaan by a few clusters of grapes and a man enters upon a great estate by the cutting of a turfe upon the land Assurance is a turfe of the land of promise and this is put into our hands by the Spirit I could adde many more places I will name at present onely one more and that is Rom. 5. 5. The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the holy Ghost that is given to us And what is the fruit of that abundant sheding abroad of the Spirit Hence it comes to passe ver 4. that our hope makes not ashamed If one man build upon the Testimony of another in businesses of concernment and when he comes to produce him in open Court his Testimony come not up to the businesse in hand or his Testimony appear suspicious a man doth not only lose his Cause but his Hope also and is publickly shamed for his confidence in such a Testimony But saith the Apostle if the Holy Ghost shed abroad the love of God in our hearts i. e. plentifully assure us of it the hope that is grounded thereupon will never make us ashamed His Testimony will bear a man and his cause up before the Judgement Seat of Christ or his Deputy Conscience whenever it shall bee called in question whether here or hereafter at the great day 2. Reason And herein consider two things I. The matter of the Assurance which the Spirit gives regularly is a Demonstration A Demonstration say Logicians is Syllogismus Scientificus an Argument that produceth a certain knowledg of the thing concluded Demonstration is of two sorts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That and Why. 1 That a thing is I can certainly prove that the tree lives because it growes and brings forth leaves and fruit that a man is in a present good temper of body because he hath a good pulse and this is called Demonstratio ab effectu or Demonstratio 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thus the Spirit certainly proves that I am a child of God by the Effects of Adoption thus He that is led by the Spirit of God is a Son of God But this man is led by the Spirit of God Therefore he is the Son of God Here is a certain Testimony The Major of this Argument He that is led by the Spirit of God is the Son of God is plain Scripture and sets forth the proper effect of being the Son of God to be led by the Spirit or to endeavor to be holy in all manner of conversation The Minor or second Proposition is true by experience which I see by the spiritual sense which the Spirit gives me and therefore the conclusion is demonstratively true Such a man is a Son of God 2 Why it is And this also hath place here I can certainly and demonstratively prove that 't is day because the Sun shines that makes day So if the Spirit conclude thus He that is begotten of God is the Son of God But such a man is begotten of God Therefore c. The Argument is Demonstrative and producing where the Spirit sets it home a certain assent This is Demonstratio 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that concludes the Effect from the Cause Quest But here is a Question Whether a man may be assured of his good estate by an Argument à priori that is by that which constitutes him in such an estate as suppose Whether a man may know that he is a child of God from the very act of his conversion which constitutes him such or rather Whether his only evidence that he is a child of God be not from the effects of his relation to God and that converting grace that made him so because grace in its first generation is dark Answ Hereunto I answer in a word 1. If the Spirit may and doth sometimes immediately testifie or mediately but not by Argument as hath been declared heretofore then he can assure a man without the present use of either of these means to prove it so that he can if hee please work an immediate consent to this Proposition at first conversion I am at this instant begotten of God which is the Minor Proposition in the Syllogisme which is an implicite assurance that such an one is a child of God 2. The Spirit testifying as he ordinarily doth i. e. by Arguments is at liberty to use his own Arguments to satisfie the conscience and the evidence or in-evidence of the Propositions shall not hinder the assent of the soul to the conclusion if the Spirit give light to them If the Spirit will tell a soul under his own vis plastica in the very womb of renewing grace in the act of Regeneration This work I am now working is a regenerating work God is now begetting true grace in thy heart therefore thou art a child of God I know not why it should not be a demonstrative evidence because the truth of this Conclusion Thou regenerated person art a child of God depends on the truth of this Proposition Every one whom God begets to a life of grace is a child of God And so certainly from Scripture The Assumption But thou art one whom God at this instant hath begotten to a life of grace is true by the evidence of the Spirit testifying to a mans own spirit who by spiritual sense is enabled to feel that work upon himself And therefore this evidence may be a sure evidence though it be à priori Yet would I be understood warily in what Cautions I say herein 1. I only affirm a possibility of receiving Assurance this way not an usual or ordinary course of the Spirit towards all or any that I know in particular because it is that which I hear oftentimes pleaded for by some of Gods precious ones whose experience in this secret work of the Spirit may be more then mine I cannot say less then this Yet for the sake of others of an Antinomian spirit that reject all trial by the effects of Regeneration which I stil affirm to be the usual rode way of the Spirit in giving Assurance I dare not say more 2 Remember that before I told you that habitual and fixed settled permanent actual Assurance is collected from the fruits of the Spirit that follow the first act of uniting grace though a present temporary actual Assurance may possibly be given in the very moment of actual union between Christ and the soul And therefore it concernes every one that hath been so assured at first not to rest there but to endeavour to ratifie and habituate that assurance
the premisses which hee doth by leaving out in thy ways out of the Scripture cited so in Assurance if Satan delude a mans reason into such an Assurance to whom assurance doth not belong there is some fault or other in the premisses whence the conclusion is deduced 3. There may also I conceive be a rational assurance whose conclusion is true as to the state of the person whom it assures and yet it may not be the speciall Testimony of the Spirit but meerly the Testimony of a mans own reason enlightened by ordinary illumination For as the Spirit when he testifies testifies with our spirits Rom 8. 16. So sometimes our spirits may testifie when the Spirit doth not As there may be in a man that is convinced of sin a true conviction by the common illumination of the Spirit which differs widely from that special and effectual conviction which ushers in saving conversion So in this case the child of God may be let alone to frame to himselfe a peace by arguing and reasoning his case from the Word of God and the Spirit may accompany this endeavour of his by common illumination wherein the conclusion may be true and truly inferred nay sometimes the Spirit may leave a man that is truly converted even in the businesse of illumination and suffer him to conclude his good estate irregularly though truly As I will give you this case for explication A man that hath prayed and waited long for Assurance and cannot obtain it growes weary and can wait upon Gods pleasure no longer nay I shall suppose that the man may be unwilling to be assured without the Spirits own Testimony ye he thinks it 's long a coming and therefore desires to hasten it In this case the Spirit of God may justly let him weary himself in a maze of his own reasonings for a time and permit him to perswade himselfe that he is in a good condition and afterwards because though this conclusion were true yet it was not gathered in a right way may suffer him to fall into such a sin or such darknesse as may make him see a need of farther evidence And in this case God may deal with a man as he did with Israel in the wildernesse God had promised them Canaan and they thought long ere they had it were loath to stay till Gods time and therefore whiles they think to hasten the time they are many of them destroyed at Hormah and all turned back into the wilderness Numb 14. for forty years CHAP. XXIII A Case how to know a false Scripture Assurance from a true THese things being premised I come directly to answer the main Question in both its parts Quest 1. How may a man know a false Assurance gathered by a mans own heart with the concurrence of Satan from that which comes from the Spirit of God An. 1 Regular Assurance from the testimony of the Spirit is an heart-purifying Assurance 1 John 3. 2 3. We know saith the Apostle that when he shall appear we shall be like him i. e. in glory for of that he speaks his glory shall reflect its image upon us as the Sun doth upon a glasse or the water for we shall see him as he is A blessed hope this But what kind of people are we to be on this side glory who have this assured hope of being so glorious hereafter It followes ver 3 He that hath this hope purifieth himself as he is pure 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Metaphor taken from the legal purifications of the Jewes wherein as soon as legal uncleanness was contracted they washed their bodies and their garments and vessels that they might be sure nothing they had to do withal might defile them again he is ever washing himself from sin and watching against it and takes all possible care to keep himself unspotted of this present world James 1. 23. Hates the very garment spotted with the flesh Jude 23. alluding again to the Levitical Law in which the very cloaths of a Leper one that had an Issue a menstruous woman were unclean he doth not only avoid the sins themselves but the very garments of them not only all besmeared with the flesh but garments spotted by the flesh In heaven where enjoyment is greatest purity is so too The grace of God when it appears to us as a grace bringing salvation teacheth us to deny all ungodlinesse and worldly lusts and to live soberly righteously and godly in the present world Tit. 2. 12. It teacheth all men so Doctrinally in the publication of it no Doctrine in the world such an enemy to loosenesse as the Doctrine of the Gospel but it teacheth the Saints to do so powerfully and despositively it inclines and enables them to it 2 Regular Assurance in not only a heart-purifying but an heart sanctifying Assurance Holynesse in the nature of it is the Dedication of a mans self and all that he is to the honour glory and service of God alone So God is infinitely holy because he is in all things most entirely and inseparably addited to his own glory which because he is the most excellent Being he may not only lawfully do but he must naturally and necessarily do and therein consists the perfection of his nature as the perfection of every being consists in the end to which it is so Gods perfection lies in this that he is to himself seeing he hath no nobler end to which his affections and actions can be referred wherefore if God could deny himself so far as to prefer any thing else above himself for a moment he must needs sin and cease to be happy for that time because he would be so much removed from his end which is his happinesse And of the same nature is holinesse in a Saint an entire devoting of himself and all to God Now a Saint assured of Gods love must needs bee holy because knowing the infinite excellency of God in his own light he cannot but conclude him the most worthy of all love and service and so be taken up in contemplating and conversing with him and acting for him which is holinesse and so far as he at any time lets God fall low in his eye so far he chargeth himself with unholinesse This we find the Saints frequently promise upon such discoveries Psal 23. ult Psal 116. 11 12 13. Indeed this is that which as it comes from us and proceeds from the consideration of Gods goodnesse to us is called thankfulnesse as it respects his own excellencies it is called praising and glorifying him Whence also take this Note by the way The more thankful the more holy Thankfulnesse and holynesse are the same things understood in a different conception Now how large praises doth God get every where in the Scriptures from his people under the light of such Assurance How many such whole Psalmes did David pen under such Discoveries of Gods countenance But false Assurance begotten by the collusion of Satan with our
those experiences whereas men should bring their experiences to the Word and not the Word to their experiences and then one mis-interpretation drawes on another and thus they multiply into vaine janglings and unnecessary disputes But true Assurance is a serious solid thing brings along with it a general experimental knowledg of all necessary truth which once learned out of the Word it seals unto and so it confirms a man in a practical savoury acquaintance with it whence such a sonl is full of the hidden treasures of divine truths savingly digested and is to seek for nothing but freedom of spirit from heterogeneous imployments and a little serious affective preparation of heart to ruminate upon them to dispose him to make a constant feast upon those dainties in his own private retirements and to communicate liberally of the same fare to others Thence there is nothing more grates his ears or afflicts his spirit then to have the strength and fervor of his zeal drawn out into Controversies seeing he can tell how to spend his time and that better As a studied Scholer that by long study and experience hath digested all manner of learning and can upon all occasions make profitable use of it will think his time lost to hear a company of fresh men maintain a Dispute about Grammatical and Logical trifles But a young raw headed fantastical Novice that hath gotten a little flashy learning in his brain looks upon them as matters of weight and moment and thinks himself the bravest fellow in the world when he can wrangle out such an inconsiderable Dispute 7 And lastly True Assurance is a constant spring of humility lowliness of mind it being impossible that so intimate a converse with God and the light of his countenance should not reflect low thoughts upon a mans self concerning himself such a man cannot but say Lord what am I that thou hast brought me hitherto what for such a peevish unbebelieving impatient soul as mine that have tempted thee by abundance of murmurings and other sinful provocations even in the wildernesse and at the red sea to be notwithstanding so carryed in thine armes and cheered with thy smiles and enjoy the comforts of thy Spirit O what am I vile wretch that God should deal thus with me False Assurance on the other side makes proud boasting self-conceited c. CHAP. XXIV A Case how to know whether a true Assurance be meerly rationally gathered or from the witnesse of the Spirit NOw come we to the second branch of the Question Quest How may a man know whether a true assurance as to the substance of it be gotten meerly by rational deductions or from the Spirit of God Wrought out of a mans brain or wrought into his heart by the Holy Ghost Answ I can but help you to ghesse at the difference These works though they really differ in themselves yet to appearance are very like and therefore I shall speak warily in a few particulars 1. Most of the former distinctions between the Testimony of the Spirit a false assurance from Satan and a mans own heart may be repeated here A true assurance gotten in an irregular way wants the advantage of a supernatural assistance to elevate and improve it for as it was gotten in the strength of reason so it must act only in the strength of the principle from whence it had its being and by consequence can have no influence but moral and rational to the production of those impressions of purity holinesse watchfulnesse heavenly mindednesse patience seriousnesse and solidnesse of spiritual self-entertainments humility and so all these must needs be thin and scanty and superficial in comparison of the same effects when they proceed from a divine assurance Thence 't is that you shal ordinarily find in the world a kind of formal cold thin-spread honesty just enough to keep life and soul together as we say in many persons that are really godly of whom a man may say as the Apostle Paul of divers of the chief men in the Church of Jerusalem Gal. 2. 6. Those who seemed to be somewhat in conference added nothing to him And therefore let this be the first difference There is a mighty odds between a man divinely assured and rationally assured in the vigour and activity of all those fruits wherein it shews it self As you may see in matter of knowledge A man that is assured of a Truth teacheth it with far more life and authority then a man who sees it only in a rational probable light 2. In a meer rational assurance there is formido oppositi As in an Opinion that a man holds meerly on probable grounds though a man may stiffely adhere to it in comparison with the contrary conclusion yet the grounds of this confidence being but probable and therefore such in which he may be deceived he is ever and anon subject to say but what if it be not so all this while And though this opinion be truth and a great many other usefull conclusions as branches grow from its root yet so long as hee is but probably perswaded of it he gives his Assent to it meerly with a reserve This is true to me in the mind I now am in But I may possibly see grounds to alter my judgement Thus in point of assurance Rational assurance be it never so full excludes not haesitancy Thence you shall find when you have reasoned with a doubting Christian a long time it may be when you go away from him you leave him to appearance well satisfied and pretty comfortable as we use to say but a while after when Satan and his own heart have had a little time to unravel the web of your reasonings he begins to think he was in an errour As an unstable man in matters of judgment Let an Orthodox Preacher speak an houre with strength of Scripture and reason upon a controverted point the man seems to be fully satisfied and altogether of his mind But this holds only till the next cunning seducer assaults him with counter-reasons and then the man wavers and cryes why may not this be the truth And so if twenty come one after another he shall still suspect what the former hath said by means of the Sophistry of the latter Thence a man rationally assured can to the most say no more for himself then the Apostle Paul to allude to his expression in another case 1 Cor. 4. 4. I know nothing by my self I confesse I cannot but incline to think bettter of my self then formerly yet am I not thereby justified I dare not stand to the perswasion that I am a child of God before the judgment seat of Jesus Christ I would not willingly be deceived but I may be deceived What if that that I take for love of God be but lelfe-love and what if that that I take for repentance be but legal sorrow and what if my hatred of sin be but a meer falling out with sin without
the Doctrines of Faith c. which he had acquainted them withal from their first vocation but it includes even those Doctrines of comfort which precede in the number of those Truthes they being part of what Christ had told them 2 The Court of Conscience It will be needful having once verified the evidence by the test of the Word to lay it up against a day of tryal Divine Truths must be laid up in the heart for Direction and divine Experiences for Consolation in an evil day This Courts Recorder is Memory and its Records in such a day are of especial use and importance Records of Gods dealing with others formerly see Psalm 119. 52. I remembred thy judgments of old and have comforted my self i. e. Those judgements by which thou hast caused thy people to triumph over their enemies in former times So also of our own experiences see both together Psal 77. 5 6 The holy man had been utterly at a losse had it not been for this Recorder and yet it seemes he had been too to blame in the laying up his evidence so that it cost much search before he could find it I communed with my heart and my spirit made diligent search the Septuagint reads 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 my spirit digged as we do for hidden treasure that must have much rubbish removed ere we can come at it But their sense is grounded upon a different reading of the word in the Hebrew Others read Scopabam I swept it seems by his carelesse keeping he had suffered his evidences to be thrown inâ—… dusty corner among waste papers and he was fain to sweep for them ere he could find them but however when he found them he made excellent use of them for by them he recovers strength to check his present unbelief I have considered the dayes of old ver 5. and I call to remembrance my song ver 6. I will remember the years of the right hand of the Most High ver 10. and I will remember the works of the Lord c. v. 11. And these remembrances prove a great strengthning to his Faith in that hour of temptation David hath some Psalms to bring to remembrance Psalm 38 and 70. And Christ hath left Ordinances for this end The Word 2 Pet. 1. 12 13. and Sacraments Do this 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Luke 22. 19. in remembrance of me And there is the same use of the communion of Saints which is the special means of keeping fresh one anothers experiences by conference and communication Therefore it will be a very good course to charge memory to record carefully all the visits and smiles and embraces of Gods Spirit together with all the passages which may confirm the truth of them afterwards As we do in Evidences concerning a temporal estate we record the Sealing dayes and the Witnesses and the considerations of the conveyance So in this case bid memory put down At such a time in such a place upon such a Prayer Sermon when I was in such an exigency and there was but an haires breadth between me and despair such a sad cloud was scattered the Spirit of God by such a Promise gave me as much comfort and joy as my heart could hold and I then set to my seal that God is true by believing Joh 2. 33 And I was confirmed in the reality of these experiences by a following assistance against such corruptions or strength against such temptations or power more then ordinary to walk in wayes of spiritual communion with God c. This course being carefully taken it cannot be imagined how great an awe it will cast upon a mans jealous and suspicious heart that it will scarce dare to entertain a doubt against an Evidence so clear and so carefully recorded Except Satan can imbezel the Records or corrupt them by the concurrence of our treacherous memories in some considerable passages 't is in vain he knows to commence a fresh sute against the soul The soul in such cases will as the Psalmist have recourse to those Records and clear his Title against such disturbances Psal 77. suprà CHAP. XXVII The Means to strengthen these Evidences IN the second place 2 Strengthen your Evidences daily 1 By strengthning Ordinances 1 The Word heard read meditated upon all these in their proper place and time are to be used with care David alwayes keeps up a fainting Assurance with a word My soul melteth for heavinesse strengthen thou me according to thy word Psal 119. 28. This is my comfort in my affliction for thy Word hath quickned me Psal 50. Vphold thou me according to thy Word c. Psal 116. Promises are the food of Faith Cordials of Hope the crutches of Patience the principal feathers in the wing of Prayer Threatnings caution us against those courses as will weaken Assurance Precepts direct us in such wayes as will continue and improve it Examples are so many ruled cases as they say in Law which may adde light to a man when there is need to search records as before said The whole Word is the fewel that maintains the fire of Assurance and Meditation blowes up the coals 2 Prayer And this applies the Word it is a souls perpetual plea against all litigious molestations If Satan or a mans own heart at any time call his Evidences into question away flyes Prayer to God and pleads Promises and Examples holy Presidents and stops the mouth of Temptation this way 'T is that way of continual intercourse with God that brings a man dayly returnes of holy familiarities which cannot but nourish a constant perswasion of his unchangeable Love as mutual Letters maintaine a good intelligence among friends 3 Sacraments As they are remembrancers of the death of Christ and Ordinances appointed for the Sealing of the benefits thereof to the soul by particular applicatory signes and tokens must needs be means not only to give as hath been shewne before but also to confirm and continue it And upon this account 't is no wonder if Christ in the Institution of the Lords Supper require a frequent attendance upon that Ordinance 1 Cor. 11. 25. As oft as ye drink it implies frequent drinking it All our faith is grounded upon the death and satisfaction of Christ and the frequent reduction of those grounds of faith to our consideration must needs strengthen it habits of the mind are strengthned by a frequent repetition of those actions by which they were first begotten and produced Now though gracious habits are not gotten in the strength of natural or moral powers as natural or moral habits are yet they are produced as I before have shewed by a supernatural power in a natural method and order And therefore though no grounds apprehended by the understanding can of themselves beget faith yet a divine power never produceth them but by the representation of some grounds And therefore the representation of the death of Christ as it is held forth by God in all its
less sensible Because God permitts this darkness in designe for some special ends of his owne Now the person a man puts on upon designe commonly he useth to over-act even beyond what he would if he were reall So although when God was really an enemy as before conversion he carryed himselfe by secret supports and encouragements of the soul as one that was not utterly irreconcileable yet when he meerely intends to appeare so he carries himselfe so strangely that the soul really believes he is in earnest and intends its ruine irrecoverably Lam. 3. 5. 7 8 9. The church aggravates her sad condition from extraordinary appearances of Gods dealing with her God in such a case leaves the soul alone like a sparrow on the house Psal 102. 7. And woe to him that is alone Eccles 4. 40. 4 And thus fourthly The grounds of the horrid troubles that Gods Saints fall into after assurance may be and are occasionally from the Spirit of God though immediately and by way of an efficient cause they are not from that spirit Thus the Spirit led Christ into the wildernesse Mat. 4. 1. 1 By an active suggesting to the soul such considerations as may start a soul-trouble As when it makes a fresh disâ—overy of New committed sinnes and stirs up the soule to renew repentance for them Such motions may be the occasion of farther enquiries into a mans own heart and so of questions concerning his estate And thus by degrees they may grow into as palpable Legal Terrours as any ever the soul groaned under 2 By withdrawing that assistance from the soul which should maintain the soul in peace and joy of the Holy Ghost When the Sun hides behind a cloud or is under an Eclipse it must needs be dark If the Father let goe the little childs hand in a dark and dangerous place he will surely fall And thus is the Spirit the negative cause if I may so express my self of the saddest bondage that comes on the people of God after Assurance 5 But Lastly the Spirit to be sure doth never cause and work a feare of bondage in the soul after Assurance as it did before and that may be seen in these differences 1. Before there was a time when he convinced the sinner of a state of sin and enmity to God After it never doth tel a man so any more 2. Before there was a time when he convinced the soul of a state of wrath and condemnation arising from that enmity but having once effectually converted and assured the soul of reconciliation he never presents hell and wrath any more to the soul as its portion 3. Besides He sometimes presented every act of sinne as unpardoned Now he never doth so any more in that sense wherein he did so formerly That is that I may not be mistaken He never presents Gods vindictive or avenging Justice unto the soul as unsatisfied for such a sin though he may present Gods fatherly Justice as displeased at it 4. Before hee sometime presented every suffering of this life to the soul as a part of the curse of the Law and the earnest-penny of Hell Now he never leads the soul to the view of sufferings under that notion but only as fatherly corrections and chastisements by which God endeavours to quicken the soul into a speedy return unto him by renewed repentance and humiliation CHAP. XXXIV The proof of the Thesis from 1. Scripture 2. Reason THe truth of this point is abundantly cleer Proof from the Scripture and Reason For Scripture Take notice of the names by which the Spirit is set out to us in the Word 1 He is called the Comforter John 14. 16. And this in his peculiar Office to the Saints Now he would fail in the discharge of it if ever he should bring Gods adopted children into bondage againe Therefore when our Saviour promiseth the Comforter he also engageth that he shall abide with the Saints John 14 16. 'T is true their comforts are many times fleeting comforts But the Spirit of God is not to be blamed for that Ordinarily 't is their own fault and oftentimes Satans temptations eclipse the comforts and refreshments of the Spirit to the soule Though their comforts be fleeting the Comforter is not To debase himself from being the Comforter to the Divels imployment the Accuser of the Brethren is dishonourable to the Holy Spirit 2 Besides he is called our Seal and how long doth he continue so unto the day of redemption Eph. 4. 30. Hee will not to day scale an evidence of heaven to the soul and tomorrow seal its Mittimus to hell 3 Moreover he is called our Earnest and can we think that God will give us an earnest of heaven one day and revoke it again the next or ever deny the bargain which that Earnest secures unto us An honest man will not do so far be it from God to do what common honesty will keep man from Rom. 11. 29. 4 He is the Spirit of Adoption testifying to us that we are the children of God ver 16. of the chapter in hand And can it be imagined that he will ever tell a child of God that he is become a child of the Divel There is no lesse Reason For Reas 1. I have shewed before that The Spirit and the Word never crosse each others Testimony Now the Word never pronounceth bondage to any one that hath received the Witnesse of the Spirit nay not to any one that hath the least grace of the Spirit The Word every where speaks comfort to such Isa 40. 1 2. Rom. 8. 1 34. Reas 2. That which is the badge of a false Prophet and which God dislikes in such cannot without blasphemy be attributed to the holy Spirit of God But to make the heart of the righteous sad is a badge and sin of false Prophets Ezek 13. 22. Reas 3. That ought not to be supposed to be wrought by Gods Spirit which as often as it is on our spirits is our sin and infirmity but to doubt of the saving love of God after enjoyment of the manifestation and feeling of it is our sin and infirmity Psal 77. 20. And therefore the Spirit cannot be the Author thereof because the Holy Spirit cannot be the Author of sin Reas 4. That which hinders the most proper and peculiar work of the Spirit of Adoption cannot be the work of the Spirit except we suppose the Spirit so indiscreet as to counteract himself But if the Holy Spirit ever become a Spirit of bondage to the soule after tastes of Gods love communicated thereunto the Spirit would be guilty of counter-acting its most proper and peculiar work which as the next Doctrine from the last words of the Text shews you is to embolden and enliven the heart in Prayer For how can he call God Father with confidence to whom the Spirit witnesseth that God is an enemy Reas 5. The Spirits Testimony if it could ever become a Spirit of Bondage
of love between thee and my soul I but Lord now thou art a stranger to me and there passeth little of common courtesie between us Lord why dost thou make thy self strange to me Cause thy countenance to shine upon me as in the dayes of old So we use to recover familiarity with friends call old passages to mind and this occasions discovery of the reasons of that alteration of countenance and carriage and produceth new mutual engagements 2 A renovation of that Covenant of friendship between thy soul and God Assure him in the strength of Jesus Christ that thou wilt omit no office of kindnesse and respect for time to come but wilt every way to thy utmost ability walk worthy of a renewed acquaintance if he will re-admit thee to such an intimacy Such a condition I am perswaded David was in Psalm 101. O when wilt thou come to me ver 2. And then he vowes what he will do to maintain familiarity with him if he will receive him to the same intimacy as formerly I will walk in my house with a perfect heart c. CHAP. LV. A Case How boldnesse and holy fear may bee joyned in prayer This boldnesse and fear wherein each of them consists explained Quest BUt I may possibly be too bold and I hear the Saints of God in Scripture described by a trembling fearful frame of spirit in the presence of God How may I bring both these together this boldness and that fear Ans To answer this I will shew you First Wherein the boldnesse that becomes a Saint in the presence of God consists and so how far I may be bold 2 And then What this fear and trembling is that should be joyned with it 3 That and how these may be joyned 1. Boldnesse 1 A Saints boldnesse before God consists in 1 The liberty of the exercise of prayer it self that a Saint may at any time in any place upon any occasion addresse himself to God and expect visits from him A man is bold with a friend to whom he is admitted at any hour whom he visits perpetually and is visited by him without any exception of times or observance of seasons which yet were proper for a stranger O the invitations and entertainments that an holy soul gives God and God gives to it back again Come my people saith God enter into thy chambers Isai c. and hide thee I have gathered my mirrhe with my spice c. Eat O friends drink yea drink abundantly O my Beloved Cant. 5. 1. And on the Churches part O when wilt thou come to me Psal 101. 2. Why standest thou afar off O Lord Psalm 10. 1. c. When I awake I am still with thee Psal 139. 8. 2. In the matter of prayer wherein 1 A soul communicates to God all its counsel and so layes all its burthens upon the Lord as we use to do upon a friend that we may make most bold withal yea even those things that he would be ashamed and afraid to utter to the most familiar friend in the world 1 Pet 5. 7. Casting all his care upon the Lord and that confidently tumbling Cum pondere curarum nostrarum non debemus diu luctari sed statim eo nos levare in Dominum illud conjicere in Gerh. 1 Pet. 5. 7. it upon him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that by and by as soon as it troubles a Saint he heaves it off presently from his own shoulders upon Gods So Hezekiah spreads Rabshakehs paper before the Lord Isai 37. 14. 2 A soul begs of God any thing he wants A man makes bold with a friend when hee fetcheth every thing he wants from him comes now for money anon for rayment another time for food and other necessaries and all that his friend hath he makes bold to ask for and hath it for asking and Christ emboldens us to this Joh. 15. 7. Ask what you will and it shall be done to you that is whatever is in Gods power to give whatever hee hath not bound himself from bestowing whatever may be for his true glory and our true good God saith as one friend doth to another If any thing I have wil do you a pleasure make bold to ask it and it is at your service As we say to a welcome Ghost Sir Make as bold in my house as if you were at home So saith God Soul make as bold in heaven my house as in thine own nothing shall be denyed thee that heaven will yeild I have read that Luther made bold upon this encouragement Domine said he fiat voluntas mea Lord let my will be done A bold speech but in a clear case falling under a plain Promise implying a clear truth A Saint may expect the performance of his own will when his will is Gods will Both these are in one verse of David Psal 38. 9. Lord all my desire is before thee and my groaning is not hid from thee Thou knowest my secrets and my wants 3 In the manner of prayer 1 A Saint may speak to God in downright plain language as to a friend A man need not study complements when he deales with such an one If he were to deal with an earthly great man especially to whom he is a stranger he must place every word in order and scare dare utter any thing but in Court language God looks not after fine expressions but warm affections 2 God accepts of imperfect and broken expressions when we can speak no better lispings and stutterings of children are welcome to a Father when through infirmity the child is able to speak no better Davids groaning Psal 38. 9. Hezekiahs chattering Isai 38. 14. 3 A Saint may use fervency urgency and importunity of petitions So Jacob Lord I wil not let thee go except thou blesse me Gen. 32. 26. As a man who may be bold with his friend takes him by the coat when he is departing holds him fast and tells him in a way of familiar power and jurisdiction as it were Sir you shall not go hence to night c. So in the case of Moses God is fain as a friend detained by such an importunate inviter as is before mentioned to intreat Moses to let him go Exod. 32. 10. This is exprest by our Savior by an elegant similitude Luke 11. 5 6 7. 8. of one friends importunity with another at midnight an unseasonable hour and when the friend is in bed at rest c. So the Saints use to knock and if knocks will not make God hear they call Where is the God of Eliah 2 Kings 2. 14. if God seem to sleep they awaken him Psal 44. 23. Give the Lord no rest Isai 62. 7. 4 A Saint may have confidence of audience and acceptance Hebr. 10. 22. Let us draw nigh 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in full Assurance of faith 1 This appears in the Saints besetting of God with promises that God cannot any way get off if he
would seem to deny them See in David abundant proof of this Psalm 119. 25 Quicken me ver 28 Strengthen me ver 58. Be merciful to me ver 65. Let it be well with me ver 76 Let thy kindnesse be for my comfort ver 116. Vphold me ver 169 Give me understanding and all according to thy Word 2 In their challenges of Gods Justice Truth and faithfulnesse and all his Attributes to make them good So David Psal 31. 1. Deliver me in thy righteousnesse And Psalm 35. 24. Judge me according to thy righteousness Psalm 119. 40 Quicken me according to thy righteousnesse Ps 143. 1. In thy faithfulnesse answer me and in thy righteousnesse So Abraham appeales to Gods justice Shall not the Judge of all the World do right Gen. 18. 25. And they presse sometimes upon the very glory of God and challenge their petitions upon the forfeiture of his glory Josh 5. 7. What wilt thou do for thy great name 2. Fear 2 A Saints fear of God in prayer consists 1. In that conscience of Duty that brings him into the presence of God if there were nothing else to move him thereunto though he had no need though there were no threatnings to the neglect of it no promises to the performance of it yet because God requires it he dares not neglect it This is that fear that God requires as a master of all his people as servants Now we must know that all fear of God as a master that is all obedience out of conscience of duty is not servile fear but then 't is servile when it is not so much out of conscience of duty as out of conscience of wrath or punishment upon neglect A child is a Fathers servant and obeyes him as such yet obeys not servilely Therefore God calls for this fear upon this account If I be a master where is my fear that is dutifull obedience to my commands Mal. 1. 6. 2. In the matter of our performances it is a diligent care of what we offer to God keeping the soul from offering stange fire bounding a mans desires with the will of God A fear lest any thing should slip from a mans mouth or heart that is displeasing to God As a child though he may make bold with his Father yet is carefull not to aske any thing of his Father that he knows will displease him so in this a Saint takes care that all his petitions be warranted by a rule and encouraged by a promise and beyond these he dares not wish much lesse come into the presence of God to aske any thing He dares not tempt God by depending on him for or desiring at his hands what his word doth not warrant But it is not such a fear as discourageth the soul in asking such things as a man hath warrant to desire So farre as the promise goes a soul dares ask else 't is not a child-like but a childish fear not the fear of a Courtier but the fear of a clown 3. In the manner of performing such duties it is a deportment of the soul with that reverence as becomes the greatnesse and glory of God compared with our own basenesse and unworthinesse and jealousie of our own hearts lest we should do any thing unbeseeming such a God or such a duty 1. No soul hath more reverend and high thoughts of God then such a soul as hath most right to holy confidence in his presence The more acquaintance with God the more of this fear None waits upon a Prince with more reverence and observance then the greatest favourites the ordinary and standing Courtiers A man that comes out of the Country and is not acquainted with Majesty and State is not so observant of every punctilio of ceremony as those that are perpetually about the Prince This it is that David speaks of Ps 89. 7. God is greatly to be feared in the Assembly of the Saints and to be had in reverence of all that are round about him Gods greatest Courtiers are most observant of him The more we converse with God the more wee know what becomes his glory and majesty and all irreverence proceeds from ignorance and ignorance from want of converse with God A country man reverences a Prince no otherwise then he doth his landlord because he is not conversant in the Court and observes not the state and ceremony kept and used there The Seraphims that are the constant Courtiers of heaven they cover their faces with a fear of awe and reverence Isai 6. 2. 2. None is more watchfull over his own heart in the manner of a performance then a Saint that hath most grounds of boldnesse and confidence in the presence of God He dares not run rashly into Gods presence and if but a low mean thought of God arise how doth his heart rise against it If but a stragling thought carry him off from his businesse how doth he send out post after it and call it in again This is a fear of jealousie This is called watching to prayer of which above Carnis enim ingenium est ut exultando dissolvatur Musc in Ps 2. and watchfulnesse proceeds from a fear of warinesse though not from fear of dastardlinesse Thus you see what fear a Saint is bound to bring to God in every performance A dutifull fear A carefull fear A reverend fear A jealous fear 3. Mixed That and how both these will stand together we shall shew in the next place in a word For I have in a sort prevented my selfe herein already Only 1. That it is so see one or two places for it Psal 2. 11. Even in those services that require highest expressions of joy rejoyce before him saith the Psalmist with trembling A more remarkable place is that Psal 147. 11. The Lord taketh pleasure in them that fear him in them that hope in his mercy Hope which in the old Testament is often taken for and always implies faith is here joyned with feare one would think doubting and fear might have been better matched but see God joyns hope or faith the mother of boldnesse and fear together So Psalm 5. 7. 2. Concerning the manner how these are conjoyned it is 1. By a joynt premeditation and collation of 1. Gods greatnesse and goodnesse majesty and mercy 2. Our own meannesse with our great relations 3. Our own unworthinesse and Christs worthinesse 4. Our own inabilty and the Spirits supplies These as they joyntly affect our hearts in meditation so they leave sutable joynt-impressions in prayer 2. By a diligent observance of our spirits in the extravagancies of them both wayes in duty and checking them with contrary meditations as when we find a petulant wantonnesse of spirit apt to break out whereby we are endangered to make too bold with God a Saint may correct that with apprehensions of Gods majesty Isai 6. 6. If carelessenesse and slightnesse of spirit a Saint quickens it with thoughts of Gods holinesse and glory such
Psalm 102. 24. When I can aske competency of estate not to spend on my lusts but to glorifie God benefit the Church refresh the bowels of the Saints and that in poverty grieves us most that we cannot do so to tell God so in prayer how successefull is it likely to be When in spiritual desertion I can say Lord I want a frame of spirit fit to glorifie thee I cannot pray read hear meditate without wofull distractions I dishonour religion by drooping c. therefore lift up the light of thy countenance upon me that I may speak great things of thy name that I may glorify thee Psalm 51. 12. 13 14 15. 142. 7. This Argument also affliction suppeditates 5. The advantage which a man in such a condition may make of an experience of Gods goodnesse in hearing prayer in such a needfull time If a man can plead as David Psalm 142. 7. Bring my soul out of prison i. e. of spiritual troubles and the righteous shall compasse me about and Psalm 51. 13. Deliver me from bloud guiltinesse O Lord then will I teach transgressors thy wayes and sinners upon the report of thy mercy to me encouraging them shall be converted unto thee So Psalm 32. 5 6. For this shall every one that is godly pray unto thee in a time wherein thou mayst be found If he can plead thus Lord give me and others of thy people an experiment upon which to trust thee with the more boldnesse for time to come It 's true thy faithfulnesse needeth no such avouchers but my faith and that of others needs such props many of thy people will be much refreshed by what thou shalt do for me I will tell them what God hath done for my soul Set me up as a patterne of mercy and tender compassions to them that after shall believe 1 Tim. 1. 16. And this Argument also an afflicted condition principally administers because experience of God in an afflicted condition is a double experience 't is more notable more encouraging then at any other time Now it is true in the last place none of these arguments work any alteration of God who is the same before we aske as when we aske and because he intends to give fits and frames our hearts to aske but it is much to us when in prayer we can urge such arguments as may support our faith in expectation of an answer God is not the more disposed to give by such arguments but we are made more inclinable to believe we shall receive upon such considerations and by so believing more disposed and qualified for the mercies we begge at his hands Arguments urged in prayer stirre up our faith and the more faith we pray withal the nearer are we to an answer Vse I shall make but this one Use of the poâ—nt to exhort all that hear me this day in stead of those many uselesse improper and sinfull wayes which they are apt as most people are to take in a time of affliction to resolve upon this course This let me presse upon you from these few motives Mot. 1. 'T is a course that will very much lighten the burthen Strangulat inclusus dolor Can a man in this sense carry fire in his bosome and not be burnt Prov. 6. 27. Every passion like the heat of the stomack when it hath no food feeds on the heart and burns up the soul that imprisons it The wind imprisoned in the earth causeth earthquakes and fire pent up in a watry cloud thunder No wonder if grief whiles it wants that kindly vent torture a man raise heart quakes Whereas on the other side when burthens of spirit have vent that a man can discharge them freely in prayer they are much allayed Prayer is an exercise that warmes a man into an holy sweat by which he sweetly breaths out the malady that vexed him If a man have but a faithfull friend that will suffer him under any pressure to sit down by his side and patiently tell him the sad stories of his pressures what a refreshment is it But to see how a child that hath gotten a grievous fall if he can but go to the father and shew him the wound and complain of the mischance if the father will take up the child in his armes and blow upon the part it is well presently How much more will prayer ease an oppressed spirt by recourse to God who is more friendly then a thousand friends and more fatherly then a thousand Fathers His bowels are beyond those of the tenderer sex whose pity and compassion is commonly most abundant as Jonathans beyond the love of women 2 Sam. 1. 26. and those of the tenderest relation in that Sex Can a woman a mother forget her sucking child c. Yet will I not forget thee Isai 49. 15. 2 'T is a course that will mightily lay the distempers of our own spirits which ordinarily are the bellowes that blow every suffering into a flame and make it a devouring fire that should be but a refining one A mans heart in an affliction is like the sea in a tempest and as that disturbs it self and tosseth it self up and down in unquiet motions one thought as so many waves dashing in pieces another it spares no body falls out with men quarrels with meer senselesse instruments occasions and providences takes pet at God himselfe and how many thousands more mad pranks of passion and discontent doth it play in such a condition What a frantick bedlam-frame for the while was that of Jobs spirit in his fit of impatience To curse the day of his birth Alas that day was past many years before and never to return again a meer non-entity he might with as much discretion have cursed latter Lammas as we use to say a day that shall never be as the day that is past and can be recalled no more Then he falls out with the knees that dandled him and the brests that nourished him his mother or if we can imagine that the fashion of putting out children to nurse was then brought into the world his Nurse This was a worse distemper an unnatural rage against those to whom he owed most love And a while after he falls out with God and will needs reason the case with him Like a mad man in a throng he deals blowes about him and cares not or at least considers not where they light on friend or foe But when God once brings us down upon our knees O what a calme is there How soon doth the Soveraignty of God the holinesse justice wisdome of God compared with our dependent condition our basenesse guilt folly c. set before the eyes of the soul when it is powred out in prayer make us tame and meek and self-resigning and reconciled to Instruments even blessing them that curse us and praying for them that despitefully use us and laying our mouthes in the dust that God may be glorified in our abasement And 't is a