in part to come written without that is plain for discovery open to the view All which imports that Iohn was to write of the then present state of Affairs and of the churches which was plain and open and as of things that are and also of the future state of things which are as a book written within sealed and secret in respect of their futurity 2. Another Note hence is That God's true Prophets and faithful Ministers will commend no more to the observation of their churches as visions from God then what they have really seen and hath been discovered from God unto them They are not to come with the word of the Lord in their mouth and pretend visions from God like the false prophets in Ier. 14 whiles their mouths and hearts are full of lying vanities Iohn writes no more then what he saw to the seven churches nor discovers no more then what he saw was then present or should come to pass in after time What we haue seen and heard saith the Apostle we speak and are bold to preach and to commend unto you Christ's Ministers should press no more then what they are assured are experienced truths I doubt me every opinion concerning outward forms of Government Discipline and the like will not at last appear to be visions of God which some do now a days so hotly contend for it may be one day said unto such hot-spurs Boanerges sons of Thunder who required such things at your hands whiles you let the greatest works as of love righteousness and judgement lie prostrate at your feet as if they did not concern you Vers 20. The mysterie of the seven Stars c. Christ in the last verse to make things plain unto John and to give him a taste of the discovery of those mysteries in his book interprets the mystery of the vision of seven Stars and of the seven Candlesticks presented unto his sight in the precedent 12 and 16 verses and he calls it the mysterie of seven Stars and candlesticks because indeed unto John it was a secret and hidden thing what those figures of stars and candlesticks did mystically mean or represent and unto John it would be still a mysterie if Christ himself had not here interpreted Hence Note That this book of Revelations is made clear obvious and manifest by a diligent observation and a right applicationof the mystical characters and figures of each vision Christ himself in this verse hath made the first enterance and essay on this account He tells us that the seven Stars in his right hand and the seven golden candlesticks do mystically represent the seven Angels or Messengers of his churches and the seven candlesticks the churches themselves In the seventeenth chapter Christ is more large in interpreting the mysterie of Babylon the great the mother of harlots c. All which connotes unto us Observ That the wise observant christian may attain unto the revelation and discovery of the mysteries of this book of Prophesies by the help of the Spirit of God upon a diligent enquiry thereinto The Spirit says often in the second and third chapters Let him that hath an ear hear what the Spirit saith unto the Churches and in chap. 13. vers 18. Here is wisdom let him that hath wit count the number Here is the mind that hath wisdom cap. 17. v. 9. so that it is for him that hath an ear an intelligent understanding ear and wisdom a wise heart to consider that is fit and capable to open and apply aright the mysteries of this book It is a mystery therefore difficult to all but unto the spiritualized eye and unto the mind that hath wisdom but it should not therefore be accounted presumption in such to undertake this essay seeing it hath pleased Christ to give us the first fruits himself in opening the mysteries of the vision of the seven stars and the seven golden candlesticks which is as an enterance into the whole and since he hath interpreted unto us that by the seven stars are meant the seven Angels of the churches by the seven golden candlesticks the seven famous Asian churches by the woman arrayed in scarlet the mother of harlots in the seventeenth of the Revelations to be the great City that reigneth over the Kings of the earth and the Beast with seven heads and ten horns to signifie a Government Empire or Kingdom on seven Mountains where the great harlot reigneth under ten Kings why should it be thought strange rash or presumptuous to interpret the rest of the mystical figures and hyeroglyphick characters of this book according to their natural and genuine tendency and as they are opened and applyed in other prophetical writings by one and the same Spirit of Prophesie whose wisdom it was ever from the beginning to represent the risings progress and downials of the great Empires and Kingdoms of the word by such dark and mysterious figures and representations unto God's servants his Prophets And conceive one great reason of this dark and mysterious carriage of the Spirit is That the Intendments of God towards the Powers and Kingdoms of the world may be revealed and made known but unto few such as have spirits sutable and wills to conform to the will of God in all things for if those great events and revolutions of State were made vulgar and known unto all it would raise innumerable combustions in the world and great sufferings and afflictions to the children of God from those Powers that they live under for whose sakes these great concussions and subversions of States and Kingdoms do come to pass that Christ's and their Interest may be exalted at the last 2. Note That it is the Spirit of Christ in his Word that makes known and opens the secrets of all Divine mysteries unto his servants Christ discovers unto John those mysteries of stars c. It is this Spirit that searcheth into the deep things of God He shall take of mine as Christ saith John 16.15 and shall show it unto you and hence he is called the Comforter because he makes the love of the Father and the grace of Christ which was before-hand hid in the bosome and counsel of God manifest unto poor souls and so sheds abroad the love of God in their hearts by faith The discovery of Divine mysteries are too high a work for the ablest and wisest person in his natural capacity without the help of Christ's Spirit for they are spiritually not carnally to be discerned But to proceed The mysterie of the seven stars Christ interprets to be the Angels of the seven churches Stars in all prophetical writings do signifie persons of eminency and honour and in Heraldry it is accounted the most noble sort of blazoning peculiar alone to the Armory of Princes The Angels of the seven churches or rather Messengers for so the Greek word signifies because they come with the best message and news that ever came to man to wit the glad tydings of
Name written that no man knoweth but he that receiveth it The Note hence is Observ That God hath reserved and treasured up unspeakable glory for his conquering Saints It is a new Name that no man knoweth a hidden Manna a spiritual participating of Christ that is above our understanding a new and joynt power given to us by and with Christ that we at present are uterly ignorant of yea it is such a prize of glory that eye hath not seen ear hath not heard or the heart of man cannot comprehend And therefore in 2 Cor. 4.17 it is called a most excellent and eternal weight of glory and therefore here in this 2. and 3. cap. this prize this crown of glory is set forth under various and divers figures and resemblances which are sensible and apt for our capacities as ver 7. under the Tree of life in the Paradice of God ver 10. under the expression of the Crown of life ver 17. of the hidden Manna and white Stone and new Name ver 26. of power over the Nations and of the morning Star in cap. 3. ver 5. under the name of white Rayment and Book of life ver 12. of a Pillar in the Temple of God the Name of God and the City of God and in ver 21. of sitting on the Throne with Christ in his Throne as Christ hath already sate down on the Father's Throne All these expressions are taken up by the Spirit to represent unto us the inestimable weight of glory that is set forth as a prize and treasured up by God for all faithful persevering and overcoming christians And therefore let us all so run as we may obtain Use But by the way here is an Use of Reproof upon such that would now at present catch at the Crown before the coronation day You must first overcome before you raign unless you will raign without Christ it is a hidden Manna a new Name it is not meat for this corrupt world nor a work for this generation It is a white Stone wherein a new Name is written that yet no man knoweth it is not a dispensation for this corrupt age it is an excellent and eternal weight of glory reserved for the new World the Golden age the new Jerusalem the new Heaven and Earth wherein dwelleth righteousness and this will be produced in God's appointed time by the almighty power and arm of Christ who is the great captain conductor and leader unto this glorious day and therefore al such as pretend to lead and advance to this day otherwise then by a placid submission to the providential dispensations of God in the world they only set up stumbling blocks for themselves and their followers to fall by They that will rule with Christ must overcome with Christ they that will sit with him in his Throne must first pass to it as he did by a conquest over sufferings and temptations 2 Tim. 2.12 Rom. 8.17 If we suffer with Christ we shal raign with Crist for this crown is gotten by the way of the cross but to seek it by Swords Pistols Rapines and Blood-sheds you may obtain a crown and Kingdom in the World from the Prince that ruleth in the Ayr and the children of the World but never from the Lambe that sitteth on the Throne O therefore returne to this true Lamb of God and his Lamb-like condition or else he will become a Lyon against you and for your highmindedness and sins of rebellion and blood will come against you quickly and fight against you by the Sword of his mouth O kiss the Son least he be angry Vers 18. And unto the Angel of the Church of Thyatira write These things saith the Son of God who hath his eyes like unto a flame of fire and his feet like fine brass Here it is evident who â—t is all along that gives these premonitions to each church it is Christ the Son of God who in the former verses is called the Spirit for his spiritual appearance in the likness of the Son of man In the first cap. from vers 13. to 16. this Son of God that appeared unto John in the likness of the Son of Man in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks gives a general discovery of himself unto John in all his attributes as God and Man as King Priest and Prophet as the Saviour and Preserver of his church also as a just Judge and avenger of his enemies But now when Christ appears with the particular charges against each church he takes as it were his attributes asunder and cloaths himself with that attribute which is most suitable for the present condition of the church that he is to deal with To the churches of Ephesus and Smyrna which were the most sound and sincere he appears under the attributes of a merciful Father who was dead and is alive ver 8. and of a gracious preserver of his church ver 1 who holdeth the seven Stars in his right hand But now unto the churches of Thyatira and Pergamus which were more debauched and unsound Christ manifests himself in a far different resemblance and posture having a Sword with two edges proceeding out of his mouth in his appearance towards the church of Pergamus and here unto Thyatira like one that hath his eyes like unto a flame of fire and his feet like fine or burning brass This is a posture of indignation and wrath for eyes sparkling like fire betokneth wrath and feet like fine brass readiness of execution Here Christ from head to feet is presented in a fiery colour This is Christ's posture when he goes out in judgments against a church or Nation when he goes out to war against his enemies he puts on this fiery posture Rev. 19.11 12 13. See more hereon cap. 1. ver 14 15. Observ That when Christ goes out in judgment against a people his appearance is very dreadful The Prophet Malachi speaking of the coming of Christ when he comes who may abide the day of his coming and who shall stand when he appeareth For he is like the Refiner's fire and shall sit as a Refiner and purifier of silver cap. 3. 2 3. A Refiners fire is the hottest it melts purges consumes and is terrible such a fire is Christ in his judgments When he comes to destroy Antichrist and his Kingdom Paul says 2 Thess 1.8 He shall come in flames of fire Have not most of our western Nations as Germany France England Scotland c. seen this terrible appearance of Christ of late in his judgments among us who hath laid many Kingdoms and Nations almost in the dust destroy'd many ancient Families Houses Cities Townes and Countries by the Sword and yet who layes it to heart And yet Christ will be more terrible for the great day of his wrath is at hand and who will be able to stand Rev. 6.17 The great ones of the earth that are found fighting against him shall that day call for the Rocks and
because this of Christ coming in the clouds here is set as the general result and the main proposition of the whole of the Revelation wherein the great designe is to set forth Christ to come and the glorious estate of his Church here on earth before the ultimate end as will appear hereafter To demonstrate this a little plainer I set these Queries out of Zach. 12. collated with this place and that of Matth. 24.30 1. Was ever Iudah or Ierusalem since that Prophesie made to her enemies a cup of trembling Was she ever a burdensome stone to the whole earth to cut them in pieces Have ever the Governours of Iudah been like an hearth of fire amongst the wood and and like a torch of fire in a sheaf devouring all the people round about Or Were they ever since that Prophesie of Zachary in that strength that the feeble amongst them were as David and the house of David as Elohim c. Peruse the History of the Iews and consider whether you can find the least accomplishment thereof I next quere when was ever that eminent effusion of the Spirit of grace and supplication poured out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Ierusalem that they should look on him whom they had pierced and mourn for him with great bitterness each family mourning apart Was this done at Christ's passion by the obstinate Iews his crucifiers They derided him Or was this fulfilled by the small number of the Iews his Disciples the eleven who fled at his suffering They did not pierce him Or was this fulfilled upon those mourners in Acts 2 They saw him not when they mourned nor with their families apart nor saw him in the clouds and thereupon mourn for him and therefore as yet the main of this Prophesie is to be fulfilled Lastly Is this to be referred to the last resurrection or ultimate judgement I ask Is that a day of repentance of mourning and of grace That is a day of judgement unto the wicked and then Christ's dispensatory Kingdom of Grace is at an end 1 Cor. 15.24 Therefore to be brief and not to exceed due bounds I assert That here by seeing Christ coming in the clouds by every eye and by them that pierced him and that all kindreds of the earth should wail because of him is meant by John as Zachary meant namely that all the Tribes both Iews and Gentiles should see Christ coming in the clouds with glory as man before the end of all to the Iews and all his Elect with grace and godly repentance to the all other his enemies with horrour and confusion consult Jer 25.5 6. Zach. 2.10 11 12. Isa 2. throughout Object But here it may be objected That you make divers comings of Christ to judgement the one to the conversion of the Iews and the restauration of his Church to a glorious State and Reigne in the destruction of their enemies and another or second coming again before the final end of all things to execute the ultimate judgement But this is contrary to Scripture which mentions only of two comings of Christ the first in the flesh in the time of the Gospel and the last at the day of judgement to execute the wrath of his Father on all his impenitent enemies and the refusers of his Gospel I answer Christ's coming in Scripture is variously taken somtimes for his first coming in the flesh somtimes in Spirit of grace power and miracles but lastly and most eminently to judgement And in this his last coming there are several remarkable periods and events In the beginning and morning of this great day he comes to convert the Jews restore the kingdom unto Israel and to the church of Christ and to destroy antichrist and all the Saints enemies not utterly finally but of all power and dominion over the Church which is quite taken off by Christ and a sure chain or tye laid on their spirits of malice and on their Ring-leader Satan himself that there is none can hurt during this glorious reigne in Gods holy mountain This Restauration is the work of the morning of the day But the wotk of the evening of this day is the universal resurrection of the dead and to give final sentence on all the enemies of Christ that opposed him and his Kingdom and to give them their portions with the divel and his angels in that lake of fire that burneth for evermore see more at large hereof in chap. 20. So that there is not two last comings of Christ but two remarkable acts or events in this his last coming to wit in the morning and evening of this great day of his appearance Verse 8. I am Alpha and Omega the beginning and the ending saith the Lord which is and which was and which is to come even the Almighty Here the Divinity of Christ is plainly asserted who counts it no robbery to be equal with God and to take his attributes unto himself And that the person here intended by the Spirit is Christ is clear from the precedent verse the same person that came with clouds and was pierced is the same here described who is the Alpha and Omega and this is most evident by collating it to verse 11. and 17. where he that is the first and the last who was dead but now alive commands John to write what he saw and that was Christ verse 1. Christ is here called the Alpha and Omega which are the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet and which is and which was and which is to come even the Almighty Out of which description of his person Note Observ That Christ is one and the same infinite almighty and eternal God of himself with the Father from everlasting By him all things were made in the beginning and without him nothing was made and by him all things shall end This eternal Word or Christ was with God from everlasting and this Word was God and therefore takes unto himself the essential and absolute incommunicable properties of God unto himself and therefore this is a most express Scripture if there were not any more of this consort in the word of God wherein it abounds to â—ay low the reasons of the greatest pretenders to reason in the world the reasonless Arrianized Socinians of these times who deny the Divinity or Godhead of Christ Collate with this to this purpose verses 4 and 5. of this chapter Verse 9. I John even your brother and companion in tribulation and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ was in the Isle called Patmos for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus Christ John in this verse describes his condition and the place wherein he was when he received this Revelation using the loving and common Christian compellations of brother and companion in tribulation the word in the original is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a fellow commoner or fellow-sharer in affliction From whence by the way observe from
will keep her from the hour of temptation which shall come upon all the world to try them that dwell upon the earth is no more in effect but as if Christ had said I will keep thee from the hurt and danger of the hour of temptation which shall come upon all the christian churches in the world for the tryal of their faith and constancy in all the quarters of the earth Hence Note Observ That not any of Christ's churches are exempted from tryals and temptations And the great reason of this is that the church most thrives and grows this way it is observed a Lily among Thorns grows fairest and largest and it was anciently said that the blood of the Martyrs was the seed-plot of the church the more times that gold is refined by the Refiners fire the more ductible and solid it becomes So Christ's churches the more tryals they go under the more eminent and resplendent they become in grace In the day of affliction under Bishops and Prelates more true godliness did appear then at present in the day of prosperity and peace A beloved child never scapes without a rod from his Father when he offends neither a true church from Gods fatherly tryals and chastisements for in some things we offend all and the best hath their maculae their spots dross and defections to be purged from therefore not strange when we fall into diverse tryals by this we know that we are not bastards but sons beloved of God Heb. 12. And all things shall work together for good to those that fear God Observ 2. Another Note hence is That the greatest hour of calamity and temptation that comes upon the world is but a tryal unto the godly Temptations unto the wicked are God's Judgments towards them they are the executioners of his wrath and justice He destroys the wicked in his fiery indignation But unto the godly they are only for their tryal strengthning and bettering To one God gives riches honour preferment c. as a mercy to the other they become snares unto and destructive So also on the godly as on Job God sends the plundering Sabaeans as a tryal of their patience on the other as the executioners of his wrath Sword famine or death that equally sweeps away both yet unto the one they are but the instruments gate or door to a higher glory yet unto the others an entrance unto final judgments Therefore Saints think it neither no loss when temptations seize upon them they become more weighty more solid more sound more sincere more experimental more gracious and at last more glorious thereby and on this ground how little are they troubled when all the world is on fire and in combustion about their ears when many do call for the mountains to fall upon them and hide them from the fiery indignation that is passing over yet they are placide serene and in a Halcion condition all is peace with them though all the world is fire about them being so far above the world Vers 11. Behold I come quickly hold that fast which thou hast that no man take thy crown Christ tells Philadelphia that he is about a remarkable and notable work and it is Behold I come quickly This is not to be understood of Christ's second coming to judgment nor of his spiritual coming but of his coming with the hour of temptation and tryal upon his churches this is somwhat agreeable unto that expression of Christ to the church of Ephesus cap. 2. 5. Else I will come unto thee quickly and remove thy Candlestick c. So Christ tells the church of Philadelphia with a Behold to usher it in I come quickly what to do But with that hour of temptation upon all the world to try all that dwell upon the earth which hapned and fell out presently after this Vision was given unto John in the time of Trajan the Emperour who succeeded Domitian in whose days this Revelation was given to John at Patmos and in the days of Trajan his successor this hour of temptation tryal affliction and persecution seized upon all the churches of Christ in Asia and else where Therefore she is exhorted to hold fast what she had received and that is the word of Christ and his patience which she had formerly received and kept and that she is now again exhorted to hold fast maintain and persevere in when that hour of temptation cometh on all them that dwell upon the earth Hence Note Observ That the consideration of Christ's speedy coming with times of tryals upon his churches is a special motive to persevere with constancy in the profession of Christ and his truth If we knew that judgement was so neer at the door it would make us to trim up our lamps to have them furnished with the oyl of faith and light of good works that we may be able to stand in the day of tryal No greater motive to set an edge upon our graces then to know that Christ is near with times of tryals If we knew the good man of the house would return this present day we would have all things garnished to bid him welcome Hold fast for I come quickly or else as in the next words you will lose your honour and your crown Hold that fast which thou hast that no man take thy crown As if Christ had said to the church of Philadelphia Thou hast hitherto kept the word of my patience kept close unto my Gospel go on couragiously in that course which thou hast begun hold fast and persevere therein lest if thou fail in thy course another come and take away thy crown and reward Here lies a difficulty what is meant by this crown Some would have it eternal life which is the crown of our faithful adhering to Christ and his doctrine but I cannot adhere to this opinion for this crown can never be taken away from the faithful for though many that are only externally called may be said for non-persevering to lose their crown which they once hoped for and indeed they never had true right and title to it but only in their outward seeming call and in the book of the visible church but not of God's election and predetermination as formerly more at large is manifested verse 5. on the book of life Therefore surely this crown which may be taken away from the faithful and given to another for inconstancy or non-perseverance in the truth is that honour and reward which was promised Philadelphia in verse 9. preceding That all her enemies should fall low before her and worship before her feet which kinde of crown and reward indeed may be taken away from the faithful for their looseness slothfulness or remisness in duties of godliness to which they are often promised and annexed and for want thereof are often removed and given to a more proficient and worthy people So you see what is this crown that may be taken away from the faithful for their
mountains Christ and his Saints shall be the universal Monarchy in the world He and they shall rule the Nations not one of them but all of them with a rod of iron which never as yet was fulfilled but rather the contrary and therefore to be expected in its due time and season Quest But the great question and doubt is whether this Triumphant state of the church shall be here on earth or in the supernal heavens as some would have it Answ I answer The new Ierusalem or new church-state is to come down from God out of heaven as aforesaid and therefore sure not in heaven Secondly It is a new heaven and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness according to 2 Pet. 3.13 now righteousness or justice is properly in earth among living Saints and is given unto them as an additional promise of future happiness in heaven above there was no fear to miss it or needed any promise for the confirmation of it Thirdly In this new State Christ shall rule the Nations with a rod of iron now surely 't is well known there are no Nations in heaven to be ruled with a rod of iron and therefore it must be on earth Fourthly This new city was measured by the Angel Rev. 21.17 and it was found according to the measure of man that is of the Angel one hundred forty and four cubits and how this finite measure can suit with the infiniteness and immeasurableness of the supernal heavens let the wise consider therefore surely it must be meant of an estate on earth Fifthly In verse 24. it is said That the Kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour unto it now this cannot be said of the supernal heavens for they can bring no addition unto that 6. To this new state there is promised That God will wipe off all sorrow and tears and that there shall be no night there Now this were superfluous to be promised and added to the supernal heaven the habitation of Gods glory and therefore it must be fulfilled to a new church state here on earth Seventhly and lastly How unreasonable would it be to describe the invisible heavens above with rivers with streets and with trees therein sutable only to an estate here on earth as this is in Rev. 22.1 2. And this is that Jerusalem which is above that Paul speaks of Gal. 4.26 which is the mother of us all it is called heavenly and from above because of its divine original and of its right of inheritance and it is said to descend or come down from God because God's singular power and mercy shall gloriously appear in building this new city And this new heaven or heavenly church state shall be on earth according to Rev. 21.1 and understand that subordiâ—ata non sunt contraria There may be a heaven on earth and yet a heaven above there may be a church triumphant on earth and yet in heaven also And therefore to close with that of Rev. 5.11 which is very downright and positive for the earth to be the place of the Saints triumphant reigne And we shall reigne on earth Quest But another question may be made whether this Imperial reigne of the Saints shall be after the general resurrection and judgment or before Answ I answer after the particular resurrection of the Saints and before the ultimate end of the judgment of the Nations and wicked of the world the Saints shall first arise and come with Christ and meet him in the clouds and be joyned to the Saints that are then alive which at the sounding of Christ's trump and in a moment shall be changed and made immortal as their brethren the raised ones are and they shall reigne a thousand years and over whom but over the unbelieving Nations of the world And this is Christ's great day of judgment and the day of his reigne wherein himself with his Saints and members do reign over and judge the wicked of the world wherein a thousand years is but as one day with God and this he does before the ultimate act of all for towards the evening of this great day God suffers Satan to gather together all the wicked of the world as the sand of the Sea shore under the conduct of Gog and Magog to endeavour the ruine of these immortal Saints if it were possible Rev. 20.8 9. but they are all taken in that enterprize with their leader Satan and cast into the lake of everlasting fire and presently thereon follows the general resurrection and judgement of all and all that were not found written in the book of life were cast into that lake of fire which is the second death And I would willingly demand of all that are contrary minded to what end should this new Jerusalem come down from heaven after the general judgement or after the ultimate end of all when all the elect Saints of God shall be translated into heaven into the Kingdom of God even the Father They that should conceive that the new Jerusalem or church state should descend unto the earth after all the Saints are carryed by Christ unto his long before prepared mansion even into that heavenly place where himself shall be and so we also shall be for ever with the Lord 1 Thes 4.17 John 17.24 I should judge them to want some Hellebore or rather true light from above to enlighten their dark understandings in this particular and therefore sure the time of the Saints triumphant reigne is to be here on earth before the ultimate end and general judgement of all the world From the words Which shall come down from heaven from my God Observe Observ 2. That that glorious new Church-state that the Saints shall enjoy or otherwise That the â—aints Imperial reigne shall be most eminently conspicuoâ—â— and openly known and acknowledged by all the Nations of the world Now the great question is Who are the true church or the only Saints in the world This question then will be cleared and put out of doubt and not till then wholly but in part according to the several measures of outward tokens and characters which may be counterfeit and hypocritical but then there shall be no deceit no hypocrisie shall lye hid the name of God will be writ upon them and of the new Jerusalem and of the Son of God and it will be so eminently obvious to all beholders and so plainly demonstrated in the operations and effects thereof as if the very name had been written in their foreheads and surely it must needs be so for this new city comes down from God he being the builder of it and John saw by a prophetical Vision this new City coming down from God out of heaven Rev. 20.2 And if it were already come down from God as some of those days do vainly dream of it would surely be known and acknowledged both by the godly and ungodly also by the godly as being the especial workmanship of his own hand only
go undiscovered that deserve such Titles better themselves or at least wise so to raise a Scar-crow to drive away the fearful and dis-ingenious from a full enquiring into the Truths of God that would discover the vanity and folly of their opposers But no more of this And here by the way I shall not be ashamed to acquaint you with one mistake of mine who once thought as most men do that God in his Providential disposing the Kingdoms oâ— this world and in exalting men of low degreâ— into the Throne of Princes and throwing down great Princes and their Progenies into the state of slaves it was only to manifest his Soveraignty over the Kingdoms of this world to give them to whom he pleaseth but more maturely considering the All-wise ordering hand of God in such great Transactions I have found the issue in all Ages to be very advantagious to the Church of God and the result of all such State-shakings and Revolutions to be in mercy towards his Church and People When God broke the great Caldeo-Assyrian Monarchy and transferred it to the Medio-Persian how vvonderfully and by vvhat strange providence did God raise Cyrus his servant or instrument for that work Who was exposed to be destroyed by the command of his Grandsire Astyages whiles an Infant upon pretence of some fatal Prophesie yet preserved and brought up amongst Shepherds as his Story goes that afterwards he became most providentially the great deliverer of God's people the Jews from their Assyrian bondage Moses the great Captain of Israel we are sure trod almost the same path under a strange providence of Preservation that at last he became the deliverer of Israel from their Aegyptian thraldome When Saul was set by who was of a Kingly Presence and by the Head and Shoulders above his brethren David was called from the Sheep-cot to the Throne the issue whereof was the exaltation of Israel and the downfal of their enemies If we shall but reflect since Christ's coming in the flesh on the example of Constantine the Great Son unto Helena a Brittish Lady who through many glorious and eminent Victories and Services was at last advanced to the Imperial Seat and how he at last became as a Temporal Saviour to the Church of Christ and Destroyer to the Kingdom of the Dragon is most marvellous to consider It is worth further the taking notice of how wonderfully God in late ages raised the Spirits of some obscure persons as Martin Luther and his Associates of the first Reformation with some other Reformed Ministers since that they have made the great Hierarchy of Rome to shake with their Power so that many Christian Princes then and since began to hate the Whore with the Wine of whose Fornications they were made drunken and now begin not only to hate her but to make her desolate and naked and to eat her flesh But yet that age was but the first fruits or Prodromus not the consummation of the work for she having since lifted up her head and endeavoured to cover her nakedness and to cure her self of her great Wound received but all in vain for her period drawing nigh God exasperates her sore more and more and makes those Horns those Princes that were once her strong Supporters to fall off from her and to hate her Indeed the first Reformers took off her outward garments and showed her nakedness in her false Doctrine and partly in her false Worship and then began to eat her Flesh in taking off some of her pompous Revenues but yet the main Work was left undone to its appointed time For as this great City rose not in one day but gradually so will also her ruine be by several Measures or Vials of God's wrath poured out upon her until the consummation of her ruine come with fire both Material and Analogical the one the fire of God's Word first destroying quite her false Worship which daylie goes on in perfecting the other God's fire of War and Judgements destroying quite up her outward State and Policy that her place be no more found And to the bringing about this great end God works very variously somtimes in moving on the hearts of Princes and so makes them willing unto this work somtimes in laying aside Princes of ancient and potent Families and raising up meaner and lower Persons on their Thrones as he most wonderfully hath done of late among our selves to whom he gives Hearts Spirits and Gifts meet for this great work and lastly in over-ruling the designs of others that though they go about to seek themselves and to advance their own Dominion and Power of Ruling yet the All-wise providence of God knows how so to order them as to bring about his predesigned end For I cannot believe that they will be all pious good Princes and right in their ends that shall be employed about this work for they are the ten Horns or ten Kings that receive power one hour with the Beast and were Members of him that shall destroy the Whore and burn her with Fire Rev. 17.12.16 I am of the minde that few conclude that Hen. 8. and some other Princes were so justifiable in their ends in expelling the Authority of Antichrist as they should have been and yet God employed them as his Instruments in this Work and when they have done his business God knows how to lay them by and all such self-ended persons as useless or at least make them but as Gibeonites or Hewers of Wood in the House of the Lord. Lastly Your Worship may be pleased to take notice that some conceive those and the like Interpretations of dark Prophesies to be but the issues of distempered brains and of little certainty To whom I answer Seeing that this is a Book that hath the publique impress of the Spirit in it and left as it were as its last Legacy of this sort in the Church of Christ I profess soberly I know not what tolerable sense to set on this Book of the Revelation if it be not for an historical discovery under Types and Figures of all the Changes and Revolutions with their Periods and Issues that should befal the Church of God and their Oppressors and Enemies until the end of all I confess there may be some difference in Interpreting and in not rightly Applying some of the several Characters Periods and Visions of this Book and in other circumstantial parts thereof and wherein I fail I entreat not only your Worship but all others to remember my weakness and our common attribute Humanum est errare and especially being amongst such Prophetical deeps and difficulties which may well plead for his failings who is conscious of his insufficiencies for so high and difficult an undertaking Yet this I dare be bold to say that the substantial part of this Prophesie is here cleared and discovered And if any receive light hereby to the better understanding the dark Mysteries thereof give me leave to say with Daniel cap.
2.28 There is a God in Heaven which revealeth Mysteries to him be all the Glory But to You worthy Sir I have nothing more to add nor for you a greater good to pray then that God who having exalted you in Authority and Power into that likeness of himself so he would Engrave upon you another image or likeness of his own true wisdom and give you an enlightned wise Solomon-like discerning heart whereby you may dayly see more and more into the great and glorious discoveries of the Truths of God in this Book of Prophesies and else-where in the holy Word of God that you may have your ayms right and your heart fixed to prosecute those ends and that in integrity which God in your present Employments hath called you unto The work of this present generation for all Christian Worthies to set their hands and hearts to being as I conceive if not to the downfal of the Throne of the Beast yet at least to the Eclipsing of the Austrian Sun the great Pillar of the Antichristian State And that your heart and hand may not be wanting amongst the chiefest of the Christian Worthies in those great transactions is the great desire of him that is Your Worships Most Humble and Faithful Servant William Hicks To the Judicious Christian READER READER IT is very well known that amongst most that are conversant in the profoundest Speculations and in searching out hidden Verities they are various in their Projects and their Cogitations are usually fixed upon divers ends Some know that they may be known and this is vanity Some know that they may know and this is curiosity Others know that they may edifie and this is charity How distasteful the two former are to all judicious persons and how desirable the latter is to all knowing Christians I need not inculcate The latter being my choice I hope thy candour and the uprightness of my ends will Apologize for me in that I appear in Publique now among the croud in Print and at such a time wherein as one wittily observed viz. Heylins Geogr. in folio 865. The Treasury of Learning was never so full and yet never more empty by reason of the many vain frothy and unnecessary discourses it abounds with from the Scriblers and idle Paper-blurrers of these days and if I have gone beside my self to become one of that number by playing the fool in Print I must say as Paul did to his Corinthians 2 Cor. 5.13 Sive insanimus Deo insanimus sive sâ—na mente sumus vobis sana mente sumus So if I have played the fool herein it is unto God and for your sakes Christians that I have done it But if thou askest me to what end I fall upon this task of interpreting this Book of Prophesies seeing many have already attempted it whereof some are come off with loss yet others with more credit and proficiency I answer Indeed in all our actions and undertakings of this kinde we are to enquire in the first place Cui bono To what good for what end we do effect them For the end crowns all our actions and adds perfection to them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Exitus actu probat The excellency of our works appears and are distinguished by their ends Therefore though my labour herein may by some be accounted superfluous and my self to be justly numbred among the former sort that have Oleum Operam perdiderunt that is come off with loss in their undertakings yet I believe the indifferent and ingenious Reader will be of another minde concerning it when God hath given him and my self opportunity to go thorow with it though I must confess it will partake of much weakness and imperfections from the Instrument yet I trust the Reader will find my ends high and honourable enough and of sufficient excellency to bear up my Spirits in the undertaking and his in perusing and considering And although to some I may seem herein Actum agere to fall upon a Theme fully already discussed by others yet I am of opinion with that saying of Augustines Utile est plures Libros a pluribus fieri diverso stilo etiam de Questionibus iisdem ut ad plurimos res perveniat ad alios sic ad alios autem sic That it is profitable to have Books composed of the same Works or Questions in a various and divers stile that knowledge may be conveyed to very many to some in one manner to others after another Though I shall not much boast of my impartiality in Interpreting and Applying those Prophetical Visions yet I assure the Reader as far as I know mine own heart it was single and unbyassed in this undertaking having first desired God to guide my Vnderstanding and Pen aright to write no more then what did genuinely rise from the substance and coherence of the Text or what might be extracted therefrom by good consequence or what did naturally flow from the proper tendency of the Figures and Hierogliphique characters of each Vision in this Book interpreted not according to private Judgement nor unto the Interest of any Party or Faction being free from any such pre-engagements all which are to be laid aside in all such undertakings as Abraham did his followers as great incumbrances when he went into the Mount to confer with the Lord in Prayer I trust the candid Reader shall finde the Divine Mysteries of this Book of Revelations Opened and Applyed according to the minde of the Spirit therein for the main made evident by the proper characters of each Vision and according to that full compleat Spirit of Harmony that runs through this whole Book of Divine Prophesies I confess I may come short of some Learned Men who have gone herein before me to whose Labours I must justly acknowledge a due Tribute being assisted thereby unto this Work And though I cannot justly apply that saying of Cicero's to my cause for it would savour of too much vanity and self-exalting Recentissima quaeque sunt emandata magis yet this I may boldly adventure to say That thou shalt find such variety of Collections Observations Questions and Truths herein Discussed not ordinary in any former Writers hereupon that will yeild thee if an ingenious person no small delight and profit in Reading Pondering and Treasuring up the same The variety of Flowers makes the sweetest Posie and various Discording yet harmonizing Sounds makes the sweetest Musick So variety of Truths and Questions Discussed will yeild the greater pleasure and profit to the Reader And though I must needs say that many that went before me on this Theme did excel in true Piety Learning and Parts yet saving due respects both to the Persons and their Parts it is not at all strange if that we in this Age being advanced by their help upon their own shoulders and coming nearer unto the accomplishment of the events and the end of all should see a little further in the Truth of these mysterious
Prophesies then they that went before us and no discredit to them be they ever so Godly and Learned I have observed that some and no mean Ones that are gone before on this Theme are not without their Maculae and Defects and more especially in that they have appeared of too private and narrow a Spirit in their Interpreting and applying the Prophesies of this Book unto their own times Interests and Designs as if the Actions and Revolutions of every petty City and Commonweal yea the ends Designs and Periods of every Person that Divine Providence exalts in Power and Authority somwhat beyond the common boundaries of the ordinary Lords and Rulers of the Nations were Comprised Predicted Fore-told and Prophesied of in this Book of Revelations and so by this means makes strange and wilde Applications of the Visions and Mysteries of this Book And where this conceit works strongly it will work madly too when once it is elevated to that height and gets a power then there must be no opposing of those Ends and Designs that such Opinionists pretends as just Collections from the Prophesies of this Book which they interpret according to their own Fancies and have only a Being as wilde Chymeras in their own deceived Imaginations This is that Rock whereon some have formerly made Shipwrack and perished thereon and others now adays are Sayling with a full gale towards the same Charybdis and if God in Mercy prevent not will thereon split and perish also But to return Here I shall give an answer Cui bono or to what ends I undertook this Exercitation on this Book of the Revelation This last the Discovery of this dangerous Rock was not the least End that I set before me in this undertaking Which Ends for better satisfaction I shall here more particularly set down in Order 1. My first was next Gods Glory and the advancement of his Truth for the keeping the Saints feet streight in not stumbling by a false Interpreting and Applying of this Book of Prophesies and in vainly endeavouring the setting up of the Kingdom of Christ before the time and in the pulling down all Authority that oppose such Pretenders to their own utter ruine and undoing without Repentance 2. That Christs true Saints may be comforted and supported under all their Afflictions and Persecutions in this World by the consideration of Christs own True and Real Kingdom which is to come Not this of Weakness which is partly Spiritual partly Carnal but that of Power and great Glory when all his â—nemies shall be made his Foot-stool and broken and ruled by his Rod of Iron which will be at the great Day of his Appearance and coming in the Clouds and not before 3. In Profiting my self and others My self in Writing others in Reading As it was once said by Augustine Prodest scribendo scribendo prodest We having all as Aquinas testifies longing desires conjungi cum suo principio to be conjoyned with our principle 4. To redeem the time having spent many precious hours and days in folly and been examples unto others in evil doing So there is all reason we should redeem the time and God calls in this day of light both from my self and all others that we should be patterns unto others in well doing if that possibly we may redeem the lost time of our youth and folly Lastly That God may have his ends and glory in the work of our Creation we being born not alone for our selves but for the work of our generation to serve God therein faithfully in all the relations that he calls us to God hath not sent us into this world to spend away all our precious days in sports pastimes and follies or about the more profitable affairs of this present world as the custom of too too many is but to sacrifice some competent part thereof unto the service of our God and Christ that our friends neighbours relations and posterity may take encouragements and examples by us to live more unto the praise of God and their Creator Having thus laid down my ends in this undertaking I have this more to acquaint thee with This Exercitation being sent forth as my First-born in this kinde in publique unto the world the second being intended also on this whole Book of Divine Prophesies if God doth continue but his wonted mercies and encouragements thereunto This first is more Practical and Doctrinal and therefore I have herein followed a method with Observations and Notes which the second will not so commodiously admit the great work of that being to demonstrate the truth of each Prophesie and how the Mysteries Figures and Characters thereof are to be interpreted understood and applyed to their proper times periods States Interests and revolutions represented by them But this first being more practical and treating of divers Questions that are under dispute now in these days I thought it fit to let this see the light in the first place to try how it will taste upon the pallates of the godly ingenious for if it savours well with them it will suffice and be a farther encouragement unto the second I know I shall not please all in this Writing neither was there ever a Writer with whom all have been satisfyed for according to the Poet Ad captum Lectoris habent sua fata Libelli Books do either hit or miss As the Readers Judgement is Neither indeed was it in my thoughts to endeavour the satisfacton of all well knowing that there are some so prepossessed with prejudice or at least so wedded to their own conceits that it were the greatest unreasonableness and servility in the World to captivate ones reason to the satisfaction of their overweening folly It was also far beneath my Designe to accommodate my Writings to the popular applause and as the Tragedian says Populo ut placerent who commonly weigh not the matter by the truth and Scriptural reason but by their own irregular fancies and affections and therefore am far from their humour who Nil rectum reputant nisi quod placuit sibi ducunt Next I shall acquaint the ingenious Reader That if any of my conclusions recede from the truth of Scriptures I could willingly wish all such an abortion in the very birth But if any thereof seem only to discede from the common received Opinions let the Ingenious consider So long as they are Warranted by the Authority of Scripture and Reason I hope I shall not want a Protector or a sufficient Defence and Apologie I have no more to add in this way of Apologizing unto the Reader but if he be a friend unto the Truths herein discussed I wish him a farther increase of Divine light If he be malevolent thereunto all the harm I wish him is a better Spirit and a more enlightned Judgement If he be supine and negligent I wish him to add diligence and prayers to God for a right enquiry If he be ignorant I wish him a greater measure of true
much every way both to every particular soule and to the whole Church of Christ First if there were no more in it but the detecting and making manifest of the Antichristian whore or state and the pollutions thereof and so give a warning to all Gods people to come out of her and not to partake of her iniquities least they be partakers of her plagues Is it not a blessing to keep their souls undefiled from Antichrists pollutious and to be delivered from judgments due thereunto Was it not a great blessing for Lot to be fore told and delivered out of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah So is it not a singular blessing and mercy unto us and the Church of Christ to be delivered and freed from the divine wrath that is gone out against spirituall or misticall Babylon 2. Is it not a great priviledge and blessing to the people of God to know the catastrophe and result of all their troubles and to have a sure word of Prophesie for their deliverance from the oppressions and cruelties of their enemies and that they shall one day triumph over them to their vtter ruine and destruction Is not this able to beat up their Spirits in all their fiery Tryals to see that their deliverance draweth nigh Is it not a blessing in the day of affliction in the day of mourning to be kept faithfull witnesses unto our God And though Satan and his deputized Antichrist have power over us to overcome and afflict us yet we are these that are sealed in the foreheads with the mark of the Lamb 3. Is it not a blessing to know that Antichrists raign is but 42. moneths a certain definite time which is now drawing to its period Is it not a blessing to know that the time of the woman in the Wilderness and the witnesses mourning in sackcloth the treading down the true Church of Christ and the Professours thereof is but for 1260. dayes which term is also neer expiring Is it not a great blessing after all the troubles and afflictions of the Church and Saints here on earth to be assured that Christ their head with Myriads of his Angels and Saints departed will appear to the finall destroying of all their enemies and giving them peace and rest causing them to raign on earth Lastly is it not a great blessing to have a promise of the enjoyment and Communion of Christ and his glorified Saints here on earth for a thousand years When mortality shall put on immortality when we shall see and know all the mysteries of God in Christ as we are seen and known when that which is perfect is come that which is imperfect shall be done away when we shall see no longer in a glass through weak and dark ordinances but then we shall see face to face when all our ordinances will be in a higher and more spiritual key when sorrow sin and death shall be swallowed up of victory when we shall walk in the light of the new Ierusalem the Lambs Wife that comes down from Heaven wherein dwelleth true righteousness And shall all those things be discovered in this Book of the Revelation with a promise thereof and of blessedness to all those that keep the words of this Prophesy and yet will any be so stupid to conclude that this is a dry useless book That treats of Christianity from its very rise to the consummation thereof full fraught with aboundance of usefull Observations to steer our feet aright in our militant course here untill we shall all come to the full stature of Christ And whereas some say it is a most difficult Book to interpret and that many able Expositors have come off with loss in their studies about it I answer first that all things to the sluggard indeed are difficult The pith marrow and substance of the Revelations is not to be found out by a coursary reading thereof it is not obvious to every ey And this is intimated in that 3. vers of Chap. 1. wherein is observable that blessedness is entailed to reading hearing and keeping the words of the Prophesy it is not a bare reading or hearing that will entitle to this blessedness but it must be keeping treasuring up pondering and digesting before it will produce the happy fruits of blessedness Indeed there are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the depths for Elephants to swim in as well as shallows for Lambs to wade thorough in the Word of God as God hath dispensed various gifts and abilities in his Saints so God hath sowne in his Word several measures of truth sutable thereunto none may complain for want to exercise their Spirits in The weakest may see so much as shall make him wise unto salvation and the highest capacity can attain no more and when it hath done all yet it must needs confess that it is not omniscient but that there are some misteries in the Word of God that will be still misteries unto it until the day of the Revelation of Christ shall come wherein hee will teach us all things It was a saying of Prospers Parvuli magni fortes infirmi Habent in Scripturis unde alantur satientur No age so young which Scripture doth not fit There 's milk for Babes and meat for stronger wit 2. It is difficult to all such that are not versed in the old and modern Romane Histories not knowing how to apply the figures and representations of this Prophesy to their several times and periods Neither knoweth how to distinguish the times of the revolutions and changes but confound several things spoken of diverse States one with another Not observing where mention is made of the secular or civil state and whereof the ecclesiastick conceiving that the Revelation is as a continued History or Relation of events succeeding one another in the same order and cause as the visions are reveiled in And for want of due observation herein many interpreters have stumbled and so confounding perverting and disturbing the whole method and harmony of the Revelation in making several epacts and periods of time so placing things which must come to pass after the destruction of Babylon and the Beast before it Whereas the passages of the Revelation are so related one to the other though written in order one after another that many thereof do concur in one and the same time so that hee that goeth about to describe them in order of time as they lye in the book in order of place without the observation of the methd oharmony and connexion which is to be observed in all the passages of this book falling under the same syncronisme or concurrencies of times indeed to such this Book of the Revelation must needs remain full of difficulty mistery and obscurity And so the whole order of the Revelation together with themselves are rendred in-extricable and confounded Whereas indeed the Spirit of God in this Book as a wise and well versed Historian is wont to do in the description of
humane actions does rightly distinguish of all the Revolutions and changes both of the civil and ecclesiastick states and though many of them are done and acted together and at the same time by diverse and sundry Persons yet cannot be declared together but severally one after another So these Prophesies though revealed and set down in order of place one preceding the other yet in vain do they go about to interpret them that observe not the peculiar characters and hidden misteries of numbers syncronising and meeting in one and the same time which is indeed the great key of the Revelation which makes all the passages and Revolutions therein though at the first sight they seem abstruse and disturbed yet by collating one to the other they become plain and revealed to us which in the subsequent discourse will manifest it self And these have been some of the reasons that some former interpreters have come off with losse in their studies and expositions of this Book when as they have applied diverse passages in this book to their own times when they had no relation to them and sometimes interpreted as they are in order set down in the Book following one another whereas they should be interpreted as they are Relata and â—orrelata and belonging to one and the same time and period though dispersed here and there thorough the whole book and so the harmony of the whole is kept some and entire For wee see that the order it self is not to be conformed to every aptness of interpretation according to the will and pleasure of the interpreter but according to the minde of the Spirit of God made clear by the Idea of their several and particuliar Characters for explanation thereof affixed thereunto Now because some expositours have herein gone astray must there no farther inquiry be made into this Book This would be a way to cast of all the Books of God for in which of them have not some expositors done amiss There is no promise of infallibility but there is a promise unto the latter dayes that many should run to and fro and knowledge should be encreased Dan. 12.4 do not arts grow in time to their 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and perfection And is it any disparagement to those that went before us that we see farther then they did Apigmy upon a â—yants shoulder may see farther then the himself So we being helped by the instructions and experiences of our predecessours upon their shoulders it is no great advancing of our abilities if we soar a little higher I would not be understood as if this my essay were perfect and so exact as nothing can be added thereunto for herein I should balk our proper attribute Humanum est errare since others that come after us will see farther then we of this present age comming neerer to the accomplishment of the events of all Only I leave this consideration and proposal with the judicious and pious Christian that if he can finde out a more commodious method of interpretation upon better reasons and grounds then I have for this Book of the Revelation suiting with the minde of the Spirit and preserving the harmony of the whole Prophesies entire and discovering the several passages and revolutions therein how they do relate one to the other in their several proper characters and syncronismes with more prospicuity and fitter application of History answering the truth of this Prophesy I should most willingly become a learner at his feet in the mean time I shall add that of the Poet. Horat. Si quid novisti rectius istis Candidus imperti si non his utere mecum Object Again others will object and say That this way of interpretation savours too much of curiosity and impertinency And the application of the Prophetical representations and of the Apocaliptique dayes and periods to the several times and changes of the Church and State here on earth is too precise and peremptory 1. To which I answer first I assert no more in this interpretation the text being not at all forced but as it is either literal or figuratively referred to the times and states then in being and that interpretation made clear and undeniable by such necessary and sure arguments characters and notable tokens as will make the true sense and meaning of every notable mistery obvious to every discerning ey And herein I walk not alone having M. Brightman Napeir Piscator Alsteed and learned M. Mede with some others in their several tractates upon the Revelation to be my leaders herein 2. Those figures and representations which makes this interpretation dubious difficult oâ— misterious being cleared out of the other places of the Revelation and the Prophets of the old Testament which being rightly applied to the civil and ecclesiastick States as the text and time doth require should wipe of the brand of impertinency and curiosity what God hath sanctified no man should call unholy what God hath revealed no man should judge himself too curious and impertinent to search into Unrevealed things pertain unto God but revealed things are for the use and good of man 3. I answer to the perciseness of the time of the Apocaliptique periods though I will not herein be too peremptory well knowing that in matters of History Chronology there is great variety of opinions and imperfection therein as it is manifest in Scaligerde Emendatione temporum and other accounts also treating upon the same subject yet all this doth not hinder but the times and periods are fixed in the predeterminate Counsels of God which are higher then the Laws of the Medes and Persians unalterable and unchangeable And though notwithstanding there is difference and imperfection in most accounts of times yet by a regular judgment drawn from the visible tokens characters image and representation of each time which are either concomitants contemporaries or immediate antecedents or consequents of each great revolution and change we may judge their periods either to be past drawing nigh at hand or yet to come And this is no more then Christ himself hath done in setting down remarkable forerunning as Signes of the destruction of Ierusalem and his least comming in the 24. of Matth. and the 13. of Mark. But I would desire alwayes to be understood when I set down the exact epacts and periods of time it may vary as unto us in preciseness of account in respect of the imperfection of our Chronology but long time it cannot miss every notable revolution and season having their own proper characters and tokens to point them out as it were with a finger which will notably help us peremptorily to conclude in the foresaid limited sense This time is the time of Antichrists birth and rising this of his raign this of his ruine and desolation Consider to this end that of the Angel in the Prophet Daniel Chap. 12.7 Who held up his right hand and left hand unto Heaven and sware by him that liveth for ever that it
in himself is too weak for such a work may be fitted in some measure from thy self who art the Wisdom of God and to whom the Revelation of all things is given of the Father because thou art found worthy O do thou enlighten his minde with true Light from above And remove all impediments his iniquities out of thy sight by the washing of thine own bloud then thou maist discover thy minde unto thy poor Servant being hallowed by thy self to a fruitful reception thereof Grant O Christ that by thy favour and the guidance of thy good Spirit he may diligently consider the misteries of this Book and that unto sobriety and declare it forth unto others that the Church of God may receive some advantage by him And if thy Servant O Lord hath herein through weakness built any hay and stubble upon thy precious structure O let it be consumed but so as that thy Servant may be saved in the great day of the Lord God Almighty but if any of thine receive good hereby to thee for it as most due which is and which was and which is to come the Almighty be praise glory and Dominion for ever and ever Amen A Catalogue of diverse Questions in this Treatise discussed WHether this Book of Revelation be of divine authority pag. 1 Whether John the divine the subordinate Author thereof be the same with John the Apostle and Evangelist or some other Person 5 Whether the Title of this Book viz. The Revelation of John the Divine be John's own or some other Persons 7 What is meant by the Christian wish or salutation grace and peace unto you 19 How comes John to wish grace and peace to the Churches whilst being Churches of Christ they had this grace and peace aforehand 19 Whether Christ shall have two last commings to Iudgment 25 Whether Christians when they are called unto it are bound in duty to suffer for the profession of all the truths of God 31 and 112 Whether the Lords day mentioned Rev. 1.10 wherein John received his Visions be the first day of the week or not 33 How shall we know Divine raptures extasies or Visions from diabolicall the Divel being Gods ape herein 34 Doth not the Divel often foretell the truth of events 37 Did not Satan tell Saul in that apparition of Samuel in the 1 Sam. 28 19. That he should be delivered with all his host into the hands of the Philistines and that he and his Sons on the morrow should be all with Samuel that is dead and was not that prediction truly fullfilled 38 Whether that Samuel which the Witch of Endor raised unto Saul was the true Prophet Samuel or the Divel in his shape and likeness or otherwise some cousening consort and confederate of the cousening Pythonists 38 39 Whether Christ according to his manhood appeared unto John Rev. 1 13. when he appeared to him as one like unto the Son of man 43 Whether there can be any separation between the deity and manhood of Christ 44 Whether the two edged sword that proceeded out of Christs mouth is to be only spiritually understood and not matterially also 50 51 Whether the blessed heavenly Spirits and Angels or glorified Persons after the Resurrection do or shall see the essential glory of God 53 Do not Angels see Gods face in Heaven and did not Moses and Jacob see God and talked with him face to face 54. and do not divines hold that in Heaven we enjoy the beatifical Vision 55 Whether Christ according to his divine nature was impassible 58 Why John is commanded particularly to write to each Church of the seven apart 68 Whether a sound Church may censure a corrupted Church 69 70 Whether by Angel of the Church of Ephesus be meant the Metropolitane over the rest of the Bishops of Ephesus and whether the Angel of Ephesus was the Metropolitane over the other six sister Churches 71 Whether the Angel of the Church of Ephesus is to be interpreted the Presbytery 72 What gives unto our works the denomination of good works And whether any of our works are simply and strictly to be called good and perfect 79 and 80 In whom lyes the power to try judge and examine false Apostles false teachers and their Doctrines 83 and 196 Whether the jurisdiction of the Church be above the word 84 Whether wicked Persons or unsound in the faith are to be admitted or being admitted to be tolerated in the fellowship of the Church 85 86 c. Whether any else besides true and real Saints or believers in the judgment of charity are to be admitted into Church fellowship 86 87 Whether the judicials or ceremonials of Moses are any foundation for a Gospel ordinance 88 89 Whether Baptisme is administred with best satisfaction of conscience upon infants 88 Whether it must be true justifying faith or dogmatical only that entitles to Baptisme 90 91 Whether the Apostolical Office be ceased to the Church or not and whether it was only tyed unto the first twelve 92 93 94 95 Whether the first 12 Apostles were but of equal authority with other ordinary Officers as Pastors Elders c. 95 Whether the gift of miracles does continue unto the Church 97 How shall we know or try false Apostles from the true 101 102 c. To what Church shall one repaire to receive a sound and orthodox call for the minâ—stery of the Gospell 105 106 c. How should the first reformers have a right call to the ministery if they â— had it not from Rome 108 Whether the Presbytery of England have a right call from the late Bishops as true Presbyters 110 VVhether Believers complaints for want of wills to repent be just or not 118 Whether it be a Legal Teaching to denounce wrath and Judgments on non-amendment or for want of Repentance 119 VVhether Repentance is to be joyned to Christ in some causality unto salvation or joyntly with him somwhat subordinate to that great end 120 And whether Faith and Repentance be the condiiion properly so taken of the Covenant of Grace 121 VVhat is meant by the Spirit that speaks unto the seven Asian Churches 126 What is meant by the Tree of Life and what is meant by Paradice 130 Whether Paradice and Heaven above be all one 131 Whether God tempteth man And whether he tempteth unto evil or sin 143 Doth not many Scriptures say That God tempteth man 144 Whether God hath a hand or efficiency in and about sin 146 Why doth God often afflict his own children with so sharp tribulations And whether the justice of God can be vindicated in that particular 149 VVhether great corruptions nullifies a Church 173 What is the reason that full Reformation cannot be attained 171 172 How is Gods justice vindicated if he smites godly and ungodly together for the sins of the wicked among them 179 VVhether Christ received now by faith to justification and absolution be the hidden Manna and white Stone promised Rev. 2.17 to
both small and great Rev. 19.18 and this is to be executed by the sword that proceeded out of his mouth v. 21. and how this can be effected by the word of his mouth I know not otherwise then by moving and working powerfully on the hearts of such instruments as God shall command and employ to take the material sword in hand for the ruine of antichrist and to effect this work of wrath and judgement Collate to this the Notes on the two precedent verses 14 15. And his face shone as the Sun shineth in his strength This shows farther the resplendency of this vision His face is likened to the Sun in his glory There was much and great glory in this vision and yet all this is but like the Sun in his glory If it were the glory of ten thousand Suns united in one yet would be short of the essential glory of the Son of God it is neither expressible nor comprehensible by any of all the creatures but here is presented by things beneath its excellency that according to man's weakness we may perceive a little of his glory for no man yet ever could see the glory of God and live Hence Note That the execution of Justice and Judgement is a glorious administration Christ's face shone as the Sun in his strength when he was about to call his delinquent and offending churches to an account for their backslidings in chap. 10. v. 1. 3. his face was as it were the Sun in that appearance also but then presently followed thunders and voices as when a Lion roareth to denote unto us when Christ was going forth with terrible judgements upon the world his carriage and appearance therein was most glorious and it is said in Exod. 15.6 upon the destruction of Pharaoh and his host in the red Sea Thy right hand O God is become glorious in power thy right hand hath dashed in pieces the enemy and in the greatness of thine excellency thou hast overthrown them that rose up against thee The acts of God's power and justice do shine so clearly in the world that they dazle mens eyes and hearts and makes them tremble before God So likewise it is amongst the children of men not any Magistrates Commonweals or Nations are more honourable shining and dreadful to their enemies then such as keep close to the rules of Justice and judgement against offenders Never was Solomon more glorious in all his reigne then when he executed justice between the two Harlots and called for the Sword to decide the controversie How honourable was Phineas and what a high reward he got for executing justice and judgement It was an old saying Fiat Justitia ruat Coelum If our chief Magistrates keep close to Justice in our Land and Common-weal our Nation will shine as the Sun in its strength none of the Nations round about will be able to look us in the face for the power and glory of the Lord will be upon us Verse 17. And when I saw him I fell at his feet as dead then he laid his right hand upon me saying unto me fear not I am the first and the last Verse 18. And I am alive but I was dead and behold I am alive for evermore Amen And I have the Keys of hell and death When John had taken a view of this appearance of the Son of man and of that great and dreadful Majesty and Glory that he appeared in it struck him as dead at his feet Hence Note That the sight of Divine glory is the most effectually and humbling sight When the Prophet Isaiah had a sight of this glory he could cry out I am a man undone and of unclean lips for mine eyes have seen the King the Lord of hosts Isa 6.5 When a soul comes to see this glory it brings him to a true sight of his own worthlesness and to an abhorrency in his own eyes There is no greater or more efficacious way to take off our hearts from the creature then to behold the vast disproportion between the glory of God and our poor selves All flesh is as grass and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field Isa 40.5 6. and why Because the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together And when Job had a sight of this glory he cryed out Job 42.5 Now mine eyes see thee I abhor my self and repent in dust and ashes Observ 2 That Revelations of Divine glory are dreadfully glorious They struck John as dead There did but Angels appear in an inferiour glory unto Gideon and Manoah and made those Worthies quake Judg. 16. 13. Apparitions of glory works strongly upon the spirits and quickly overwhelms them And if the glory of the creatures is so resplendent how is the glory of God to be born who dwells in the light which no man can approach unto 1 Tim. 6.16 Paul could not behold that glorious light that shined about him Acts 9. but was strucken to the ground and blinded with it In the Earth Heavens and World we may behold the glory of God in part and as in a glass but his essential glory as it is himself wherein he makes his habitation is that light which no man can approach to or comprehend and live and therefore when it is but left out to appear but in some likeness or similitude of man Fire or the like it works such terrible effects upon the beholders of it Abraham fell to the ground when he had this glory appeared to him Gen. 17.3 The three Disciples when they had but a taste of this glory at the Transfiguration in the Mount they fell upon their faces to the earth Now the reasons that the appearance of Divine glory is so dreadful are First Because the Majesty of God is partly in those visions and the luster that accompanies it is too high and burdensom for mortal eye Secondly That it may breed an awe and reverence in us of and unto the Divine Majesty When Israel saw the lightning and heard the Thunder in the Mount all the people in the Camp trembled Exod. 19.16 Thirdly It is to prepare a soul for entertainment of what God hath to speak unto it Our souls are quite out of temper by reason of lusts cares fears and the world to have converse with God This prepares them for this Divine communion Quest Here a question may be made whether the blessed heavenly Spirits Angels or blessed Souls or glorified persons after the resurrection shall or do see the essential glory of God Though it were granted mortal eye cannot see this glory yet those blessed glorified creatures may I answer That I am swayed for the negative My reasons are Because God's essential glory is himself and God is invisible and that glory inaccessible and no farther and in no other way to be seen and comprehended by any created being then himself thinks good to propound it in and this hath
be praised cherished and followed as having the impress of the Spirit on them Christ having given his approbation of the sufferings constancy and patience of the church of Ephesus for his names sake and taking notice thereof as their works catexochen I know thy works that is I take notice of these your graces and works of suffering patience and zeal against such workers false Teachers and false Apostles and these are your good works worthy of commendation and imitation in you Now in all our actions observe there must be many circumstantial ingredients to denominate them by the name of good works according to that old rule A Quo cui quomodo quando First They must proceed from a true Fountain God's Spirit must be the first Mover and Author of them corrupt Nature can produce nothing higher then it self Rom. 3.9 10. God can look upon none of our duties or works with an eye of complacency unless they have in the first place his stamp upon them Secondly Cui You must examine to what ends and to whom to whose name and glory they are directed if we sacrifice to our selves for our own ends and advantages our sacrifice is in vain an abomination and as the cutting off a dogs head in as much as we do it unto our selves and not unto the Lord consider Isa 1. A good action or work may lose its crown for want of a right end If we pray repent mourn for sin c. which are necessary duties yet if we only respect our selves and our own ends to wit to be freed and delivered only from wrath to come not having an eye to the sanctifying of God's name thereby we may lose much of the comfort of those duties if not the duties themselves become sin unto us for all must be done unto the glory of his Name Thirdly You must consider the Quomodo In what manner works are to be done to denominate them good they must not be done Pharisaically to be seen of men so they lose their reward The sufferings and patience of the church of Ephesus for the name of Christ were highly commendable graces in them yet if they should affect them as the popelings do to attain to themselves the glory and name of Martyrs they had their rewards The Familistical Quakers of these days do most perversly walk in the same steps highly affecting sufferings and rushing thereinto not considering the Cui nor the Quomodo neither to what end they do it nor the manner how they do it Indeed persons may suffer justly for their pertinacy and obstinacy against Magistrates but not for the name of Christ unless in his providence he calls them to it Therefore Fourthly The Quando is also to be considered the time when they are to be performed To bestow a beneficence on a rich person or one that wants it not it cannot be called an act of charity for they are able to make retribution for it but to do it towards Christ's poor afflicted members when their wants and necessities call for it then it is truly a good work Secondly To draw sufferings on ones self for ones pertinaciousness in opinions not relating as necessaries or fundamentals unto salvation and so disturbing the peace of Commonwealths in the promotion thereof this cannot be termed a suffering for Christ's name But it must be clear and real Truths that justifies a soul in his sufferings for it that the soul and conscience be kept undefiled thereby and so become a faithful witness unto Christ and the Truth when God calls him to it in clear dispensations of providence See more hereon in v. 9. of the former chapter Fifthly in the last place understand That the best and choicest of our works though they are all rightly circumstantiated as aforesaid yet strictly and simply in themselves according to the rules of Justice they are not to be called good works for so and in that sense God is only good Mark 10.18 and our best works being mingled with much weakness and imperfection in the production of them though the agency of God's Spirit is manifestly in them yet passing through corrupt conduits and the hands of sinful instruments they receive a tincture of the vessels and defilement from the sinful Agents that do produce and effect them and so singly in themselves are sinful and imperfect But as our persons are accepted in Christ our works though otherwise weak sinful and imperfect in themselves being performed in the sincerity of our souls God accepteth as good holy and perfect as being done and presented in the name of Christ and upon that altar that both sanctifies the gift and the giver In vain to seek for an acceptation of our works before our persons be in Christ then he accepts the will for the deed and our works though weak and imperfect in themselves yet in Christ and as flowing from his divine efficiency they are accepted of God as most holy good and perfect I shall in the next place consider more especially what was commendable in the church of Ephesus which was the labour and patience they under-went for Christ's sake which did manifestly appear in their zeal against evil doers and false Apostles which they could not bear From hence Note Observ That it is equally burdensome troublesome and grievous to Christ's faithful churches to have evil doers and false teachers amongst them The one doth corrupt their manners the other their judgements the one is pernicious in their examples the other in their doctrines the one destroyeth the life of godliness the other the truth of God and where the one is tolerated the other follows also for if evil workers are forborn in the churches their judgements will be soon corrupted to endeavour to uphold their more corrupt practises for such as keep not to the commands of God he gives them over judicially to embrace and follow false Teachers and to believe lies and vanities And secondly When false Teachers are tolerated quickly follows evil practises When in the time of the late Bishops in opposition to the godly it was asserted that the Law that required the observation of the Sabbath was not moral but only humane and Ecclesiastique what followed that false teaching but most profane and wicked practise of carding bowling sporting revelling drunkenness and all sort of profaness upon that day Uprightness in life and doctrine are the two pillars of a church and where one fails the other will soon fall to ground after they are as inseparable twins the corruption of the one will be the death of the other It is to be observed as soon as these primitive churches entertained false Apostles amongst them we presently hear of the obscene Sect of the Nicholaitans following the divel will not be contented to corrupt the head only but the heart also and if in the first place he corrupts the heart the evil affections will soon fume into the judgement and darken the understanding wherefore a use of caution
so called for on the performance of every condition by vertue of compact it hath a legal influence merit and causality unto the production of its end Neither indeed is there any such compact in the Word since the fall of Adam that on the performance of any conditions be they never so Evangelical as Faith Repentance c. Justification or life was promised thereupon only the condition of the old covenant between God and man was death upon disobedience and life upon obedience Man having forfeited the one by his disobedience Christ steps in as the Mediator of a better and surer covenant and makes his soul an offering unto death which was the full performance of the penal condition due unto the sinner and so absolutely purchased a blessed seed unto himself and on such stable conditions performed altogether by himself that they cannot possibly forfeit their inheritance being in so sure a hand and are still heirs though whiles under years they differ not from servants that is whiles under sin and unregeneracy are still in bondage until faith come to discover their heirship and interest unto the purchased possession and in the mean time by evil works they are as enemies strangers and aliens to God and the commonweal of Israel according to the old Legal distinction they have notwithstanding Jus ad Rem though not Jus in Re. And though I deny faith or repentance to be conditions properly so called in the covenant to life or justification yet I say they are required in the same new Law Covenant or Testament as conditions improperly so called or as conditions in order preceding one the other and as benefits of the same covenant But seeing the word condition is of late glown so rampant and overmuch perfumed with the Spiceries of Rome I shall willingly let it lie as that other term of merit which in their first births were more innocent and inoffensive and shall rather call them as duties and qualities required in the new covenant by Christ as necessary in all his redeemed ones to life and salvation And when I say they are duties necessary I would be understood not absolutely necessary but virtate precepti and virtute medii unto all such as are capable of their duties but not unto Infants or Idiots that want the use of reason for to believe and repent are acts of the will and understanding which Infants or Idiots are not capable of and therefore we exempt them from salvation dying so if the condition of faith was absolute and peremptory as Augustine once dreamed and therefore was called durus pater Infantum and all others must conclude the like harsh judgement on them also that hold actual faith and repentance as absolute necessary conditions unto justification and life But again If it were true what the Arminian says That none are saved but on the condition of the To credere or act of faith and none damned but for unbelief then I re-assume that some persons according to this are neither damned nor saved for Infants dying such as aforesaid cannot have by reason of their incapacity the act of faith nor unbelief which is a privation by refusal or resistance of the truth made manifest Indeed such absurdities do they incur that assert such absolute conditions in the covenant of grace to be done on man's part yet I say they are absolute and peremptory on Christ's part to be performed and he having fully finished all the conditions for his elect ones by his death though some of them dying Infants yet are saved by vertue of that everlasting covenant made with Christ in for and on the behalf of all his chosen ones of whom he will not lose one which the Father hath given him From this precedent discourse you may plainly conclude that though I grant repentance a necessary Gospel duty and for divers good ends it is ordained so yet do not in the least place it in any subordinate causality joyntly with Christ in the work of our salvation but only as our duty thorowfare or way thereunto commanded and instituted by Christ as part of his new Law that he himself might have the pre-eminence in all things and the name and glory alone of our salvation And this hereon shall suffice See more hereon v. 23. Observ 2. Another Note hence is That the doctrine of judgments and threats is a very useful Gospel doctrine When Christ hath passed with his doctrine of grace and offers a reconcilement freely if the sinner will but turn from his iniquities and repent and yet the sinner will refuse his gracious terms he hath another burden to tell him that after he hath refused so great salvation he can cast both soul and body into hell fire the most obdurate and incorrigible child must have the sharpest rod a smile or a love-token will work upon the ingenious but saith Solomon a rod is for the back of a fool Neither is judgement a strange work unto Christ for as he is related unto his church as a Saviour and a Father respecting his grace and loving kindness so he is as well a Judge and a Legislator and so may justly chastise his church as contemners and transgressors of his Royal Law If he calls us to repent which is part of his new covenant Law as he did the church of Ephesus and yet go on obstinately in sin justly may he remove his candlestick from amongst us If his Lamb-like quality of mercy and grace will not invite us to return he can roat as the Lion of the Tribe of Judah which will cause us to call upon the mountains to fall upon us and to hide us from the presence of the Lamb wherefore they are much mistaken that would shut out as useless the doctrine of threats and judgements from the Gospel which are to be preached soberly and conditional not peremptory and absolute for if there were not a curb and fear of loss and punishment the wanton straying soul would hardly be reclaimed though the more tender hearted the apprehension of grace and love might reclaim and mollifie Observ 3. Another Observation is To take off God's candlestick or to unchurch a Nation or people is the most grievous of all God's judgements Christ could not afflict the church of Ephesus with a greater loss then to remove his church from among them for hereby First Privatively His glory and special presence of grace and favour is withdrawn Secondly The guidance light and comfort of his holy Spirit is departed Thirdly His Ordinances are all defiled and vanished Fourthly His special protection is withdrawn also Fifthly and lastly Instead of his gracious presence they have his presence in wrath judgements and fiery indignations Instead of his Spirit of light and comfort they have the dismal spirit of darkness errour and despair instead of Christ's holy Ordinances they have the Divel's sacrifices and instead of God's special protection over them they are carried captives by Satan to all foul and
unwholesome stenches and savours So God emits his comfortable beams of providences towards us spreads our tables with good things and our own base lusts make them a snare unto us presents us with objects of Beauty as a remedy against sin and our base hearts and lusts makes them occasions to sin God gives us the fruit of the Vine to cherish us and we turn them to drunkenness The providence of God disposes riches and honours on us for good ends and we employ them on our lusts usurpations and grinding the poor All the creatures of God are in themselves good phisically considered and we tacitely reflect on God as the author of our sin when we lay the blame of our sins on the occasions thereof Women wine riches honours are excellent creatures of God and for singular uses and comforts unto men but the occasions that are taken thereby to sin rise not from any innate quality in those objects for they all are good but from the lusts of the heart of man consider that of 2 Pet. 1.4 The corruption that is in the world through lust the world is the object lust is the cause The reason that men are covetous effeminate voluptuous drunkards sensual c. is not in riches gold wine women c. but in mens most corrupt and naughty affections and dispositions of heart which does as the Spider or Toad by their own corrupt natures turn the extraction of the sweetest flowers into poyson Object But again doth not many Scriptures say that God tempteth man As Gen. 22.1 God tempted Abraham God tempted or moved David to number the people 2 Sam. 24.1 God stirred up Pul King of Assiria to carry away the Jews captive 1 Chron. 5.26 and also Psal 105.25 he turned their heart to hate his people and to deal subtilly with his servants Thus also 1 Kin. 22.22 Thou shalt be a lying spirit go forth and do so and thou shalt prevail It is also said Rom. 1.26 28. that God delivers over to a reprobate sense and to send strong delusions 2 Thes 2.11 It is said of Joseph Gen 45.5 8. speaking to his Brethren Be not grieved nor offended it was not you that sent me hither it was not you but God Or that Is there any evil in the City but God is in it Amos 3. And many other places say That God delivered Christ to be bruised and afflicted by his unbelieving enemies which was an evil act Therefore from those and the like places it may fully be objected that God tempteth to evil and hath a hand in sin and iniquity I answer First We must be careful to distinguish between temptations that are in themselves simply sinful and those that are not so God may justly try the faith of Abraham by calling him to sacrifice his only son Isaac for he is the God and Maker of the whole Creation and therefore without any injustice or sin can call for the life of any of his creatures God can lay afflictions on Job and who can question his righteousness for it God can chastise the church of Smyrna with ten days of tribulation and who shall lay any thing to his charge Tryals and temptations on this account are not simply evil neither are they absolutely to be deprecated but with a submission unto the Will of God for though no affliction at present seemeth joyous but grievous yet the fruits thereof are eternal life If our judgement were rightly enlightned we would not look upon the afflicting hand of God or his tryals by the cross a bitter thing considering the happy effects and consequents thereof even mortification of sin and a crown of eternal life If God comes with sharp corrections and Tryals on us be sure we have strong corruptions to be mortified and if we are called to great tryals our hopes are the greater and more sublime and indeed a faithful christian is of that heroick spirit that he can look upon all the sufferings of this present world with an eye of contempt and not worthy to be compared with the joys that shall be revealed and so with Moses can esteem the reproach of Christ better then the treasures of Aegypt and so often on this score God tries his children and this is for their bettering not for their worse But secondly I answer When ye read that God moves or tempts to that act that is sinful it is either permissively or judicially most commonly understood as when God moves David to number the people it was on God's part both permissively and judicially for the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel and he moved David to number the people 2 Sam. 24.1 God suffered it and that judicially but Satan did it maliciously and destructively God suffered Satan tempted God judicially permitted it Satan executed it for it is said 1 Chron. 21.1 Satan stood up and provoked David to number the people So it was a judicial act of God to stir up Pul of Assyria to carry away a rebellious people the Jews into captivity 1 Chron. 5.26 God only permits the lying Spirit to go forth to deceive Zedekiah 1 Kings 22. and so permits the Egyptians to deal deceitfully with his people the Jews Psal 105.25 that thereby he might rise in judgement against them And where it is said that God delivers over to a reprobate sense to harden the heart to blinden or send strong delusions God does it most justly and judicially to punish evil with evil administers occasions of sin that the sins of the obstinate may be heightned and aggravated that their judgements may be the greater and in the case of Joseph that was wickedly handled by his brethren yet it is said that God sent him into Egypt and there is no evil done in the City but God is said to do it yea if it be rebellion it self as 1 Kings 12.15 First God pre-ordains it intends and appointed it should be Next He permits it and that not by an idle permission but by an efficacious permission then he disposes the events thereof to his own glory according to his pre-ordained purposes and decrees And lastly God is said to deliver Christ to bruise and afflict him that is God pre-ordains him to that end and hinders it not but permits it by a providential assistance and co-operation by which every physical action of the creatures comes to pass for in him we live move and have our being Object But then it seems you make God to have a great hand or efficiency in and about sin I answer There would be no sin if God had not given the commandment If there were no Law there were no transgression neither is it beside the Will of God nor against his Will for if it were then he were not God omniscient or omnipotent neither can we without a continued concurrence and supportation of providence produce any action or work of ours wherein there is sin and therefore God has an agency and concurrence in the action
man shutteth shutteth and no man openeth Rev. 3.7 and so he hath the power both in heaven and earth and executes the office of a headship and none but him Isa 9 6. Col. 1.18 Ephes 5.23 Secondly there is a delegated or Ministerial power which is given by Christ to his church and this is 1 Either the power of judgment and election Or 2. Of Office and Authority The whole body hath power of choosing admitting receiving or of rejecting and censuring and so the whole is above any particular Member or Officer But Secondly the power of Office is not in the Multitude but in some one or more as Pastors Elders and the like which they have called to this Authority and Ministerial offices and so are in a higher Authority though inferior to the whole then any other private members whatsoever So that whatsoever the whole church does judicially act or censure the power of Office is to precede therein and all what is done thereby it is still in ordine ad Ecclesiam And hence it is evident that the power of judgment and censuring is not a power of Office in the Brethren over their Elders as some would object but a distinct power and the one is essential to a church as that of judgment but that of 〈◊〉 and Rule is meerly accidental and it may be or not be in a church sine interritu subjecto So hence it is evident that the whole church of Thyatira had the essential power of the Keys in her Officers and Fraternity as in one origanical body joyntly together for the removing of this woman Jezabel for how unreasonable a thing is it to conceive that the Spirit of God should lay a chece upon the whole church of Thyatira for suffering the Idolatries of Jezabel amongst them if it were not in theirs but in the Officers power alone for the removal of them We should think him a hard Father or Master if not somwhat senfless and beside himself that would would would whip all his children and servants with stripes for the neglects miscarriages and faults of the chief Steward of the house and shall we judge this a hard matter amongst the sons of men And shall we not judge it far from the wisdom of God and his mercful dealings towards us that he should put a check upoh us and come against us in wrath and judgment for tolerating evils among us which is not in our power to reform or remedy Far be these conceits from our thoughts and judgments concerning God and his righteous judgments towards us Doubtless the whole combined church of Thyatira had power to remove her scandals although the charge is superscribed 〈◊〉 the Angel of the Church of Thyatira woite I know thy love thy service thy faith and thy patience notwithstanding I have somwhat against thee The Pastors Officers or Ministers are God's Angels they receive from God his messages and deliver them to the people they are aâ— it were God's mouth unto them and acquaint them with the mind of God what God hath to say unto them either for their encouragement or for their reprehension So this check and message here was not laid or sent only on the Angel or Pastor of Thyatira but on the whole church Col. 1.11 Hear what the Spirit saith unto the Churches The Angel was but the hand and instrument for to receive it and though he should first move and lead to the removoving and censuring of this Harlot Jezabel and yet be neglegent rmiss and dormant therein that shall not excuse this church if they be found guilty with him in the same sinful connivance and compliance for I will give unto every one of you saith Christ according to their works If you will indulge and comply with Jezabel and her cursed doctrines you shall suffer with her but if you shall overcome and escape her falsities you shall have a crown of life The power of judgment and censuring is in the Officers only directively but in the whole church formaliter and effectually the whole church cannot act out of office neither can the Officers or Presbiters act in judgment or censuring without the aprobation and assent of the church and fraternity Mr. Rutherford the great learned champion for Presbitery writes thus in favour of this way and judgment Lib. 1. pag. 49. Here grave Beza our Divines Calvin Bucer Bullinger Melancthon Bucan Pareus Rivetus Sibrandus Iunius Trelcatius The Fathers Cyprian Ierome Augustine Nazianzene Chrisostome Ambrose Theodoret Theophilact require all to be done to wit about excomunication and censuring plebe consentiente and why should their consent be desired if the Elders would do it without the consent of the people Peter Martyr is peremptory in his Common Places Sect. 9. Unde concluditur non absque commensa Ecclesiae quempiam excommunicari posse And this hereon shall suffice see more formerly in the 2 vers of this cap. Vers 21. I gave her space to repent of her fornication and she repented not Vers 22. Behold I will cast her into a Bed and them that commit Adultery with her into great tribulation except they repent of their deeds Though the church of Thyatira was very faulty in suffering the false doctrines of Jezebel within her and though the abominations of this false Prophetess were highly provoking sins against the justice of God yet God was pleased to give unto this false Prophetess and to the church that entertained her a space not a little but a long tract of time to repent of her spiritual and corporal fornications and yet â—he slighting the long suffering of God which should lead her to repentance and she repented not whereupon Christ lays an Index a mark an Asterisme upon her not such a mark as he lays on his elect ones of love and favour but the contrary of wrath and indignation Behold as much to say as let all see take notice admire of the righteous judgment I am going about to pour forth on this false impenitent Prophetess and her adherents I will cast her into a bed and them that commit adultery with her into great tribulation except they repent of their deeds As she hath played the Harlot under her green covertures both in her idolatries and adulteries and as she made her bed the place of her abominations so I will cast her into another bed a bed of my own making not of Doun or of wanton dalliance but a bed of affliction a bed of tribulation and of much anguish If nothing will cure her if she will not hearken to my gracious precautions if she will not repent for all my gracious dealings and long sufferings towards her I will cast her into a bed I will make her sick unto the very heart it shall be a bed of great tribulation and if all this will not prevail with her to reform and amend I will cast her into another bed a bed of death and not only her but all that commit adultery with
life in the Paradise of God c. all being variety of expressions to set forth the great and excellent glories of the other world Christ did formerly promise the participation of himself in that his glorious kingdom to the conquering Saints under the Types of Hidden Manna Tree of Life and in this verse as the morning Star Christ is the bright morning Star First Because he then brings comfort with him to his afflicted churches Secondly He brings light with him to his ancient people the Jews that now sit in darkness and in the shadow of death Rom. 11.25 2 Pet. 1.19 This morning Star is the same with that Sun that rises in Malachy 4.2 with healing in his wings and must of necessity signifie Christ's personal appearance again as the greatest part of the crown and reward of his faithful ones and for the healing enlightning and conversion of his ancient church and people the Jews Hence Note Observ That Christ will appear again to the comfort of his afflicted Gentile churches and to the enlightning and conversion of his ancient people the Jews before the ultimate end of all and general judgement Because then is a day of total destruction not an appearance for the conversion of them that are in unbelief That is the time when the Saints receive their utmost glory not striving ruling and over-powring the Nations Christ then delivers up all power unto the Father 1 Cor. 15.24 therefore that is no day to give power into their hands over the Nations In the day of ultimate judgment Gog and Magog and all the churches enemies are caught and cast into the Lake of fire and brimstone for evermore cap. 19. 20. Therefore it is no day of ruling over them for that day then will be past and over To conclude the Saints temporal reigne begins with the appearance of this Morning Star and ends with the final destruction of all the wicked but their heavenly glory shall never end And for the conclusion of this chapter Vers 29. He that hath an ear let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the Churches Let the wise intelligent christian consider and ponder what the Spirit saith to each of these churches and from the often repetition of the Spirits memento in these words take this conclusion That Christ's Doctrines and Prophesies cannot be too often inculcated upon the hearts and memories of his people CHAP. III. Verse 1. And unto the Angel of the Church in Sardis write these these things saith he that hath the seven Spirits of God and the seven Stars I know thy works that thou hast a name that thou livest and art dead CHrist proceeds with his charge against the church at Sardis superscribed unto the Angel or chief Minister of that church for the reasons before specified chap. 2. v. 1. Write these things saith he that hath the Spirits of God and the seven Stars I cannot joyn unto their Interpretation that makes the seven Spirits and the seven Stars to be all one to wit Christ's seven Angels of his Churches which he carries in his hand cap. 1. 20. so it would seem a tautologie whilst a more convenient sense may be found applicable to it to wit These things saith he which hath the seven Spirits of God that is the Spirit of God in his sevenfold graces and perfections for the number seven in all Prophetical writings doth intimate perfection as cap. 1. 5. and 4. 5. and this sevenfold spirit of perfection being Christ's own spirit and being sent by him and at his disposal and therefore Christ may be truly verified to have the seven Spirits of God or the sevenfold operating Spirit of God as well as the seven Stars in his hand and disposal Hence Note Observ That the Spirit of grace and a gratious Ministry are the special inseparable gifts of Christ towards his Churches They are inseparable companions where the one doth go the other is present also If Christ comes with seven Stars in his right hand he comes with the seven Spirits in his left hand to that people also A true Ministry and the Spirit are never separated Though I should not ty up God to those means only yet ordinarily it is in vain to expect Christ in the Administration of the Spirit without the Ministerial Adminstration of his Stars and Angels They are as it were the Charioteers of the Spirit The Word is the Spirit 's Vehiculum or Chariot but the Ministers thereof are those that carry and support this Chariot on the shoulders never think that the Spirit the glory of this Chariot will come or rest in our Temples unless it be brought unto us by the feet of those Stars those beautiful ones that bring the glad tidings of peace God hath so linked together in his all-wise decrees and predeterminations the concatenation of subordinate causes or mediums unto salvation that ordinarily one cannot be effected without the other and so we are saved by faith in Christ through the sanctification of the spirit and word One will not doe this work without the concurrence of the other but when Christ comes with them joyntly together either to a particular Soul or Church he makes them of a wilderness and a land of darkness a Goshen and a land of light And happy is that people to whom Christ so cometh with his seven Spirits and his seven Stars with his gracious Spirit and spiritual Ministry and for such whose lot is fallen in such a Land I say their lot is fallen in a goodly Heritage But what is the reason that Christ here appears under this representation of one that hath the seven Spirits of God and the seven Stars I Answer Christ is upon discovery of the hypocritical defections of the church of Sardis and thererefore he needs to appear not only under a searching piercing and spiritual administration as one that can search the reines and hearts cap. 2. 23. and as one that hath the seven spirits of God or the sevenfold searching Spirit of God which knoweth the hidden things of man but also under a lightsom administration of the seven Stars for a further discovery and conviction of their hypocritical practises and therefore the church of Sardis's hidden hypocrisies and inward rottenness being searched out by the Spirit of God and made manifest by the true light and Ministry of the seven Stars Angels or Ministers of the word he falls upon them with his charge against them and tells them I know thy works that thou hast a Name that thou livest and art dead Hence by the way Note Observ That Christ's spiritual Ministry in the hands of his Ministers and Embassadors can try the secret and hidden things of man The spiritual man saith the Apostle judgeth all things and is judged of none And if a private spiritual member may judge Judicio discretionis then surely much more the publique Embassadors and authorised Ministers of Christ they can try by the Word and Spirit whither our works profession
some one may be more eminent then others yet the truth of all must be there as they will have faith they will have patience as patience love zeal humility self-denial and all other graces whatsoever Be ye holy for I am holy in all manner of conversation 1 Pet. 1.15.16 and this must be also in the prevailing degree thereof for his servants ye are whom ye obey if sin be stronger in thee then grace then ye are sinners and wicked ones but if grace prevail then are ye gracious and perfect ones Thirdly Their aims and desires must be after perfection they will not be contented with a little grace no less measure will serve their turn then what they enjoy after the resurrection I would by any means attain to the resurrection of the dead saith Paul Phil. 3.11 their aims are no lower then unto the glorious and everlasting state and therefore do alwaies press on unto perfection their desires are somewhat infinite as the glory they expect Leaving these things that are behind Heb. 6.1 and herein their aims and desires will appear more perfect in that they hate sin so perfectly that they cannot be quiet until it be abolished and they freed from it 1. From the guilt thereof by justification in the blood of Christ 2. From the piercing power thereof by the sanctification of the spirit of grace 3. From the very being of it in their glorification 4. They are to aim at perfection in duration and perseverance As they are not to want any grace in the truth thereof or in the prevailing degree thereof so are they not to want it in any part of their lives for the Crown is given to him that overcometh 5. True Saints press forward to excel and precede other formal and outside christians in all duties of grace and perfection he that hath any grace will always desire more a holy ambition in grace and goodness is very commendable God tells Satan that there was none like Job on the face of the earth Job 1.8 a perfect and upright man Many desire to be before others in honour riches and power but few desire to excel in grace If we be true Saints and aim at perfection we will not think it enough to be like others in grace but labour to go beyond others in all good and perfect works Hence the Quakers may see and be convinced that we hold a perfection in this life though not an absolute legal one whereunto nothing can be added as they but an Evangelical one upon better grounds and principles Verse 3. Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard and hold fast and repent if therefore thou shalt not watch I will come on thee as a thief and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee Call to minde therefore the doctrine of grace which thou hast formerly received and heard and cleave fast thereunto and repent thy straying there from But if thou wilt not repent and be awaken'd out of this thy sleep of sin I shal come as a thief suddenly unawares upon thee and seize on thee with unexpected judgements Christ takes up this metaphor and comparison of coming as a thief for divers reasons 1. Because a thief cometh speedily in a time when no man looks for Mat. 24.43 This sets us on a diligent watchfulness If the good man of the house did know in what watch the thief would come he would watch and not suffer his house to be broken thorow or his goods stolen 2. As a thief comes in the dark or dead of night so Christ comes when there is the greatest darkness and deepest night of errour on the whole world and therefore Christ says in Luke when he comes shall he find faith on earth True faith will be such a rarity at Christs coming that it will be found in very few his elect only This quickens our faith and puts us upon the tryal of it 3. A thief comes prepared and resolved to over-master all oppositions so Christ's coming in judgement is with power and to tread down and make all his enemies his footstool This supports and comforts the distressed afflicted Saints He formerly came as a Lamb to suffer and he after came as a comforter to support all those for whom he suffered and died and he hath an other coming his ordinary particular temporal judgements against his enemies which he frequently and very often sends forth against them for their transgressions and so he threatens to come here against Sardis and his offending churches And lastly he comes in his last and ultimate judgement with great power and glory to overthrow and destroy all his antichristian foes and enemies whatsoever in Rev. 16.15 it is said Lo I come as a thief and presently follows the great battel of Armageddon and the utter destruction of Babylon by the seventh Vial of God's plagues and judgements First from the former part of this verse observe Observ That a calling to mind of God's former gratious dealings with us is not only a great preservative against sin but an effectual means for the recovery out of sin by a holy repentance Look back unto the Rock from whence thou art hewen and review thy former unregenerate state and how you were therein aliens strangers and enemies unto God by evil works and how it is far better with you now in your state of faith then it was then in sin and wrath for when ye have sin presented unto you in its enticements and provocations it will make gracious souls to reason thus with themselves Was I not once an enemy unto God in my sinful unregenerate state and shall I again fall back into it as the Sowe into the myre God forbid How shall I do this great wickedness and sin against God Will not then my latter estate be far worse then the first Because God hath been gracious unto my poor soul and delivered it as a Bird out of the snare or snatch'd it as a brand out of the fire shall I again cast my self into the bonds of Satan and into the flames of hell by my turning this grace of God into sin and wantonness The Lord forbid Again for the recovery of backslidden souls that are almost spiritually dead and have almost nothing but the name and common reputation of living ones It is most useful and advantagious to such poor souls for their recovery to recognize and look back on those good things they formerly received of God and heard concerning him For first They heard that God was a gracious reconciled God and a merciful Father in Jesus Christ ready to receive those of his chosen ones even in their blood and sin that did come to him by faith in Christ to be healed of their transgressions and this they not only heard by the hearing of the ear but received it also into their hearts by faith And if God was so ready then to receive us into reconciliation with himself whiles enemies unto
in the time of his coming in the maner of his coming in the disposition of his coming it is to destroy and spoil When Christ said unto the man that had not the Wedding Garment Friend how camest thou in hither without thy Wedding Garment Take him bind him hand and foot and cast him into utter darkness This was an act of a dreadful Judge in cap. 1. ver 14 15. Christ eyes and feet were like unto flames of fire he had fiery judgments in his hands against his churches which destroyed and dissolved them for their sins and transgressions It was Christ that sent the miserable desolating judgments on the Jews by Titus and continues it over them until this day It is Christ that sends the sword and blood unto the Nations round about for their iniquities It is Christ that goeth forth on his red Horse of judgments to War against Babylon the Beast and false Prophet and all their cursed complices and adherents Rev. 19 We may conceive and conceive amiss when we think that it is man that blows these coals of War and contentions in the world but it is Christ that doth it Luk. 12.49 I am come to send fire on the earth and Mat. 10.34 I come not to send peace but a sword for I am come to set a man at variance against his Father and the daughter against her mother and the daughter in Law against her mother in Law and a mans foes shall be they of his own houshold And this fire hath been kindled among us and other neighbour Nations and who is able to put it out unless it be Christ to whom power is given to compose all our differences and dissentions who hath the Key of David and opens and no man shuts and shuts and no man opens If Christ opens the sluce and door of his desolating judgments who can shut it up or keep them back But if he shuts the door of his wrathful judgments and sets a stop unto the current and progress of them who can open it For it is he alone that can treat War and all the miseries thereof and can again produce the happy fruits of tranquility and peace Object But if any one should unadvisedly Object This were an evil to affirm that Christ sends the sword and war into the world or think it harsh that he that is the Lamb of God should put on such a fiery posture abhorrent to his meek and peaceable nature or say it is not strange for the wicked to do this work or to see fire come forth from a bramble Judg. 9.15 this were but ordinary but to see fire come out from the Vine from Christ this is most strange and abhorrent to their understandings I answer As Christ is the Lamb slain so also he is the Judge of all the earth and a Judge you know must have his Sheriffs the Executioners of his Judgments and Sentences So Christ takes the Sword War Famine and Pestilence they are the Executioners of Christ's Judgments against the delinquent wicked ones of the world and so he uses them lawfully and justly And for such as will not kiss the Son obey him fear him and love him he can be angry with them though they be the Kings the great ones and Judges of the earth Psal 2.10 11 12. Christ can raise up Cyrus Nebuchadnezzar Heathen Kings and call them his Servants and make them his Instruments to do his works of Judgments against his rebellious Prophets and send them forth as Ottoman Mahomet Selimus c. to be just Executioners of Gods wrath upon dead formal and luke warm christians and therefore I say unto all such as have but the least spark of grace and true life in them hold fast be watchful and repent or else Christ will come upon thee suddenly as a thief both with his particular temporal Judgments and with his eternal also Vers 4. Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments and they shall walke with me in white for they are worthy It may be first demanded who the person is that hath these few names in Sardis Doubtless it is meant of the Angel Pastor or Minister of the church who principally receives this charge and to whom the whole is directed to be made known unto the church to and over which the Holy Ghost had made him Overseer Pastor or Angel Thou hast that is under thy charge a few Names even in Sardis Names are here put for Persons Act. 1.15 The number of the Names that is of men or persons that were in one place were about an hundred and twenty and Rev. 11.13 it is said that in the Earth quake were slain of men seven thousand in the Greek it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The names of men that were slain were seven thousand And I conceive this word Names is not used by the Spirit simply to denote the persons of men as thus Thou hast a few persons in Sardis which have not defiled c. but also to demonstrate the quality of the persons they were a few Names that is a few persons of Name and Quality they were Names of men or men of Name of excellent spirits tempers weight and quality for they had not defiled their garments they were not so much as outwardly tainted by the common wickedness and iniquities of Sardis And those poor souls shall walk with me in white To walk with Christ is to be sharer and partaker with him in his Heavenly enjoyments With whom we walk we communicate with him enjoy his discourse councel presence familiarity friendship and all other comforts whatsoever that is possibly to be enjoyed by him And they shall not only so walk with Christ but they shall walk with him in white A white raiment was usually set by antiquity on the acquited innocent absolved person but a black on the guilty and condemned This hath some allusion to the former white Stone which was given either to the conquering or to the innocent absolved Saint So to walk with Christ in white is no more then to partake with Christ either a free absolution at the last day o◠to be with him as white innocent conquering Saints at the resurection for they are worthy that is those pure undefiled souls are accepted by me as worthy of such happinesses Note hence from the person that had these few names in Sardis Observ 1. That Christians of the best Quality and Name are under the charge and oversight of their Pastors and Angels Thou hast a few names in Sardis Christ is the supream ruling teaching and influencing head over his church but the Pastor or Minister is the subordinate organical head to every particular church And so the hand or eye cannot say unto the head I have no need of thee a body without a head will be but a trunck unfit for lively motion So a church without a Pastor or Minister may be a body but very liveless and useless
when they call themselves so and that they are not of the true christian church but of the Synagogue of Satan See more hereon cap. 2. vers 9. Behold I will make them that they shall come and worship before thy feet and they shall know that I have loved thee These words contain a promise to the church of Philadelphia that Christ would make those enemies of hers the blaspheming Iews to come and worship before her feet that is would make them to submit to the Scepter of Iesus Christ and to worship him in the presence of Philadelphia which for her purity and soundness may pass for a type and figure of the true church of Christ before whom these carnal formal Iews shall fall low and worship Object But if it be demanded Whom shall they be made to worship I answer First God in Christ whom they have blasphemed and dishonoured the sole object of Divine worship which Philadelphia and the true church do honour and obey Secondly They shall civilly worship and reverence Philadelphia and the true church for the honour that Christ hath put upon her and so will think it an honour indeed to come under the same profession worship and discipline with the christian church And when I have done this saith Christ they shall know that I always loved thee and that thou wert most dear unto me Now this Prophesy and promise was never fulfilled unto Philadelphia in the full extent thereof only we read of some few of the malignant Iews given by Christ to the church of Philadelphia and others of that age but how this promise was fulfilled in the Latitude thereof it cannot enter into my understanding to comprehend For when ever did those perverse Iews that for their notorious malignity against Christ and the truth were justly called the Synagogue of Satan come and worship or bow down before the feet of Philadelphia Or when did they submit to the worship of the the churches of Christ only but in some first fruits and that before this was written to Philadelphia And when did the Iewish Sinagogue of Satan even to this day ever since become the true church of Christ more then some few scattering persons that were converted to the faith inconsiderable to the fulfilling of this promise Or when did ever God make it it eminently appear to them that the christian churches were the only beloved people and societys in the eye of God above all others in the world Seeing those things were never yet acomplished according to the fulness of this promise surely there is yet a time to come when there shall be a more universal call of the Iewish Synagogue into holy Philadelphia or the christian church then ever yet have been to this present day A Note hence will rise Observ That God will not only make the natural obstinate Iews but also their true counterpanes the nominal seeming Christians to come and bow before the true Spouse of Christ before the latter day This is confirmed from this verse wherein it is promised by Christ that the obstinate Iews should come in and worship before the feet of the church of Philadelphia but towards Philadelphia in the latter this was never as yet performed in the extensiveness of this Scripture as is above manifested therefore as yet to come to pass before the feet of the true Philadelphia the holy church of Christ And not only the natural Iews shal come in submit and joyn to the holy church of Christ but al formal birth christians shall also either come in and worship before this true church or else shall at least wise reverence this true holy church as the only beloved of Christ for the glory of the Lamb will be upon her and the Nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it and for her greater honour the Kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it Rev 21.23 And it is but just that God's true church and people should have a day too as well as their adversaries had theirs We know how that the great and lofty ones of the world have put all possible reproaches and afflictions on the Saints of God and churches of the purest judgment but yet the time is at hand that they shall be convinced and shall know the Saints to be the only beloved of God and the great interest and stay of Kingdomes and then the greatest Monarch will be glad to take hold on the skirt of a Jew to come under the protection of this holy church for their God is the Lord of Hosts Quest. And if any one ask when this shall be Answ When the fulness of the Gentiles shall come in and all Israel shall be saved Rom. 11. When Christ shall appear again for the restoring of his Kingdome then the Kingdome and Dominion and the greatness of the Kingdom under the whole Heaven shall be given unto the people of the Saints of the Most High Dan. 7.27 then shall all come and worship before Philadelphia the glorious new united christian church of Jews and Gentiles And this shall be the true Sion the dwelling place of God's glory whereunto all Nations shall flock and worship before it and become one with it or otherwise shall be made bow unto the Iron Scepter of Christ whereby he will make all the Nations of the earth to submit to his Soveraigne Authority and fall and worship before his feet Rev. 19.15 Vers 10. Because thou hast kept the word of my patience I also will keep thee from the houre of temptation which shall come upon all the world to try them that dwell upon the earth That for which Philadelphia is commended for by Christ is for keeping the word of his patience This hath either respect to Christ or unto the church as if Christ had said because thou hast kept the word of my patience that is the word and doctrine which with a great deal of patience I have taught the world and with a like patience Preached it from time to time or else the effect being put for the cause Because thou hast kept the word of my patience that is the word of my Gospel which enjoineth and worketh patience Either or both of these senses may aptly be raised and entertained from these words without any prejudice unto the truth and intention of the Spirit in these words or 2. as respecting the Church of Philadelphia This word as it was the word of Christ's patience which he taught patiently the word is for many generations so it was received and kept by her with patience and constancy for which she had the reward of being kept from the hour of temptation Quest But whither was Philadelphia so saved and kept from the hour of temptation that fell upon all other her Sister churches that she was so freed that she was not touched by it Answ It is not probable that Philadelphia went free when the ten days of persecution under the Emperours
were as much hopes of us if we were altogether Romish then half Reformed as we are The reasons that this luke-warm temper is more blame-worthy and dangerous then coldness it self are First Because where there are most means of grace there should be greatest improvement Sin is more sinful where grace is more abounding the servant that knows his masters will and doth iâ— not is worthy of many stripes the sin of our first parents was the more aggravating being committed in paradice the fall of the Angels in heaven left them remediless and unpardonable and that idolatry of those twenty five men in Ezek. 8.16 between the Porch and the Altar was most detestable God would rather that his grace should not be known then that it should be neglected and despised he will be sanctified of all that come near unto him Therefore if Baal be God follow him why halt ye between both God hateth such scrupulous inquisition as if it were hard to determine which part to follow Secondly Because there are greater hopes of the conversion of the irreligious profane of the world if God shall be pleased to afford them the means then of the luke-warm christians who think all is well with them because of their moderation and peaceableness which indeed is honoured of the world and for some other external priviledges that they enjoy O! How hard a thing it is this day to perswade the moderate indifferent State-christians into the true power of godliness or unto a fervent zeal for God and his Truths they think they have enough in their birth-right church priviledges or common profession to make them everlastingly happy and therefore think they what need they trouble themselves more they never intended to take heaven by violence if it would descend unto them in a bed of Doune in an easie way then they would be in for it but if otherwise it be to be taken by striving and violence then let the violent take it for them they will have nothing more to do with it Therefore surely Publicans and Harlots shall sooner enter into the Kingdom of heaven then such easie luke-warm Professors who are neither hot nor cold I would they were hot or cold Vers 16. Therefore because thou art luke-warm and neither cold nor hot it will come to pass that I will spew thee out of my mouth The greatness of Laodicea's sin for her luke-warm temper appears by the severe punishment afflicted on her for the same one would have thought that luke-warmness being some degrees neerer unto heat then coldness should be somwhat more commendable as nearest unto heat yet they are equally abominable unto God for he will spue out all such indifferent Professors out of his mouth as offensive and nauseous to his stomack It is said by Naturalists That the stomack will rather admit of hot or cold things in it quietly then tepid or luke-warm by reason that it puts forth its digestive faculty more operative and effective towards such things in which work it is delighted but luke-warm things being near to its own natural heat and temper gives not so much delight unto it nor puts it so a working as the contrary quality does and therefore remains therein unconcocted and of easie egestion as by experiment of drinking warm water it appeareth If it be demanded who is to be spewed out The answer is ready Thou lukewarm Angel of Laodicea and thou lukewarm church of Laodicea for though the charge be directed to the particular Angels of each church yet the churches too being guilty of the same sins are under the same judgements and threats which are inscribed unto their Angels or Pastors and therefore there is still added as an Epiphonema to each Epistle He that hath an ear to hear let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the Churches For the matter of their sin it is luke-warmness an indifferent disposition and temper in Religion which is neither hot nor cold which was opened in the last precedent verse and the danger thereof demonstrated accordingly but in this by the way I would be understood not that Christ simply alloweth coldness in Religion but only preferreth it before luke-warmness for the reasons before on the last verse expressed and we daylie see that God spareth longer notoriously wicked persons or those that are strangers from him altogether rather then the luke-warm Professors and this appears from God's long forbearance of the church of Rome who hath played egregiously the harlot and departed from the truth and yet flourisheth outwardly whiles the Reformed churches are corrected and chastised out of hand when they incline unto luke-warmness and indifferency in Religion Hence Note Observ God's judgements on luke-warm Christians are dreadfully judicious This appeareth if we consider but what Christ meaneth when he saith He will spew him out of his mouth by which is meant an utter casting out of this luke-warm church from her church-state and profession he will no longer entertain her as his candlestick but will discharge his care of her in that particular as a stomack-sick person with eating or drinking that which he loatheth desireth vomit to ease him of his sickness so Christ desireth to discharge his stomack his care his vigilance of this loathed luke-warm church 2. As meat once vomited up lies loathed and abhorred and never to be licked up again but by Dogs or Sows so this luke-warm church is to be spewed out as a loathed thing not that Christ would ever return to so unclean a thing again 3. As in vomiting an unclean place is sought for so Christ will seek for an unclean place to spew out those luke-warm Professors into He will make the place of their habitation a Cage of all unclean birds Ziim and Oiim shall dwell there Hath not Christ begun this work of spewing out of his mouth the luke-warm Prelatical church within our days How long did it lye as a loathed and indigested lump in the stomack of Christ before it came to egestion This was Christ's goodness long expecting repentance and thorow reformation from our churches who began in the days of Queen Elisabeth to be warm in Religion and never came to a farther degree then luke-warmness or a moderate civil State-religion and therefore Christ's stomack being long troubled with this undigested bit up it must come at last So it was in Germany in Bohemia the Palatinate Stiria Alsatia Austria and other Provinces there whiles God expected they should reform up to the pattern in the Mount they only stick'd to Luthers and Zuinglius first principles and moved no farther and withal abated so much of their first heat that they became luke-warm and indifferent to things of Religion as if Popery and Reformation were things indifferent and so clothed their reformed doctrines and worship with many of the Harlots raggs rites and trumperies for which tepid and mongrel disposition of theirs they were severely chastised by Christ and some of the churches quite spewed out of his
earth shall wail because of him Even so Amen He cometh with Clouds This is a Graecism that is In the Clouds This verse hath an Index or an Asterisme before it Behold to show that it is very remarkable what is here expressed being as the general proposition unto the whole Revelation Christs coming in the clouds in power and glory to set up his Kingdom here on earth before the ultimate judgement This hath relation to Zachary 12.10 and promised in Matth. 26.64 and 24.30 and Acts 1.9 c. Several Interpretations offer here to the consideration Some would have it here meant that at the time of Christ's passion this Scripture was fulfilled in these first fruits of the Jews conversion in Acts 2. that were the crucifyers of Christ being pricked to the hearts because of him and of the evil by them done unto him and so mourned over him Though indeed it is granted that that prophesie in Zach. 12. is partly fulfilled in that of the first fruits of the Jews conversion who truly mourned for him whom they had pierced Iohn 19.37 yet Iohn here in this prophesie and in this verse long after Christ's ascension re-inforces and takes up the same relation to be fulfilled at Christ's second coming in the clouds therefore that of Zach. 12. was never compleatly accomplished to this day Secondly These small numbers of the first effusion of the Spirit after Christ's passion cannot with any sound reason answer that general and universal mourning promised of in Zach. 12. where the several families of David of Nathan of Levi of Simeon c. and all the families that remain shall all mourn apart or joyntly as they did at Hadimmon in the valley of Megiddon Thirdly That prophesie of Zachary 12. could not wholly relate to the time of Christ's passion or little after because in the day of the fulfilling of that prophesie he would make the Governour of Judy like an hearth of fire in the wood and like a torch of fire in the sheaf and they shall devour all the people round about and the Lord shall save the Tents of Judah c. ver 6 7. and that in ver 8 and 9. God would in that day make the feeble of the house of Judah as David for strength and of the house of David as the Angel of God and that God would in that day seek to destroy all that came against Jerusalem But in how contrary low and weak condition Ierusalem and Iudah was in at the time about Christ's passion being then under the Roman yoke and ever since have been under a miserable afflicted estate as all histories testifie And how unsutable such a condition is with the fulfilling of the aforesaid prophesie let the wise consider Therefore sure this coming of Christ must be intended of his second coming future to his Ascension for he was ascended long before this Revelation was given This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven Acts 1.11 Others again apply the time of this mourning and looking upon Christ whom they had pierced wholly to be the time of the last and ultimate judgement of the wicked when as they say all they that crucified him and all his enemies shall mourn and wayl for anguish and tremble before him But this cannot be the whole or main sense of the Spirit herein nor altogether according to the time thereof for these reasons First Because this time or day of mourning is not of mourning to desperation as that ultimate mourning of the wicked is but it is a godly sorrow or mourning that leadeth unto repentance compare it to Zach. 12.10 11. It is as one mourning for his only son or as that mourning was for good Josiah slain at Megiddo out of bowels of love and compassion not of horrour and desperation as the former is 2. Another reason is because in this day of mourning there is promised that God would pour out the Spirit of Grace and Supplications upon the Inhabitants of Judah and Ierusalem Zach. 12.10 unto which this verse does relate but in that day of God's executing his last wrath on the wicked is no time of pouring out of grace nor the spirit of supplications therefore to me it clearly follows that seeing the Prophet Zach. 12.10 and John in this seventh verse both prophesie of one and the same personal appearance and coming of Christ in the clouds especially intends the conversion of the Iews of them that pierced him and that before the ultimate judgement of all for then there is no time of repentance or conversion 3. The third reason is from the words And all the kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him Even so Amen If it were to be understood here only that all the kindreds of the earth should see Christ's coming and wail for dread or horrour as the wicked at the ultimate judgement day then John would never set such a heavie Amen to it So it shall be seeing himself and all the Saints departed likewise do expect and rest in hope for the sight of this his second coming unto their joy and comfort Therefore the conclusion or observation that arises hence and as a right Interpretation of this verse is Observ That Christ will appear again in the clouds to be seen of all to the conversion of his ancient people the Iews the destruction of all his enemies and the restauration of all things before the end of all And this conclusion and interpretation flows from these grounds or reasons First from the very genuine sense of the words themselves in this verse Every eye shall see him gloriously coming in the clouds As ye have seen him going so shall ye see him come Acts 1.9 We see him now by the eye of Faith in heaven but then by the eye of the body Faith and sight are two distinct things 2 Cor. 5.7 all do not now see him by faith but then all and every eye shall see him coming in the clouds to perform a double work the one in a wonderful manner to cause the Iews that pierced him to look on him and mourn even to a holy repentance whose conversion will be so wonderful that it wil be as a Nation born in one day Isa 66.8 And this is no more then was done formerly towards Paul Christ miraculously appearing to his conversion and which he intimates must likewise follow afterwards to Israel in that that God shewed him this grace first Secondly That all his obstinate enemies may look upon him and mourn and wail even to desperation for that their ruine and the day of God's great wrath is coming on them for it is the work of Cnrist's appearance not only to destroy all his anti-christian adversaries 2 Thes 2.8 9. but also to the joy comfort and exaltation of his Church 2 Pet. 5.4 Now this cannot be the work of the end of all and ultimate judgement