the understanding by solid demonstration of infallible principles or else by the undeniable evidence of sense and experience as thus that every natural body hath power to move or that the Moon will suffer an Eclipse or that the fire is naturally apt to ascend and the water to moisten c. These things have both a naturall certainty and truth in themselves and there is an undoubted evidence and certainty in the minde of the person truly knowing them and so certaine and full is the perswasion of the minde about them that there is no scruple of doubt remaining to discuss as any uncertainty whether the things be so or no. Another is opinion which is an inevident evident assent if I may so phrase it My meaning is the understanding doth so assent and yield to the things as that yet it sees some contrary reason to suspect and question whether the thing be so or no for as much as in opinion the grounds are not fully evident to the minde but they are only probable and therefore the assent by opinion is but conjectural As take a man in a case of a scrupulous conscience there is to that man some evidence of argument which doth seem to warrant his action or attempt and yet that argument is not so entirely convincing of his judgment but on the other side there starts up a medium or argument which renders the practice probably sinful whereupon if you come to demand of him May you do such a thing he answers I do not certainly know that is I am not entirely and absolutely resolved of it yet I think I may I think it is lawful and this thinking which is opinion is alwayes accompanied with some fear and suspition so that the minde is like a paire of Scales tottering and tilting to either side Things are partly cleare and partly obscure partly evident and partly inevident and therefore the assent of opinion is alwayes doubtful Another is beliefe which is an assent unto things not from any evidence of the things themselves but only from the relation or testimony of another If I feel the fire to burne my hand I do not call this a believing but a sensitive knowing if Ahimaaz comes and tells David that his Son Absolom is hanged and slaine though this be knowledg in him who saw it yet it is belief in David who did heare and credit the tidings so that to be brief belief differs from knowledge in this that knowledge depends on the evidence of things themselves but belief though the things be certainly true to which it doth assent yet it assents unto them for the testimony or authority of him who relates and reports them Though this be most true That Jesus Christ was borne of the Virgin Mary and that he is the Messias and Saviour yet I beleeve it to be true because God hath given testimony or report thereof in his Word unto me Again Belief differs from opinion in this that opinion is an indifferent probable hazarding and difficultly inclinable assent but in believing the assent is firme certaine and fixed especially where testimony and authority is sufficient Believing as it is restrained to a theological and divine consideration that is in the generall an assent of the soul to the truth and goodnesse of all divine revelations upon divine testimony Here much might be said as for instance First that all divine revelations are the object of belief as supernaturally inspired Secondly that the ground of believing them is Gods own testimony Faith hath sufficient reason to believe all things there to be true in their relation because of his truth and authority who doth say so viz. God himself Thirdly of the generall nature of believing which is an assent unto all spoken by God as most true and credible Secondly particularly of justifying Faith Faith as you well know hath a double aspect one is to the whole revealed Word of God another is to God in Christ or to Jesus Christ I am not now to speak of it as an eye which may see all colours but as an eye fixing it self on some singular and special object viz. on Jesus Christ in respect of whom it is called justifying faith The believing on whom may be thus described CHAP. V. Faith in Christ what described IT is a singular Grace of God whereby the heart and will of a sensible sinner doth take and embrace Jesus Christ in his person and offices and doth wholly or only rest on him for pardon of sin and eternal life There are many things to be opened in this description forasmuch as all the force of true faith cannot at once in a few short words be clearly expressed SECT I. COnsider therefore the spring or fountaine of this faith is at heaven Gods eternall decree is the radicall cause of it so Causa Acts 13. 48 As many as were ordained to eternal life believed And the instrumental cause of it is the Word of God Rom. 10. 17. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God And the immediate and singular cause of it is the Spirit of God Gal. 5. 22. there it is an expresse fruit So Joh. 1. 12. speaking particularly of believing on the Name of Christ he addeth verse 13. men come to this not being borne of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man but of God That the will or heart of man should be brought off from it self and to abhor its own condition and sufficiency and to take Christ as God propounds him to be the only rock upon which I must built my salvation to be the only Lord to whose Law and Will I must resigne up my whole soul and to cleave unto him in a conjugall union and affection This I say ariseth not from naturall principles nor from the wisdome of a mans free will nor from any endeavour or action which can find footing in man himself It is observed that there are two sorts of habits Two sorts of Habits 1. Some which are acquired by the industry of the person and through a right use of a segacious and understanding mind and such may be purchased by practise and use as the Scholar by writing gets the habit of writing and the Apprentise by his wise and honest observation and industry gets into the skill of his trade and calling Now faith is no such quality we can send forth no such singular acts or operations which are able in time to ripen or beget so excellent a Grace in the soul 2. Others are plainly and entirely infused Faith is not water in the Earth which a man may pump out but it is even in the fulnesse or littlenesse of it in the allnesse of it as the drops or showers of raine which come from heaven Though the subject of it be below yet the cause of it is above it is man who doth believe but it is Gods Spirit alone who gives him that faith to believe
then nothing and in the mean time to lose eternity a soul a Christ a heaven yet thus it is the poor creatures at the best but our servants have goâ— our hearts whiles Christ complaines against us we withhold our souls from him our just Lord and best Master But if there were not more glory in Christ then honour in the world if there were not more gaine in Christ then profit in the world if there were not more love in Christ then friendship in the world if there were not more comfort in Christ then discouragements in the world if there were not more safeâ—ies in Christ then dangers in the world nay if the real and â—rue exceedings of infinite betternesse were not on Christs part iâ— durst not so to encline your hearts for saith in him c. Sixthly the cunnings of naâ—ural unbâ—l of are a great impedimâ—nt I will not speak of al of them only I wil discover a few all which are hindrances Imaginations of impossibiâ—iâ—y it cannot be that if I should labor for faith that ever I should get it the intentions of mercy lie not that way nor do the streames of graâ—iousness â—un towards such a deeply sinful and guilty soul my sins are grown to such a vastnesse of provocation as if all the Angels in heaven should be senâ— unto me I could never credit their relation of hope or peâ—câ— unto me Now when the heart is thus forestalled with a strength of conceit that God never did nor wilâ— bend the â—uâ—ement of the blood of Christ towards the soul Why the bands sink no man will be perswaded to compasse impossibilities Apprehensions of difficulty Vnbelief sets upâ—â— Lyon in every paâ—â— and so keeps off from all endeavour First I shall never be able to pare time I shall never be able to pray I shall never be able to keep on in such a course I shall never be able to leave such society I shall never be able to deny the world I cannot take such paines I cannot waite I cannot tell how to get off these sinnes to change this heart to bring it to yield to Christ Discourse of carnall reasonings which try all the promises of God at a humane bar disputings against just precepts by unjust practices and the undertakings of a great and faithful God by the shallownesse of a blind and proud and weak understanding throwing up infinite exceptions Instances of sense and feeling Why if a man will judge of God by what he alwaies hears and feels within himself he shall never believe Yea if I were now sure I should have mercy that Christ were mine that my sins were pardoned if I could see my heart changed and sins dispersed and subdued then I would put out for faith and then I would look up to Christ And wouldst thou have thy cure before thy plaister thy health before the Physick thy life before thy soul the portion before the person thy nonefast before thy meal the benefits of Christ the vertues of Christ before Christ himself SECT III. Thirdly the Meanes NOW I come to direct you unto the use of such meanes by which God workes this saving faith in the hearts of men Where premise with me some particulars 1. There is no natural power in man to produce a cause within himself This great grace of faith is no fruit of the wisdome of the flesh nor is it the birth of a corrupt will if it were possible for a natural heart to see all the excellencies of Christ if it were possible for him to draw out and behold all the arguments of Scripture yet could he not by his own strength make his own heart to believe 2. The immediate and sole cause of faith is the Spirit of God He it is who is greater then the heart and who can perswade and draw the heart and who can change and renew the spirit which till it be renewed by him will never be moved to beleeve in Christ 3. There are meanes appointed by God and which God doth ordinarily blesse for the production of faith as he hath ordained meanes for the revelation of Christ so he hath likewise consecrated meanes to lead the soul unto him to implant faith 4. Now the great and ordinary meanes by which God workes faith in the hearts of men I speak of such as are come to ripenesse of years is the preaching of the Word So Acts 13. 48. When the Gentiles heard this they were glad and glorified the Word of the Lord and as many as were ordeined to eternal life believed Rom. 10. 17. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God Eph. 1. 13. In whom ye also trusted after that ye heard the Word of truth the Gospel of your salvation That the Word is the Ministerial instrument which God useth to beget faith in Christ may thus appeare 1. It is that which discovers unto the soul its extreame misery and great need of Christ nothing quickens the conscience to that reflexive evidence to the cleare and true sight of the natural state which pricks the soul which in a sort compels the soul to look after the Redeemer of the world as the Word doth You see it hath been thus formerly that when men have heard it it hath unfolded their state unto them it hath broken all their proud imaginations it hath driven them to their feet it hath made them to cry out men and brethren what shall we do to be saved Yea and we find it in experience to be so that the preaching of the Word it opens the eyes of sinners it frames in them the sense of sinfulnesse and accursednesse it makes them indeed to feel the need of a Physician of such an one as Christ 2. It is that which discovers a share for a broken ship which doth reveale and proclaime to poor sinners Articles of peace in Christ it makes known the great love of God and Christ and how that Christ is the Sonne of God and was sent by God and satisfied for sinners and this was accepted 3. It makes the soul to confesse those things as most true and good in themselves It convinceth a man that of a truth God meanes graciously to men that his Sonne was a Sacrifice was a propitiation that he did purchase pardon and salvation for sinners 4. It is that which casteth down all the reasonings arguments and dâ—sputes of the minde against the conditions of Christ and râ—nders all the termâ—s of Christ upon which he will be taken as most equal and faire and reasonable 5. It is that which clears the way for the soul against all its feares and unbeleeving doubts from the freenesse of Gods mercy from the fulnesse of Christs redemption from the willingnesse on Christs part and requests unto us to accept of him 6. It is that which doth powerfully renew the disposition of the understanding and will and so incline them to esteeme of Christ as the highest truth and to bend after him as
I would have the present grants are not satisfying of my desires yet something is got by every faithful seeking there is not one faithful prayer which thou hast dispatched to heaven but it delivers thy message and is returned with a blessing Either it gets more additions to some grace or other or more alienation from some sinne or other or more dispotion to some duty or other or more resolution to seek or more strength to waite Like the many Bees which go out every one comes home with some thing one with honey another with wax so every faithful prayer flies up to heaven and gathers something or other from the good promises and though not so much as thou desirest yet alwayes more then thou deservest though not so much as to satisfie yet as to help 5. Suppose that yet you are not answered it is then a sinne to murmur and quarrel but it is thy duty to wait I observe this 1. That God never gives thee so large an almes but that thou needest the next houre to become a farther Petitioner 2. That God is pleased to make the beggar to stay sometimes at door he doth not alwayes presently give what he intends certainly to bestow but as his own free grace is the treasury of our gifts and supplies so his own wisdom is the dispensor of the time and season Now then as the goodnesse of the promise should draw us to beleeve so the fidelity and certainty of it should cause us to wait and expect God doth give thee leave to urge him but he likes it ill to hasten him if God doth promise then it is thy duty to believe and if he stayes then it is thy duty to wait for God doth wait that he may be gracious and blessed are all they that wait for him CHAP. XVII Of living by faith HAving formerly shewed unto you what it is to beleeve in the Lord Jesus Christ and earnestly pressed upon you to get faith in him I now proceed to another Use which supposing that Vse 5 by this time you have attained unto faith shall be to excite and perswade you then to live by that faith in the Lord Jesus Christ Beloved there be two offices of faith One is to breed conjunction and acceptance and this is done when the heart is upon good and choise and deliberated grounds effectually inclined to content and take whole Christ upon his own terms Another is to breed dependance and this is done when the beleeving soul makes continued use of that fulnesse and vertue which is in Christ touching the continued exigencies of its state and condition in this life As it is with a woman she first gives her consent and becomes a wife and then being a wife she looks upon her husband as the onely person to supply her direct her comfort her provide for her and hers So is it with faith first it doth espouse the soule to Christ it takes him as Lord and husband and then it casts all the provisions of the soule upon him all the supplies and helps it trusts on him for righteousnesse on him for pardon of sinnes on him for grace one him for strength on him for comfort on him for eternal life c. Now because this is a point of singular consequence give me leave therefore and it matters not if now and then I make a little digression to unfold these particulars that you may the better understand and be assisted how to use that faith in Christ which you have to live upon him by it 1. What it is in the general to live by faith 2. To what states the life of faith may extend 3. What it is more particularly to live by faith on Christ 4. What arguments and enducements I have to presse not only the getting of faith but also the living by faith on Christ 5. In what particulars the Beleevers should live by faith on Christ 6. What things oppose the life of faith 7. Tryals if so that we live by faith 8. What good helps may be found out to assist and more and more to encline and enable the beleeving heart still to live by faith If any other profitable and pertinent enquiry may hereafter fall in for the better information and direction besides those particular heads which I have now propounded unto you you shall have a view of them likewise but for the present I can think of no more Now the God of mercy and Father of all consolations direct and blesse their deliveries so unto you that you may not only have that precious faith but live by faith nay and die in faith and so receive the end of your faith even the salvation of your soules SECT I. Quest 1. VVHat it is in the general to live by faith Sol. I will not now stand on the several kindes and sorts of life viz. That there is a life of vegitation which the trees and plants do live and a life of sense which the beasts and cattel do live and that there is a life of reason and knowledge which man doth live and that there is a life of faith which the Christian either doth or should live Neither will I stand upon the opposition 'twixt the living by faith and living by works one being a legal life and upon our selves the other being an evangelical life and upon Christ Nor now of that opposition 'twixt the life of faith and the life of sense the one being a life in hand the other in promises That depending upon our eye this upon our eare that is sense dwelling on what it can see and faith on that good word which it doth hear These things being passed over I conjecture that to live by faith may be thus described It is an heavenly and dutiful committing of our whole persons To live by faith what and of our whole estates unto God with a pious depending upon his faithful and good promises in Christ for sutable and seasonable supplies in all our exigences occurrences and changes whatsoever Here are divers things observable First to live by faith is to commit all to God It is as it were to intrust him with our selves and ours I know saith Paul whom I have beleeved and I am perswaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him 2 Tim. 1. 12. As if he should say I have put my very soul and life into the hands of Christ who I know will look to it take care of it for ever David makes this to be the putting of our selves under God as our Shepherd Psal 23. 1. and as our Keeper Psalm 121. 5. Mark this a man lives not by faith when he undertakes to be himself the Lord of himself or a God to himself when he trusts to his own heart or will subsist by his own arme or when he puts his confidence in any arme of flesh O no faith gives God the honour of our beings and safeties and resignes up all to be
pardon and to crown him with eteâ—nal glory Beleeve it assurance will make thy life more fruitful and thy heart more suffering Faith will make holy duties to be no harden and assurance will make it a delight Faith will make a man to bear the Câ—osse â—nd assurance will make a man to triumph under it We are more then conquerours said perswaded Paul Seventhly Assurance of faith it is a bathing spring to all our graces Shall I instance in some 1. The mourning heart doth much depend upon the assured minde No man ever did or ever shall take God by the hand as reconciled to him or look on Christ as redeeming him or read his pardon with assurance but his heart shall be full of joy and his eyes full of teares They shall look on him whom they have pierced and shall mourne as a man mournes for his only childe Zach. 12. 10. There is nothing softens the heart so well as faith and which melts it so much as assurance The powers of the greatest kindnesse and most gracious love do open the fountain of godly sorrow within the soul 2. Love kindles in the heart upon assurance To whom much is forgiven the same will love much said Christ Luke 7. 47. We love him because he loved us first said John The love of God to us is the cause of our love to him againe and againe and the more that love is cleared to us the more is our love rekindled to him goodnesse is a cause of love here it is bountifulnesse is a cause of love here it is knowledge of both a special provocation of love in assurance here it is What a thing is this that God should give his Covenant to me his Sonne to me his Mercies to me his loving kindnesse to me his glory in heaven unto me I love a man who defends my Name I love a man who gives me a book I love a man who gives me my ransom I loue a man who gives me a meales meat Ah! poore things in comparison how do I then infinitely exceed in love to my God who I know hath pardoned hath justified hath accepted will save me for ever More might be said of all particular graces whatsoever 8. Assurance by faith doth but ease us of the world and mounts the soul above it 1. It easeth us of the world How can he walk with cares who is indeed perswaded that God is his Father he that gave him Christ will give him all other things freely God will not stand for a little earth who hath bountifully given a whole heaven and he will surely finde me food and rayment for my body who found mercy and the blood of his own Sonne for my soul 2. Nay it mounts us above the world they do observe that these lower things grow little and lesse by how much the higher a man is seated If a man could be elevated to one of the celstial orbes the whole world would seeme but a narrow spot of ground unto him In one point this is most true the neerer God draws unto the soule the more nothing doth this world appeare O the blessed favour of God! the evidences of our union with Christ This is like the light of the Sunne which puts out the light of ten thousand candles Thou wouldest never complaine of too little in the world if thou haddest so much as made up a true assurance of heaven 9. Lastly Assurance will breed comfort in life and confidence in death Object Why are Gods people afraid many times to die they cannot say with Christ I will go to my Father They have the bond but see not the seale They are not assured of Reconciliation of pardon of salvation But if they could with Simeon Take Christ into their armes if once they could be assured Now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace for mine eyes have seen thy salvation He who by assurance looks Christ in the face may with cheerful confidence look death in the face I have a desire to depart and to be with Christ said Paul Phil. 1. 23. How so verse 21. For to me to live is Christ and to die is gaine But how knows he that 2 Tim. 1. 12. For I know whom I have beleeved and I am perswaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day So 2 Cor. 5. 1. For we know that if our earthly house of this Tabernacle were dissolved we have a building of God an house not made with hands eternal in the heavens SECT V. Quest 1. NOw I come to the last inquiry by what means the soule mâ—y get up to this assurance Sol. I shall only 〈◊〉 be such rules as reach a beleeving person Thereâ—oâ—e 〈◊〉 1. If thou be a bâ—â—eever and wouldest be assured then preserve the sense of thy own natural wretchednesse and of the darknese of thy souls state without assurance Christ came to Mary when shee was weeping and the Great God looks down upon thâ— broken Spirit The highest mountaine hath the first sight of the Sunne but the lowest Christian hath the first sight of God When the people of God were mourning then saith God Comfort ye comfort ye my people and say unto them your sins are pardoned You shall finde this That the truely sensible heart hath Note three properties in it which envite the Lord much to gratifie it with assurance viz. One that is very humble Another that is much in the prizing of Gods love and mercy And a third that it is exceeding thirsty after a good look from God after some taste of Christ and God will satisfie all these 2. Be no strangers to the Ordinances you shall finde this that the ripening of faith belongs to them as well as the seeds of it The word you know is the soule of faith it was that which did incline the heart to yeild which did make it to accept of Christ and it is that also which can make us to know our possessions 1 John 15. 13. These things have I written vnto you that beleeve on the Name of the Sonne of God that ye may know that ye have eternal life So 1 John 1. 4 These things we write unto you that your joâ— may be full More plainly In whom after you heard the Word of truth ye beleeved in whom also after that ye beleeved ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise Ephesians 1. 13. For look as the Word hath promises which draw the soul to Christ so it hath promises to clear the soul in its interest in Christ to answer all doubts and feares and to answer the feare about acceptance so it removes doubts which strive against evidence and propriety The Sacrament you know it is the Seal of righteousnesse which is by faith Rom. 4. 11. Look as a Seale doth distinguish and confirme and settle the minde so is the Sacrament ordained to satisfie and perswade the heart of a beleever God appointed this
the heart and conquer Satan But if we trouble the Devil the Devil will not cease to trouble us It hath been the lot of the best Ministers to do most good and find most affliction Look but in the 19. ver and there you shall see Paul and Silas caught and drawn before the Rulers Good God! That Paul should be questioned because he did cast out a Devil But this is not the matter objected nor the immediate ground of the trouble Her Master saw that the hope of their gaines was gone How far will the love of the world thrust a man against Gods servants even Paul himself is brought to the Bar when he cuts off the gaines which the Devil brought Covetous hearts and good Ministers can never agree They will rather sell â—he Truth than lose their Gaine But being now before the Magistrate what is their accusation What! That Paul and Silas did cast out the Devil No That they who were the Masters of the Damosel were impaired and disadvantaged by their Preaching No though this was the ground yet something else was the Pretence This would seeme somewhat too base and therefore they urge against them another allegation which they knew would easily take vers 20. These being Iews exceedingly trouble our City and ver 21. Teach Customes which are not lawful for us to receive nor to observe being Romans As if he said they are a couple of factious and schymatical fellows men of a singular spirit given to innovation speak strange things of one Christ and of Believing and of Repenting and we know not what They need say no more presently there is an uprore and without any more ado right or wrong they have Justice The Magistrates rent their clothes and command to beare them ver 22. And this is not enough besides the whip they must to the Prison and be kept safe and close verse 23. Hatred of goodnesse doth many times precipitate evil men to the acts of injustice and he who hates a good man will many times become a bad Judge But in the prison and stocks they are and the layler is as strict to execute as they unjust to command verse 24. He did thrust them into the inner prison and made their feet fast in the stocks A strange Providence is that of God Paul and Silas are sent to prison to convert a Jayler to unloose him who bound them to heale him who scourged them God hath some special ends in the times and places of his servants sufferings Well at Midnight Paul and Silas prayed and sang prayses to God verse 25. No prison can bolt out our Communion with God Prayer will get up to heaven in dispite of all opposition and even a suffering Christian may be very cheerful But now see the consequents of this their prayers shooke the Heaven and the Heaven shooke the Earth so that the foundations of the Prison were shaken and immediately all the doores were opened and every ones bands were loosed ver 26. I do not marvel that Prayer can breake the bonds of Iron when I know it is able to break asunder the bonds of death it self The Iayler awakes sees the prison doores open and for ought he knew an escape of all his prisoners for whose lives probable it is that he must pay his own and therefore in a passionate desperatenesse drawes out his sword to kill himself Paul espies him and cryes out with a loud voice hold hold Do thy self no harme for we are all here not a man of us that hath stirred Which when he had searched and found O what a strange alteration is in this Jayler verse 29. He came in trembling What! he who before made them to bleed doth he now tremble he that before cast them into the stocks doth he come trembling to them What were they or what could they do shackled and scourged and imprisoned persons that he trembled before them But so he did Scorners will become Tremblers when God hath once touched their hearts yet this is not all He also falls down before them He is upon his knees to ask them forgivenesse for his cruel usage And then he brings them forth But what of all this All this may arise from sparks of pitty and Object humanity Nay but there is a greater matter then all this Sirs said he Sol. what shall I do to be saved As if he said I am in a miserable condition I have lived wickedly and done wrong to many of the people of God and in particular to you Good Lord what shall become of me you are the Ministers of Christ I beseech you have pity on me and shew unto me what I may do to save this poore soul of mine What does Paul and Silas Answer him they said Beleeve in the Lord Iesus Christ and thou shalt be saved And I beseech you marke it how immediate their answer is to his question they do not say as the High Priests to afflicted Iudas look thou to that they do not upbraid him with his hard and cruell usage They take not that advantage and say nay now doth thy conscience trouble thee for being so wicked and scourging us so sharply yea and so let it doest thou come for direction and comfort to us whom thou hast so shamefully abused No they forget the injuries and presently pour in the Oyl They instantly direct him into the true way of life Believe in the Lord Iesus Christ and thou shalt be saved But more of this anon I have chosen this text on purpose that I may proceed to the next article of the Creed I believe in Iesus Christ our Lord you see it is exprest in the next But before I handle it give me leave to Analyse the words and to touch upon some singular conclusions and then I will set down upon the Article it self more fully CHAP. II. The opening of the words with the severall Doctrines in the text THe words of the text do containe two parts A case of Conscience to be propounded by a troubled and trembling sinner The case is not for another but for himself what shall I do And not about his Riches or wealth or his body but about his soul And that not for meer speculation but for practicals it is a case about his salvation and about the meanes which he should take to attaine Sirs what shall I do to be saved Secondly The case fully resolved Beleeve in the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved As if he said Christ is the onely way to Heaven and faith is the onely way to Christ God hath given Jesus Chrâ—st to sinners and salvation in him And whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternall life Now then believe in him and you shall be saved There are many conclusions emergent from these words I will omit most of them and onely insist on the latter Change of heart breeds change of estimation toward the Ministers of the Gospel The Jayler a little
Sampson dayes as Methusalah riches as Dives were his dwellings like the doors of the Sanctuary and shaped into the most imaginable Paradise of all exquisite and earthly delights If yet his soul remained and expired unbelieving if he had not faith His unbelieving soul shall be cast out into the lake which burnes with fire and brimstone Revel 21. 8. 2. Nay again A man may perhaps be guilty of many sins and those very fowle high and crying he hath perhaps been an Idolater or else an Adulterer or else a Blasphemer or else a Persecutor yea even of Christ yet upon his repentance and faith in Christ his soul shall be saved in the day of the Lord. For no former sinnes shall prejudice the soul which is now truly turned from them and hath by faith yeilded up it self to Christ But the unbeleeving person hath every sinne and every guilt upon a severe and sure account he rejects his own satisfactions by refusing Christ The Law of God will sue him cut for every rebellion and the justice of God will break out upon him for all his iniquities and conscience will give up all his guilts and because he is unbelieving vengeance to the utmost shall cease on him and there is none to deliver him nor he ever able to deliver himself Vnbelief it bindes all the sinnes upon the soul and condemnation fast unto the sinnes It leaves the sinning soul naked to the eye of divine Justice neither hath the soul any shelter which is out of Christ O thou who wilt not kisse the Sunne now who wilt not have Christ to rule thee who despisest the tender love of God the precious blood of Christ who wilt receive him for thy Priest for thy Prophet for thy King In the last day thou shalt curse thy heart and accurse thy sins and cry to the mountaines but they will not cover thee to mercy but that will not pitty thee to Christ but he will not regard thee to Justice but it will not heare thee thou wouldst not believe thou wouldst not receive Christ as Lord and Saviour but thou wouldst have the love of sin and therefore thou shalt have the portion of a sinner thou shall not see life but the wrath of God shall abide upon thee Nay if the father hath given and offered unto thee his own Sonne and thou harden thy heart by unbelief thou wilt not take him upon those termes I tell thee in the name of the Lord Jesus that if thou wilt thus bid Christ farewell thou dost bid God farewell all mercy farewell all salvation farewell all hope of it farewell and thou bindest all thy sinnes upon thy soul and all the curse of the Law upon thy soul Woe unto thee it s better thou hadst never been borne If thou hast any sense as an ordinary creature any reason as a man any understanding as a Christian any true estimation of an immortal soul any conceptions of heaven or hell if salvation be any comfortable thing if damnation be any miserable thing then I beseech thee I beseech thee labour for faith get out of an unbelieving condition thou perâ—shest if thou stay'st there thou art lost for ever he that believes not shall be damned said the Prince of salvation O repent and believe why will you die O house of Israel Consider throughly of the love of God in giving Christ and of 2. Motive the love of Christ in giving himself and perhaps this may perswade thee to labour for faith The love of God in giving of Christ See Joh. 3. 16. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life 17. For God sent not his Sonne into the world to condemne the world but that the world through him might be saved O this love of God to sinners To give his Son and not a servant his own Son and not another his only Son and not a second his only begotten Son and not an adopted childe and that not for any ill but for good he did not send him as an enemy but as a friend not to deliver a poor and mean good but the best and highest good to save us not to deliver us from an ordinary danger but from condemnation Yea and he is sent and given he was not sought by us but given by him Yea and no way deserved but freely given yea and given to us not friends but enemies Thou hast shewed this day said Saul to David 1 Sam. 24. 18 How that thou hast dealt well with me forasmuch as when the Lord had delivered me into thine hand thou killedst me not 19. For if a man finde his enemy will he let him go well away Thus here 'twixt man and man but saith the Apostle God commendeth his love towards us in that whiles we were yet sinners Christ dyed for us Now shall all this love be in vaine shall God think of a Christ and we pass by him shall he give a Saviour and we reject him shall he bring salvation to our doores and we not accept of it Why you need my Son and you are damned if you take him not and I freely offer him unto you that you may be saved and shall not we strive for faith to receive him The love of Christ O how wonderfull was his love to us it was not a love to the fallen Angels but to fallen man and such a love to fallen man as the like cannot be found He laid aside his glory to do us good he humbled himself to raise us he became poor to enrich us he fasted and prayed and endured the contradiction of sinners Reproaches Crucifyings Wrath Bloody agonies Conflicts with Satan sorrows in his soul piercings in his body and a bitter death to satisfie for us and to reconcile us and shall we not accept of him shall all this be in vaine Why doest thou not heare Christ calling and crying out unto thee never were any sorrowes like my sorrowes never was any love like to my love O unbelieving and sinning soul look upon me why doest thou passe by why doest thou hide thine eyes from me why doest thou stop thine eares at me I am the Saviour of sinners and there is none else besides me thy own miseries might cause thee to look up and embrace me And let my love unto thee a little draw thee move thee melt thee Hast thou not heard of the revilings and scoffes which I susteined my love to thy soul made me a willing patient Hast thou not heard of the agonies of my soul which made me to sweat drops of blood and my soul was exceeding heavy even to the death yet my love to thy soul made me willing to drink that cup Hast thou not heard of that desertion and of that wrath which made me to cry out my God my God why hast thou forsaken me And yet my love to thy soul made me to passe through it Hast
in thy stead and answered Justice for all thy sins 3. Divine justice will not desire a double satisfaction It will not require satisfaction from thee and from thy surety too The quarrel ceaseth 'twixt thee and God for Christ hath by his own blood taken that up As Elihu spake of uprightnesse that I say of believing in the Lord Jesus if thou doest then the Lord will be gracious unto thee and will say deliver him from going down to the pit for I have found a ransome Job 33. 23 24. Obj. But I who am I so totally unworthy there is nothing in me to move Christ to engratiate me he will never bestow himself on such an one as I am will ever Christ look on such a dead dog as I am I answer to this 1. Personal unworthinesse it is no prejudice You read in Mat. 7. Things 8. 8. that the Centurion came to Christ for his servant and believed on him and sped well Yea will you say but he was worthy nay he professeth the Obj. contrary Lord I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof Sol. as if he should say I have nothing in me to demerit and challenge this gracious act of thine nothing and yet I believe that thou canst and wilt heal my servant so the Prodigal I am not worthy to be c. 2. Nay the humble sense of our unworthinesse it is a furtherance Christ doth not expect any excellencies and meritorious motives from thee thou must come unto him as an empty vessel the full soul and the sound spirit is not for him bring a soul to Christ which is spread all over with misery and need why such a soul is a proper object for mercy to deal with bring a soul to Christ which is all over with lostnesse with poverty with sicknesse with unworthinesse why this is the soul upon which Christ will look It s never well with a man untill he can take Christ upon his knee upon a bare knee with an empty hand that is till he be brought to be poor in spirit that he is nothing and deserves nothing and begs of Christ to accept of him even for Christs sake The Lord be merciful to me a sinner went home justified when the thank God I am not as other men returned as he came a proud Pharisee You shall finde it thus that God looks most on him who looks least on himself The humble and contrite spirits which are broken out of themselves and can cry out O Lord I am really vile and mostly unworthy These the high God who inhabits the lofty places doth behold And Christ is ready to take him by the hand who thinks himself unworthy to touch his feet There are two tempers which like Christ well one is a beleeving heart and another an humble soul 3. Personal worthinesse is not the motive nor designed ground for faith in Christ The ground of belief that which invites the soul to draw on it self to Christ is no deserving or eminent quality in our selves but the goodnesse and fidelity of the promise and the gracious offer of Christ himself to the soul Behold he calls thee why this is enough if thou canst finde God holding forth the golden Scepter offering Christ unto thee upon such and such termes and thou consent unto them with all thy heart thou mayest confidently close and lay hold on Christ by faith This is the wise skill of a Christian truly to observe the proper rise of faith When God promised Abraham a son the text saith he did not consider his own body Rom. 4 19. that is he did not consult with the strength of his own nature what an able principle there was in himself to compass such an effect but he was fully perswaded that what God had promised that he was able to performe The ability and fidelity of Gods promise exceedingly enclined his heart to believe So is it here about faith in Christ if thou doest consider thy own body thy own deserts thy own excellencies thou shalt never beleeve for faith can finde no ground in these to encourage the soul but the ground of faith is without our selves Why God offers me Christ and Christ calls me unto him being heavy laden and he saith that he who beleeves in him shall have eternal life Now this is a word of truth and this word of his is worthy of all acceptation I will venture my soul upon it It is with faith as with a bird cast him into the water he cannot flie that element is too grosse for him he cannot gather and beat his wings there and therefore is kept down but cast him into the aire which is a more pure element then he can clap and â—pread the wings and mount why faith is the wing of the soul and the promise is that spiritual element that aire which breaths a life and motion to faith faith is raised by it alone and it is checked and hindered whiles the soul would force it to act it self upon those poor and grosse excellencies in our selves Faith desires no better object then Christ nor suâ—â—r pawnes then Gods promâ—se Fourthly to receive Christ by faith it is not a matter of merit but a point of duty When God commands a sinner to repent and to forsake his sinnes and take him he shall have mercy iâ—â—e will do it This may not now be said O Lord I am not worthy to obey thee in this duty if I were worthy to repeâ—t I would repent nay but O man divine commands are to be obeyed it is thy duty to repent So God commands the soul to beleeve in Christ to accept of him The soul now looks on the excellencies of the gift but forgets the obligation of duty It s true Christ is a most excellent gift and blessing there is not such a thing in all the world for a poore sinner as Christ but then know that his excellencies may not take thee off from thy duty This is his Commandment that we beleeve on the Name of his Sonne Brethren you are mistaken to beleeve in Christ being proposed unto us in the Gospel it is not a matter of indifferency I may or I may not nor is it a matter of curtesie as if we did a work of supererogation more then God requires nay but it is a matter of conscience a man sinnes he violates a command an evangelical precept if he doth not beleeve It is not a dispute of worthinesse or unworthinesse but it is obedience to the Command which thou art to look upon 5. Christ is given out of rich grace and mercy and love and therefore none can receive him but the unworthy There is this difference 'twixt the reward of Justice and the gift of graciousnesse Justice hath an eye upon the disposition and acts of the person and according unto their qualities and degrees doth it commensurate reward or punishment But graciousnesse hath an eye only upon it self the free
is really his as certainly he is thine as thy husband is thy husband so the Christian is obliged to assure his heart thereof Which I shall easily clear by Argument 1. We are bound to draw neer unto God in the full assurance of faith Heb. 10. 22. Which is 〈◊〉 conceive in a cleare perswasion that we shall not faile but enjoy the good which he promiseth now this cannot be unlesse a man be assured and perswaded that God is his God and Christ is his Christ for as much as perswasion of audience doth always arise from a presupposed persâ—asion of personal and mutual interest I cannot by faith be perswaded that God wil give such a good thing or such unless I am first perswaded that he is my God that God is my God or Christ is my Christ It is a fundamental perswasion upon which all others are built for this gives life and settlement to my doubting soul I many times doubt but shall I have this thing which I ask yes sayes the beleeving heart but how are you assured of it I reply because God is my God he hath given himself unto me Ergo he will give this but how know you that God is your God Upon good ground why saith the beleeving soul of that I am abundantly perswaded I doubt it not hereupon the soul raiseth it self to that other assurance of acceptance and audience why then I will nor doubt of this I will be confident that then the Lord will heare for he is my God and David goes this way very often 2. We are bound all our dayes to give God thanks for his greatest mercies now I think that the bestowing of Christ upon the soule is as great a mercy as ever poore sinners had Obj. It is so but what of this Sol. But we cannot give God hearty thanks whiles we are doubtful of our particular interest in Christ Can'st thou go unto the Lord and say O Lord I blesse thee from my soul for all the mercies which thou hast conferred on me health I have and I know it for which I do thank thee riches I have and friends and this I know too and for them I thank thee too I thank thee also exceedingly from the bottome of my soul for that thou hast given thy own Sonne to me Jesus Christ but truly I know not whether thou hast given him to me or no I thank thee exceedingly for the pardon of my vile sinnes in this blood but verily I am not sure of this I rather think they are not pardoned Nay this will not runne smooth and the reason is because so much particular evidence as God gives a man of his personal interest in himself or Christ or his merits so much and no greater thankfulnesse will the soul be brought unto SECT IV. Quest 4. WHat Arguments to move beleevers to labour for the assurance of faith Sol. There are many 1. As he said to Job Do the consolations of God seem small unto thee That I say here doth assurance seeme a small thing unto thee Consider seriously the matters and things about which this assurance is conversant and thou shalt finde them of the greatest consequence in the world What doest thou think of Jesus Christ for a sinner Can there be a more excellent good then Christ I count all things but drosse and dung for the excellency of Christ said Paul Phil. 3. or can there be a more necessary good for thee then Christ Tell me in sad thoughts that if thou hadst all the pleasures of the world and all the honours ours of the world and all the riches of the world and yet wast Christâ—esse that is thou hadst no portion in Christ why what avails all this as long as thou art Christless as Abraham said seeing I am childlesse In whom is God reconciled unto thee but in Christ and how wilt thou stand before God if thou have not Christ by whom canst thou get salvation but by Christ and why then wilt not thou force thy soul to give all diligence to make thy part in Christ sure to thy soul that thou mayest come in all cases to that of Job I know that my Redeemer liveth and with Paul He loved me and gave himself for me Again what doest thou think of the pardon of sinnes verily the time was once even then when thy spirit did roare all the night and thou foundest no quiet in the day when thy moysture was turned into the drought of Summer and thy soul was disquieted within thee I say in that time thou couldest with many teares break out and say with David Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven and whose sinne is covered Psal 32. 1 2. Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity O what wouldest thou have given to have beleeved that thy sinnes should be pardoned thou couldest then discover death in so unpardoned a state and life then in a discharged and absolved condition Why I pray you is pardon of sinne so precious a thing and is the assured knowledge thereof a small thing Is it not enough to have the pardon passe not onely the seale of the King but the eye also of the malefactor Yea yet further what think you of eternal life what is it O I cannot reach it by thoughts much lesse by words Life no such thing on the earth as it eternal life what thing in heaven more then it To see my God my Christ to be gloriously united to them to be filled with the perfections of holinesse brightnesse of glory to know him as we are known to love him in the transcendency of love I know not what I say for I speak of eternal life O! if the the glimpse of divine favour here be the admiration of our soules the perfection of our joyes the heaven on earth tell me what is the fulnesse of his favour what is the full evidence of his favour what is the everlasting evidence of his favour Now eternal life is all this all this alas I have said nothing of it yet Eye hath not seen ear hath not heard neither hath it entred into the heart of man what God hath c. And is not this a matter to be determined and ascertained to our souls what to let eternal life hang in suspense verily though until we do mount and rise to the assurance of faith we leave for our part though the thing may be sure in it selfe even this also our eternal life as a thing doubtful Thou wile not hold the least quillet of thy land upon unevident and unsure term yet wilt thou c. 2. Assurance will marvellously settle and quiet the soul David expresseth so much Psal 4. 6. Lord life thou up the light of thy countenance upon us Ver. 7. Thou hast put gladnesse in my heart more then in the time that their corn and wine increased Ver. 8. I will lay me down and sleep The ship at anchor is safe but in a calme
not him whom he seeth to condemn himself It is enough that his Son who was lost is now returned and that he who was dead is now alive We must imitate our heavenly Father in this who in the Covenant of Grace will forgive our iniquities and remember our sins Jer. 31. 34. no more So in another place If the wicked will turn from all his sinnes that he hath committed and keep all my statutes c. All Ezek 18. 21 22. his transgressions which he hath committed they shall not be mentioned unto him Why Brethren If God forgives the man all the wrongs done against him should not we forgive the smaller trespasses against us and what have we to do to upbraid when God is pleased to forgive and convert and what should we stand upon our respects when God hath past by all the indignities cast upon his honour and glory There are two sorts of sinners Stout and resolute who know how to slight mercy neglect command and to fear at the threatnings A severe denunciation of judgment and wrath a conviction and aggravation of their sinnes are the proper discoveries for them For where hath God spoken a word of peace or comfort or ease to such Bleeding and afflicted who tremble at threatnings gaspe for mercy faint for deliverance and change Here now Ministers must have eyes of pity and tongues and hands of Oyl they must not pour in scorpions nor add terrors to the afflicted but Preach liberty to the Captives They must binde up the broken hearted and give them beauty for ashes the Oyl of joy for mournings the garment Esay 61. of prayer for the spirit of heavinesse that they may be called trees of righteousnesse the planting of the Lord Isai 61. 1 2 3. In these cases we are not to look on our selves but on our office not on our own indignities but on the patients necessities that way which God looks and speaks that must we speak also Now God looks on the Contrite to revive them and speakes comfort to the troubled soules and therefore we must be silent to upbraid and ready to direct and comfort afflicted souls Troubled souls must be directed to Christ for this is it which Paul and Silas adviseth the afflicted Jayler Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ c. They do not direct him to any man or Angel to any pilgrimage or Saints they set him not up on any selfe-standing project but Beleeve in the Lord Jesus Christ But why to Christ Because none is appointed to relieve a troubled soul but Christ Him hath God the father sealed and he was anointed to preach glad tidings Secondly none is able to pacifie and quiet a troubled soul but Christ whatsoever is sinful or imperfect cannot be a stay to an afflicted conscience But Christ hath perfect righteousnesse he hath wrought full redemption he is able to save to the utmost That which cannot satisfie Gods Justice can never pacifie an afflicted heart but if God might be fully satisfied if he might be reconciled then the conscience would be quiet now Christ hath done this he hath made peace and become a curse and is a propitiation c. He will relieve the afflicted heart He is called a merciful High Priest and one who is touched with the feeling of our infirmities and he will not break the brused reed and he calls the heavy laden to come to him to be eased There be three things which would marvelously ease and refresh a troubled soul One if he could get off the guilt of former sins Another if he could get such a righteousness as with which he might boldly stand before God A third is if he could get his heart and wayes to be changed Now Christ can yield out all this his blood gets off the gilt of our sins he is made sin for us that we may be made the righteousnesse of God in him and he can change our natures by his blessed Spirit Therefore the Apostle saith that he is made redemption righteousnesse and sanctification unto us But I passe over all these conclusions and come to that upon which I must somewhat insist CHAP. III. Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ the onely way to salvation TO believe in the Lord Jesus Christ is the only way of Salvation The text is cleare for it Parallel places are these Mark 16. 15. Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature 16. he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved Joh. 3. 16. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life Act. 4. 12. Neither is there Salvation in any other for there is no other name under heaven given amongst men whereby we must be saved For the discovery of this assertion we must open these particulars First the meaning of each of these titles viz. Jesus and Christ and Lord. Secondly what the believing in the Lord Jesus Christ doth import Thirdly how it may appeare to be the onely way of salvation Fourthly the usefull application of all this to our selves What is the sense and summe of those three titles Jesus Christ Lord I shall resolve them distinctly SECT I. JEsus signifies a Saviour as it was a name imposed from the Sect. 1. pleasure of heaven by an Angel Mat. 1. 21. Thou shalt cast his name Jesus for he shall save his people from their sinnes The first name that you read of imposed on Christ in the New-Testament is this name of Jesus for the best name that sinners could possibly desire to heare was this that God hath provided a Saviour for them The Prophet Isaiah 9. 6. saith that his name shall be called wonderful and indeed Jesus is a wonderful name It is a name which breeds just wonder and admiration to all the world to men and Angels it may make our hearts to wonder at the hyperbole of Gods love as one of the Fathers speaks that he Mirandum Amoris should notwithstanding our vile deserts bestow a Saviour upon us who else had been lost for ever The Apostle saith Phil. 2. 9 10. That it is a name above all names no name like it either for the authority which was conferred on him who bare that name or for the comfort which that name beares in it for a sinner Therefore said the Angel to the Shepherds fear not for behold I bring you good tydings of great joy which shall be to all people for unto you is borne this day in the City of David a Saviour Luk. 2. 11. yea that is good news indeed A Saviour for a sinner What kind of Saviour Christ is no such news as that Now here observe divers things The Sonne of God is a singular Saviour No Saviour in all the world like him Joshuah is called a Saviour and the Judges were called so yet the Son of God is a Saviour infinitely beyond them For. They could save
true as truth it self and as good as goodnesse it self we cannot make men to understand it nor to believe it nor to yield unto it but Christ is that Prophet whose Chair is in heaven and whose speaking can yet pierce into the hearts of men He can make us to know wisdome he can teach our reines and truth in the inward parts there can he write his Law in our hearts though the minde be as dark as darknesse it self yet he can make the light of knowledge to arise in the thickest darknesse of the minde though the judgment be corrupt and full of errors yet Christ can erect a throne of truth and direct us into the pathes of righteousnesse though the heart be dull yet his words are as fire to quicken that heart though it be as hard as the rock yet his word can be as the hammer to break that stony heart His teaching can soften the most unflexible adamant he is able to convince and bend and alter and bow it the very dead shall heare his voice and live So that if any person doth need any directions any enablement for heaven or the way thither he must know that Christ is the Prophet anointed whatsoever belongs to an heavenly instructing and to an heavenly drawing and obeying that is to be found in Christ and had from him who is anointed a Prophet that is designed to teach the Church and furnisheth with all the treasures of wisdome and knowledge and ability c. SECT V. LAstly Christ was anointed to be a King therefore Psal 2. 2. he is called Gods anointed and ver 6. the King whom he Psal 2. 2. did set upon his holy hill of Sion The King of Kings Rev. 19. 16. He shall reigne over the house of Jacob Luk. 1. 33. so Mat. 28. 18. All power is given to me in heaven and in earth He hath the Scepter of Royalty and the Rod of authority and the sword of power and the throne of judgement and the Laws of his lips and the keys of life and death Now this regal office of his to which he was anointed imports many things First that he is to beare rule over all the Nations and indeed his natural kingdome reacheth over all the world from the highest Angel to the lowest Devil Secondly that he is to Governe and rule the Church which he hath purchased with his blood The Government is upon his shoulders Isai 9. 6. And therefore he is called the Law-giver Jam. 4. 12. and all judgment is committed to his hand Joh. 5. 22 27. to this end you have the rod of his Scepter his holy and righteous Laws and his mighty and blessed Spirit to give force unto them even into our hearts and there to bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ Thirdly that he is to maintaine and uphold his Church therefore he is said to Gird his sword upon his thâ—gh Psal 45. 3. and to ride upon a horse with his garment dipped in blood and armed as if he were ready to fight He is the mighty redeemer of his servants against all who intrench upon their peace and safety and he strikes downe Paul to the earth for persecuting him It belongs to the King to be the defence of his subjects so here God hath appointed all the Protections and safeties and deliverances of the Church to be in Christ Fourthly he is to conquer all his and our enemies God hath given Christ a Kingdome but it is such as he must fight for Not a Subject which he hath which comes in unto him but by conquest If we be in our own hands peccatum Hostisest quamdiu est said Saint Augustine and if we be in Satans hands we are in that enemies hands More plainely there are these enemies of Christ and his Church which he is to conquer for himselfe and them First hell and we read that he hath spoiled principalities and powers and made a shew of them openly and triumphed over them Col. 2. 15. Secondly death 1 Cor. 15. 54. Death is swallowed up in victory 55. O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory c. 56 57. But thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ Thirdly sin and this is Christ also to conquer he is to cast down all the strong holds of lusts and all imaginations and to captivate the whole man He is to subdue our iniquities for us and not to suffer sin to have dominion over us Fourthly Wicked men he will stick his arrowes in the brests of Princes and in the hearts of the mighty and terrible he is to bruise the Nations with a rod of Iron and to dash them in pieces like a potters vessell He will execute judgment upon all of them and cast them all to the dust who rose up against his person or Government or people He will set his people at rest from them that rise against them and will make his enemies his foot-stool CHAP. IV. What Believing in the Lord Iesus Christ doth import Q. 2 WHat doth the believing in the Lord Jesus Christ import Jesus Christ is like a ring and faith is like the finger which wears it He is like a treasury and faith like the hand which draws out thence As David spake in another kinde come and I will tell you what the Lord hath done for my soul or as Philip to Nathanael can there any good thing come out of Nazareth Philip saith come and see The same is to be said of faith God hath done great matters for sinful man saith faith Why but can any good be brought by any to us who are so bad yes sayes faith come and see Christ is very good he is a Saviour for a poor sinner but it is faith which finds him so Marke the answer of the Apostles here in the text what shall I do to be saved saith the Jayler They do not answer there is a Jesus Christ take thou no more care he did dye for sinners and thou shalt do well enough Nay this they answer thou maiest be saved by Christ but thou must believe in Christ Not a medicine is the remedy but a medicine applyed Not the man but the man taken becomes the husband So the taking of Christ the believing in him is the way to heaven Because this is an excellent point for our life lies in it give me leave to speak somewhat of faith First in the general and there I will be brief Secondly in special as justifying of faith or faith believing in Jesus Christ our Lord. First Generally For the generall nature of believing observe these propositions First that believing is an assent to such matters as are known only by revelation from another there are in the soul of man three qualities by which we came to finde out or perceive things First one quality is Scientia or knowledge which is a firme assent unto a thing which may be evidenced to
it is the will of man which doth take and receive Christ but it is Gods Spirit who doth bestow that grace of faith by which he doth take and receive That a man hath a will none can deny who know that they are men Nay and that the will is able to send out its own actions it is willingly confessed but infinite is the difference 'twixt the naturall actions of the will and the supernatural qualities and operation of Gods Spirit in the will It is true a dead carcase is able of it self to send forth a stinking smell but it is not able to quicken and enliven it self That the will can will I grant but that the will can of it self enliven it self to that great part of life I meane believing it is not only a vehement injury and dishonour to the fountaine and freenesse of grace but also a most foolish and senselesse error the will of man being naturally so opposite to believing and believing being an act so every way unsutable and disproportionable to the inclination and ability of the will No verily faith in God comes from God and so faith in Christ from Christ none ever could see Christ in a justifying and saving way who had not that eye of faith put into him by the Spirit of Christ No grace cōe◠from any but the God of Grace Vnto you it is given to believe Phil. 1. 29. SECT II. THe subject of this faith is a sensible sinner I do not as yet speak of the immediate subject of inhesion which respects Subjectum those parts of the soul wherein this grace is seated of this I shall speak anon But of the subject of denomination and this subject is a sensible sinner There are two sorts of sinners Two sorts of sinners 1. Some generally corrupted both in their natures and in their lives and they are as unsensible as they ere sinfull They do not know in any powerfull degree of true reflection and feeling their own vilenesse accursednesse and miserablenesse of persons being so and remaining so in an unsensible condition of sinfulnesse I dare confidently affirme that though they may have most able and strong presumptiors yet they have not as yet the least degree of justifying and saving faith How can any man by Faith look upon Jesus Christ as his Physitian who is whole in his own opinion The unsensible sinner as he cannot close with Christ so he will not care for Christ for what should now move such an heart is it this holinesse of Christs person Good Lord How ridiculous is that motive to a profane and gracelesse heart or is it the sutablenesse of Christs Office Why what is Salvation to him by another who as yet sees no ground or reason of condemnation in himself 2. Others sensibly experienced who know thus much that they in particular are sinful and there is no Salvation no hope of it from themselves but it is to be found onely in Jesus Christ I confesse there are severall degrees of this sensiblenesse neither dare I to assigne the height and latitude of it unto the tearmes of horror and terror that is that a person must be alwayes and necessarily anguished with extremities of amazement and dejections before he can believe in Christ No though these sharp throwes are manifest in some yet I dare not make them a rule for all only this I say that the heart believes not it looks not towards Christ till it feel it self to be sinful and lost by reason of sin and that there is no possibility of subsistence in it self And now there is room for faith when I feel my self a sinner now there is reason for me to look upon a Saviour and when I am sensible of my own vilenesse now is there reason to look upon another righteousnesse and when I perceive my own lostness now is there cause to look after that salvation which God hath put in the Lord Jesus Christ. Me thinks that of Christ he came not to call the righteous but sinners that he is sent to finde that which is lost that the whole need not a Physitian but the sick that he is sent to preach liberty to the captives do abundantly confirme this truth Yea and our own experiences gives in a clear evidence that not only in the beginning but in the progresse of our conversion our eyes are then most upon Christ to look after him and to prize him when we are most sensibly acquainted with our own sinfulnesse and miserablenesse of condition SECT III. THe Seat or babitation of faith is the heart or will Scriptures are copious in this Rom. 10. 10. with the heart man Sedes believeth unto righteousnesse Acts 8. 37. And Philip said if thou believest with all thy heart thou mayest and he answered and said I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God Rev. 22. ver 11. whosoever will let him take the water of life freely There be who distinguish 'twixt three kindes of faith First Credere deum which is a universall and large conception of a God when the understanding is perswaded beyond Atheisme to believe that there is a God Secondly Credere Deo and this is such a disposition of the understanding by which it gives credit or belief to that God speaking and revealing as to one who is truth and cannot lye Thirdly Credere in Deum which is not only a credence to God as true in his Nature and Word but a reliance on him with the will and embracing of him and his truth and goodness with the affections Now justifying faith or faith in Christ is comprehended in this latter kinde of believing For the better apprehending of this observe a few things viz. First the things which God doth propound unto us are of different ends and uses some are propounded meerly to be known of which sort some conjecture many historicall pasages in the Word and many predictions and many Genealogies Some are propounded not only to be known but also to be done as the Divine Precepts or Commandments some are propounded to be known and to be avoided or declined as all the comminations and threatnings in the Word against sinners Some are propounded to be known and to be embraced with the will and affections of which sort are all the Promises of God and Jesus Christ our Lord. All those parts of the Word which conteine our good and our good to be embraced They have a necessary and naturall reference to the will of man which is planted in us by God to be conversant about all that which respects our good Since then Jesus Christ is our good both personally considered and also vertually considered faith therefore as conversant about him must naturally be planted in the will That there are two parts as it were of faith One is imperfect and in compleat yet is it a necessary ingredient unto faith and this respects the understanding when we are supernaturally illightned to see the
Eph. 4. It takes Christ so as none with Christ or besides Christ The Patriarchs had most of them a wife and a concubine it is not so here Faith doth match with an absolute exclusion of all other matches It is not the soul and Christ and sin nor the soul and Christ and the world nor the soul and Christ and the Devil it is not the soul and Christ in chief and sinne in service as a deputy or a corrivall a secondary thing c. Fourthly this taking is freed from mistaking Faith knowes what it doth it sees its way it understands 1. Who that is whom it takes 2. Upon what termes he will be taken 3 Its grounds of taking First who it is viz. the Son of God God and man a most holy person a mighty Redeemer and Saviour Secondly upon what termes viz. He will not come in by the by he will not be taken as a vassaile as a captive as a drudge he will not be taken for base and changeable reasons meerly to stop a gap in the conscience or only in faire weather but he will be taken as Lord and King to command all the heart to dispose all the wayes to rule our very thoughts he will be taken for his own sake out of a judicious love and estimation of his person he will be taken with all the estates and conditions that befall on the crosse crucified as well as in the way to Hierusalem magnified as one persecuted and distressed on earth as well as one raised and glorified in heaven and thus true faith takes Christ Thirdly upon what grounds viz. upon Gods offer of Christ and promise that whosoever believes on him c. and on his commandment that we should believe on the Name of his Son whereupon faith brings in the soul to Christ it believeth that God saith true that he doth not call upon men he doth not command men he doth not promise men and all this to delude men so that if you should ask faith what warrant had you to bring in such a soul to Christ Why saith faith God revealed and offered his Sonne and commanded me to believe and promised not to cast off any that come c. Fifthly this taking is resolved against untaking All takings are not of the same force and power if I take a servant I take him so that upon good reasons and occasions I can put him off againe but if I take a wife there can be no untaking on my part unless God takes her I must never forsake her Faith takes Christ this way to be a Saviour for ever to be a Head an Husband a Lord for ever I observe that there are two kindes of taking Christ to be a Lord one is compulsory and violent as when an enemy is made to rule a man in a sicknesse in a terror of conscience in a day of wrath in an expectation of death he will take Christ to be his Lord he will say Oh! sinne is vile I abhor it I will become a new man I will have none but the Lord Christ and he only shall be my Lord and hereupon the man sets about the work of shewing that Christ is his Lord he will command his servants to pray to heare to read to keep the Sabbath c. Yet this man as soon as Gods hand is off as soon as ever he is freed from his bands he will like a lewd apprentise break loose from his Lord and Master he will serve Christ no longer he will to his sins again to the world again to his base society again c. Why because this accepting was only violent and no actions are stedfast or constant whose causes are compelling and violent Another is ingenious of faith and this taking of Christ is grounded onely in Christ in its excellencies beauties perfections which are not like the light of a candle this houre very cleare and the next none at all but like light in the Sunne still abiding and remaining and therefore when a man doth by faith take Christ he takes him for ever for faith can never change for the better and it sees stedfast reason in Christ to cleave to Christ Now I come to the consequent object of faith and that is remission of sinnes and righteousnesse and whatsoever good comes from Christ For thus it is faith doth order its motions or actions according to the word Now the word reveales and offers Christ first and then the benefits next It is not whosoever beleeves eternal life shall have Christ the Sonne of God but whosoever beleeves on the Sonne of God shall have eternal life Nor is it whosoever beleeves the remission of sinnes shall have Christ but whosoever beleeves in Christ shall have the Remission of sinnes Yet when faith hath made the soule to take Christ it goes then from the person to the portion from Christ to the good in Christ and by him for if Christ be ours all is ours saith the Apostle 1 Cor. 2. SECT VI. I Will therefore speak a word of faith as conversant about First Remission of sinnes Secondly Righteousnesse For the first of these viz. the pardon or remission of sinnes Consider That remission of sinnes is an Action of God acquitting the gilt and the punishment so that he will never reckon with the soul any more in a judicial way for those sinnes which are pardoned As when the King throughly pardons a Malefactor he dischargeth him and takes off the gilt we speak of it in respect of redundancy that it shall not now prejudice the person any longer so doth God when he pardons sinne Though he doth not in this annihilate the sinne that is make that to be no sinne which was sinne yet he doth prejudice sin that is he takes off the guilt that it shall never redound to the damnation of the sinner no nor to his dammage Jesus Christ hath procured remission or pardon of sinne for us hence Ephes 1. 7. In whom you have redemption through his blood even the forgivenesse of your sinnes His blood was shed for many for the remission of sinnes Mat. 26 that is he did die and by his death hath merited and procured our pardon and discharge God offering Christ offers with him the purchase of Christ viz. the pardon of sinnes If you will take my Sonne I will pardon your sins Now faith inclines the soul which is sensible of its sinful guilt to put it self on Jesus Christ for the discharge of them As the wife looks for none and goes to none but to her husband to discharge her debts so faith goes to none for to procure remission of sinnes but only to Christ and on him doth it rest O Lord Christ saith Faith thou didst take these my sinful debts upon thee and thou didst undertake to satisfie for them and to get them to be blotted out yea and I know that thou didst make a full satisfaction Now I renounce all hope of pardon from any thing in me
bound for me alas saith he all my estate will not reach or extend to satisfie half of what thou owest Then he goes to another Sir be you pleased to engage your self Alas saith he I am so poore that the Creditor will not take my word Even thus it is when a man will runne to something in himself to justifie him before God alas saith holinesse I am not able enough and saith good works God may finde reason enough to discard us Therefore saith Faith To Christ To Christ None but Christ SECT II. SEcondly All that can justifie and save a man is only to be found in Christ as in the meritorious cause Ergo the only way to be saved is to be beleeve in Jesus Christ Hence is Christ called Heb. 2. 10. The Chaptaine of our salvation Heb. 5. 18. The Author of eternal salvation There be two things which if a man had he should be saved one is the forgivenesse of his sinnes Ergo saith David Ps 32. 1. Blessed is the man whose transgression is forgiven whose sin is covered ver 2. Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity Another is the possession of a most compleat righteousnesse by which he might stand and appeare perfectly just before the judgement seat of God so that if divine justice should look on it with the exactest eye yet it were every way unspotted and full Now these two are to be found only in Christ and by him First Remission of sinnes It is the purchase of his blood onely and therefore often in Scripture assigned thereto Thou canst not with all thy teares wipe off meritoriously the least of thy sinnes nor with all thy grace buy out the pardon of thy present failings All Remission is by blood by the only blood of Christ Secondly the righteousnesse which justifies and saves us is only in Christ He is made righteousnesse to us 1 Cor. 1. 30. and Rom. 5. 19. As by one mans disobedience many were made sinners so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous see verse 21. Grace reignes through righteousnesse unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. I know that this Point of imputed righteousnesse is the great quarrel 'twixt us and the Church of Rome I shall therefore reserve the handling of it to the Uses where I may more fitly clear our doctrine Now put things together Whatsoever will save us is in Christ And faith is the only grace to conjoyne us with Christ and therefore To believe in Jesus Christ is the only way to saved SECT III. THirdly Salvation is by grace only Eph. 2. 5. Rom. 11. 6. And it is a free gift Rom. 5. 15. The free gift the grace of God and the gift of grace which is by one man Jesus Christ hath abounded unto many and v. 16. the free gift is of many offences to justification and v. 18. the free gift came upon all men to justification of life Now if it be so then here 's roome for beleeving For Faith brings nothing of its own but receives all as gift from God It is the receiving grace Lord give me thy Son Lord give me the pardon of my sinnes Lord give me a righteousnesse Lord give me eternal life all these things are gifts and faith only receives these gifts Ergo. SECT IV. FOurthly Salvation is only conferr'd in such a way whereby God only may have the glory of it Though God doth bestow great matters on us for our good yet all the end of them is for his own glory To commend the riches of his grace and mercy Ephes 2. 7 8. so v. 9. Not of works least any man should boast that is he should vaunt and say I have got heaven by my own merits I have my wages for my labour and my happinesse for my penny Now the way of beleeving is the only way of acknowledgeing a God and of emptying of our proud imaginations whatsoever faith hath it hath taken the same out of a gracious hand All is almes which comes to faith and it will confesse I have nothing and am nothing but what I have received and what I expect I expect it for his sake who promiseth it not for my sake who receives it and thus faith puts all the glory on God SECT V. FIfthly neither would our salvation be sure nor our comfort sure if we were to be saved any other way then by believing in Jesus Christ Salvation would not be sure because First our happinesse would be no more sure now being in our own hands out of Christs then was Adams left to himself Secondly we would never be sure of salvation by any thing against which God might take just exception No sure comfort because conscience troubled with the sence of sin could never be pacified with imperfections and sins That which will not satisfie God can never pacifie conscience But saith the Apostle Rom. 5. 1. Being justified by faith we have peace with God faith findes one who was delivered for our offences who pacified God to the utmost who was without spot whose righteousnesse is full imputed to us accepted for us and so hereupon doth graciously quiet and still the heart We must distinguish 'twixt the root and fountaine and ground of our comfort and between the testimonies of our interest in the root of our comfort only Jesus Christ is the ground of a Christians comfort and therefore saith Paul God forbid that I should rejoyce in any thing but in the crosse of Christ If at any time we behold holinesse or any part of it in our hearts we take comfort in it not as the ground but as in the testimony because it doth manifest our interest in him who is our comfort our peace our joy our salvation our all in all Thus much for the Explication and confirmation of this great assertion viz. That to beleeve in Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation Now I descend to the useful Application of all to our selves CHAP. VIII The preaching and hearing of the Gospel of singular use THe first Use shall be for Information which consists in many profitable consectaries or inferences which will flow from this truth If beleeving in the Lord Jesus Christ be the only way to be saved Then first hence it will follow That the preaching of the Gospel is worthy the while it is of necessary and singular consequence Peruse that place Rom. 1. 16. I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Chrict for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that beleeveth verse 17. for there is the righteousnesse of God revealed from faith to faith as it is written the just shall live by faith The Apostle presents two arguments of his honourable estimation and confident preaching of the Gospel 1. One is that it is the power of God to salvation that is it is the instrument which God useth and into which he doth imprint a power to save men It is called the power of
God to salvation not only in respect of revelation because it doth manifest and declare the sole means of reconciliation 'twixt God and man but also in respect of operation and efficacy because it doth communicate and produce that faith in Iesus Christ by which we are saved 2. Another is that it comprehends the righteousnesse of God which faith only doth take By the righteousnesse of God he understands that righteousnesse whereby a man is justified in the sight of God and it is called the righteousnesse of God because God is the Authour and giver of it it is wrought and given by God in Jesus Christ and also because it is approved and of force with God at his Tribunal and judgement-seat See another place Ephes 1. 13. In whom ye also trusted after that ye heard the word of truth the Gospel of your salvation He in the precedent verses doth enumerate many singular and heavenly blessings amongst which Christ was one and he doth in this verse expresse the order and manner how they come to be interessed in him viz. by trusting or believing and they come to that trusting and beleeving by the Gospel which he stiles a word of truth and a message of salvation Tell me seriously is not salvation the great scope and aime of your most choise and sober thoughts and can any attaine that but by Christ and can you have Christ without faith How preciously deare then unto you should the Ministry of the Gospel be which is the instrument of God to produce that faith which layes hold on that Christ by whom only we are saved Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God so the Apostle Rom. 10 17. and John 6. 45. Every man that hath heard and learned of the Father cometh to me He is an enemy to his own salvation who slights the preaching of the Gospel and he is an enemy to the salvation of others who labours to oppresse and extinguish it for if salvation be by faith in Christ and that faith depends on the Gospel Then For our parts let us blesse God for his Gospel Let us for ever honour and respect the message of the Gospel yea let us heartily embrace the Doctrine and power of the Gospel Let the feet of them which bring the glad tydings of salvation be acceptable unto us for as much as salvation and Christ and faith are all of them annexed unto the Gospel 2. Then hence it will follow that a meer hearing of Christ and his doctrine will not save if beleeving be the only way There are divers sorts of hearing One with incogitancy when perhaps the Ear is open but the Three sorts of hearing minde is asleep and heeds not that precious object revealed Another with Reluctancy when the eare is open and the mind attentive but the heart striving against the truth and goodnesse of the word Another with Conformity when the ear heares and the understanding yields and the heart embraceth Now it is this latter kinde of hearing which brings to salvation That hearing which consists only in the delivery of the message which brings something from God to us this will not save but such an hearing as brings back something from us to God which is accompanied with beleeving which turnes home the soul to the acceptance and embracing of Iesus Christ this is the only hearing to save our soules A motion made and tendred doth not conclude a match but a motion consented unto and embraced 3. If beleeving in Jesus Christ be the only way of life then Iesus Christ should be the main scope and mark of all our preaching and studying 1 Cor. 2. 2. I determined not to know any thing among you save Iesus Christ and him crucified It was the maine theame and subject upon which that blessed Apostle did spend himself Look as it is with a Physician that though he doth sometimes lance and sometimes make very sick and sometimes restraine to strictnesse of diet and sometime binde and trouble the patient and sometimes relieve him with precious cordials though these actions are different among themselves yet they do concenter in one end which is health and life So whether Ministers preach the knowledge of sinne or whether they strive to make men sensible of sinne or whether they let flie the arrows of Gods threatnings upon the conscience of sinners or whether they touch on the mercy Seat all the end and scope is or should be to bring men to Christ to make Christ more glorious in the eyes of sinners and to incline their hearts to accept and embrace him Christ may be preached two ways Either Explicitly when he in his person or offices or benefits Christ preached two wayes is the only matter which is handled and published Or Virtually when he is the end of that matter which is delivered One of these wayes Christ still to be preached Do I meet with a broken and afflicted spirit groaning under the load of sinful Nature and life panting after the Prince of life and peace willing to yield up it self to all the conditions of God in Christ Here now I am to lift up Christ on his Crosse to spread his armes to shew unto that broken Spirit the very heart blood of Jesus Christ poured out for the remission of sinnes to be a propitiatory Sacrifice for his soule Do I meet with an obstinate and proud spirit which dares to defie justice and presumtuously to areign mercy Here I open the indignation of God against sinne of purpose to awaken the conscience to cast down the high and lofty imaginations and for no other end but this That such a person being now come to the sense of his misery may fitly be directed and seasonably encouraged to the sight and fruition of his remedy in Christ CHAP. IX Iustification only in Iesus Christ FOurthly If that beleeving in Jesus Christ be the only way to be saved Then this Informes us where to finde our justification viz only in Iesus Christ For there only is the righteousnesse which can satisfie justice and in his blood only is remission of sinnes Now because this is a fundamental point 'twixt us and the Papists and it is the great bottome of comfort to a beleeving soule give me therefore leave to improve the remainder of the time in a brief and distinct explication of it Where First of the word and title Justification Secondly of the nature and definition of it together with some Arguments to evince that it is only by and for Christ and some Answers to the choisest Objections SECT I. FOr the word justification it hath a double acception amongst Writers 1. One Intrinsical and so it signifies to make a man just by an act of infusion that is by the implantation of sanctified or holy qualities 2. Another Forinsecal and so it signifies to repute or pronounce a man just by an act of jurisdiction that is a judiciary sentence to pronounce him righteous and free
from gilt and condemnation And thus is it for ought I can learn altogether used and sensed in the Scriptures which speak of our justification before God viz. for such an action of God whereby after the manner of a Judge he absolveth and acquitteth an accused person Rom. 8. 33. Who shall lay any thing to the charge of Gods Elect it is God that justifieth verse 34. Who is he that condemneth where you have a manifest Antithesis or opposition 'twixt justification and condemnation now as condemnation is an action of the Judge a sentence of his pronouncing the person gilty and obnoxious so justification being contrary to it must import an action or sentence acquitting and absolving Yea and again as condemnation most improperly and abusively must be interpreted if we expound it to be a making of a man so and so sinful by infusion so is justification unrightly conceited when men make it to be a making of a person just by infusion of holinesse It is observed that in this kinde of justification viz. which is judicial There are foure persons as it were First the Agent One who begins the suit accuseth layeth such and such things to the charge of another the Apostle said it Rom. 8. 33. Who shall lay any thing to the charge c. Secondly the Patient the person accused and charged with default and offence and gilt Thirdly the Advocate who endeavours to vindicate the party so charged from the accusation either by declaring the innocency of the person or impleading satisfaction Fourthly the Judge who in justification of that person gives sentence for the person accused according to the valid plea of the Advocate and so absolveth him It is thus in the point of our justification there is Satan accusing and something else There is man accused of sinne and gilt there is Christ interposing and pleading as an advocate by his blood and righteousnesse and there is God as a Judge for Christs sake acquitting and absolving and pronouncing righteous and accepting to everlasting life So then the proper and punctual acception of the word justification is not according to infusion but according to absolution and pronunciation It is not Physical as when a man is made whole but it is judicial as when a man is cleared at the bar He that justifieth the wicked and he that condemneth the just they are both an abomination to the Lord Proverbs 17. 15. There is the word againe Not I trust to be expounded by way of infusion that is he who makes a wicked man a good man by impression of righteousnesse is an abomination to God but it is to be expounded by way of judiciary sentence that is he who pronounceth of a wicked man in the Court of Justice as if he were just and reputes him as so and accepts him as so This man is an abomination to the Lord. Now take one distinction and then I will to the nature of Justification There is a twofold Justification A twofold Justification One of the cause and this is a particular kinde of acquittance touching such and such things which are laid to a person perhaps sometimes very unjustly Secondly another of the person when he is throughly purged and absolved now in this respect we speak of justification which I think for the nature of it may be thus defined SECT II. JVstification of a sinner it is a gracious and just action of God whereby he imputing the righteousnesse of Christ to a believing sinner absolveth or acquitteth him from his sins and accepteth of him as righteous in Christ and as an heire of eternal life There are diverse things considerable in this description 3. Things in this description First Justification immediately belongs to God it is his action It is God that justifieth saith the Apostle Rom. 8. 33. And who can forgive sins but God only Luk. 5. 21. We well distinguish 'twixt officia and beneficia 'twixt duties and 'twixt blessings duties belong to us but blessings belong to God It is God who is offended and therefore condemnation and absolution belong to him to the Judge not to any other hence saith the Apostle God was in Christ reconciling the world to himselfe 2 Cor. 5. 19. not imputing their sin You do well to distinguish of the causes of our Justification There is first the prime cause the Author and this is God the Father who gave his only begotten Son for us and set him forth to be a propitiation for sinne through faith in his blood that all who do believe in him should be justified Rom. 3. 25. And who is the Judge absolving all that believe and pronouncing them just in Christ Secondly The meritorious cause so the Son of God our Mediator is said to justifie us both as our surety in paying our debt and laying down the full price of our redemption Isai 53. 11. thereby affording unto us the matter and merit of our Justification and as our Intercessor and Advocate pleading effectually for us that his merits may be imputed to us Hence is it Isai 53. 11. My righteous servant shall justifie many God the Father justifies as a Judge by way of prime authority and God the Son justifies as a Mediator The Son justifies as a surety paying our debt and giving satisfaction to the Father for us to the utmost and the Father justifieth us as a Creditor fully accepting of that price and satisfaction Thirdly The applying cause and thus the Holy Ghost may be said to justifie in asmuch as he conjoynes Christ and the soul by faith together whence ariseth a participation of the righteousnesse of Christ and the pardon of sin by him Once more distinguish of justification it may be taken two wayes either actively as a judiciary sentence absolving acquitting c. and so we say God justifieth Or Passively as a thing apprehended and rested on and so we say that Faith justifieth not as if faith did acquit but as it takes and receiveth the acquittance not as if faith did impute a righteousnesse but because it receiveth and resteth on the righteousnesse of Christ by God imputed to us now when we say that justification is an Action of God it is meet for you to understand somewhat of the kinde of this action For the actions of God are of different sorts Some which are produced within us and make a reall alteration 2. Sorts of actions and change in the soul of man thus sanctification is an action of God that is such an action of God as is altering the inward frame and qualities of the soul of unholy making them holy of unbelieving making them believing of hard making them soft of earthly making them heavenly c. Others are wrought for us but not in us and though they import a change of the condition and state of the person yet properly and formally they imprint no change in the inward disposition And thus Justification is an action of God not an action changing
the inward frame of the heart but an action changing the great estimation of the person as when one of a bond-man is made free this alters the state but not the nature of the person when a gilty person is pardoned by his Prince this alters not his nature but it doth alter his condition he is now in the state of life who before was in the state of death So is it in justification it is such an action which alters the state that is the man who is in the state of wrath and condemnation being justified is now acquitted and so passed into the state of life and salvation A man who before was guilty of sin and damnation the same man remaining a sinner in himself and in himself worthy of damnation is in his justification absolved from the gilt of sin and accepted as righteous in Christ and is passed into the state of salvation We deny not but the blood and the water goes together that is whom God justifieth by the blood of Christ him also he sanctifieth and washeth by the Spirit of Christ but the action of the blood is one thing and the action of the water is another thing The light and heat in the fire go together yet the action of light is not the action of heat So here The action of the blood is a justifying action and this is without us yet for us and of us The action of the water is a sanctifying action and this is for us and in us too SECT III. THe person justified is a believing sinner the Apostle is clear Rom. 4. 5. To him that believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly his faith is counted for righteousnesse There is great dispute which is first of Faith or Justification to me now it seemes a fruitlesse trouble to molest our selves with priorities in this kinde I conceive we may distinguish 'twixt the purchase of our Justification which was long ago in the blood of Christ He was a Lamb slaine long since for to merit the remission of sinnes neither doth he now begin his merit who hath heretofore performed it Secondly 'twixt the imputation of that purchase It is true whiles I am an unbelieving person my justification is already as a purchase but untill I believe God imputes it not unto me My meaning is this there is a righteousnesse of Christ which hath deserved pardon of sinne before ever I believe nay be before ever I was borne but God imputes this over to me when I believe as soon as ever I take Christ by faith God imputes the righteousnesse of Christ unto me and will not impute my sinnes to me And Scripture is open enough for this we reading so constantly in the New-Testament for men to come in and believe that they may have remission of sinnes in the blood of Christ and through him also eternal life I only propound this scruple whether faith be to deale with the person of Christ first or with his benefits first Surely we say with his person and then with his portion well then if faith deales with the person of Christ immediately then it appears that a man must believe and so be justified forasmuch as justification is an action of God imputing the righteousnesse of Christ and not imputing sin which are the generall benefits as I may so speak of Christ It is not handsome to conceive that God should first pardon me and then I believe or that I should have the righteousnesse of Christ before I have Christ himself which must be if there be a priority of justification before faith For my part I conjecture that they are Semultaneous things that is they go both together If yet any men will be acute let them be so The perill is little on either side so that I have faith and then am justified or so that I am justified and then have faith or so that I have faith to be justified will in the substance and event redound all to one SECT IV. REmission of sinnes belong to justification that is when God justifieth the person he doth absolve or forgive him his sins There be in sin two things One is the staine pollution defilement of it and corrupt inclination Two things in sin with this Justification deales not but Sanctification Another is the gilt and punishment and with this doth Justification deal Suppose you saw a sick thief there are two sorts of persons to deal with him a Physitian because he is sick and a Judge because he is a thief If the Judge acquit or pardon him this clears him as a thief and guilty person if the Physitian heal and cure him this respects him as a sick and diseased person the case is our own Now I say that God in justification remits or absolves the sinner Two things are here considerable First quid secondly quousque Remission what First quid what this remission is I answer it is an exempting of the sinner from guilt redounding to punishment If any man sin guilt cleaves universally to the sin but then in Justification it shall not be imputed it shall be taken away in respect of efficacy and redundancy Suppose a person areigned and cast for a murder and the King graciously steps in and pardons him though this pardon makes not the murder formally to be no murder and though it makes not the murder now meritoriously deadly yet it doth hold off the efficacy of that gilt that now it shall not prove death to this person because he pardons him So in Justification where God pardons the sinner he doth not make sinne to be no sinne or that there should not be any natural condemnability in sinne but that it shall not effectually redound to the death and damnation and hell of the person whom he hath acquitted for Christ Secondly quousque How farre remission of sinnes extend in Justification There is a twofold remission A twofold remission One particular which is circumscribed to some particular facts and is ordinary in the Courts of humane Princes who limit and restreine their discharges of offenders Another universall which reacheth to the whole estate of gilt now this I take as sure that whomsoever God justifieth he will forgive unto him all his sinnes All his sinnes Jer. 33. â— before conversion and all his sinnes after conversion But whither this forgiving of all be once for all simul semel as they speak I am not able to speak my thoughts fully It is true I confesse and embrace that opinion that justification is not a divided act it is not repeated over and over and over but it is one act only but whither it be one transient act as if all were dashed out with a pen or whither it be one continued act is very disputable The Scripture leanes much to this latter and therefore describes God to be a God forgiving iniquity transgression and sinnes importing a course of pardoning and not a momentany act Againe it is hard
and with all those to have a heart glued to the world folded up in the love of sinne resolved against all hazards to shift off all profession rather then to endure any storme what so great a task is this But to have a minde taught of God and to have an understanding bowed with the strength of Divine light and inward change to the obedience of truth and to have a will sweetly renewed and with an holy trembling humbly receiving Christ in his person and offices and bestowing the whole soul and body on him againe here the work sticks CHAP. XII The sure and dangerous misery of unbeliefe THe last thing which may stirre us to try our selves is the consideration of that amazing danger and unspeakable misery to which the soul is assuredly obnoxious in case of unbelief Why will you say What danger if we believe Obj. not I answer there are three special dangers First all thy sinnes stand upon record against thee like so many sad debts which thou hast run thy self into from thy conception to this very day They are all written with the pen of a Diamond there is no blotting out of a mans sinnes but by the blood of Christ and the unbeliever hath not his portion in that blood and therefore there are all thy sinnes uncancelled thy sinnes of nature and all thy sinnes of life such a sin and such a sin then and there and againe committed c. O how great is the volume of them the number of them cannot be numbred and the guilt of them cannot be conceived if one sin binds thee over to hell Good God! To what flames of vengeance and horrible degreâ—s and intensions of misery and wrath do all thy sins oblige thee Yea and as Solomon said in another case Prov. 9 12. If thou scornest thou alone shalt beare it so I say here if thou remain an unbeliever thou alone must answer for all thy sinnes Whatsoever the wrathful displeasure of God is whatsoever the horrors of conscience are whatsoever the gnawings of that worm are whatsoever the heat of hell flames are Whatsoever the doleful separation from God is Whatsoever curse the Law implies for sin that maist thou expect who wilt not believe in Christ O! if that wrath was so hot when it obliquely as it were fell on Christ where it had no unholy and self-guilty quality to admix with it selfe that he sweat drops of blood and cryed out my God c. How wilt thou with any patience ease possible quietnesse susteine the extream wrath of the Almighty Judge who art vile and filthy and hast a conscience with all thy torments to gall and vex thee with the stings of misery guilts and self-accusations tell me how art thou able what canst thou say how canst thou beare up before the Lord if he should arise if he should terribly arise to judge the nations He is the Holy God and Just and is True and Great in power What satisfaction canst thou bring where are thine oblations or with what wilt thou reconcile thy self to the Lord Whereby canst thou either make thy former sins to be no sins or perswade the Lord to be propitious to thee without Christ Nay verily he will judge thee as an unrighteous person for if thou hast not Christ what righteousnesse hast thou there is no hope for thee to be acquitted nay nor hope to be saved nay thou art sure to be damned Mark 16. 15. Go you into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature 16. He that beleeveth and is baptized shall be saved but he that beleeveth not shall be damned John 3. 18. He that believeth not is condemned already because he hath not beleeved in the name of the only begotten Sonne of God 36. He that beleeveth on the Son hath everlasting life and he that beleeveth not the Son shaâ—â— not see life but the wrath of God abideth on him Rev. 2. 8. The fearful and unbelieving are cast into the lake of fire and brimstone But you will say Why This is strange Why such Obj. extreame misery for not beleeving what sinne is it It is one of the greatest sins in the world not to believe that is Sol. not to receive the Lord Jesus Christ Because It is a sinne against the greatest love to the world Joh. 3. 16. God so loved the world that he gave c. Rom 5. 8. But God commendeth his love towards us that whiles we were yet sinners Christ dyed for us God shewed the greatnesse of his love to bestow his Sonne and Christ shewed the greatnesse of his love to dye for us Greater love said Christ can no man shew then to lay down his life c. Now for the Lord to finde out a way of Salvation and in love to our soules to offer this Son of his unto us and to beseech us to be reconciled and then for us like them who were envited to the supper we cannot come we will not come O this c. It is a sin for which there can be no remedy for asmuch as it is a sin against the only remedy of a sinful soul The sentence of the Law may be repealed by the Gospel but not ècontra There is no plaister for the soul but the blood of Christ which yet unbelief will not take and receive It is a sinne which as much as in it lies makes void and vaine all the Covenant of Grace turning all the goodnesse of it into nothing and all the truthes of it into lyes and makes the blood of Christ to be shed in vaine He that beleeveth not makes God a lyar because he beleeveth not the record that God gave of his Sonne 1 John 5. 10. It is a sin which directly murders the soul because it doth wilfully hold it off from Christ who would upon believing pardon and justifie and save All these things being premised let us now descend towards the triall or evidences of true faith in Christ where I beseech you observe CHAP. XIII Rules for the discovery of faith FIrst some Rules of Direction for the manner of â—vidence and testifying of faith that you may neither be deceived by presumption nor perplexed by error and doubting Two things Secondly some lively instance of true faith as the Word of God doth clearly represent them The Rules of discovery and finding out faith which are these SECT I. THere are some things without which faith cannot be in the heart and yet they do not necessarily and infallibly conclude that a man hath faith They do well distinguish in the Schools 'twixt an Antecedent and a Cause a Cause is such a thing as is before the effect and which beiâ—g put the effect also is put one will not go without the other But an Antecedent is that which must go before another thing yet it is not necessary that if it be that the other thing should follow The rising of the Sunne is a cause of day and therefore this will
another thing for thee to be a servant of sin Not who assaults me but whom I love and serve he is my Lord. When the heart goes off from Christ to the approbation and love and habitual obedience of sin now sin is thy Lord But if by faith thou hast sworne fealty to Christ then though all temptations begirt thee though the insolencies of corrupt nature break in upon thee to captivate or to alienate thy heart from service to Christ yet amidst all oppressions yea under all the knocks and buffettings and interruptions by sinne the heart cries out I acknowledge no Lord but Christ him I would obey him I honour I love his I am and I yet hate those sins which yet I cannot conquer SECT V. FOurthly a fourth tryal of true faith is this It makes the heart humble and lowly Every unbeleeving heart is proud and hath high imaginations and stands upon its own bottom It hath no sound experience either of God or of it self But true faith casts a man quite out of himselfe it sees no ground of confidence and excellency from any thing in our selves Faith hath a double aspect 1. One is upon us 2. Another A double aspect of faith is upon God and Christ When faith looks down upon us alas it findes no matter of boasting in the world for either it findes sinnes which should abase our hearts or else imperfections which should curb our pride or wants which should shew unto us our indigence and dependance The Evil which it findes may confound us and the good which it findes may make us ashamed not only because it is so short and defective in what we ought to have but also because we have not answered the giving of that good with just thanks or we have not improved that good to the advantage as we might have done When faith looks upward to God and Christ there it sees all the causes of all our mercy and of all our happinesse have we pardon of sinnes why saith Faith the cause of this is in Gods love Have we righteousnesse why saith Faith the cause of this is in Christs merits Have we any gifts any acceptance any remembrance from heaven why saith faith the cause of this is only in Christs blood All that I have is given me and the cause of all that giving is utterly out of my self so that the soul sits down now and sayes O Lord in my selfe I am nothing nay of my self worse then nothing but what I am I am that by thy grace All I have is thine my bread my health my life my body my soul all thine If any love if any mercy if any Christ if any grace if any comfort if any strength if any stedfastnesse if any performances if a good work if a good word if a good affection if a good thought why all is thine thou only art the cause I am lesse then the least of thy mercies and what is thy servant that thou shouldest look on such a one as I am Thou madest me and thou boughtest me and thou calledst me and thou justifiest me and thou savest me Though faith makes thy condition high yet it makes thy person low Thou shouldst by faith be not high minded but feare Rom. 11. 20. why not high minded because standing by faith Because this standing of faith is not of our selves but in God but in Christ Faith is the foot of the soul but heaven the grace of heaven the strength of heaven is the ground upon which the foot doth stand SECT VI. FIfthly true faith is fruitful James 2. 18. I will shew thee my faith by my works ver 21. Was not our father Abraham justified by works verse 22. seest thou how faith wrought by his works and by works was faith made perfect The Apostle in that Chapter speaks of a double faith A double faith One was a counterfeit faith a shadow as it were which had the looks but not the substance it was a dead faith which hath the limbs but not the soul and life But how did it appeare that this faith was dead did it not speak many good words yes saith Saint James It gave gâ—od words praeteria nihil no good works It could say to the poore be ye cloathed and be ye warme but gave nothing to cloath or to feed why saith he this mans faith is vaine â—hat is he hath not the true quality of faith and it will stand him in no stead Another was a lively and justifying faith It had in it the true nature and property of faith but how did that appear The Apostle answers by Works You know that there is a great difference 'twixt these two viz. the justifying of a mans person before God and the justifying of a mans faith before the world That which justifies my person before God is only faith in Jesus Christ and that which Justifies as one particular my faith before men not to be a dead but a living faith is the acting of good works Hence that of Paul Tit. 3 8. This is a faithful saying and those things I will that thou affirme constantly that they which have beleeved in God might be careful to maintain good works these things are good and profitable unto men Right is the speech of Saint Augustine sequuntur justificatum though non precedunt justificandum As in a clock the finger makes not the clock to Austin go but the clock it and yet the motion of the finger without shews whether the clock goes within So although works do not cause or infuse justifying faith nor yet cause our Justification yet they do cleerly manifest whether we have such a faith as doth indeed justifie or not Obj. You will say the work of Faith is to look up and to come and to deal with God only and therefore to breath out good works which respect men seems not to be any testimony of faith Sol. I answer 1. The Apostle there expressely distinguisheth the lively and the dead faith by works as if he said it is so 2. There is if you will let me distinguish so as it were a double act of faith One is proper and personal and this is circumscribed to that Heavenly employment of receiving or presenting in and through Christ Another is Grateful and this is extended to the sending forth of good works Not as if it were a work of superarogation for faith findes the doing of good works under many commands and also the rewards of them under many promises but because faith sees also a sweet and reasonable equity that if God be good to me in Christ I should be good to some for Christs sake And verily as the worklesse person doth not now own Christ by faith so hereafter Christ will not own him by mercy depart from me Obj. But yet you will reply good works cannot be a sure testimony of faith because many evil men may performe them and some beleevers have not wherewithal
she yea the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their Masters Table As if she might say Be it so Lord Jesus I am no better then a dogge an unworthy creature yet let me have the compassions to a dogge though not plenty yet the crumbs Now what saith Christ of her Then Jesus answered and said unto her O woman great is thy faith Remember it that the faith which can bring up the soul which can lead it up to heaven against discouragements Though God doth not answer yet I will seek though he kill me yet I will trust in him I say such a faith is strong an expostulating faith a faith which will make the soul to presse on after denials Job after suspensions it is come to a great measure of faith which will not be answered or will not be gone a faith that will not let God go or Christ until it speed Jacob was as a wrestler he would not let God go except he blessed him A faith that can dispute it much with God which will in a holy reasoning take and urge God with God and will so enforce the promises on him which he hath made that God is even faine to yeild Be it unto thee as thou wilt this is faith ripened 3. The more entirely the soul is carried to expectation from the sole strength of a Divine promise the greater and the stronger is that faith As in Abrahams case He wanted a sonne and God promised him an Isaac Abraham did not now stagger through unbelief he did not consult the truth of it from his own natural abilities How unable he was that he neglected but how able God was to perform his own word upon this his faith did pitch And for this the text saith that he was strong in faith Rom. 4. 20. Remember this that the more sensible helps the soul needs to draw out the act of beleeving the weaker is the faith as the man is judged to be very weak who cannot go without many crutches and holdings But the more strength a naked promise hath with the soule when it alone puts life and quietnesse into us now faith is grown As David said The Lord is on my side I will not fear what man can do unto me So when we can quash all our troubles with the sight of a promise I have Gods word for my pardon his word for my help his Word for my comfort I desire no better pay-master then God no better security then his own promise though all things stand contrary in sense and feeling yet all is sure in Gods promise and there I will settle this argues a great faith 4. The more ability a man hath to deny himself in neare and great occurrences the greater is his faith Abraham in leaving of his countrey parting with Isaac The more easily we can beleeve great things and part with great things the stronger is our faith There is nothing more hard then to give up a mans self There is a threefold self First his sinful self in respect of old and dear sins Secondly his natural self in respect of the separation of soul and body Thirdly his temporal self in respect of the comforts of this life And it must be a strong faith which must enable to strong denials of our selves when a thing comes nearer to the quick either when God denies a man a special comfort or draws off from him a special comfort now to submit now to be quiet I can do all things through Christ that strengthens me said Paul I know how to want and how to abound to be exalted and to be abased I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be contented To have the heart pleased with Christ alone and satisfied with his presence mark it the more entirely that the soul makes up its state in Christ and the lesse power that the world imprints upon the heart in its changes this imports the faith is come to strength Strong faith is like a strong tree which holds its body unmovable against great tempests but weak faith is like a plant which every winde makes almost to touch the ground Fifthly the weaker the arguments of distrust grow in the heart this is a signe that the faith is got to a strength This I conjecture that the strength or weaknesse of faith is not to be judged by the multiplicity of distrustful arguments but by the force and efficacy of them It is possible that manifold arguments of feare and doubts may present themselves to the minde of a strong beleever as well as unto the judgement of a weak beleever but then if faith be strong it doth weigh them down it doth prevaile over them that is it brings the soul to Christ it cleaves still unto him The soul maintaines its title to Christ and owns God in his promises it will not cast away its hope nor its strength wherein the soul can habitually foyle the reasonings which crosse its way and can cleare up and vindicate its state what God is to it and Christ is to it and what it hath received from them this is an argument that it is not weak but strong Sixthly the more easie compliance with change of a mans condition is an evidence of a faith which is more strong There are several changes incident to mans temporal life the Moon sometimes is ful and anon it is in the Eclipse our sea doth ebb and flow sometimes prosperity like the candle of the Lord shines upon us by and by adversity like the winde blows out the candle sometimes we abound and our mountaine seemes strong anon we are stript and our mountaine is shaked one while health and presence of friends another while sicknesse and losse of all Now in these changes not to be changed like the ship right up in a calme but tossing and reeling in a storme but to be as the rock fixed and setled holding up and rejoycing in the God of our salvation and encouraging our selves in the Lord our God and willing to be any thing in any condition yea to blesse God for all as Job did If I die I shall go to God If I live I will serve my God If I enjoy I will be fruitful If I want I will be thankful The more Passive the heart is the more active and strong the faith is Paul had been learning that lesson In every state therewith to be content O when a Christian can comply with contrary states not through an insensiblenesse of Spirit but from an apprehension and approbation of divine wisdome goodnesse love and authority his faith is singularly cleared and well improved 7. The more satisfaction and quiescence that the soul hath in Christ alone the greater is the faith when a naked Christ is the centre and loadstone and the All in all As the Sunne to make day I desire to know nothing but Christ crucified said Paul 1 Cor. 2. 2. Whom have I in heaven but thee and there
at the Pool and so will weak faith it will be at the meanes of strength It loves to be doing about Christ and to be where the strength of Christ is revealed It is wise to observe the grounds of its fears and doubtings and carefull to remove them O how earnest is the weak believer to heare what God will speak unto him and if at any time the soul can get by the assistance of the Word to close with mercy and Christ it is revived with joy of tears and falls down with thanks Lord what is thy servant Nay if it hath apprehended but a hint but a crevise if it be enabled but a little to step above its dark doubtings to apprehend but a darting beame any perswasion that all is well or will be so it is refreshed and saith that God is good I observe that the weak childe will be much after the breasts and the weak man will handle his staffe much and the weak believer will be much at the places and ordinances and wayes of more strength It is with faith as it is with a blade of corn at the first the eare of graine is quite skinned over yet it breaks open aside and at length is the very top of the stalk So faith at first is swathed over with doubtings none but a tender and merciful God can see that little mustard-seed but at length it opens to more adherence on God and Christ and promises and in time it can triumph against its former feares and suspitions Or it is like a weak man recovering if he can but stand it s well then if he can set on in a few paces with his staff then if his motion can be single then if longer then if stronger so is it with faith if it can make the soul to look upon Christ then if it could look on him as mine then if so without fear then if so with joy then if so with strength and stedfastnesse It will not rest in weakness though it begins in weakness but like the weak Ivie which is winding up the tree so will faith be winding up the soul higher and higher into Christ by the help of his Spirit of his Promises of his Word and of his Sacraments 5. Weak faith will yet venture the soul upon Christ though it cannot cleare its title nor answer its feares nor to it s own sense rely on Christ yet if the soul be put and determined to one of these either to renounce all hope in Christ and so to be lost or to put it self upon Christ though it hath no inward encouragement from it self I say at such a time even weak faith will discover it self it will not renounce its hidden interest in Christ but will roule the soul on him If I perish I perish yet I will cleave to Christ yet I will cast my soul on him and on his blood and righteousnesse SECT VI. THe third general which we observed to the former scruple 6. The concordance of all faith in foure things was the concordance of all faith which is true whether strong or weak in fundamentall comforts First every believer hath a sure interest in Christ It is with the members of Christ as with the members of the body though they are not all of equall strength in a comparison one with the other yet they are of equall conjunction in a relation of all of them to the head So one believer exceeds another in a special measure of faith yet every believer is a member firmly and surly knit to Christ the head of all believers Christ is not the Saviour and Lord only of the strong but also of the weak not only the old man nor only the young man but also the children the little children to whom Saint John wrote they are all in Christ 1 Joh. 2. There is a wide difference 'twixt reflexive certainty and 'twixt real certainty of interest strong faith hath the pre-eminence of weak faith in respect of a reflexive and sensible certainty but not in respect of a reall certainty this is univocal the union 'twixt Christ and the soul doth not depend upon the strength but upon the truth of faith If my will consents unto Christ if my heart accepts of him upon his own tearmes if I take his whole person and his whole condition the match is truly made 'twixt Christ and me he is surely mine and I am surely his Although I am not in an assured condition yet I am in a sure union Christ doth certainly own that soul which by faith doth truly embrace him All mine are thine and thine are mine saith Christ Joh. 17. 10. He speaks of the Disciples and of all the Elect who were the fathers in respect of a gracious election and gift and Christs in respect of a tender affection and union So that here is one concordance of all faith in respect of fundamentall comfort viz. that the objective unity is one and common the weak and the strong eye meet in the same colours as the object and weak and strong faith are two different hands yet both of them upon one and the same Christ Secondly every believer hath a beneficial interest in Christ that iâ— weak faith hath an interest in the benefits of Christ as well as the strong faith I will instance in some special and choise benefits First Redemption from the Malediction of the Law Christ took that off He was made a curse for all that believe on him He did not stand in the room only of eminent but of every believer and endured the wrath to the utmost for every one who doth believe on him Thou art freed from a cursed estate by the least faith every degree of true faith makes the condition to be a state of life and passeth us from death and condemnation There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus Rom. 8. 1. Secondly Remission of sinnes what Christ said to that impotent person Sonne be of good cheer thy sinnes are forgiven thee that is true of every beleever Christ hath purchased a pardon for him Acts 13. 38. Be it known unto you men and brethren that through this man is preached unto you the forgivenesse of sinnes Ver. 39. And by him all that beleeve are justified c. If any believer went without his discharge then probable it is that the weakest should be he but the Scripture speaking of the weakest faith makes it an hand holding a pardon in it 1 John 2. 12. I write unto you little children because your sins are forgiven you for his names sake though children though little children yet pardoned children and mark it the cause of that pardon was common to them with the stronger men viz. for his Names sake a man is not pardoned for the strength of his faith nor debarred of it for the weaknesse of his faith but both th' one and the other enjoys it for his Names sake that is for Christs sake Nay observe it that
though weak and strong faith may vary much in the manner and degree of the apprehension or perswasion or reading of the pardon yet they both agree in the strength and in the latitude of pardon The weak believer hath as an effectual and as ample and full remission as the strongest believer for Christ did not become an unequal surety or an uneven Sacrifice for sinne my meaning is this that he did not only undertake the debts of some believers but of every one nor did he undertake some debts only of some beleevers but all the debts of all beleevers Therefore it is said Esay 53. 6 The Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all and Jer. 32. 8. I will pardon all their iniquities whereby they have sinned which words extend to all beleevers because to all that are covenanted Thirdly Justification by imputed righteousnesse There is a common equal interest in this by all beleevers It is but one garment for every beleever it is an entire thing One believer hath not one righteousnesse to justifie him and another believer another but all are justified by the same righteousnesse of Christ neither is the imputation of this righteousnesse partial or unequal but alike to all that believe Rom. 3. 21. The righteousnesse of God without the Law is manifested being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets Ver. 22. Even the righteousnesse of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that beleeve for there is no difference Therefore God is said in v. 26 the Justifier of him that beleeveth in Jesus if any man doth truely believe in Christ God justifies that man and Christ is made righteousnesse unto him that is the Lord will reckon unto him the righteousnesse of Christ he will in Christ pronounce him just and acquit him The most elevated beleever cannot be presented in a judicial way before Gods justice safely in the strength of his own perfections and therefore hath no reason to glory or boast and the most weak beleever is not excluded but adorned with the robe of Christs compleat righteousnesse notwithstanding his own manifold imperfections and therefore hath no reason to be discouraged or dismayed for as much as Christ is the end of the Law for righteousnesse to every one that believes Rom. 10. 4. Fourthly the inheritance of glory even those weak Disciples who were oft rebuked for their fears and doubtings were commanded by Christ to rejoyce because their names were written in the book of life If we be Believers we are sonnes and if sonnes then heirs heires of life and co-heires with Christ in glory Rom. 8. 16 17. Gal. 4. 26. Ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus Vers 29. And if ye be Christs then are ye Abrahams seed and heirs according to the promise John 3. 16. Whosoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life for eternal life is founded in Christ God hath put all life in him from him we draw our life of grace and by him we possesse our life of glory 1 John 5. 11. God hath given unto us eternal life and this life is in his Sonne Verse 12. He that hath the Sonne hath life Obj. Yea but who are they who have the Son Sol. See ver 13. These things I have written unto you that believe on the Name of the Sonne of God that ye may know that ye have eternal life as if he should say every believer is he who hath the Sonne and by him that eternal life 3. Every beleever hath vertual interest in Christ that is he shall partake of the vertues and graces and strength of Christ The vertues of Christ are many I will touch at some viz. 1. A crucifying vertue which subdues the love and dominion of sinne now every beleever shares in this though one beleever be more troubled with the insolent motions of sinne then another yet no believer shall lie under the dominion of sinne Rom. 6. 14. Sinne shall not have dominion over you for you are not under the Law but under grace Gal. 5. 24. And they that are Christs have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts Every beleever is gathered under the rod and Scepter of Christ and is made alive to Christ and dead to sinne yea and Christ will more and more mortifie his corrupt heart He will be made death to the strongest lust in the weakest believer 2. An assisting vertue which aides the soul in matter of duty and service now Christ will not only guide the strong but also lead the weak believer He will send forth his enabling strength for all the services which he requires 2 Cor. 12. 9. He said unto me my grace is sufficient for thee for my strength is made perfect in weaknesse most gladly therefore will I glory in mine infirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon me As if he should say there was weaknesse and infirmity on Pauls part but there was strength and power on Christs part and this strength would Christ make to appear in Pauls weaknesse that is though Paul saw and felt his own strength insufficient yet he should find Christ sufficient sufficiently inabling him in that particular Rom. 8. 26. Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities for we know not what we should pray for as we ought but the Spirit it selfe maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered Mark that place though we are very infirme very weak to any holy duty to prayer and the rest yet Christ will help he will come in with his Spirit which shall enable us with supplications so that even very weak believers may take comfort in this that Christ will strengthen and aide them by his Spirit in duties as well as the strongest The greatest believer cannot performe service by his own strength and the weakest shall be inabled by Christs There be three things which Christ will communicate to every believer even to the weakest about duty One is an affection and heart Another is strength and assistance The last is pardon and acceptance what is amisse and wanting shall be pardoned and what is imperfectly and weakly good shall yet through his intercession be accepted His Father for his merits will not despise the day of small things 3. Persevering vertue by which the soul comes at length to cast Anchor and to be safely landed Now the strong faith hath in a sort heaven already yet weak faith shall also make a saving voyage as it was with them in Pauls shipwrack some of them could swim and quickly and better get to shore others were more unskilful and therefore laid hold and made use of broken boards yet the text saith That they all came safe to land That I say of strong and weak faith though the strong believer can better cut through the manifold oppositions of the world though he can rise more easily above the waves of Satans temptations then the weak believer
thou not heard of that accursed and despitfull death which I was put to numbred with transgressors cast out of the City nailed to the crosse pierced through the heart and yet my love to thy soul made me to poure out my soul an offering for thy sins Why and shall I veile my glory under the condition of a servant in vaine shall I combate and conquer Satan in vaine shall I beare the scorne of men the wrath of God the terrors of death the curse of the Law in vaine was not all this for thee shouldst not thou have susteined all this if I had not and must thou not if thou refusest him who hath done it and yet wilt thou prefer thy sins before me yet wilt thou not accept of me yet wilt thou not get faith to receive me have I sought thee freely bought thee so dearly and thou neglect and refuse me so easily Thirdly consider thou hast extreame need of a Lord Jesus 3. Motives Christ Excellency prevailes much with an ingenious nature and necessity with the worst when the Lepers saw that they must either venture their lives or die they would out into the Camp when the Prodigal saw he must famish abroad or repaire home he would then back to his fathers house Why Brethren the Captive doth not more need a Redeemer and the sick doth not more need a Physician then the sinner doth need a Christ and a Saviour Were we in Adams created innocency then we need not to look after a Saviour but we are fallen but we are broken but we are sold under sin but we are transgressors from the womb but we are by nature the children of disobedience and wrath Had we any stock left in our hands to set up our broken souls againe had we any strength to repaire our losse to recover our good to purchase our own peace and salvation but we are dead in trespasses Eph. 2. 1. we all fall short of the glory of God Rom. 3. 23. we are all without strength Rom. 5. 6. Could any thing be a Plank to the Shipwrack but Christ or an hand to lay hold on the rock but faith then we needed not to give such diligence for faith to believe but there is no salvation in any other name and there is no quality but faith to get us into Christ It is not the confidence which thou mayest put upon the faith of another which will do it as every mans soul is for his own body so every mans faith is for his own soul the wise virgins had no more oile then would serve their own Lamps and no mans faith is more then enough for himself Though Christ can save many yet faith saves him only who hath it It is not the confidence of a naked decree which will do it if God hath decreed to save me I shall be saved O no his decrees are his own secret wayes and the way which he hath opened to us is to get faith and to believe in his Son It is not an empty profession nor the worthlesse accesse of all the creatures that can ensure or save thy soul Only Christ none but Christ thou art wounded and Christ is thy plaister thou art dead and Christ is thy life thou art sold and Christ is thy ransome thou art an enemy and Christ is thy peace The debts are infinite the curse great the justice of God pure thy strength nothing and nothing satisfies and delivers but Christ and none hath Christ but the believer why then wilt thou not labor for faith Fourthly consider Christ is every way fitted to thy need 4. Motive Why Brethren gold will ransome a debtor to man it will not ransome a sinner from the Law an offender against God Why look upon your need aright and then judge who but Christ for a sinner There is guilt much guilt lying upon thy soul and who is the Priest to suffer to offer to satisfie to take away transgressions but Christ None can blot out the guilt of sin for us but he who had not a spot of sin in himself There is filth much filth defiling our natures poysoning our actions and who is the Prophet to enlighten to teach to change to cleanse from sinfulnesse but Christ None can teach us holinesse and obedience but he who was Holy undefiled separated from sinners and was obedient to the death There is dominion much dominion of sin prescribing a Law to our members sending out all insolent inclinations holding us in a willing subjection to every base lust and who is the King to conquer the heart to subdue iniquities to lead captivity captive to spoile principalities and powers to bid the captive go free to erect a thorne of righteousnesse and peace in the soul but Christ So that the wise love of God hath prepared and fitted Christ in all respects sutable to the exigencies and straits of a sinful soul and hath appointed faith to be that which shall put on this Christ upon the needy soul why then will we not labour for faith Fifthly God hath not only fitted a Saviour for thee but he 5. 〈◊〉 comes neer unto thee with him he deales mightily with thy soul â—o beleeve on him Thou hast the word of revelation to this very day wherein the mystery of thy salvation is made known and cleare unto thâ—e Thou needest not to say in thine heart Who shall ascend into heaven to bring Christ down from above or who shall descend into the deeps to bring up Christ againe from the dead But the word is nigh thee even in thy mouth and in thy heart that is the word of faith which we preach That if thou shalt confesse with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him him from the dead thou shalt be saved Rom. 6. 7 8 9. Thou hast the word of gracious proposition God hath offered Christ with all his plentiful redemption with his strong salvation unto thee yea he hath assured thee by his Word of John 3. truth which cannot lie nor deceive that if thou believest on him thou shalt be saved by him Thou hast the word of injunction which layes a bond of duty upon thee This is his Commandment that we beleeve on the Name John 3. 23. of his Son Jesus Christ Nay thou hast the word of penalty and correction God hath said that he will judge thee for not believing and that in the sharpest method of expression He that believes not shall be damned Nay thou hast the word of obsecration and gentle intreaty God stoops infinitely below himself he doth streine curtesie with thee God doth beseech you by us and we pray you in Christs stead to be reconciled to God Nay thou hast the word of expostulation why will you not beleeve why will ye die in your sins why will ye not come to me that you may be saved How often would I have gathered thee All the day long
any such displeasures nor torments that thus it shall be indeed Now how can the soul be inclined to believe in Christ to part with its deare lusts with its worldly advantages and pleasures and to submit it selfe to the Lawes and Scepter of Christ when as it doth expressely or vertually deny the nature of God and the power of his truths Didst thou indeed beleeve that there was a God didst thou indeed believe that his revelations of mans sinful misery and of his singular mercy in Christ were true and real Didst thou believe that God hath wrath and blacknesse of darkness and vials of vengeance for ever to be poured on the unbeliever and that the lake which burnes with fire and brimstone must be thy assured portion as God hath spoken how couldst thou sit still content thy heart neglect thy salvation by Christ stand off from the wayes and endeavours for faith Therefore to remove this impediment beg of God to forgive and cure the Atheisme of thy Spirit Strive to set up the true God in thy understanding and to believe that he is the Lord who will not lye Whatsoever he hath revealed himself to be and to do Why that he is and that he will performe that it is thy duty to return from sinne to him in Christ and if thou dost returne he will in mercy spare and deliver thy soul from the pit because he hath found a ransome but if thou wilt not return he wil bathe the sword of his flaming justice for ever in the blood of thy soul 2. A second impediment to the getting of faith is grosse ignorance Whatsoever is contrary to knowledge that same is contrary to faith for though faith sees not its ground in natural reason yet it must have divine evidence to shew it its object and way and causes or else it cannot be wrought in the soul The soul must have light for all its apprehensive operations for the eye to see and the understanding to perceive and for the heart to embrace Now this is it which keeps men off from beleeving they are extreamly ignorant First of their own sinful condition they do not know their nativity and conception what sin is nor what belongs to sinners â—â—w abominable and vile their natures are without all good and like a fountaine full of all wickednesse how dead in trespâ—sses and sins how totally defiled from the crown of the head to the sole of the foot How perpetually rebellious against every precept of heaven and how slâ—ghting of the tenders of salvation and mercy Secondly of Gods just disposition towards the sinful person They see him not armed and setting out against them in all the threatnings and curses of his Law as Balaam in his passage he adventured on for he saw not the Angel of the Lord with a sword in his hand ready to cleave him asunder So men rest securely in their natural state talk what you will of Christ and of God and of sinne and of faith they are not moved they know not the fearful issues of a natural and unbeleeving condition they know not that God will judge them and condemn them for ever Thirdly of the excellencies of Christ what he is whither God or man or both even as it pleaseth him but favourly what he is in respect of his Natures in respect of his Offices in respect of his Actions in respect of his Passion in respect of his Benefits in respect of his Vertues they understand not these things How God hath manifested love in Christ how Christ manifested love to them to what end he was made man why Ministers preach him so much what is more in him then in any other Alas they think not of these things they know them not Now brethren how is it possible for the soul to believe or to be perswaded to believe in Christ or to labour for this precious faith which is a stranger to it self to God to Christ Didst thou indeed know thy condition to be the condition of death wouldest thou not make out for the Lord of life didst thou indeed know thy condition to be the condition of enmity wouldest thou not strive to get unto the Prince of peace So againe as Christ spake to the woman If thou knewest the gift of God and who it is that saith unto thee give me to drink thou wouldest have asked of him and he would have given thee living water John 4. 10. O if men did know what a gift Christ was If heaven and earth men and Angels had studyed the helps of a poore sinner they could never have imagined such a remedy as God found in giving his own Sonne Now if men did know him aright what a Redeemer what a Lord he is what living water is in him That in him only there is life for the dead recovery for the sinner satisfaction for guilt sanctification for the soul atonement for trespasses comfort for distresses balme for wounds salvation for their persons Why how could it be but that they should ask of him for a drop at least of water for some faith to receive him who is the fountain of grace and life 3. A third impediment to the endeavours for faith is a vain confidence of natural righteousnesse This was it which kept off many of the Pharisees the Text saith That they trusted to their own righteousnesse Yea this is called the stumbling of the Jewes it cast them flat that they doted so on legal abilities When a base heart hath proud imaginations of Christ and peace and safety from something within it self why It will never look after Christ A proud person who hath mony in his house he scornes to be beholding to his neighbour the proud sinner who conceives that all is well 'twixt him and God and that he hath done no man wrong and none can say black is his eye he is neither whore not thief and his heart is as good as the best and his meanings are alwayes honest and none can tax him for injustice and he hath kept all Gods Commandments as well as ever he could and he hath had a good belief he thanks God ever since he was borne I tell you such a person will not be beholding to God for Christ for he in his opinion being so whole needs not the Physician neither shall you perswade him to mourn for his sinnes or to repent and to part with all for Christ to deny himself and all his own vaine confidences and to put himself only upon Jesus Christ he trusts to be saved by his good deeds and by his good meanings Ah foolish and seduced soul Who hath bewitched thee to forsake thine own mercies Thinkest thou that God would have sent his onely Sonne and to poure out his own soule for sinners if that yet there had been ability in sinful man to have purchased his own safety and happinesse And doest thou see no sinne in thy self which may therefore for ever thrust thee off from
make his addresse unto the Lord Jesus for cure and health and that he should by faith accept of him and trust upon him for the healing of his soul and the subduing of his sins and then verily you shall finde vertue to come from Christ raising a greater hatred of sin war with it in the very fountaine watching and praying against it and the power of the ordinance successively weakening and crucifying the power of sin Lastly know this that the time of contrariety is the time for faith to work When a man sees death then is it the time for faith to believe life When he sees the grave then is it the time for faith to believe a resurrection when he sees guilt then is it the time for faith to believe pardoning mercy when he sees himself a sinner then is it the time for faith to believe a Saâ—iour when he sees strong corruptions then is it the time for faith to believe great grace when he sees great discomforts then is it the time for faith to believe strong consolations the exigences of sense and the reliefes of the promises are quite contrary what I feel is one thing what God doth promise is another thing That which the patient observes in himself is sicknesse and that which he hopes for in the medicine is health Hath God made thee sensible of thy sins dost thou finde thus much that al that thou canst do wil not become a rebuke of corruption thou art able now to see the strength of thy sinfull nature but to remove it thou art utterly unable Why what is now to be done truly as in the sense of the guilt of sin we must then flye by faith to God and put our soules upon his free mercy for pardon so in the sense of the filthy strength of sin we must to heaven by faith and put our soules on Gods faithful promises in Christ for the healing and subduing of it This is the way and therefore strive to walk in it you may try other waters but they shall not help you and perplex your own thoughts but they shall not availe you the cure of the sinful soul is only in heaven and it is faith only which can lift up a soul to God and Christ which puts it into the Pool When sin is felt then let faith work If thou canst finde any one promise which God hath made of sanctifying and healing and subduing Why here 's ground for faith yea for thy saith for in these promises are the cures of thy sinful nature and faith it is which will apply the healing medicines to thee 8. Obj. Yet I am not satisfied saith the sensible sinner and fearfull soul Why Because First I cannot finde an heart to duty to pray and seek of God and surely if God did purpose and mean any good to me he would in some measure frame and encline and excite my heart towards him Secondly yea and againe though I do sometimes seek and entreat yet I observe that what I was that I am nothing comes of it how then can I may I should I be enduced to believe Sol. Here are two sore and real scruples which do indeed vehemently beat upon a sensible sinner I shall endeavour to assoyle them successively 1. I cannot finde an heart to any duty to pray for faith c. I Answer 1. As the inability to holy duties depends on natural corruption so the indisposition towards them depends exceedingly upon unbelief There is nothing disheartens a man more towards God then it For bâ—sides this that unbelief in its own nature is a departure from God it is a bias drawing the soul downwards This also is true of it that it represents God to the soul in all the appearances and methods of discouragements It makes the soul to see nothing in God or from God which might encline it to him O saith unbelief there is such holinesse and purity in him that he will never endure thee there is such truth and justice in him that he will surely be avenged of thee There is such strength and power in him that he will certainly meet with thee and lay load on thee There is I confesse a mercifulnesse in him but alas his tender bowels of compassion his ready forgivenesse extends not to thee there are many sweet intimations in his promises but they concern not thee there is a mighty salvation in Christ and powerful intercession to ingratiate some persons and their services but what of this to thee He is a God hearing prayer yea but he will not regard the cryes nor tears of some but their Sacrifices are an abomination unto him And thus doth unbelief set up God utterly against the soule so that the poor soul conceiving of God as an enemy dares not come neer it flies off it is even afraid to speak to him It is perswaded by unbeliefe that God will frowne upon all that is done whereupon the spirit sinks the affectionâ— are flatted I have no minde nor heart am like a lump a stock a stone Secondly it is faith which will fetch up the soul Psal 27. 13. I had fainted unlesse I had beleeved to see the goodnesse of the Lord c. As if he should say my spirits were even breathing themselves out I was even sinking down giving up all unlesse I had beleeved but that confidence of Gods goodnesse towards me that did put life into me that did fetch me again that did put heart into me You see now the spring is coming on that those seemingly dead branches of the trees they begin to thrust out some hopeful sproutings and put on another colour of freshnesse why because the root is now more fed and warmed It is faith which will put colour into our faces and spirit into our hearts and life into our duties For 1. Faith sets open the mercy-seat It represents God to the Two reasons of it soul in all his attributes of graciousnesse not as an hard tyrant but as a good God willing to give audience to the humble requests and suit of a poore sinner Nay willing to dispatch and grant his requests What is thy request said Ahashuerus to Queen Ester it shall be granted thee c So saith the Lord What wouldest thou have of me Is it mercy I do promise it unto thee Is it grace I promise that unto thee Is it strength is it comfort is it deliverance whatsoever it be if thou beleeve on me I will not fail to give to thee Nay I will do it freely nay cheerfully with all my heart and with all my soul Jer. 32. Yea this makes the soul to come unto God as the ship into the haven with full speed and stretched sailes O the soul bends the knee with cheerfulnesse when it sees it shall be raised up with kindnesse a man may have some heart to pray when he knows My God will hear me that God hath a readiness to answer 2. Faith sets the soul in
for certain God hath spoken such good things but further that he will assuredly performe them Behold the dayes come saith the Lord that I will perform that good thing which I have promised unto the house of Israel and to the house of Jacob Jer. 33. 14. 6. His performance of them to them that have lived by faith When persons have committed themselves and their conditions unto him when they have trusted upon his word he hath not failed them he hath made it good Abraham he did live by faith when God promised him a Son the text saith that he did beleeve he did not consider his own body but gave glory to God nâ—resting upon the sole goodnesse fidelity and strength of his promise and God did indeed perform the same unto him Not any of the Kings of Israel and Judah but expressely sped well when in their exigencies they did trust unto God Our father 's trusted in thee and thou didst deliver them they trusted in thee and were not confounded Psal 22 4 5. The Lord is my strength and my shield my heart trusted in him and I was helped saith David Psal 28. 7. The Lord shall help them and deliver them speaking of the righteous and save them because they trust in him Psal 37. 40. Now put all together should we not live by faith trust upon God in Christ and through and for Christ for all our helps of soul who is 1. An alsufficient fountaine 2. Who commands us in unto himself for our helps 3. Who hath promised all good unto us if we will but trust him 4. Who is able enough to make good whatsoever he promiseth 5. Who cannot and will not lie deceive or faile us 6. Who hath given testimony of his truth in all ages Who hath performed his oath to Jacob and remembred his mercy to Abraham who hath been ever in all ages mindful of his Covenant to such as durst by saith live upon him and trust in him Thirdly consider the qualities of this life of faith and these may much prevaile with us to labour to live upon God in Christ by faith There be foure ingredients in this kinde of life all which are admirable and indeed they are peculiar priviledges of it 1. It is the only Christian life 2. It is the only comfortable life 3. It is the only getting and thriving life Four excellencies of this life 4. It is the only certain and stedfast life 1. The life of faith it is the only Christian life The Christian hath a life common with many creatures his life of eating and drinking of nourishing and growth it is such a life as the beasts live as well as he his life of reason and labour that also is such a life which all men live as well as he but thee life of faith that is singular and proper to the beleever for no man hath that faith which the true beleever hath and no man hath his estate so in heaven so in Gods hands so inclosed and treasured in the Covenant of promises as he What Christ spake to his Disciples about this very matter Mat. 6. 31. Take no thought saying what shall we eat or what shall we drink or wherewith shall we be cloathed Ver. 32. For after all these things do the Gentiles seek As if he should say it is enough for meer sinners for such as have not God to be their God who cannot in Christ call him Father it is enough for them to lead such a vexing and distrustful life That I say here Why it is enough for men of this life the men of this world for them who have their onely portion here to live the life of sense to be scraping to be plodding to be vexing their thoughts and hearts how to compasse how to fetch in how to lengthen an estate To have a God and yet to live without him a Christ and not to live upon him as if either were nothing in this Christian But for the beleever who hath a God and a Christ and all good undertaken for him by a full and faithful Covenant It is his life now to trust upon his God to rely upon his Saviour to quiet himself in Gods Word of promise As Christ spake in another case If you love them that love you and if ye do good to them that do good unto you what singular thing do you do not even the Publicans and sinners the same That I say in this case if ye will make up your own estate if ye will live upon what you see and what you taste and what you handle and go not above and beyond these and your selves do not sinners do not the worst of sinners do the same If the vilest person can rejoyce when his table is full and hang down his head when sensibles go off wherein doth the beleever exceed him who is merry and cheerful only in a sensible plenty and his heart is ready to break in the ebbe and substraction of that by the dayes or years of scarsity and sensible distresse If thou didst look upon God as thy Father and Christ as thy plentiful redemption and the promises as a goodly portion and thine inheritance then the dayes of tears to others would be houres of thankfulnesse unto thee and the nights of fears to others would be times of sweet repose and contentment unto thee When the spiders web was swept away yet thou couldest see the house standing and sure even in all sensible abstractions of the olive and vine and stalles thou couldest yet rejoyce in the God of thy salvation For the place of thy defence is the munition of rocks bread shall be given unto thee and thy waters shall be sure Isaiah 33 16. I observe a threefold difference 'twixt an unbeleever and a beleever One is in the very estate for the beleever hath a far better portion then the unbeleever he hath a portion set out for this life and a portion also for a better he hath food for his body and grace for his soul Another is in the manner of settling the estate for general providence relieves the one and special affections provides for the other The one is helped by common goodnesse of universal kindnesse and the other is undertaken for and secured by a singular bond of Covenant God hath made over himself and all his goodnesse unto him in his Sonne Jesus Christ He hath taken upon himself all the care and all the good and only wills the beleever to be upright and diligent and so to trust upon him he hath settled all his grace and strength and comfort in Christ c. A third is in the manner of managing The unbeleever he will like the prodigal have all the estate into his own hands he will trust upon himself he dares not settle on God for he feares him he suspects him he thinks verily God will not do him good but he will faile But the beleever knows whom he hath trusted God is
upon all his termes and articles of peace and life and may cast and repose it self on him as the only rock and hope of the soul and yet it may be so farre from assurance even at that time when it doth so earnestly cleave unto Christ that instead of assurance it may be both tossed and prevailed upon by doubtings suspitions and feares concerning its particular and personal propriety in Christ and in his merits But the last of the propositions I am Christs and Christ is mine this is formal assurance for this concludes the dispute of the heart and hath in it particular and personal evidence 2. It is a victorious conclusion against the strength of doubting you know that in the minde of man there are three kinds of working about an object comprehending goodnesse and truth One they call peremptory assenting and peremptory dissentings in which the minde doth yeild plainly or else refuseth to subscribe and grant the matter proposed to be true and good Another they call doubtings which are the wavering acts of of the minde wherein it doth not absolutely grant or deny it doth not absolutely conclude that so it is nor absolutely that so it is not yet rather enclines for want of further evidence in the soul that it is not so then that it is so The third they call evidence or assurance which is such a work of the minde wherein against all doubtings and suspitions the minde sees clearly the thing to be so or not to be so And thus is it here in the assurance of faith it hath such a light the minde hath that it is able to rise beyond and against doubtings and to convince the soul against all suspitions that Christ indeed is mine and I am his Where by the way observe thus much that assurance doth presuppose some doubtings for if the mind of a believer had not doubtings about its personall interest it could not well be said to be now assured Doubtings did verily and do and may work in a believing soul yea but am I sure that Christ is mine is it certain that my sins are pardoned I trust they are but I fear they are not Now assurance comes and conquers these workings and clears all the doubting arguments and convinceth the minde that of a truth Christ is mine and my sins are pardoned There are two degrees of doubtings One consists in the questioning of our beleeving proprieties is Christ mine is his righteousnesse mine c Another exceeds this and consists in dominion when the soul is supprest by the strength of these doubtings to side with it and still to hang in suspense Now this latter degree especially is assurance opposite unto namely it conquers our doubtings answers our arguments cleares it unto the soul against the many suspitions which did arise that Christ doth indeed owne it that he is the Saviour thereof and therefore I call it a victorious conclusion 3. Assurance of faith it is an ascertaining or perswading act and that is proper and inseparable from assurance therefore is it so expressed in Rom. 8. 38. I am perswaded that neither Death nor Life nor Angels nor Principalities nor Powers nor things present nor things to come ver 39. Nor Height nor Depth nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Iesus our Lord. Yea and it is expressed by a word of personal certainty 2 Tim. 1. 12. I know whom I have believed In knowledge there is alwayes a certainty for that is one of the maine differences 'twixt it and opinion that the one leaves the minde uncertain and wavering and the other determinates the minde with certainty and infallibility Whiles the minde remaines like a paire of indifferent scales which bend this way and that way or like a boat in the river now floating up and then sinking down now reeling to this side by and by to that side it cannot be said to be assured perhaps Christ is mine perhaps I am his this is a plaine uncertainty for the minde is not perswaded But in the assurance of faith the minde is like a scale that weighs down it is perswaded and ascertained there is a prevalent evidence of the thing Not only in absolute tearmes that Christ belongs to a believer but in reflexive tearmes that Christ belongs to me he gave himself for me and he is my redeemer and this particular or personal perswasion is assurance 4. Assurance is not all kinds of perswasion or ascertaining there are two kindes of assurance or perswasion of the minde touching a mans personall interest in Christ One is Imaginary and deluding for as the heart of a man may deceive it self about the habit of faith or any other grace so it may delude him about the acts and degrees of the same doth the true believer believe in Christ so thinks the Hypocrite that he doth too Hath the true believer a perswasion of his personall propriety in Christ which cleares the minde of doubting so hath the Hypocrite too a most exalted confidence an iron faith that would never bend nor bow by doubtings It may be with him as with a poore man in a dreame what the rich man hath by propriety and in possession even that same thing may the poorest man have in a dreaming fancy and imagination But then ask the Hypocrite by what grounds art thou thus confidently perswaded what did encline thy mind hereto what promise hast thou found that Christ is and will be his whose heart was never humbled for sin whose heart still retains the love of sin Now as the man who being demanded how he came without his wedding garment he is speechlesse The fool saith Solomon Prov. 14. 16. rageth and is confident and so the presumptuous person He sinneth and yet is perswaded he walketh in his sinnes and yet is assured I pray you remember that the assurance of faith is no such absolute and boystrous setling of the minde that Christ is mine however though I be never so ignorant and wicked and though I live never so wretchedly and profanely yet Christ is mine and God is my mercifull Father and my sinnes are pardoned O no this is a Diabolical assurance it is no Evangelical assurance Another is grounded and divinely rational and it alwayes followes sound repentance and faith That assurance which goes before these is false absolutely I am bound to repent and to believe but I cannot be assured but in a conditionall order If I should be assured that Christ were mine before before I did believe this were a lie forasmuch as Christ is not mine untill I do by faith accept of him and if I should be assured that my sins were pardoned before I did repent I did in this delude mine own heart forasmuch as sin is not pardoned unlesse it be repented of No but I must repent of my sins I must accept of Jesus Christ offered unto me in the Gospel to be my Lord and Saviour
by faith p. 99 How faith produceth a change of the condition and how of the person p. 99 Every beleever hath a changed and hâ—ly heart p. 99 Wherein this change lies ib. No man hath a changed nature but a beleever p. 100 Enquire after this change in thy self p. 100 Change of condition easily complyed with an evidence of strong faith p. 128 Christ What it signifies p. 18 Christs anointing doth import his assured ordination abundant qualification sweet and pleasant acceptation both with God and man p. 19 20 Vnto what Christ was anointed p. 20 Vid. Priest Prophet King Christs and his Churches enemies who they are and how conquered by him p. 28 Whole Christ the adaequate object of faith p. 41 Whole Christ taken and received by faith p. 42 How Christ is taken by faith as a Saviour and Priest p. 43 How Christ is taken by faith as a Saviour and King and Prophet p. 45 Taking and receiving Christ as Lord and Saviour hath many things in it p. 46 Vid. Taking All that can save and justifie a man is only to be found in Christ as the meritorious cause p. 62 Christ should be the main scope of our preaching and studying p. 67 Christ may be preached two ways p. 67. Plentifulnesse of our supplies in Christ encourageth to live by faith on him p. 248 The ordination of Christ to supply beleevers encourageth trust p. 249 Christs services done in behalf of beleevers encourageth trust p. 250 Christ is given out of rich grace mercy and love p. 190 Christ is worth your taking though we be unworthy of receiving p. 191 Christs disposition encourageth trust p. 251 Christs conjunction and relation encourageth trust p. 253 Christs invitation encourageth trust p. 255 Christs assurances that he will not fail him that lives by faith on him p. 255 Foure things by which we may be perswaded that Christ will do us good if we live by faith on him p. 255 Christs offices encouragements to live faith on him p. 256 257 Impossible to have supplies for the soul any other way then by faith in Christ p. 258 Comfort Comfort not sure but by believing p 64 Distinguish betwixt the ground of our comfort and the testimonies of our interest in them p. 64 Communion No prison can boult out communion with God p. 3 Communion with God in Ordinances and duties not so sweet in a weak beleever as in a strong p. 149 Reasons of it p. 150 Confidence Confidence of easie answers for great matters an argument of strong faith p. 125 Covenant A double Covenant and for two wayes of life p. 56 Impossible to be saved by the legal Covenant whence it is so p. 56 Vid. Holiness Vnbelief makes void the Covenant of grace p. 89 A true beleever is in singular Covenant with God p. 114 Covenant of grace what it is in the offer and revelation of it and what in respect of our entrance and admission into it p. 114 115 Happinesse of being in Covenant with God p. 115 Every beleever in the same fundamental Covenant with God p. 145 Crucifying Crucifying vertue from Christ p. 143 D Day Day of grace fear of having outstood it divers considerations about it p. 203 Debts Christ takes our debts upon himself the comfort of it p. 112 Degrees Degrees of faith what they are and how beleevers differ in them p. 122 123 Reasons of the diversity of degrees of faith p. 124 Delay vid. Hasty Desertions In times of desertions to live upon Christ and the promises an argument of a great faith p. 130 Discouragement Stedfast following Christ notwithstanding discouragements argues a strong faith p. 125 Distrust Arguments of distrust when they grow weak faith gets strength p. 128 Doubtings Doubtings argue weaknesse of faith p. 131 Doubtings prejudice our suits p. 150 Doubts of the weak beleever about his title and mistakes in passages betwixt God and the soul p. 155 Duty Want of a heart to duty should not discourage from beleeving p. 210 Faith puts life into our duties the Reasons of it p. 211 E Exchange A real exchange betwixt Christ and beleevers and wherein it is p. 111 F Faith Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ the only way to salvation p. 13 Faith in Christ described p. 32 The spring and fountain of justifying faith p. 32 The subject of faith p. 34 The sâ—at of faith p. 35 Three kindes of faith distinguished viz. Credere Deum Deo in Deum p. 36 How faith is seated in the will how in the understanding p. 36 37 The proper act of faith as justifying p. 37 The object of justifying faith p. 40 The immediate object of justifying faith p. 4. 1 Vid. Christ The consequent object of faith p. 48 Faith may be considered Absolutely Actually Correlatively Instrumentally how to be understood p. 52 53 How faith justifieth p. 71 72 Whether faith deal with the person of Christ or the benefits of Christ first p. 73 Divers kinds of faith p. 84 Historical faith what it is p. 84 Faith of miracles what it is p. 85 Temporary faith what it is Ib. How temporary faith differs from justifying faith Ibid The consimilitude betwixt faith and presumption p. 86 The easinesse of faith short of justifying and of presumption and our aptnesse to rest in that Ibid Rules for the discovery of faith p. 90 Some things faith doth produce not as essential properties but as magnificent testimonies and how we must distinguish betwixt them p. 91 93. Some things faith doth produce yet not alwayes therefore we may not conclude a wait of faith from the absence of these p. 91 92 Many inward contrarieties to the intrinsecal acts and fruits of faith p. 94 Evidences of faith cannot be given by way of abstraction but by way of existence how to be undersstood p. 95 A double contrariety to faith Ib. Faith endeavours after increase and wherein p. 107 Wherein true faith in one differs from faith in another p. 120 121 Signes of a great and strong faith p. 125 Signes of a weak faith p. 131 Vid. Weak The vital act of faith is not reflexive but direct p. 136 Motives to greaten our faith p. 156 Exhortations to labour for faith p. 157 Impediments and hindrances to faith p. 168 Means whereby God works faith p. 176 The proper rise and ground of faith is without our selves p. 189 To receive Christ by faith is not a matter of merit but a point of duty p. 190 Faith no hindrance to holinesse p. 208. The time of contrariety is the time for faith to work p. 209 Two offices of faith p. 216 Vid. living by faith Faith of adherence and faith of evidence the difference betwixt them p. 259 The frequent exercise of faith improves it to assurance p. 282 Fruitful True faith is fruitful The more fruitful the stronger faith p. 130 G Glory vid. Salvation The inheritance of glory all beleevers have a like interest in it p. 142 How many wayes God hath glory from
us p. 153 God The actions of God of several sorts p. 72 How many things in God encourage to live by faith as Gods alsufficiency p. 231 Gods command p. 232 Gods promises p. 233 Gods power p. 234 Gods truth and fidelity p. 236 Gods performance to them that have lived by faith p. 237 Goodness Hatred of goodnesse precipitates evil men to acts of injustice p. 2 Gospel The preaching of the Gospel is of necessary and singular consequence p. 65 Ghost Holy Ghost how he may be said to justifie p. 71 Grace Salvation is only by grace p. 63 The best graces are but imperfect excellencies p. 113 H Habits Two sorts of habits acquired and infused p. 33 Hasty A soul hasty to be answered is weak in faith p. 132 Heart Heart or will the seat of faith p. 35 Hearing Meer hearing of Christ and his Doctrine will not save p. 66 Divers sorts of hearing Ib. Historical vid. Faith Holinesse Inherent holinesse cannot justifie and save p. 56 Inherent holiness is defective and imperfect p. 57 The conscience dares not rest upon it p. 58 Actual holinesse no meritorious efficacy in it p. 58 Humble humbled Faith makes the heart humble p. 103 A soul that thinks himself not humbled enough answered p. 197 A twofold humbling according to a double cause of it and the workings of each p. 197 198 Fitnesse for Christ not to be judged by the measure and strength of legal humblings the reasons of it p. 198 Some things which if they follow upon legal humblings may be subordinate encouragements to the heart to put it selfe upon Christ p. 199 Humblings and meltings of soul not hindred by faith Ibid But furthered by it p. 200 I James James what kind of faith he speaks of p. 104 105 Ignorance Grosse ignorance an impediment to getting faith p. 169 170 Ignorance of our sinful condition of Gods justice and of the excellency of Christ impediments to getting faith p. 170 Imputed vid. Righteousness Infidelity The dangerous state of positive infidelity p. 158 The degrees of positive infidelity p. 159 Intercession vid. Priest A twofold intercession p. 24 25 Christs intercession what is meant by it p. 25. Inherent Inherent qualities and abilities insisted on as means of perswasion argues weaknesse of faith p. 134 Joy Spiritual joy the sole fruit of faith p. 92 Several sorts of joy whence they spring p. 92 Joy an inseparable fruit of faith p. 92 Joy three wayes considered p. 146 147 Justifie Justification There is not a co-operation of faith and other graces to justifie yet there is a co-existence of them in the person justified p. 55 Justification only in Jesus Christ p. 68 Justification the word opened p. 69 The nature of it designed p. 70 Justification an action in God p. 71 The kinde of this action p. 72 The meritorious cause of it p. 71 The applying cause of it p. 71 Whether Justification be before faith p. 73 Justification not a divided act p. 75 Whether it be one transient act or one continued act p. 75 Justification of a sinner a gracious and just action p. 78 Justification by imputed righteousnesse all beleevers have an equal interest in it p. 142 Justice Gods Justice should constraine us to believe p. 187 K King Christ ancinted to be a King p. 27 His Kingly office what it imports Ib. Knowledge Knowledge how one beleever differs from another therein p. 121 L Law No ability to keep the whole Law wholly Reasons of it p. 60 Life Living A heart inclined to the life of sense is weak in faith p. 133 Of living by faith p. 216 What it is in general to live by faith p. 218 To live by faith is to commit all to God Ibid To live by faith is to depend upon God for all p. 219 Living by faith extends to two sorts of life p. 220 To live by faith on Christ described p. 221 The several exigencies and conditions of soule in which we had need to live by faith p. 221 222 Encouragements from Christs fulnesse to live by faith in those exigencies p. 223 224 The conjunction of our own exigencies and Christs fulnesse is the very living by faith upon Christ p. 225 To live by faith on Christ is more then a meer complaining of our wants or an acknowledging of his fulnesse p. 226 To live by faith on Christ is more then a meer going to Christ p. 227 To live by faith on Christ is not only to trust on Christ for supply but to expect performance p. 227 To live by faith on Christ is an extensive work p. 228 Arguments to perswade to live by faith p. 229 The life of faith is congruous to our condition p. 229 The necessity of living by faith in all sensible sequestrations p. 231 Six arguments from God himself to perswade to live by faith p. 231 The life of faith is the only Christian life p. 238 The life of faith is the only comfortable life p. 240 What things make the life uncomfortable and what makes it comfortable p. 241 The life of faith easeth of all burdens and secures against all prejudices p. 240 The life of faith makes the present condition good enough and assures of universal and reasonable supplies p. 244 The life of faith is the only getting and thriving life p. 245 The Reasons of it p. 247 Divers arguments from Jesus Christ himself to perswade us to live by faith on him p. 248 Vid. Christ Lord. True faith takes Christ only to be its Lord. p. 101 No unbeleever can accept of Christ to be his Lord only Reasons of it p. 191 Every beleever admits of Christ to be his Lord Reasons of it p. 102 How to know whether Christ or sin be our Lord. p. 103 Weak faith will honour Christ as a Lord though it be not sure that he is its Saviour p. 136 Love True love of Christ an infallible evidence of true faith p. 96 Love is not separated from faith p. 96 Reasons of it p. 97 True love to Christ three tryals of it p. 98 Every beleever hath an equal interest in Gods special love p. 145 The love of God in giving Christ and the love of Christ in giving of himself p. 161 M Ministers Ministery The best Ministers do most good and finde most affliction p. 1 Good Ministers and covetous hearts cannot agree p. 2 Ministers better esteemed when the heart is changed p. 5 Ministers must forget personal injuries when they deal with sensible sinners p. 10 How Ministers must deal with stout and resolute and how with bleeding and afflicted sinners p. 11 How preciously dear the Ministery of the Gospel should be unto us p. 68 Miracles vid. Faith N Natural No natural principle of justifying faith now in a man p. 79 80 A natural principle of unbeliefe and infidelity in every mans heart p. 80 There is a natural opposition in the heart against Christ. p. 81 Natural condition throughly studyed a way to get a beleeving
p. 142 Every Beleever partakes of Christs crucifying vertue p. 143 Every beleever partakes of preserving vertue from Christ p. 144 Every beleever partakes of Christs assisting vertue p. 143 Uncheerfulnesse Uncheerfulnesse of heart shews faith to be weak p. 135 Unbelief Dangerous misery of unbelief p. 87 Unbelief leaves all our sins upon record p. 87 The unbeliever must alone answer for his sins p. 87 The unbeleever judged as an unrighteous person p. 88 The greatnesse of the sinne of unbelief proved p. 88 A sinne against greatest love Ibid Against the only remedy p. 89 Makes void all the Covenant of grace p. 89 Directly murders the soul p. 89 Unbelieving state dangerous p. 160 Unbelief binds all our sins upon the soul p. 160 Unbelief grieves the heart of Christ p. 166 The cunnings of natural unbelief hindrances to faith p. 175. What those cunnings are p. 175 176 Unbelief is the worst of sinnes p. 185. Unbelief is no cure to the strength of sin p. 206 207 Unbelief breeds an indisposition towards holy duties p. 210 A threefold difference betwixt an unbeleever and a beleever p. 210 Unholy An unholy beleever is as proper a phrase as a holy Devil p. 100 Upright An upright care to please God a meanes of assurance p. 28◠Unworthinesse Unworthinesse should not keep us off from Christ p. 188 Personal unworthinesse is no prejudice but a furtherance p. 188 A twofold unworthinesse p. 192 Unity Habitual unity of all true faith in four particulars p. 119. 120 W Waiting A waiting faith is a strong faith p. 130 Way Way of beleevers is not a By way nor an uncertain way p. 110 Weak An anxious and careful soul is weak in faith p. 135 A weak faith though not sure that Christ is its Saviour yet will honour Christ as its Lord. p. 136 A weak faith what it wants in breadth of perswasion makes up in depth of humility p. 137 A weak faith though it have but tender confidences of its interest in Christ yet it hath strong dislikes and combates with unbeliefe pag. 137 A weak faith will not rest in weaknesse if truth be in it p. 138 A weak faith ventures its soul on Christ though it cannot clear its title nor answer its fears p. 139 A weak beleever falls short in joy p. 146 A weak Beleever hath not that sweet peace a strong beleever hath p. 147 A weak Beleever hath not that sweetnesse in communion with God pag. 149 A weak Beleever hath not that successefulnesse in communion with God pag. 150 A weak beleever is more under the power of the creature then the strong pag. 151 A weak beleever cannot bring God so much glory as a strong p. 153 A weak beleever will be more puzzled to die p. 154 A weak beleever hath not such cheerful expectations nor quiet submissions p. 155 A weak beleever is more entangled with efficacy of temptations p. 155 Will. The Will cannot of it self enliven it selfe to that great part of life believing p. 33 34 Christ is willing to accept sinners proved p. 193 Christs Will to save sinners manifested three wayes p. 195 196 Vid. Assurance Word The Word and Prayer the great power of God to change the heart and conquer Satan p. 1 What word a sinner hath to induce the soul to believe p. 165 The word is the Ministerial instrument to beget saith p. 177 The word a meanes to make us know our interest in Christ p. 280 World The world an impediment to beleeving p. 174 Works In what the perfection of good works doth consist p. 58 59 No proportion betwixt our works and our pardon p. 59 60 What relation there is betwixt good works and salvation p. 60 Works justifie our faith p. 105 How works can evidence faith since evil men may performe them and some beleevers have not wherewithal to do them p. 106 Worthinesse There is a double worthinesse p. 192 Vid. Unworthinesse The Contents of the Chapters and Sections CHap. 1. The dependance of the words p. 1 Chap. 2. The words opened with the several doctrines p. 4. § 1. Change of heart breeds change of estimation towards the Ministers of the Gospel p. 5 § 2. Sensible sinners are ever inquisitive p. 5 § 3. The main and choise thing the troubled soul looks after is how to save it self p. 6 § 4. Persons rightly sensible are as throughly resolved for the means and wayes as for the end and scope p. 9 § 5. When God doth throughly work upon mens consciences personal injuriousness must be forgotten by them who are to deal with them p. 10 § 6. Troubled souls must be directed to Christ p. 12 Chap. 3. Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ the only way to salvation p. 13 § 1. What Jesus signifies and what kinde of Saviour Christ is p. 14 § 2. What Christ signifieth and of his anointing p. 18 § 3. Vnto what Christ was anointed and of his office of a Priest p. 20 § 4. Christ anointed to be a Prophet p. 26 § 5. Christ anointed to be a King p. 27 Chap. 4. What believing in the Lord Jesus Christ doth import p. 29 Chap. 5. Faith in Christ described p. 32 § 1. The spring or fountaine of faith p. 32 § 2. The Subject of faith p. 34 § 3. The seat or habitation of faith p. 35 § 4. The proper and genuine act of faith p. 37 Chap. 6. The object of justifying faith p. 40 § 1. The immediate object of faith p. 41 § 2. The adequate and proper object of faith p. 41 § 3. How faith doth exercise it self about whole Christ p. 43 § 4. What is the exercise of faith in Christ as a Saviour King Prophet Lord. p. 45 § 5. Five particulars about taking and receiving Christ as a Lord and Saviour p. 46 § 6. The consequent object of faith remission of sins and righteousnesse and how faith is conversant about remission of sins p. 48 § 7. How faith looks on Christ for righteousnesse p. 50 Chap. 7. How it may appear that to beleeve in Christ is the only way to be saved Where are some particulars premised p. 52 § 1. The Argument for the confirmation of the Doctrine p. 55 § 2. The second Argument p. 62 § 3. The third Argument p. 63 § 4. The fourth Argument p. 63 § 5. The fifth Argument p. 64 Chap. 8. Consectaries from this doctrine setting out the singular use of preaching and hearing of the Gospel p. 65 Chap. 9. Our Justification to be found only in Jesus Christ p. 68 § 1. The word Justification explained p. 69 § 2. Justification defined and opened p. 70 § 3. The person justified is a believing sinner p. 73 § 4. The Remission of sinnes belong to Justification p. 74 § 5. The righteousnesse of Christ is that by which we are Justified p. 76 § 6. The Justification of a sinner is a gracious and just action p. 78 Chap. 10. The difficulty of beleeving p. 79 Chap. 11. The facility of
error and mistake about beleeving p. 84 Chap. 12. The sure and dangerous misery of unbelief p. 87 Chap. 13. Rules for the discovery of faith p. 90 § 1. Four things premised for the manner of evidencing of faith p. 90 § 2. A true love of Christ an infallible and essential evidence of true faith in Christ p. 96 § 3. Inward change and sanctity of the heart an infallible testimony of a living faith p. 98 § 4. True faith takes Christ and him only to be its Lord p. 101 § 5. Faith makes the heart humble and lowly p. 103 § 6. True faith is fruitful p. 104 § 7. True faith desires and endeavours after encrease p. 107 § 8. Faith in Christ and a mournful heart for sin go together p. 108 Chap. 14. Singular comfort for all true heleevers p. 109 § 1. They are in the way to heaven p. 110 § 2. There is a real and blessed exchange betwixt them and Christ p. 111 § 3. They are in singular Covenant with God p. 114 § 4. They may now with boldnesse approach the throne of grace p. 116 Chap. 15. The Agreement and difference of a strong and weak faith p. 117 § 1. The habitual unity of true faith and wherein expressed in four particulars p. 119 § 2. The intensive diversities of faith wherein there is a difference p. 120 § 3. Signes of a great and strong faith p. 125 § 4. Signes of a weak faith p. 131 § 5. Demonstrations of the truth of faith though weak p. 136 § 6. The concordance of all faith which is true whether strong or weak in fundamental comforts p. 139 § 7. The inequality of strong and weak faith in respect of circumstantial comforts and some other consequences p. 146 § 8. Motives to greaten our faith p. 156 Chap. 16. Exhortations to labour for saving faith p. 157 § 1. Motives to get saving faith p. 158 § 2. Impediments hindrances to the geting of saving faith p. 168 § 3. Meanes by which God works saving faith p. 176 § 4. Objections that hinder from beleeving p. 184 Chap. 17. Of living by faith p. 216 § 1 What it is in the general to live by faith p. 218 § 2. To what states of life faith may extend p. 220 § 3. What it is to live by faith on Christ p. 221 § 4. Arguments to move us to live by faith p. 229 Chap. 18. The improvement of faith to a full assurance p. 259 § 1. What the Assurance of faith is p. 260 § 2. Whether such an assurance may be had p. 265 § 3. Whether every beleever should strive to the assurance of faith p. 267 § 4. Arguments to move beleevers to labour for assurance of faith p. 269 § 5. By what means the soul may get up to this assurance p. 280 Imprimatur EDM. CALAMY Febr. 27. 1655. BOOKS Printed and are to be sold by Adoniram Byfield at the Bible in Popes-head Alley neer Lumbard-street A Comentary upon the three first Chapers of Genesis by that Reverend Divine Mr. John White late Preacher of Gods Word at Dorchester in the County of Dorset in sol All the Works of Mr. Stephen Marshal collected into one Volume in 4o. The Reasons presented by the dissenting Brethren against certain propositions concerning Presbyterial Government together with the answer of the Assembly of Divines to those reasâ—ns of Dissent As also the Papers and Answers of the Dissenting Brethren and the Committee of the Assembly put into the Committee of Lords and Commons and Assembly of Divines for accomodation in 4o. The humble Advice of the Assembly of Divines concerning a larger and the lesser Catechisme presented by them to both Houses of Parliament with the proofs thereof out of the Scriptures in the Margin in 4o. The tenth Muse several Poems compiled with great variety of wit and learning full of delight wherein especially is contained a compleat Discourse and description of the four Elements Constitutions Ages of man Seasons of the year together with an exact Epitomie of the four Monarchies Also a Dialogue between Old England and New concerning the late troubles with divers other pleasant and serious Poems by Mrs Anne Bradstreet in 8o. Hidden Manna or the mystery of saving Grace wherein the peculiarity of Gods especial grace to the Elect is asserted and proved and divers Objections of Pelagians and Arminians about the power of the will of man to supernatural good are fully answered and confuted by the Reverend Mr. William Fenner in 12o. A short Chatechisme being a brief Instruction of the most ignorant before the receiving of the Sacrament of the Lords Supper by Mr. Obadiah Sedgwick Safe Conduct or the Saints Guidance to Glory opened in a Sermon preached at Dunstans in the East at the Funeral of the vertuous and Religious Gentle-woman Mrs Thomasin Barnard-Iston late wife of Mr. Samuel Barnard-Iston Marchant by Ralph Robinson Pastor of Mary Wolnoth Lumbardstreet The Saints longings after their Heavenly Country A Sermon preached at St. Pauls Church at a Solemn Aniversary meeting of the Cheshire Gentlemen by that faithful Servant of Jesus Christ Mr Ralph Robinson late Minister of Mary Wolnoth Lond. A Sermon preached before the Honourable House of Commons at their late monethly Fast by Nathaniel Ward Minister of Gods Word Short Writing Shortned or the Art of short Writing reduced to a method more speedy plain exact and easie then hath been heretofore published in which the principal difficulties and discouragements that have been found in Short-writing particularly the burthening of memory with and inconvenient joyning of many Characters are removed and the whole art so disposed that all usual words may be written with aptnesse and brevity by John Farthing Authour and Teacher thereof who wrote Mr. Love's Tryal and hath practised Short-writing this twenty six years attested by the hands of divers eminent Ministers in and about London in 8o. FINIS
So c. Secondly consider his many personal invitations he hath from his own mouth both counselled and envited the poore sinner unto him I counsel thee to buy gold and raiment and eye salve Rev. 3. 18. The Spirit and the bride say come and let him that heareth say come and let him that is a thirst come and whosoever will let him take of the water of life freely Rev. 22. 17. Ho! every one that thirsteth come ye to the waters and be that hath no money come ye buy and eat yea come buy wine and milk without money and without price hearken diligently unto me and eat ye that which is good and let your soul delight it self in fatness Encline your eare and come unto me and your soul shall live And I will make with you an everlasting Covenant even the sure mercies of David Isa 55. 1 2. 3. Behold I have given him for a witnesse to the people Ver. 4. Jesus stood and cryed saying If any man thirst let him come unto me and drink John 7. 37. Thirdly consider he hath assured thee of acceptance Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out John 6. 37. He will not shut the door against thee when he hath envited thee but thou shalt be a welcome guest nay he will surely do thee good Mat. 11. 28. Come unto me all ye that labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest Fourthly there was never any one who did come unto him but sped well Thou canst not finde any one Iota of unwillingnesse nor of his disregard but all have found him to be a merciful High Priest and a compassionate Saviour who have accepted of him Fifthly consider that he doth still negotiate with thee Though he be returned to the highest heavens yet he hath dispatched Embassadors in his Name to publish and to call upon thee and to beseech thee 2 Cor. 5. 19. God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself not imputing their trespasses unto them and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation Ver. 20. Now then we are Ambassadours for Christ as though God did beseech you by us we pray you in Christs stead be ye reconciled to God V. 21. For he hath made him to be sin for us that we might be made the righteousnesse of God in him Object If there were any hope of reconciliation may a man reply then I should believe Sol. Why saith the Apostle God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself Object But if God had commanded any in his Name to publish this Sol. He hath committed to us the word of Reconciliation Object But you may do it out of your compassion not from a commission Sol. We are Embassadours for Christ and pray you in Christs stead Object But our sins will prejudice the Reconciliation Sol. He hath made him to be sin for us Sixthly consider his marvellous patience If he were not willing he would never have re-inforced his suit but would have taken the first denial But he hath followed them who have fled from him He hath gone after the sinner who hath many times turned his back Rom. 10. 21. All the day long have I stretched out my hand unto a disobedient and gainsaying people In this sense we may apply that of the Prophet He doth wait that he may be gracious and yet continues his Embassadors to bring thee home unto him Seventhly consider His sad complaints for thy holding off and not beleeving when he came neer to Hierusalem he wept over it and said How often would I have gathered thee Matth. 23. 37. And O if thou hadst known even thou at the least in this thy day the things which concern thy peace Luke 19. 41 42. And why will you not come unto me John 5. 40. As if you did see a tender father pursuing a rebellious childe and working upon him by counsel and entreaties and by hands of bounty and he will not yet hearken the father steps to a friend and powers out tears O I cannot win him I cannot turn him doth not this shew a willingnesse So c. Lastly consider his Will is exhibited to us in all the kindes of willingnesse I observe that his will may be manifested three wayes First in commands and there is a preceptive will and Christ commands thee to beleeve Secondly in promises and there is a gracious and encouraging will and Christ hath promised himself and all that he hath done and suffered if thou wilt beleeve in him Thirdly in threatnings and there is a just and vindictive will and Christ hath pronounced an abiding wrath and an everlasting death against him that will not beleeve So that this is most clear that Christ is most willing that a poor sinner should come in and embrace him and be saved by him Secondly The order of assurance But then for the order of assurance that Christ is willing Observe that there is a double assurance 1. One which is precedent and grounds the soul to beleeve 2. Another is subsequent and attends the soul after its beleeving That precedent assurance consists in a clear and convincing demonstration that Christ is willing to be taken by the sinner This subsequent assurance consists in a reflexive perswasion that he is my Christ and Saviour being by faith taken and accepted Now if a sinner expects this latter assurance before he will beleeve he doth preposterously and vainly perplex his soule nay it is an impossibility to lead on the soul this way nay it were a falshood and a delusion to the soul if it had a reflexive assurance that Christ and his benefits are mine before the heart did by faith beleeve in him and accept of him I did cousen my soul with a lie for Christ is not that mans who doth not yet beleeve on him the ways of this kinde of assurance is as it were the eccho of the original wayes of faith a consequent of it but never an antecedent For a man to solace himself that the estate is his before the person is his or that the person is his before he hath accepted of the person Why this is but the fruit of a vain and idle fancy But the former assurance that is a sweet inducement unto the soul to beleeve viz. when the soul ban get three things cleared and resolved 1. The certainty of a Saviour 2. The alsufficiency of him 3. His willingnesse to embrace and accept of a beleeving sinner Now this assurance is to be drawn from the very nature and offices and dispositions of Christ and from the command and invitations and promises of the Gospel which when the soul hath throughly perused and scanned it shall clearly see and freely acknowledge if it wil not blasphemously suspect Gods own truths for lies that Christ is both an able and also a willing Saviour not only willing to lay down his life but most willing that sinners should come to him and believe in him and so
find eternal life So that you may from this take notice of three things One That to be assured of Christ as mine is no ground for to move a man to believe but it is a consequent of it Another that to be assured that Christ is willing and ready to be mine and to accept of me this is a sweet motive and an encouraging ground for the soul to believe A third there is no better way to feel the sweetnesse of Christs being willing to bestow himself upon a man then by believing first on him for it is faith in Christ which opens to a man all his interests in Christ And if this be sure that Christs willingnesse prevents thine if therefore thou be willing to accept the very nature of the treaty and match assures thee sufficiently that Christ was ready long ago 5. Obj. But then saith the sensible sinner I am not prepared and humble enough Christ is to binde up the broken hearted but my heart is still hard and Christ is to open the prison for them that are bound but I am not at least in sufficient bondage and he is to give the oile of joy for mourning but I have no melting nor mourning spirit and therefore I may not believe on him nor take him for I am distinguished Sol. I shall not need to say much to this because I have touched heretofore upon in the Exposition of Mal. 1. 1. yet I will touch a little at this time 1. There is a twofold humbling according to a double cause of it One is in the exceedings beating of the conscience with inward terrors and feares springing from the Power of the Law which quickens the conscience and wounds it with the expresse sense of former guilt and which presents God in all the glories and terrors of his justice and as the great and sure avenger of an unrighteous person When the soul is in this kinde of humbling it is filled with exquisite sense and exquisite torment like a man with a burning arrow in his thigh or like a thief hearing the sentence of death pronounced upon him by the judge Now this kinde of humbling though sometimes it may be an antecedent to faith in Christ for God doth many times bring a man to heaven by the gates of hell he doth bruise and wound and even kill him by the terrors of the Law and then revive him with the workings and tender goodnesse of the Gospel yet it may be possibly without any future accesse of the soul to Chrâ—st For this mark that though God doth many times graciously superad another work of conversion to this of legall affliction yet he may and doth many times distribute these sorrows in wrath and they are but the testimonies of his pure and displeased justice even in this life to begin an hell of anguish in the conscience of a proud and daring sinner Another is in the tender abasings and sweet bathings or mournings of the affections when there is a fountaine of sorrow set open within the soul giving out it self in severall streames of melting because of sin and transgression Now this latter is not an antecedent but a consequent of faith in Christ as you shall hear presently A man cannot rightly judge of his fitnesse to lay hold on Christ by the meer strength or measure of any legall humbling but by the Issue and event of them If instead of one item from conscience thou shouldest now heare an hundred and instead of one lash from conscience thou shouldst now feel a thousand though thy heart were broken into as many pieces as the glasse which is dashed against the wall though thy spirits did even fry within thee for the heat of horror and that thou didst roare day and night for the disquietment of thy guilty conscience yet couldst thou not confidently affirme by all this I am now for Christ and Christ will assuredly accept of me I shall not misse of him Reasons whereof are these 1. Because these may be Gods tokens of just vengeance on thee meer punishments and judicial acts 2. The soul under these may be rather taken up with the stinging guilt and feares of sin then with the foul vilenesse and base nature and acts thereof standing in contrariety to the holy and good will of a gracious God 3. The thus afflicted soul may cry out for Christ meerly out of self-love to ease the burden but not to cure the nature to deliver it from paine but not to heal it of the sinfull inclination Therefore this I would say to any legall broken spirit do not judge of fitnesse meerly by the strength or depth of teares there is a threefold enough 1. Intensive for the degree 2. Extensive for the time 3. Dispositive for the efficacy therefore do but observe what disposition attends and follows these There be five things which if they follow upon legall humblings may be subordinate encouragements to the heart to put it self upon Christ First if quite driven out of ones self Secondly if sin comes to be felt as the basest evil as the guilt of it hath been found the sorest paine A third is if the heart finds it self any way loosened from the league of iniquity yea and that a secret war is begun now 'twixt the soul and the sinner Fourthly an high estimate and valuation of Christ as the only and choisest good of my soul and hope c. An active and fervent desire to put the soul under the Government of the Lord Iesus Whether thy legall humblings be great or small long or short more or lesse that 's not the thing but if they be thus attended thou mayest safely venture thy soul upon the Lord Jesus thou mayest believe and he will in no wise refuse thee 3. Faith in Christ will not hinder the humblings or meltings of thy soul I observe when there is a Thunder-clap then there is such a hurry in the cloud that fire flasheth out and the cloud is brust insunder and a mighty deluge of water is thrown down and you may likewise observe that the Sun doth though there be no storme draw up and sweetly open and pierce the clouds which thereby give down the most seasonable and refreshing showres of rain The Law is like a Thunder-clap it doth many times so tosse and hurry and vex the conscience that infinite sighes and feares and teares gush out But then faith makes the Sun of righteousnesse to arise within the soul and nohing melts the heart more then Christ apprehended by faith Zach. 12. 10. They shall look upon him whom they pierced and they shall mourne for him as one mourneth for his onely son and they shall be in bitternesse for him as one that is in bitternesse for his first-born For faith First sees the greatest love the sweetest kindnesse the freest pardons 3. Reasons of it the readiest acceptations all which do even me it the heart into a river and works the greatest mournings I doubt not but
repose the victories of our corruptions upon his mighty arme nor the reforming and beautifying of our spirits upon his singular wisdom and holinesse Why what didst thou think or mean when thou didst accept of him to be thy Mediator didst thou conjecture that if once thou gavest thy consent to take him that never after thou shouldst need him or if so wouldest never make use of him Well no more what the Apostle said in another case that I say in this if we will not live by faith upon Christ we do what in us lies make void the Redemption of Christ the intercession of Christ the holinesse of Christ the glory and power of all the offices of Christ. 9. If all this will not move us to live by faith in Christ that is to trust upon him for the help and supply of our spiritual estate then take one thing more there is an impossibility of supplies for thy soul any other way go and think and act any other course to do thy soul good besides this and it shall be fruitlesse after many years industry as thou art so still shalt thou be Obj. Thou wilt say I will never leave complaining of this nature till it be bettered Sol. Thy nature is not bettered by complaint but by grace and that is in Christ and never had till we can trust Object Thou wilt say I will never leave grieving nor praying nor hearing nor reading nor fasting nor conferring till c. Sol. 'T is true these are meanes but where is the cause What if a man should say I will stay here all my life at these conduit pipes but I will have water whiles in the meane time the fountaine yields not forth I confesse the Christian must apply himself to the Ordinances but then it is Christ who sends forth the help and then do the Ordinances deliver us our helps from Christ not presently when one hears but when effectually they have enabled us to beleeve If thou canst heare and beleeve pray and beleeve mourne and beleeve fast and beleeve c. Then good shall come unto thy soul Draw a thousand bonds yet if they be none of them sealed nothing is yet legally and forcibly made over and conveyed many prayers availe little or nothing till they are sealed with faith and now God will acknowledge our demands as authentick and Christ will deliver unto us our hearts desire I had thought to have handled the opposites of the life of faith with the evidence of a true living by faith and also the meanes which might assist us to the life of faith But I recal my self I may not expatiate so farre sufficient hath been touched for this Use perhaps the subject may be more amply treatised if ever I should come to set down before that theame directly and intentionally I therefore proceed to another Use CHAP. XVIII The improvement of faith to a full assurance I Will yet advance on to one Use more Since faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is the only way to be saved therefore not only to labour for that faith but to exalt that faith my meaning is to improve this faith also yet further â—o strength and comfort Divines observe a double act of faith One of adherence by which it cleaves unto Christ and relies upon him alone for righteousnesse pardon of sin grace and salvation Another is of evidence by which it cleares unto the soule its interest in Christ and his righteousnesse and merits In the former the soul renounceth all other corner stones all other rocks of salvation and trusts only upon the Name of Jesus Christ accepts of him as the only Lord and relies on him as the only Saviour casting or rolling its heavenly and eternal safeties into his blessed armes In the latter the soul feels it self reciprocally embraced by Christ I have accepted of him to be my Lord and he saith I am thy King I have relyed on him to be my Saviour and he saith I am thy salvation For pardon of sinnes and he saith unto me Be of good cheer thy sins are forgiven thee Now to this part of faith do I desire to mount the soul of a true beleever viz. not only to apprehend Christ but to know himself to be apprehended by him not only to beleeve but to know him whom he hath beleeved To rise thus far by faith to an assurance that Christ is my Christ my Redeemer liveth who gave himself for me My Lord and my God that he is my righteousnesse my redemption my propitiation For the better settling and exciting of you in this particular I will briefly touch at these things 1. What the assurance of faith is 2. It may be had 3. It should be had 4. The Arguments to stir us up to labour for it that is to know our riches and to know our possessions 5. The means to get it SECT I. Quest 1. WHat the assurance of faith is Sol. It is a victorious conclusion against the strength of doubts whereby the minde of a beleeving person is ascertained and perswaded and upon good ground settled concerning his personal interest in Christ and his benefits For the better opening of this description be pleased to observe these subsequent propositions 1. That the assurance of faith it is the conclusion of an evangelical syllogisme The syllogisme is this Whosoever repents and beleeves in Christ Christ with his benefits are his and he is Christs but I do truly repent and beleeve in Christ therefore Christ and his benefits are mine and I am his In this Syllogisme there are three propositions The first is a Proposition of most infallible certainty it being expresly the voice of Jesus Christ himself and of it the minde hath no doubt but fully assents unto it as a principle of Divine truth viz. That he who repents and beleeves in Christ is his and he is Christs And of this the minde of a beleever may be abundantly perswaded without questâ—onings and doubts for as much as it is a part of the Word of God to whose absolute truth it doth plentifully subscribe The second is a proposition carrying with it the direct act of faith in which the beleeving soul doth accept of Christ or receive him and trust upon him by vertue of which there ariseth a most real and true union 'twixt Christ and the beleever The third and the last which is the conclusion or inference drawn from both the former comprehends in it the formal assurance of a beleeving heart that therefore Christ is mine and I am his That he who beleeves in Christ hath Christ and shall be saved this is not yet that subjective assurance of justifying faith for as much as many an hypocrite may beleeve that truth and yet have no personal interest in Christ Againe that I do beleeve in Christ neither is this essentially assurance for as much as to beleeve is one thing and to be assured is another thing many a good heart may accept of Christ