Christians puddle themselves in the mire of their own darknesse and discouragement because they cannot find any thing in themselves that can give but the least probable conjecture that he will admit and welcome them to come to him or that such precious promises and sweet invitations can belong to such sinners as they conceive themselves to be Truly my beloved I think while we exercise our selves thus we are seeking the Sun with a candle making that which is in it self as bright as the light to be more dark The evidence of Gods reality in offering life to you in Christ and his willingness to receive you it is not without the compasse of his invitation and yet you seek it where it is least to be found that is in your selves But indeed his invitations in the Gospel carry the evidence in their bosome that which is above all other signs and evidences that he did ever send his own Son in the flesh for this purpose is there any thing besides this either greater or clearer I think we are like these who when they had seen many signs and wonders done by Christ which did bear testimony to all the world of his Divine Nature yet they would not be satisfied but sought out another sign tempting him Mat. 16.1 And truly he might return this answer to us O wicked and adulterous generation that seeketh after a sign there shall no sign be given to thee but the sign of the Prophet Ionas the greatest testimony that can be imagined is given already that the Father should send his only begotten and well beloved Son into the state of a servant for man If this do not satisfie I know not what will I see not how any work of his Spirit in us can make so much evidence of his reality and faithfulnesse in the Gospel and of his willingness to welcome sinners All the works of Creation all the works of Grace are nothing to this to manifest his love to men and therefore there is a singular note upon it God so loved the world that he sent his Son Joh. 3.16 And in this was love manifested that he gave his Son 1 Joh. 4.9 If men and Angels had set themselves to devise and find out a pledge or confirmation of the love of God they would have fallen upon some revelation unto or some operation upon their spirits but alace this is infinitly above that his own express image and the brightness of his glory is come down to bear witnesse of his love nay he who is equal with himself in glory is given as a gift to men and is not he infinitly more then created gifts or graces who is the very spring and fountain of them all God so loved the world that truly he gave no such gift besides to testifie such a love Therefore when all that he hath done in this kind cannot satisfie thy sâ—rupulous mind but thou wilt still go on to seek more confirmation of his readinesse to receive thee I think it is a tempting of the Holy One which may draw such an answer from him O wicked and adulterous person there shall no sign be given thee but that which is darker then the former that which thou shalt understand lesse thou may get what thou seeks perhaps some more satisfaction in thy own condition but it shall plung thee more in the issue thou shall alwayes be unsetled and unconstant as water thou shalt not excell I confesse indeed if we speak of the manifestation of ones particular interest in these promises and of an evidence of the love of God to thee in particular then there must needs be something wrought by the Holy Spirit on thy soul to draw down the general testimony of Gods love to mankind into a particular application to thy self But that I do not speak of now because that is the sealing of the Spirit after believing and because you are alwayes unsetled in the first and main point of flying unto the Son and waiting on him for life therefore have you so much inevidence and weakness in that which follows That which I now speak of is that if this were cordially believed and seriously considered that God sent his own Son in the flesh to save sinners you could not readily have any doubt but that you coming to him for salvation would be welcome you could not say that such precious invitations could not belong to sinners or that he could not love the like of you Truly I think if the general were laid to heart that God hath so loved mankind that he gave such a gift unto them there is none could make any more question of his reality when that gift is tendered to any in particular Nay I think it is the inconsideration of this general evidence and manifestation of love to the world that makes you so perplexed in particulars Could you have so much difficulty to believe his love to you if you indeed believe that he hath loved the world that is so many thousands like you Is there so much distance I pray you between you and another as between him and all If then he loves so many miserable sinners is there any impossibility in it but he may love you for what is in them that might conciliat his love I tell you why I think the right apprehension of the general truths of the Gospel would be able like the Sun in its strength to scatter all the clouds and mists of our particular interest-debates because I find that these very grounds upon which you call in question your own particular interest if you did consider them you would find they go a further length to conclude against all others and either they have no strength in your case or they will be of equal force to batter down the confidence of all the Saints and the certainty of all the promises What is it that troubles you but that you are sinners and such sinners so vile and loathsome from whence you do conclude not only that you have no present assurance of his love but that he cannot love such a one as you are Now I say if this hold good in reference to you take heed that you condemn not your selves in that which you approve that is that you do not diâ—pute against the interest of all the Saints who were such as you are and the truth of these fundamentall positions of the Gospel God so loved the world c. And so you do not only wrong your selves but all others and not only so but you offer the greatest indignity to him that out oâ— love sent his Son and to him who out of love came and laid down his life O consider how you indignifie and set at nought that great manifestation of Gods love God manifested in the flesh how you despise his love-pledge to sinners a greater then which he could not give you because as great as himself O that you could see the consequence of your anxious and
Christ Jesus there is a Throne of Justice where no sentence passes but pure unmixed Justice without any temperament of mercy and this all men must once compear before Ye know what a Covenant of Works God once made with us If thou do these things thou shalt live not thou shalt die the death according to this we must once be judged that Justice suffer no prejudice Therefore God speaks out of his Law upon this Throne the language of Mount Sinai he reads our charge unto us and because all the world is guilty therefore the sentence of death is once past upon all Now whoever of you come before this Tribunal to be judged know that it is a subordinate Court there is a higher Court of Mercy and Judgement both Justice and mercy mixed together though mercy be the predominant Iustice and Iudgment i◠〈◊〉 habitation of it but mercy and truth goeth before the Judges 〈◊〉 and come nearest sinners to give them access And this 〈◊〉 may appeal unto from that Tribunal of Justice But there is forgiveness with thee c. Psal. 130.4 5. And whoever comes here Christ Jesus sits on this Throne to absolve him from that sentence If you ask what equity is in it is not this a prejudice to Justice and an abomination to the Lord to justifie the wicked and ungodly sinner I say it is no iniquity because Jesus Christ hath payed the price for us and was made a curse for our sins that we might 〈◊〉 he righteousness of God in him and therefore it is just with God to forgive sins to relax that sinner from the condemnation of the Law that flees unto Jesus Christ. Ye may answer Justice I will not take this for Gods last word I hear that all final Judgement is committed to the Son that he may give life to whom he will he calls me and to him will I go for he hath the words of eternal life he will justifie and who shall condemn Now if any man will not now arraign himself before the Tribunal of Gods Justice if he will not search his guiltiness till his mouth be stopped and hear his sentence of condemnation read and take with it that man cannot come to Jesus Christ to be absolved for he justifieth none but self condemned and lost sinners so your day is but yet coming when ye must answer to Justice the Tribunal of Mercy shall be removed and Christ shall sit upon a Throne of pure Justice to judge these who judged not themselves Alas for your loss the most part of you I pity you ye live in great peace and quietness without the ports of the city of refuge We declare unto you in the Lords Name ye are under the curse of God will ye yet sit secure and put the evil day far from you Oh! rather trouble your peace for a season with the consiâ—eration of your sins enter in judgement with your selves till ye see nothing but perishing in your selves and there is no hazard because here is salvation brought near in the Gospel If ye will not trouble your selves so much as to judge your selves then ye shall be judged when there is no Mediator to plead for you none to appeal unto But whosoever takes the sentence of condemnation unto them and subscribes to the righteousness of the Lords curse upon them we do invite all such in the Lords Name to come in hither even to Jesus Christ there is no condemnation to them that are in him If ye stand scrupulous making many questions in such a matter of so great necessity ye wrong your own soul and dishonour him know this that God is in Christ reconciling the world to himself therefore thou condemned sinner may come to God in Christ If ye ask any warrand we think there should be no such questioning when ye are in so great necessity If a man weâ—e starving without a city and it were told him there is plenty within were he not a fool that would make any more business but labour to enter in This is enough to cross all your objections ye are in extream necessity and like to perish within your self He is able to save to the utmost all that come to him What should more let there be then a closure between absolute necessity and sufficient ability to save will ye yet stand disputing without the city when the avenger of blood is above your head If ye will yet press for some more ground and warrand of believing then I will tell you all that I know is in the Word for a ground of Faith ye have great misery and necessity within you that ye grant and it is your complaint Christ hath mercy and sufficiency of grace in him he is able to save to the utmost that ye cannot deny But I do add this third he is willing also to save thee whoever will be willing to be saved by him nay he is more willing than thou art If ye question this I desire you but to consider the whole tenor of the Gospel How many invitations How many perswasions How many promises to those who come Yea how many commands and that peremptory to believe on him Yea how many threatnings against you if ye will not come to him to have life Hath he given himself for the sins of the world and will he not be willing that sinners partake of that he was at so much pains to purchase Think ye that Christ will be content his death should be in vain and it should be in vain if he did not welcome the worst sinners yea it should be in vain if he did not draw them to him and make them willing But besides this he hath promised so absolutely and freely and fully as there should be no exception imaginable against it Him that cometh I will not in any case cast out Joh. 6.37 Why do ye imagine any case where Christ hath made none Why do ye sin against your own souls Oh! if I were in Christ say ye I would be well and Oh! that he would welcome such a sinner Christ answers thee in express tearms Whosoever will let him take and drink freely Thou declares thy willingness in so speaking and he declares his willingness in so promising Nay thy looking afar off on him is a fruit of his willingness Ye have not chosen me but I have chosen you and loved you first If ye will not yet believe this look upon his command This is his command that ye believe on the Son 1 Joh. 3.23 What warrand have ye to do any duty he commands and why do ye more question this Is not this his command and is it not more peremptory because a new command and his last command And when withall he boasts us in to his Son that we may have life Oh! who should have the face to question any more his willingness Other grounds than these I know none And I think if any come to Christ or pretend to come on other
satisfied in our Cautioner and considers us as righteous in that account before God And this likewise I speak for your use that ye may loath and abhor your selves as much in your selves who are made clean by the blood of Jesus Christ as if ye were not washen Nay so much the more ye ought to remember your own sins which he doth not remember as debt any more and to be ashamed and confounded because they are pardoned It is ordinary for souls to look on themselves with an eye of more complacency in themselves when they apprehend that God lookes favourably on them I do not think that any soul can duely consider the gracious aspect of God in Jesus Christ to them but they will the more loath themselves but I find it ordinary that slight and inconsiderate thoughts of pardon begets jolly conceits in mens hearts of themselves and this is even the sin of Gods children something is abated of our self abhorring when we have peace and favour spoken in to us but I beseech every one that believes there is no condemnation for them to consider there is all things worthy of it in them yea nothing but what deserves it and therefore let that aspect of God beget self-loathing and self-detestation in you the more you apprehend he is pleased with you be ye the more displeased with your selves because it is not your selves he is pleased with but his own well-beloved Son The day of redemption is coming when there shall be no condemnation and nothing condemnable either In Heaven you shall be so but while ye are here this is the most important duty ye are called to to loath your selves because of all your abominations and because he is pacified towards you Ezek. 16. at the close and Chap. 36.31 and 20 43 44. There is a new and strange mortification now pleadde â—or by many whose highest advancement consisteth in not feeling or knowing or confessing sin but in being dead to the sense and convictâ—â—n of the same Alace whither are these reforming timeâ— gone Is not this the spirit of Antichrist I confess it is a mortification of Godliness a crucifying of Repentance and Holiness a crucifying of the new man but it is a quickning of the old man in the lusts thereof a living to sin this is a part of that new but â—aâ—sly so called Gospel that is preached by some which if an Angel would bâ—ing from Heaven we ought not to believe it Other foundation can no man lay then which is laid already upon which the Prophets and Apostles are builded even Christ Jesus Lord give the spirit to understand these mysteries already revealed but save us from these new discoveries and lights That which we have received is able to make us perefâ—ct to salvation Every one pretends a claim and right to this priviledge of Christians to be pardoned and absolved from condemnation who doth not put it out of question though in the mean time their iniquities testifie against them and their transgressions say in the heart of a godly man that there is no fear of God before their eyes Therefore the Apostle describes the man that is in Jesus Christ to be such an one That walks not after the flesh but after the Spirit Not only to guard against the presumptuous fancy of those that live in their sins that pretend to hope for Heaven but to stir up every justified soul to a new manner of conversation since they are in Jesus Christ. We would speak a word of two things from this First that the Scripture gives marks and characters of justified and reconciled persons that they may be known by both to themselves and others Next that the Christian escaped condemnation hath a new manner of walking and is a new creature in Christ. It might seem a strange thing that this fiâ—st were questioned in this generation if any the most clear and important truth could pass without scanning the very tenor of the whole Scripture holds out so much of it I wonder that any man that reads this Chapter or the Epistles of Iames and Iohn should have any more doubt of it Hereby we know that we know him if we keep his commands Is not this a conclusion of our state and condition from the conformity of our walking to the will of God What divine truth can we be sure of if this be uncertain When the beloved Disciple who knew how to preach Christ asserts it in express terms 1 Ioh. 5.13 These things have I written to you that believe that ye may know ye have eternal life and that ye may believe on the Name of the Son of God this very thing was the great scope and purpose of that Evangelick and Divine Epistle I find that Antinomians confound this question that they may have the more advantage in their darkness The question is not concerning the grounds of a mans believing in Christ but concerning our assurance or knowledge of our believing There is a great mistake in Christians practice in confounding these two it makes Christians very unreasonable in their doubtings and exercises therefore let us have this before our eyes Faith in its first and pure acting is rather an adherence and cleaving of a lost soul to Christ than an evidence of its interest in him or of his everlasting love You know all that it is one thing to know a thing or love a thing and another thing to reflect upon it and know that I know and love Iohn did write to believers that they might know they did believe and believe yet more These things then are both separable and the one is posterior to the other After ye believed ye were sealed The perswasion of Gods love and our interest in Christ is the Spirits seal set upon the soul there is a mutual sealing here the soul by believing and trusting in Jesus Christ sets to its seal that God is true as Iohn speaks 3.33 When God speaks in his Law the soul receives that testimony of his Justice and Holiness subscribes to the equity and righteousness of the sentence by condemning it self And when Christ speaks in the Gospel the soul seals that doctrine of free Salvation by approving and consenting with all its heart to the offer subscribes to the way of Salvation in Christ and truth of his promises and thus is the truth of God and Christ sealed by the souls believing Then the Spirit of Jesus Christ afterward when he pleaseth irradiats and shines upon the soul and discovers these things that are freely given and witnesseth to the conscience of the believer that he is a son of God thus the Spirit seals the believer and gives his testimony to his truth Now if we speak of the ground of the first viz. Of believing in Christ to salvation I know none but that which is common to sinners and holden out in the Gospel generally to all Our sin and misery and absolute necessity and Christs invitation of all to
come and receive his full and perfect salvation I think a man should seek nothing in himself whereupon to build his coming to Christ though it be true no man can come to a Saviour till he be convinced of sin and misery yet no man should seek convictions as a warrand to come to Christ for salvation he that is in earnest about this question how shall I be saved I think he should not spend the time in reflecting on and examination of himself till he find something promising in himself but from discovered sin and misery pass straight way over to the grace and mercy of Christ without any interveening search of something in himself to warrand him to come there should be nothing before the eye of the soul but sin and misery and absolute necessity compared with superabounding grace and righteousness in Christ And thus it singly devolves it self over upon Christ and receives him as offered freely without money and without price I know it is not possible that a soul can receive Christ till there be some preparatory convincing work of the Law to discover sin and misery But I hold that to look to any such preparation and fetch an incouragement or motive therefrom to believe in Christ is really to give him a price for his free waters and wine it is to mix in together Christ and the Law in the point of our acceptation and for souls to go about to seek preparations for a time resolving not at all to consider the promise of the Gospel till they have found them and satisfaction in them is nothing else but to go about to establish their own righteousness being ignorant of the righteousness of Christ. And therefore many do corrupt the simplicity of the Gospel by rigid exactions of preparations and measures of them and by making them conditions or restrictions of Gospel-commands and promises As in this Come ye that are wearied And from thence they seem to exclude persons not so qualified from having a warrand to believe Alas it is a great mistake of these and such words certainly these are not set down of purpose to exclude any who will come for whoever will let them come and take freely but rather to encourage such wearied and broken souls as conceives themselves to be the only peâ—sons excluded and to declare unto us in some measure the nature of true faith that a soul must be beaten out of it self ere it can come to Christ. Therefore I conclude that not only it is â— ridiculous and foolish conceit of many Christians that uses to object against believing Iâ— I were as such or such a person if I did love God if I had these fruits of the Spirit if I walked according to the Spirit then I might believe Alace how directly opposite is this to the tearms of the Gospeâ— I say If thou place satisfaction in these and from that ground come to Jesus Christ then thou dost not come really thou dost indeed establish thine own righteousness Doth any Saint though never so holy consider himself under such notions of grace when he comes to be justified No indeed but as an ungodly man rather he must deny all that though he had it And besides it is most unreasonable and incongruous to seek the fruits before the tree be planted and to refuse to plant the tree till you can behold the fruits of it But also it is contrary to the â—ree and comfortable Doctrine of the Gospel for a soul to seek the discovery of any thing in it self but sin before it apply to Jesus Christ. I say there must be some sense oâ— sin otherwise it hath not rightly discovered sin but a soul should not be at the pains to discover that sense of sin and find it out so as to make it a motive of believing in Christ He ought to go straight foreward and not return as he goes he must indeed examine himself not to find himself a sensible humbled sinner that so he may have ground of believing but that he may find himself a lost perishing sinner void of all grace and goodness that he may find the more necessity of Jesus Christ. And thus I think the many contentions about preparations or conditions preparatory to believing may be reconciled Now if the question be as it is indeed about the grounds of our assurance and knowledge of our own faith certainly it is clear as the noon-day that as the good tree is known by the fruits thereof and the fire by the heat thereof so the in-dwelling of faith in the heart is known by its purifying of the heart and working by love it makes a man a new creature so that he and others may see the difference Neither is this any derogation to the free grace of Christ or any establishing of our own righteousness except men be so afraid to establish their own righteousness that they will have no holiness at all but abandon it quite for fear of trusting in it which is a remedy worse than the disease because I make it not a ground of my acceptation before God but only a naked evidence of my believing in Christ and being accepted of God it being known that these have a necessary connexion together in the Scriptures and it being also known that the one is more obvious and easie to be discerned then the other Sure I am the Lambs Book of Life is a great mystery and unless this be granted I see not but every mans regeneration and change shall be as dark and hidden as the hidden and secret decrees of Gods Election for the Spirit may immediatly reveal both the one and the other Is it any derogation to the grace of Christ to know what is freely given us Doth it not rather commend his grace When a soul looks upon it self beautified with hiâ— comeliness and adorned with his graces and loaths it self in it self and ascribes all the honour and praise to him Is it not more injury to the fountain and fulness of grace in Christ not to see the streams of it at all nor to consider them then to behold the streams of grace that flowes out of this fountain as coming out of it I think Christians may be ready to idolize their graces and make them Mediators when they are known but is this a good remedy of that evil to abandone all sight and knowledge of the things freely given us of God Shall we not speak of the freeness of grace because mens corruptions turn grace into carnal liberty and wantonness If these graces be in us sure I am 't is no vertue to be ignorant of them but rather a weakness and darkness It must then be the light and grace of God to know them and from thence to conclude that assurance of faith which is not a forced ungrounded perswasion and strong fancy without any discovered reason of it Sure I am the Apostles counsel is to make our election sure by making our calling sure
How shall any venture to look in to these secrets of the Lambs book of life and read their name there undoubtedly they belong not to us they are a light inaccessible that will but conâ—ound anâ— darken us more Therefore whoever would know their election according to the Scriptures must read the transcript and copy of the Book of Life which is written in the hearts and souls of the elect the thoughts of God are written in his works upon the spirits of men his election hath a seal upon it The Lord knoweth who are his and who can break up this seal Who hath understood the mind of the Lord None can untill the Lord write over his thoughts in some characters of his Spirit and of the new creature in some lineaments and draughts of his own Image that it may be known they are the Epistle of Christ not written with ink and paper but with the Spirit of the living God not in tables of stone but in the fleshly tables of the heart 2 Cor. 3.3 Christ writes his everlasting thoughts oâ— love and good-will to us in this Epistle and that we may not think this doth extol the creature and abase Christ it is added vers 5. Not that we are sufficient of our selves but our suffiâ—iency is of Goâ— The seeing of grace in our selves doth not prejudge the gâ—ace oâ— God unless we see it independent of the fountain and behold not the true rise of it that we may have no matter to glory of It is not a safe way of beholding the Sun to look straight on it it is too dazling to our weak eyes you shall not well take it up so but the best way is to look on it in water then we shall more stedfastly behold it Gods everlasting love and the redemption of Jesus Christ is too glorious an object to behold with the eyes of flesh such objects certainly must astonish and strike the spirits of men with their transcendent brightness therefore we must look on the beams of this Sun as they are reflected in our hearts and so behold the conformity of our souls wrought by his Spirit unto his will and then we shall know the thoughts of his soul to us If men shall at the first â—â—ight climb so high as to be perswaded of Gods eternal love and Christs purchase for them in particular they can do no more but scorch their wings and melt the wax off them till they fall down from that heaven of their ungrounded perswasion into a pit of desperation The Scripture-way is to go downward once that ye may go up first go down in your selves and make your calling sure and then you may rise up to God and make your election sure You must come by this circle there is no passing by a direct line and straight thorow unless by the immediat revelation of the Spirit which is not ordinary and constant and so not to pretended unto I confess that sometimes the Spirit may intimate to the Soul Gods thoughts towards it and its own state and condition by an immediat overpowering testimony that puts to silence all doubts and obejctions that needs no other work or mark to evidence the sincerity and reality of it that light of the Spirit shall be seen in its own light and needs not that any witness of it The Spirit of God sometimes may speak to a Soul Son be of good comfort thy sins are forgiven thee This may break into the Soul as a beam darted from heaven without reference to any work of the Spirit upon the heart or word of Scripture as a mids and mean to apply it But this is more extraordinary the ordinary testimony of the Spirit is certainly conjoined with the testimony of our own consciences Rom. 8.16 and our consciences beares witness of the work of the Sâ—irit in us which the Spirit discovers to be according to the Woâ—d The spirit makes known to us things that are freely given but by comparing things Spiritual with Spiritual 1 Cor. 2.10.13 The fruit and special work of the Holy Ghost in us is the medium and the Spirits light irradiats and shines upon it and makes the heart see the same clearly For though we be the children of light yet our light hath so much darkness as there must be a supervenient and accessory light of the Spirit to discover that light unto us Now what is all this to us I fear that there be many ungrounded perswasions amongst us that many build on a sandy foundation even a strong opinion that it is well with them without any examination of their Souls and conversations according to the Word and this certainly when the tempest blows cannot stand Some teach that no man should question whether he believe or not but presently believe I think none can believe too suddenly it s alwise in season nunquam sera est fides nec paenitentia its never late in respect of the promise and its never too early in respect of a mans case But I cannot think any man can â—elieve till the Spirit have convinced him of his unbelief And tâ—erefore I would think the most part of men nearer faith in Jesus Christ if they knew they wanted faith Nay it s a part of faith and believing God in his word and setting to our Seal that God is true for a man to â—ake with his unbelief and his natural inability yea aveâ—sness to it I would think that these who could not believe in Christ because they â—ought honouâ— one of another and went about to kill him they had done well to have taken with that challenge of Christs and if men ought to take with their sin they ought to search and try their sin that they may find it out to take with it I wonder since Antinomians make unbebelief the only sin in the world that they cannot endure the discovery and confession of it it seems they do not think it so heinous a sin I confesse no man should of purpose abstain from believing in Christ till he find out whether he hath believed or not but what ever have been he is bound presently to act saith in Jesus Christ to flee unto him as a lost sinner to a saving Mediator But that every man is bound to perswade himself at the first that God hath loved him and Christ redeemed him is the hope of the Hypocrite like a spiders web which when leaned to it shall not stand that mans expectation shall perish he hath kindled sparks of his own a wilde fire and walketh not in the true light of the Word and so must ly down in sorrow Many of you deceive your selves and none can perswade you that ye do deceive your selves such is the strength of that delusion and dream It s the great part of the hearts deceitfulness to flatter it self in its own eyes to make a man conceive well of himself and his heart I beseech you do not venture your souls salvation to such
ver 16. Here the Spirit not casting out the Word but bringing it in plentifully and sweetly agreeing with it The Spirit that Christ sent did not put men above Ordinances but above corruptions and the body of death in them It s a poor and easie victory to subdue Grace and Ordinances every slave of the Devil doth that I fear as men and Angels fell from their own dignity by aspiring higher so these that will not be content with the estate of Christ and his Apostles but soar up in a higher strain of spirit and trample on that ministration as fleshly and carnal I fear they fall from Jesus Christ and come into greater condemnation It s true indeed 2 Cor. 3.6 The Letter killeth that is the Covenant of Works preacheth now nothing but condemnation to men but the Spirit of the Gospel giveth life nay even the Gospel separated from the Spirit of life in Jesus is but a savour of death to souls Shall we therefore separate the Spirit from the Gospel and Word because the Word alone cannot quicken us David knew how to reconcile this Quicken me O Lord according to thy Word Psal. 119.25 Thy Spirit is good lead me into the land of uprightness and quicken me Psal. 143.10 11. The Word was his rule and the Spirit applyed his soul to the rule the Word holds out the present patteâ—n we should be conformed unto now if there be no more a man may look all his dayes on it and yet not be changed but the Spirit within transforms and changes a mans soul to more and more conformity to that pattern by beholding it If a man shall shut his eyes on the pattern he cannot know what he is and ought to be if he look only on the Spirits work within and make that his rule he takes an imperfect rule and an incompleat copy and yet this is the highest attainment of these aspirers to new light they have forsaken the Word as their rule and instead of it have another Law within them as much as is already written on their hearts which is in substance this as they suppose I am bound to do no more then I have already power to do I am not to endeavour more holiness then I have already These men are indeed perfect here in their own apprehension and do not know in part and believe in part and obey in part because they are advanced the length of their own Law and rule their rule being of no perfection Paul was not so but forgetting what he had attained he followed on to what was before him and was still reaching forward Let not us my brethren believe every spirit and every doctrine that comes out under that name Christ hath forwarned us Let us pray for more of that Spirit which may quicken the Word to us and quicken us to obey the Word there must be a mutual enlivening the Word must be made the ministration of life by the Spirit of Jesus which can use it as a sword to divide the soul and spirit and we must be quickned to the obedience of the truth in the Word The Word is the seed incorruptible but it cannot beget us or be a principle of a new life within us except a living spirit come alongs to our hearts Know that the Word is your pattern and rule the Spirit your leader and helper whose vertue and power must conform you that rule 1 Pet. 1.22 Peter joyns these two the purification and cleansing of the soul which Christ attributes to the Word ye are clean through the word I have spoken Joh. 15.3 Peter attributes it to the Spirit working according to the pattern of truth It s true the Spirit of God needs no pattern to look to nay but we must have it and eye it else we know not the Spirit of truth from a lie and delusion we cannot try the spirits but by this rule and it is by making us stedfastly look on this glorious pattern in the Word and the example of Christ Jesus his life that we are conformed unto Christ as by the Spirit of the Lord 2 Cor. 3.13 Certainly that must be fleshly walking which is rather conformed unto the imaginations of a mans own heart then the blessed will of God revealed in his Word Can such walking please God when a man will not so much as hearken to what is Gods will and pleasure As other heresies so especially this is a work of the flesh Now there is another principle amongst many of us we account it spiritual walking to be separated from the gross pollutions of the world to have a carriage blameless before men this is the notion that the multitude fancy of it Be not deceived you may pass the censure of all men and be unreproveable among them and yet be but walkers after the flesh It is not what ye are before the world can prove you spiritual men though it may prove many of your carnal Your out-side may demonstrate of many of you that ye walk after the flesh and if ye will not believe it I ask you if ye think drunkenness a walking in the Spirit Do ye think ye are following the Spirit of God in uncleanness Is it not that Holy Spirit that purgeth from all filthiness Look but what your walk is ye that are not so much as conformed to the Letter of the Word in any thing who cares not to read the Scriptures and meditate on them Is this walking after the Spirit of truth If drunkenness railing contention wrath envy covetousness and such like be the Spirits way then I confess many of you walks after the Spirit but if these be the manifest works of the flesh and manifestly your way and work then why dream ye that ye are Christians But I suppose that you could be charged with none of these outward things that you had a form of Religion and Godliness yet I say all that is visible before men cannot prove you to be spiritual walkers Remember it is a spirit ye must walk after now what shall be the chief agent here sure not the body what fellowship can your body have with him that is a Spirit the body indeed may worship that eternal Spirit being acted by the Spirit but I say that alone can never prove you to be Christians we must then layaside a number of Professors who have no other ground of confidence but such things as may be seen of men if they would enter their hearts how many vain thoughts lodge there how litle of God is there God is not almost in all our thoughts we give a morning and evening salutation but there is no more of God all the day throughout and is this walking after the Spirit which imports a constancy And what part can be spared most but the spirit of a man The body is distracted with other necessary things but we might alwayes spare our souls to God Now thus should a man obey that command Pray alwayes
Covenant of Grace I will put my Spirit in you and cause you walk in my wayes there is first quickening and then walking You who were dead in sins hath he quickned together with Christ Eph. 2.1 5. and then it follows in due order I will cause you to walk in my wayes Ezek. 36 27. Christ comes into the heart to dwell and then he walks in it 2 Cor. 6.16 And what is that Christ to walk in believers it is nothing else but Christ by his Spirit making them to walk in his way there is so little in us to principle a spiritual action even when renewed and quickned that we should look on our selves not so much as workers with him but as being acted by him we should look on soul and body as pieces of organized clay that cannot move but as it is moved by him as the soul and life of it so that according to the Scriptures diâ—lect a Christian is nothing else but Christ living and waâ—king in such a person This is it which Christ when he is to go out of the world instructs his Disciples into Iob. 15.1 He is the vine and we the branches the branch must first be united to the tree and implanted into the tree ere it bring forth fruit without the tree it withers So must a soul be fust ingrast in Jesus Christ implanted in him by â—aith in his death and sufferings before it can grow up into the similitude of his resurrection or walk in newness of life as Paul speaks Rom. 6.4 5. Without me ye can do nothing ye must first be one with him by believing in him and receiving him as a compleat Saviour and then the sap and vertue of the tree flows into the dead branch and it shoots forth and blossoms and bears Now if this Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles were duly pondered and believed O what a change would it make on the lives and spirits of Christians since this is the order established in the Gospel and an order suitable both to his grace and our necessity as all that is in it speaketh forth an excellent contriver when we go about to establish our souls in another method how is it possible that we should not weary and vex our souls in vain how can we choose but torment our selves and intricat our selves still more Our method and way is just contrary we perplex our souls how to find the fruits of the Spirit of Christ how to walk after the Spirit without fiâ—st closing intirely with Christ himself We trouble our selves to find the operations of a spiritual life before we lay hold on Christ who is the life of our souls It is made an argument by many to keep them from believing in Christ because they do not find that spiritual life stirring in them How cross is this to the declared mind of Christ in the Gospel It cannot choose but both darken the spirit more and dry up the influences of the Spirit of God because it keeps thee from the fountain of all consolation You may disquiet your souls by this means but you shall never make advantage this way without him ye can do nothing and yet ye will not come to him because you have done nothing It s strange how little reason is in it if your eyes were opened you refuse or delay to abide in the vine till you bring forth fruit and fruit you cannot bring forth till you be in the vine you would walk and you will not have the life from which you must walk Paul lived indeed but what a life the life that I live is by the faith of the Son of God faith in Christ transported him out of himself to Christ or received Christ into the soul and Christ in the soul was the life of his soul Gal. 2.20 your walking is as if a dead man essay to go Will one expect figs of thorns or grapes of thistles I beseech you know what wrong ye do to your selves and to Christ ye wrong your selves because ye stand in the way of your own mercy ye stand a back from your life him that is the way the truth and the life You would walk in the way but no man can walk in this way but by this way Christ must quicken you to walk in himself ye must get life in him and not bring it You are in a vain expectation of fruits from your selves they will never see the Sun and when you have wearied your self in such a vain pursuit you must at length come and begin here Ye wrong Christ his grace and mercy this order is suited of purpose for our desperat condition and yet ye presume to reject it and seek another You prescribe to your skilful tender Physician that which would undo you I beseech you know the original of your miseries doubts barrenness and darknesse Here it is you are still puzling your selves about grace and duties how to fill your eyes with these and ye neglect Christ as your righteousnesse as one dead and risen again and now sitting at Gods right hand for us you must first close with him as ungodly men though you were godly you must shut your eyes on any such thing and lay living Jesus upon your dead and benumb'd hearts answer all your challenges with his absolution and stand before God in his cloathing put his garment immediately on your nakednesse and vilenesse and we may perswade you it shall yield you abundant consolation and life because he lives ye shall live and walk If you were more frequent and serious in the consideration of his excellent Majesty of his beautiful and lovely qualifications as the Mediator for sinners and of the precious promises which are all Yea and Amen confirmed in him and lesse in the vain and unprofitable debates of self-interest and such like I am perswaded ye would be more fruitful Christians This is not as the business of a holy-day to be done at your first coming to Christ and no more no it must run alongst all your life the aged experienced Christian must come alongs as an ungodly sinner to a blessed and living Saviour and have no other ground of glory or confidence before God but Christ Jesus crucified SERMON VII Vers. 2. For the Law of the Spirit of life in Iesus Christ hath made me free c. YOU know there are two principal things in the preceeding verse the priviledge of a Christian and the property or character of a Christian he is one that never enters into condemnation he that believeth shall not perish Joh. 3.15 And then he is one that walks not after the flesh though he be in the flesh but in a more elevat way above men after the guiding and leading of the Holy Spirit of God Now it may be objected in many consciences how can these things be Have not all sinned and come â—â—ort of the glory of God and so the whole world is become guilty before God Is not every
what hopes are there then of delivery when the prisoner accounts his bondage liberty and his prison a palace what expectation of freedom when all that is within us conspires to the upholding that tyrranous dominion of sin against all that would cast it out of its usurpation as if they were mortal enemies Yet there is a delivery possible but such as would not have entered in the heart of man to imagine and it is here expressed the Law of the Spirit of Life c. this declares how and by what means we may be made free Not indeed by any power within us not by any created power without us sin is stronger then all these because its imperial seat is within far without the reach of all created power there may be some means used by men to beat it out of the out-works of the outward man to chase it out of the external members some means to restrain it from such gross out-breakingâ— but therâ— is none can lay â—iedge to the soul wiâ—hin or sâ—orm the undeâ—standing and will where it hath its pâ—incipal residence its inaccessible and impregnable by any humane power no intreaties or perswasions no terrors or threatnings can prevail it can neither be stormed by violence nor undermined by skill because it is within the spirit of the mind Untill at length some other spirit stronger then our spirit come till the Spirit of life which is in Christ come and bind the strong man and so make the poor soul free You heard that we were under a law of death and under the power of sin now there is another Law answering this law and a power to overcome this power You may indeed ask by what law of authority can a sinner that is bound over by Gods Justice unto death and condemnation be released Is there any law above Gods Law and the sentence of his Justice The Apostle answers that there is a Law above it a Law after it the Law of the Spirit of Life Jesus Christ opposes Law unto law the Law of life unto the law of death the Gospel unto the Law the second Covenant unto the first Thus it is then Iesus Christ the eternal Son of God full of grace and truth did come in mans stead when the law and sentence of death was past upon all mankind and there was no expectation from the terms of the first Covenant that there should be any dispensation or mitigation of the rigour of it he obtains this that so many as God had chosen unto life their sins and their punishment might be laid on him and so he took part of our flesh for this end that he might be made a curse for us and so redeem us from the curse Thus having satisfied Justice and fulfilled the sentence of death by suffering death him hath God exalted to be a Prince and Saviour and the head of all things In compensation of this great and weighty work given him by his Father all judgment is committed to him and so he sends out and proclaims another Law in Sion another sentence even of life and absolution unto all and upon all them that shall believe in his Name Thus you see the law of death abrogated by a new Law of life because our Lord and Saviour was made under the law of death and suffered under it and satisfied it that all his seed might be freed from it and might come under a life-giving law so that it appears to be true that was said at first there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ there is no Law no Justice against them But then another difficulty as great as the former is in the way though such a law and sentence of life and absolution be pronounced in the Gospel in Christs Name yet we are dead in sins and trespasses we neither know nor feel our misery nor can we come to a Redeemer as there was a law of death above our head so there is a law of sin within our hearts which rules and commands us and there is neither will nor ability to escape from under it It is true life and freedom is preached in Christ to all that come to him for life to all that renounce sins dominion is remission of sin preached But here is the greatest difficulty how can a dead soul stir rise and walk how can a slave to sin and a willing captive renounce it when he hath neither to will nor to do Indeed if all had been purchased for us if eternal life and forgiveness of sins had been brought near us and all the business done to our conâ—ent and that only wanting if these had been the terms I have purchased life now rise and embrace it of your selves truly it had been an unsuccessful buâ—ineâ—â— Christ had lost all that was given him if the moment and weight of our salvation had been hung upon oâ—r acceptation Tâ—erefore it is well provided foâ— this alâ—o that there should be a power to overcome this power a spirit of life in Christ to quicken dead sinnerâ— and â—aise them â—p and draw them to him And so the second Adamâ—ath â—ath this prerogative beyond the fiâ—st that he is only a living soul in himself but a quickening spirit to all that aâ—e given him of the Father 1 Cor. 15.45 So then as Christ Jesus hath law and right on his side to free us from death so he hath vertue and power in him to accomplish our delivery from sin as he hath fair law to loose the chains of condemnation and to repeal the sentence past against us without prejudice to Gods justice he having fully satisfied the same in our name so he hath sufficient power given him to loose the fetters oâ— sin from off us When he hath pay'd the price and satisfied the Father so that justice can crave nothing Yet he hath one adversary to deal with Satan hath sinners bound with the cords of their own lusts in a prison of darkness and unbelief Jesus Christ therefore comes out to conquer this enemy and to redeem his elect Ones from that unjust usurpation of sin to bring them out of the prison by the strong hand and therefore he is one mighty and able to save to the uttermost he hath might to do it as well as right to it Consider then my beloved these two things which are the breasts of our consolation and the foundation of our hope we are once lost and utterly undone both in regard of Gods justice and our own utter inability to help our selves which is strengthned by our unwillingness and thus made a more desperat busineâ—s now God hath provided a suitable remedy he hath laid help on one that is mighty indeed who hath almighty power and by his power he fiâ—st conflicted with the punishment of our sins and with his Fathers wrath and hath overcome discharged and satisfied that and so hath purchased a right unto us to give salvation to whom he will be conquered
should buy it at the dearest rate of pains and expenses from all those vain impertinent and trifling diversions that take it up that we may imploy it as it becomes suitable to eternity that is posting on And then as the shortness of it makes it the more precious and considerable in regard of the end of it eternity as the scantnesse of a thing increases the rate of it so that same consideration should make all worldly things that are confined either in their being or use within it to be incosiderable as Paul 1 Cor. 7.29 30 31. shews seing the time is short it remaineth that we should rejoice as not rejoicing weep as not weeping buy as if we possessed not use the world as not abusing it Seing all its worth is to be esteemed from the end of it eternity never ending then certainly whatsover in time doth not reach that end and hath no connexion with it we should give it but such intertainment as a passing bird that is pleasant to the eye gets of a beholder while it is in its flight the shortness of the day should make us double our diligence and put on the harder in our walk or race that so we may come in time to our place of rest and that same should make the passenger give an overly and passing look to all things that are by the way and which he must of necessity leave behind him Seing these things then are so important let us draw our hearts together to consider what the Lord speaks to us in this word for in it you have two wayes and two ends opposite and contrary wayes and walks and as contrary ends the wayes are walking after the flesh and walking after the Spirit the ends to which they lead are death and life We spoke something of the wayes and the wide difference that is between them what excellency is in the one beyond the other but truly it is hard to perswade you to take off your accustomed wayes and walks because your inward sense and the inclination of your hearts is wholly perverted and corrupted by nature You know the moving faculty is subordinat in its operations unto the knowing feeling and apprehending-faculties The locomotive power is given for a subsidiary and help to the apprehensive and appetitive powers because things are convenient and disconvenient good or evil to the nature of the living creature are without it and it could not by meer knowledge or desire or hatred of things either come in possession of them or eschew them therefore God hath given them a faculty of moving themselves to the prosecution and attainment of any apprehended good or to the eschewing and aversion from any conceived evil Thus when beasts savour or smell that food which is fit for them their appetite stirs them up to motion 〈◊〉 it to obtain it Now I say if this inward sense be â—orrupâ—â—d thâ—n things that are destructive will be conceived good because they are suitable to that corrupt humor or quality that possessed the senses and thus all the motion and walk will be disordered The truth is my beloved our spirits and minds are infected with a poysonable humour fleshly passions and lusts are predominant naturally and as in them that are in a feaver their organ being distempered with a bitten unsavoury humour the pleasantest things seems unsavoury because not suitable to that predominant humour even so it is wiâ—h you by nature That which puts all upon motion is out of course since the fiâ—st distemper of mâ—n your spirits and minds are fleshly and carnal they have a strong and deep impression of all the lusts that are in the body and are accordingly affected and therefore you cannot fitly judge what is good or evil for you but as these Isai. 5.20 You mâ—st call evil good and good evil bitter sweet and sweet bitter because you are already prepossessed thus And therefore the wayes of the flesh those paths that lead to destruction you cannot but look on them as pleaâ—ant because they suit and please your corrupted sense or spirit and so this disordered savour or smell of some fragrant perfume in the ways of the flesh puts you upon walking in these wayes and being thus possessed and ingaged you cannot but stop your ears to all contrary perswasions you think it against-your sense and reason to tell you that these are loathsome and unsavoury and that the other wayes of widom and spirit are pleasantness and peace I say you cannot believe this till your hearts and spirits be purged and your taste be pure and uncorrupted It is certainly upon this ground that our Saviour puts such characters upon the way to Heaven and Hell to life and death the one is strait and narrow and few walk in it the other broad and easie and many walk in it Matth. 7.13 Certainly it is not the way in it self simply that admitâ— of such a motion to speak properly as the thing is the way to life by the guiding of the Spirit is easiest plainest shortest and broadest it hath all the properties of a good way none so pleasant and plain how sweet and pleasant sights all the way its an Alley of delight the way of his Commandments it wants not accommodation in it to refresh the Traveller the most delightful company is here the Father and the Son who sought no other company from all eternity but were abundantly satisfied and rejoiced one another this fellowship the Christian hath to solace himself with and he is admitted to be partaker of that joy There is nothing that doth disbuâ—den the soul so of care and anxiety nothing doth rid a man of so many perplexities and troubles as this way But the way of sin in it self is most laborious most difficult it hath infinite by-wayes that it leads a man into and he must turn and return and run in a circle all the day all his time to satisfie the infinit lusts and insatiable desires of sin O! how painful and laborious is it to fulfill the lusts of the flesh how much service doth it impose how serious attention what perplexing câ—res and tormenting thoughts how many sorrows and griefs are in every step of this way Do you not perceive what drudges and slaves sin makes you how much labour you have to satisfie your lusts and you are alwayes to begin as near that which you seek in the end of your years as in the beginning How thorny how myry is the way of covetousness Are you not alwayes out of one thorn into another and cut asunder or pierced through with many sorrows 1 Tim. 6.10 Mat. 13.22 Is that a pleasant and easie way I pray you that makes all your sorrow and your travel grief and suffers not your heart to take rest in the night Eccles. 2.22 23. What pains of body What plotting oâ— mind What labour and vexation of both must a sinner have as his constant attendants in this way The way is intricat deep
Christ hath continued our mortality Else he would have abolished death it self if he had not meant to abolish sin by death and indeed it would appear this is the reason why the world must be consumed with fire at the last day and new Heavens and earth succeed in its room because as the little house the body so the great house the world was infected with this leprosie so subjected to vanity and corruption because of mans sin therefore that there might be no remnant of mans corruption and no memorial of sin to inteâ—upt his eternal joy the Lord will purify and change all all the members that were made instruments of unrighteousness all the creatures that were servants to mans lusts a new form and fashion shall be put on all that the body being restored may be a fit dwelling place for the purified soul and the world renewed may be a â—it house for righteous men Thus you see that Death to a Christian is not real death for it is not the death of a Christian but the death of sin his greatest enemy it is not a punishment but the enlargement of the soul. Now the next comfort is that which is is but partial it is but the dissolution of the lowest part in man his body so far from prejudging the immortal life of his spirit that it is rather the accomplishment of that Though the body must die yet eternal life is begun already within tâ—e soul for the Spirit of Christ hath brought in life the Righteousnesse of Christ hath purchased it and the Spirit hath performed it and applyed it to us not only there is an immortal being in a Christian that must survive the dust for that is common to all men but there is a new life begun in him an immortal well being in joy and happinesse which only deserveth the name of life that cometh never to its full perfection till the bodily and earthly house be taken down If you consider seriously what a new life a Câ—â—istâ—â—n is â—â—â—aâ—lated unto by the operation of the Holy Ghost and the ministration of the word it is then most active and lively when the soul is most retired from the body in meditation the new life of a Christian is most perfect in this life when it carrieth him the furthest distance from his bodily senses and is most abstracted from all sensible engagements as you heard for indeed it restores the spirit of a man to its native rule and dominion over the body so that it is then most perfect when it is most gâ—thered within it self and disingaged from all external intanglements Now certain it is since the perfection of the soul in this life consists in such a retirement from the body that when it is wholly separated from it then it is in the most absolute state of perfection and its life â—cts most purely and peâ—fectly when it hath no body to communicat with and to entangle it either with its lusts or necessities The Spirit is life it hath a life now which is then best when furthest from the body and therefore it cannot but be surpassing better when it is out of the body and all this is purchaâ—ed by Christs righteousnesse As mans disobedience made an end of his life Christs obedience hath made our life endlesse He suffered death to sting him and by this hath taken the sting from it and now there is a new statute and appointment of Heaven published in the Gospel whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish but have eternal life Now indeed this hath so intirely châ—nged the nature of death that iâ— hath noâ— the most lovely and desirable aspect on a Christian that it is no more an object of fear but of desire amicable not terrible unto him since there is no way to save the passenger but to let the vessel break he will be content to have the body splitted that himself that is his soul may escape for truly a mans soul is himself the body is but an earthly tabernacle that must be taken down to let the inhabitant win out to come near his Lord the body is the Prison-house that he groans to have opened that he may enjoy that liberty of the sons of God And now to a Christian death is not properly an object of patience but of desire rather I desire to be dissolved and be with Christ Phil. 1.23 He that hath but advanced little in Christianity will be content to die but because there is too much flesh he will desire to live but a Christian that is riper in knowledge and grace will rather desire to die and only be content to live he will exercise patience and submission about abiding here but groanings and pantings about removing hence because he knoweth that there is no choice between that bondage and this liberty SERMON XXIX Rom. 8.10 The body is dead because of sin but the Spirit is life c. IT was the first curse and threatning wherein God thought fit to comprehend all misery Thou shalt die the death in that day thou eatest though the sentence was not presently executed according to the letter yet from that day â—orward man was made mortal and there seemeth to be much mercy and goodness of God interveening to plead a delay of death it self that so the promise of life in the second Adam might come to the first and his posterity and they might be delivered â—rom the second death though not from the first Alwayes we bear about the markes of sin in our bodies to this day and in so far the threatning taketh place that this life that we live in the body is become nothing else but a dying life the life that the ungodly shall live out oâ— the body is a living death and either of these is worse then simple death or destruction of beeing The serious contemplation of the miseries of this life made wise Solomon to praise the dead more then the living contrary to the custom of men who rejoyce at the birth of a man-child and mourn at their death yea it pressed him further to think them which have not at all been better then both because they have not seen the evil under the Sun this world is such a Chaos such a masse of miseries that if men understood it before they came into it they would be far more loath to enter into it then they are now afraid to go out of it And truly we want not remembrances and representations of our misery every day in that children come weeping into the world as it were bewailing â—heir own misfortune that they were brought forth to be sensible subjects of misery And what is all our life-time but a repetition of sighs and groanâ— anxiety and satiety loathing and longing dividing our spiâ—its and our time between them How many deaths must we suffer before death come for the absence or losse of any thing much desired is a sepâ—ration no lesse gâ—ievous to the hearts of men
The more the soul be satisfied with eaâ—thly things it is the deeper buâ—ied in the grave of the flesh and the â—urther separated from God Alas many oâ— you know no other liâ—e then that which you now live in the body you neither apprehend what this new birth is nor what the perfect statuâ—e of it shall be afterwards but truly while it is thus you are but walking shadows breathing â—lâ—y and no more A godly man used to calculat the years of his nativity from his second birth his conversion to God in Christ And truly this is the true period of the â—ight calculation of life of that life which shall not see death True life hath but one period that is the beginning of it for end it hath none I beseech you reckon your years thus and I fear that you â—eckon your selves many of you yet dead in sins and trespasses Is that life I pray you To eat to drink to sleep to play to walk to work Is there any thing in all these worthy of a reasonable soul which must survive the body and so cease from such things for ever Think within your selves do you live any other life then this What is your life but a tedious and wearisome repetition of such bruitish actions which are only teâ—minat on the body O then how miserable are you if you have no other period to reckon from then your birth day If there be not a second birth day before your burial you may make your reckoning To be banished eternally from the life of God As for you Christians whom God hath quickned by the Spirit of His Son be much in the exercise of this life and that will maintain and advance it let your care be about your spirits and to hearten you in this study and to beget in you the hope of eternal life look much and lay fast hold on that Life-giving Saviour who by his righteous life and accursed death hath purchased by his own blood both happinesse to us and holinesse Consider what debters ye are to Him who loved not his own life and spared it not to purchase this life to us Let our thoughts and affections be occupied about this high purchase of our Saviours which is freely bestowed on them that will have it and believe in Him for it if we be not satisfied with such a low and wretched life as is in the body He will give a higher and more enduring life and only worthy of that name SERMON XXX Rom. 8.11 But if the Spirit of him that raised up Iesus from the dead dwell in you he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken you c. IT is true the soul is incomparably better then the body and he is only worthy the name of a Man and of a Christian who prefers this more excellent part and imploys his study and time about it and regards his body only for thâ— noble guest that lodges within it and therefore it is one of the prime consolations that Christianity affords that it provides chiefly for the happy estate of this immortal piece in man which truly were alone sufficient to draw our souls wholly after Religion suppose the body should never taste of the fruits of it but die and rise no more and never be awak'd out of its sleep yet it were a sufficient ground of engagement to godlinesse that the life and well-being of the far better part in man is secured for eternity which is infinitly more then all things beside can truly promise us or be able to perform Certainly whatsoever else you give your hearts to and spend your time upon it will either leave you in the midst of your dayes and at your end you shall be a fool or you must leave it in the end of your dayes and find your selves as much disappointed or to speak more properly because when your time is ending your life and being is but at its beginning you must bid an eternal adieu to all these things whereupon your hearts are set when you are but beginning truly to be But this is only the proper and true good of the soul Christ in it most portable and easily carried about with you yea that which makes the soul no burden to it self and helps it to carry all things easily and then most inseparable for Christ in the soul is the spring of a never-ending life of peace joy and contentation in the fountain of an infinit goodnesse and it out-wears time and age as well as the immortal beeing of the soul yea such is the strength of this consolation that then the soul is most closly united and â—ully possessed oâ— that which is its peculiar and satisfying good when it leaves the body in the dust and eâ—capes out of this pâ—iâ—on unto that glorious liberty But yet there is besides this an additional comfort comprehended in the vers read that the sleep of the body is not perpetual that it shall once be awakened and raised up to the fellowship of this glory â—or though a man should be abundantly satisfied if he possesse his own soul yet no man hateth his own flesh the soul hath some kind of natural inclination to a body suitable unto it and in this it differs from an Angel and therefore the Apostle when he expresseth his earnest groan for intimat presence oâ— his soul with Christ he subjoyns this correction not that we desire to be uncloathed but cloathed upon it 2 Cor. 5.1 2 3. If it were possible sayes he we would be glade to have the society of the body in this glory we would not desire to cast off those cloaths of flesh but rather that the garment of glory might be spread over all if it were not needful because they are old and ragged and would not suit well and our earthly Tabernacle is ruinous and would not be fit for such a glorious guest to dwell into and therefore it is needful to be taken down well then here is an overplus and as it were a surcharge of consolation that seing for the present it is expedient to put off the present cloathing of flesh and take down the present earthly house yet that the day is coming that the same cloaths renewed shall be put on and the same house repaired and made suitable to Heaven shall be built up that this mortal body shall be quickned with that same Spirit that now quickens the soul and makes it live out of the body and so the sweet and beloved friends who parted with so much pain and grief shall meet again with so much pleasure and joy and as they were sharers together in the miseries of this life sâ—all participat also in the blessednesse of the next like Saul and Ionathan lovely and pleasant in their lives and though for a time separated in death yet not alwayes divided Now is the highest top of happinesse to which nothing can be added its comprehensive of the whole man and its
are debters indeed but you owe nothing to the flesh but stripes and mortification SERMON XXXIV Rom. 8.13 For if ye live after the flesh ye shall die but if ye through the Spirit c. THough the Lord out of his absolute Soveraignty might deal with man in such a way as nothing should appear but his supream Will and Almighty Power he might simply command obedience and without any more perswasions either leave men to the frowardnesse of their own natures or else powerfully constrain them to their duty yet he hath chosen that way that is most suitable to his own wisdom and most connatural to mans nature To lay out before him the advantages and disadvantages and to use these as motives and perswasives of his Spirit for since He hath by his first creation implanted in mans soul such a principle as moveth it self upon the presentation of good or evil that this might not be in vain he administers all the dispensation of the Law and Gospel in a way suitable to that by propounding such powerful motives as may incline and perswade the heart of man It is true there is a secret drawing withall necessary the pull of the Fathers arm and power of the Holy Ghost yet that which is visible or sensible to the soul is the framing of all things so as to engage it upon rational terms it is set between two contraries death and life death which it naturally abhoâ—reth and life which it naturally loveth an even ballance is holden up before the light of the conscience in which obedience and sin are weighed and it is found even to the convincing of the spirit of man that there are as many disadvantages in the one as advantages in the other This was the way that God used fiâ—st with man in Paradise you remember the terms â—un to what day thou eats thou shalt die he hedged him in on the one side by a promisâ— of life on the other by a threatning of death and these two are very rational restraintâ— â—uited to â—he â—oul of man and in the inward principles of it which are a kind of instinct to that which is appâ—ehenâ—ed good or gainfull Now this vers â—uns even so in the form of words If ye live after the flesh ye shall die you see thiâ— method is not changed under the Gospel for indeed it is natuâ—al to the spiâ—it of man and he hath now much more need of all such peâ—swasions because there is a great change of mans inclination to the woâ—st side all within is so disordered and perverse that a thousand hedges of perswasive grounds cannot do that which one might have done at fiâ—st then they were added out of superabundance but now out of necessity then they were set about man to preserve him in his natural â—â—ame and inâ—linations but now they are needfull to change and alter them quite which is a kind of creation therefore sayeth David creat in me a new spirit and therefore the Gospel abounds in vaâ—ieâ—y of motives and inducementâ— in greater variety oâ— far moâ—e powerâ—ul inducements then the Law Heâ—e is that grâ—aâ— peâ—swasiâ—n tâ—kâ—n fâ—om the infinit gain or lâ—sse of â—â—e â—â—ul of man which is any thing be able to prevail this must do seing it is seconded wiâ—h some natural inclination in the soul of man to seek its own gain Yet there is a diâ—â—erence between the nature of such like promises and threatningâ— in the fiâ—st covenant and in the second In the fiâ—st covenant though life was freely promised â—et it was immediatly annexed to perâ—ect obedience as a consequent â—eward oâ— it it was fiâ—stly pâ—omised unto compleat â—ighteousnesse of mens persons But in the second covenant firstly and principally liâ—e eteâ—nal grace and glory is promised to Jesus Christ and his â—eed antecedent to any condition or qualification upon their part and then again all the promises that run in way of condition as he that believeth shâ—ll not perish c. If ye walk after the Spirit ye shall live these aâ—e all the consequent fruits of that absolute gracious disposition and resignation of grace and life to them whom Christ hath chosen and so their believing and walking and obeying cometh in principally as parts of the grace promised and as witnesses and evidences and confirmations of that life which is already begun and will not see an end Besides that by vertue of these absolute promises made to the seed of Christ and Christs compleat performance of all conditions in their name the promises of life are made to faith principally which hath this peculiar vertue To cary forth the soul to anothers righteousnesse and sufficiency and to bottom it upon another and in the next place to holy walking though mixed with many infirmities which promise in the first covenant was only annexed to perfect and absolute obedience You heard in the preceeding vers a strong inducement taken from the bond debt and duty we owe to the Spirit to walk after it and the want of all obligation to the flesh Now if honesty and duty will not suffiâ—e to perswade you as you know in other things it would do with any honest man plain equity is a sufficient bond to him yet consider what the Apostle subjoynes from the dammage and from the advantage which may of it self be the Topickes of perswasion and serves to drive in the nail of debt and duty to the head if ye will not take with this debt ye owe to the Spirit but still conceive there is some greater obligation lying on you to care for your bodies and satisfie them then I say behold the end of it what fruit you must one day reap of the flesh and service of sin If ye live after the flesh ye shall die but then consider the fruit you â—hall reap of the Spirit and holy walking ye shall live It is true the flesh may flatter you more for the present but the end of it will be bitter as death amplâ—ctitur ut strangulet the flesh imbraces you that it may strangle you and so if you knew all well you would not think you owed it any thing but enmity and hatred and mortification If your duty will not move you let the love of your selves and your souls perswade you for it is an irrepealable statute The wages of sin is death Every way you choose to fulfill the lusts of your flesh and to make provision for it neglecting the eternal welfare of your souls certainly it shall prove to you the tree of the knowledge of good and evil it shall be as the forbidden fruit which in stead of performing that was promised will bring forth death the eternal separation of the soul from God Adam's sin was an Breviary or Epitome of the multiplied and enâ—arged sins of mankind you may see in this tragedy all your fortuns so to speak you may behold in it the flattering insinuations and deceitful promises of sin and Satan who is a liar
and murderer from the beginning and murdered man at first by lying to him you find the hook covered over with the varnished bâ—it of an imaginary life and happinesse satisfaction promised to the eye to the taste and to the mind and upon these inticements man bewitched and withdrawn from his God after these vain and empty shadows which when he catched hold upon he himself was caught and laid hold upon by the wrath of God by death and all the miseries before it or alter it Now here is the Mapp of the World for all that is in the world is but a larger volume of that same kind the lust of the eyes the lust of the flesh and the pride of life Albeit they have been known and found to be the notablest and grossest deceivers and every man after he hath spent his dayes in pursuit and labour for them he is constrained to acknowledge at length though too late that all that is in the world is but an imposture a delusion a dream and worse yet eveâ—y man hearkens after these same flatteries and lies that hath cast down so many wounded and made so many strong ones to fall by them every man trusts the world and his own flesh as if they were of good report and of known integrity and this is mens misery that no man will learn wisdom upon others expences upon the woâ—ul and tragical example of so many others but go on as confidently now after the discoverie of these deceivers as if this were the first time they had made such promises and used such fair words to men Have they not been these six thousand years almost deluding the world And have we not as many testimonies of their falshood as there hath been persons in all ages before us After Adam hath tasted of this tree of pleasure and found another fruit growing on it that is death should the posterity be so mad as to be medling still with the forbidden tree and therefore forbidden because destructive to our selves Know then and consider beloved in the Lord that you shall reap no other thing of all your labours and endeavours after the flesh all your toyling and perplexing cares all your excessive pains in the making provision for your lusts and caring for the body only you shall reap no other harvest of all but death and corruption Death you think that is a common lot and you cannot eschew it however nay but the death here meant is of another sort in respect of which you may call death life it is the everlasting destruction of the soul from the presence of God and the glory of his powerâ— it is the falling of that infinit weight of the wrath of the Lamb upon you in respect of which mountains and hills will be thought light and men would rather wish to be covered with them Rev. 6.16 Suppose now you could swim in a River of delights and pleasures which yet is given to none for truly upon a jâ—st reckoning it will be found that the anxiety and grief and bitteâ—nâ—sse that is inteâ—mingled with all earthly delights â—wallows up the sweetnesse of them yet it will but carry you down ere you be aware into the Seâ— oâ— deâ—th and destruction as the fish that swim and sport for a while in Iordan are carried down into the dead Sea of Sodom where they aâ—e presently suffocated and extinguished or as a Malefactor is carried through a pleasant Palace to the Gallows so men walk thâ—ough the delights of their flesh to their own endlesse torment and destruction Seing then my beloved that your sins and lusts which you are inclined and accustomed to will certainly kill you if you inteâ—tain them then nature it self would teach you the Law of self-defence To kill ere you be killed to kill sin eâ—e it kill you to mortifie the deeds and lusts of the body which aboâ—nd among you or they will certainly mortifie you that is make you die Now if self love could teach you this which the love of God cannot perswade you to yet it is well for being once led unto God and moved to change your course upon the fear and apprehension of the infinit danger that will ensue ceâ—tainly if you weâ—e but a little aâ—quainted with the sweetnesse of this life and goodnesse of your God you would find the power of the former aâ—gumenâ— Ã debito from debt and duty upon your spirit let this once lead you in to God and you will not want that which will constrain you to abide and never to depart from Him If you mortifie the deeds of the body you shall live as sin decayes you increase and grow as sins die your soulâ— live anâ— it shall be a sure pledge to you of that eternal life and though this be painful and laborious yet consider that it is but the cutting off of a rotten member that would corrupt the whole body and the want of it will never mâ—im or mâ—tilat the body for you shall live perâ—ectly when sin is perfectly expired and out of life and according aâ— sin is nearer expiring and nearer the grave your souls are neaâ—â—â— that endlesse life If this do not move us what can be said nâ—xt What shall he do more to his Vineyard SERMON XXXV Rom. 8.13 14. But if ye through the Spirit do mortifie the deeds of the body ye shall live Vers. 14. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God they are the sons of God THE life and being of many things consists in union separat them and they remain not the same or they losse their vertue It is much more thus in Christianity the power and life of it consists in the union of these things that God hâ—th conjoyned so that if any man pretend to one thing of it and neglect the other he hath really none of them and to hold to the subject in hand there are three things which joyned together in the hearts of Christians have a great deal of force the duty of a Christian and his reward and his dignity his worke and labour seems hard and unpleasant when considered alone but the reward sweetens it when it is joyntly believed his duty seems too high and his labour great yet the consideration of the real dignity he is advanced unto and priviledge he hath received will raise up the spirit to great and high attempts and to sustain great labours Mortification is the work and labour life eternal life is the reward following the Spirit is the Christians duty but to be the son of God that is his dignity Mortification sounds very harsh at first the hearts of men say It is a hard saying who can bear it And indeed I cannot deny but it is so to our corrupt nature and therefore so holden out in Scripture the words chosen to press it express much pain and pains much torment and labour it is not so easie and trivial a business to forsake sin or subdue it as many think