to me saith Christ wherein God the Son receives the Bride as mutually partaking of the same nature and can say This now is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh wherein God the holy Ghost knits our wils in a full and glad consent to the full consummation of this blessed wedlock And those whom God hath thus joyned together let no man no Devill can put asunder What is there then which an affectionate husband can withhold from a dear wife He that hath given himself to her what can be deny to impart He that hath made himself one with her how can he be divided from his other-self Some wilde fancies there are that have framed the linkes of marriage of so brittle stuffe as that they may be knapt in sunder upon every sleight occasion but he that ordained it in Paradise for an earthly representation of this heavenly union betwixt Christ and his Church hath made that and his own indissoluble Here is no contract in the future which upon some intervenient accidents may be remitted but I am my welbeloveds and my welbeloved is mine And therefore each is so others that neither of them is their own Oh the comfortable mystery of our uniting to the Son of God! The wife hath not the power of her own body but the husband We are at thy disposing ô Saviour we are not our own Neither art thou so absolutely thine as that we may not through thine infinite mercy claim an interesse in thee Thou hast given us such a right in thy self as that wee are bold to lay challenge to all that is thine to thy love to thy merits to thy blessings to thy glory It was wont of old to be the plea of the Roman wives to their husbands Where thou art Caius I am Caia and now in our present marriages we have not stuck to say With all my worldly goods I thee endow And if it be thus in our imperfect conjunctions here upon earth how much more in that exquisite one-nesse which is betwixt thee ô blessed Saviour and thy dearest Spouse the Church What is it then that can hinder us from a sweet and heavenly fruition of thee Is it the loathsome condition of our nature Thou sawst this before and yet couldst say when we were yet in our bloud Live Had we not been so vile thy mercy had not been so glorious thy free grace did all for us Thou washedst us with water and anointedst us with oyle and cloathedst us with broidered work and girdedst us about with fine linnen and coveredst us with silk and deckedst us with ornaments and didst put bracelets upon our hands and a chain on our neck and jewels on our fore-heads and eare-rings on our ears and a beautifull crown on our heads What we had not thou gavest what thou didst not find thou madest that we might be a not-unmeet match for the Lord of life Is it want of beauty Behold I am black but comely what ever our hiew be in our own or others eyes it is enough that we are lovely in thine Behold thou art fair my beloved behold thou art faire yea pleasant Thou art beautifull O my love as Tirzah comely as Jerusalem How fair and how pleasant art thou O Love for delights But oh Saviour if thou take contentment in this poor unperfect beauty of thy Spouse the Church how infinite pleasure should thy Spouse take in that absolute perfection that is in thee who art all lovelinesse and glory And if she have ravished thy heart with one of her eyes how much more reason hath her heart to be wholly ravished with both thine which are so full of grace and amiablenesse and in this mutuall fruition what can there be other then perfect blessednesse The Spirit of God well knowing how much it imports us both to know and feel this blessed union whereof himself is the onely worker labours to set it forth to us by the representations of many of our familiar concernments which we daily finde in our meats and drinks in our houses in our gardens and orchards That which is nearest to us is our nourishment What can bee more evident then that the bread the meat the drinke that we receive is incorporated into us and becomes part of the substance whereof we consist so as after perfect digestion there can be no distinction betwixt what we are and what wee took Whiles that bread was in the bing and that meat in the shambles and that drink in the vessell it had no relation to us nor we to it yea whiles all these were on the Table yea in our mouths yea newly let down into our stomacks they are not fully ours for upon some nauseating dislike of nature they may yet go the same way they came but if the concoction be once fully finished now they are so turned into our blood and flesh that they can be no more distinguished from our former substance then that could be divided from it self now they are dispersed into the veins and concorporated to the flesh and no part of our flesh and blood is more ours then that which was lately the bloud of the grapes and the flesh of this fowl or that beast Oh Saviour thou who art truth it selfe hast said I am the living bread that came down from heaven My flesh is meat indeed and my blood is drink indeed and thereupon hast most justly inferred He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in mee and I in him and as a necessary consequent of this spirituall manducation Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternall life Lo thou art bread indeed not the common bread but Manna not the Israelitish Manna alas that fell from no higher then the region of clouds and they that ate it died with it in their mouths but thou art the living bread that came down from the heaven of heavens of whom whosoever eats lives for ever Thy flesh is meat not for our stomacks but for our souls our faith receives and digests thee and makes thee ours and us thine our materiall food in these corruptible bodies runs into corruption thy spirituall food nourisheth purely and strengthens us to a blessed immortality As for this materiall food many a one longs for it that cannot get it many a one hath it that cannot eat it many eat it that cannot digest it many digest it into noxious and corrupt humours all that receive it do but maintain a perishing life if not a languishing death but this flesh of thine as it was never withheld from any true appetite so it never yeelds but wholesome and comfortable sustenance to the soul never hath any other issue then an everlasting life and happinesse O Saviour whensoever I sit at mine own Table let mee think of thine whensoever I feed on the bread and meat that is set before mee and feel
a greater never allowed as good neither had so much as that toleration ever been if the hard-heartednesse and cruelty of that people had not enforced it upon Moses in a prevention of further mischief 〈◊〉 what place can this finde with a God in whom there is an infinite tendernesse of love and mercy No time can be any check to his gracious choice the inconstant mindes of us men may alter upon sleight dislikes our God is ever himself Jesus Christ the same yesterday and to day and for ever with him there is no variablenesse nor shadow of turning Divorces were ever grounded upon hatred No man saith the Apostle ever yet hated his owne flesh much lesse shall God do so who is love it self His love and our union is like himself everlasting Having loved his own saith the Disciple of Love which were in the world he loved them to the end He that hates putting away can never act it so as in this relation we are indissoluble Can they have received that bread which came down from heaven and that flesh which is meat indeed and that bloud which is drink indeed can their souls have digested it by a lively faith and converted themselves into it and it into themselves and can they now think it can be severed from their own substance Can they finde themselves truly ingraffed in the tree of life and grown into one body with that heavenly plant and as a living branch of that tree bearing pleasant and wholesome fruit acceptable to God and beneficiall to men and can they look upon themselves as some withered bough fit onely for the fire Can they find themselves living stones surely laid upon the foundation Jesus Christ to the making up of an heavenly Temple for the eternall inhabitation of God and can they think they can be shaken out with every storm of Temptation Have these men ever taken into their serious thoughts that divine prayer and meditation which our blessed Redeemer now at the point of his death left for an happy farewell to his Church in every word whereof there is an heaven of comfort Neither pray I for these alone but for them also which shall beleeve in me through their word That they all may be one as thou Father art in me and I in thee that they also may bee one with us And the glory that thou gavest me I have given them that they may be one even as we are one I in them and thou in me Oh heavenly consolation oh indefeasible assurance what roome can there be now here for our diffidence Can the Son of God pray and not be heard For himselfe hee needs not pray as being eternally one with the Father God blessed for ever he prays for his his prayer is That they may be one w th the Father him even as they are one They cannot therefore but be partakers of this blessed union and being partakers of it they cannot be dissevered And to make sure work that glory which the Father gave to the Son of his Love they are already through his gracious participation prepossessed of here they have begun to enter upon that heaven from which none of the powers of hell can possibly eject them Oh the unspeakably happy condition of beleevers Oh that all the Saints of God in a comfortable sense of their inchoate blessednesse could sing for joy and here before-hand begin to take up those Hallelujahs which they shall ere long continue and never end in the Chore of the highest Heaven Having now taken a view of this blessed union in the nature and resemblances of it it will be time to bend thine eyes upon those most advantageous consequents and high priviledges which doe necessarily follow upon and attend this heavenly conjunction Whereof the first is that which we are wont to account sweetest Life Not this naturall life which is maintained by the breath of our nosthrils Alas what is that but a bubble a vapour a shadow a dreame nothing as it is the gift of a good God worthy to be esteemed precious but as it is considered in its own transitorinesse and appendent miseries and in comparison of a better life not worthy to take up our hearts This life of nature is that which ariseth from the union of the body with the soul many times enjoyed upon hard tearms the spirituall life which we now speak of arising from the union betwixt God and the soul is that wherein there can be nothing but perfect contentment and joy unspeakable and full of glory Yea this is that life which Christ not only gives but is he that gave himself for us gives himselfe to us and is that life that he gives us When Christ which is our life shall appeare saith the Apostle And Christ is to me to live and most emphatically I am crucified with Christ Neverthelesse I live yet not I but Christ liveth in mee Lo it is a common favour that in him we live but it is an especiall favour to his own that he lives in us Know you not your own selves saith the Apostle how that Jesus Christ is in you except ye be reprobates and wheresoever he is there he lives we have not a dead Saviour but a living and where he lives he animates It is not therefore Saint Pauls case alone it is every beleevers who may truly say I live yet not I but Christ liveth in mee now how these lives and the authors of them are distinguished is worth thy carefullest consideration Know then my son that every faithfull mans bosome is a Rebeccaes womb wherein in there are twins a rough Esau and the seed of promise the old man and the new the flesh and the spirit and these have their lives distinct from each other the new man lives not the life of the old neither can the old man live the life of the new it is not one life that could maintain the opposite struglings of both these Corrupt nature is it that gives and continues the life of the old man It is Christ that gives life to the new we cannot say but the old man or flesh is the man too For I know saith the chosen Vessell that in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing but the spirituall part may yet better challenge the title For I delight in the Law of God after the inward man That old man of ours is derived from the first Adam as we sinned in him so hee liveth in us The second Adam both gives and is the life of our regeneration like as he is also the life of our glory the life that follows our second resurrection I am saith he the resurrection and the life What is it then whereby the new creature lives surely no other then the Spirit of Christ that alone is it that gives beeing and life to the renued soule Life is no
of our souls we are readie to think of Christ Jesus as a stranger to us as one aloof off in another world apprehended onely by fits in a kind of ineffectuall speculation without any lively feeling of our own interesse in him whereas we ought by the powerfull operation of this grace in our hearts to finde so heavenly an appropriation of Christ to our souls as that every beleever may truly say I am one with Christ Christ is one with me Had we not good warrant for so high a challenge it could bee no lesse then a blasphemous arrogance to lay claim to the royall bloud of heaven but since it hath pleased the God of heaven so far to dignifie our unworthinesse as in the multitudes of his mercies to admit and allow us to be partakers of the divine nature it were no other then an unthankfull stupidity not to lay hold on so glorious a priviledge and to goe for lesse then God hath made us Know now my son that thou art upon the ground of all consolation to thy soul which consists in this beatificall union with thy God and Saviour think not therefore to passe over this important mystery with some transient and perfunctory glances but let thy heart dwell upon it as that which must stick by thee in all extremities and chear thee up when thou art forsaken of all worldly comforts Doe not then conceive of this union as some imaginary thing that hath no other beeing but in the braine whose faculties have power to apprehend and bring home to it self far remote substances possessing it self in a sort of whatsoever it conceives Doe not think it an union meerly virtuall by the participation of those spirituall gifts and graces which God worketh in the soul as the comfortable effects of our happy conjunction with Christ Doe not think it an accidentall union in respect of some circumstances and qualities wherein we communicate with him who is God and man nor yet a metaphoricall union by way of figurative resemblance but know that this is a true reall essentiall substantiall union whereby the person of the beleever is indissolubly united to the glorious person of the Son of God know that this union is not more mysticall then certain that in naturall unions there may bee more evidence there cannot be more truth neither is there so firm and close an union betwixt the soul body as there is betwixt Christ and the beleeving soul for as much as that may be severed by death but this never Away yet with all grosse carnality of conceit this union is true and really existent but yet spirituall and if some of the Ancients have tearm'd it naturall and bodily it hath been in respect of the subject united our humanity to the two blessed natures of the Son of God met in one most glorious person not in respect of the manner of the uniting Neither is it the lesse reall because spirituall Spirituall agents neither have nor put forth any whit lesse vertue because sense cannot discern their manner of working Even the Loadstone though an earthen substance yet when it is out of sight whether under the Table or behinde a solid partition stirreth the needle as effectually as if it were within view shall not hee contradict his senses that will say it cannot work because I see it not Oh Saviour thou art more mine then my body is mine my sense feels that present but so as that I must lose it my faith sees and feels thee so present with mee that I shall never be parted from thee There is no resemblance whereby the Spirit of God more delights to set forth the heavenly union betwixt Christ and the beleever then that of the head and the body The head gives sense and motion to all the members of the body And the body is one not onely by the continuity of all the parts held together with the same naturall ligaments and covered with one and the same skin but much more by the animation of the same soul quickning that whole frame in the acting whereof it is not the large extent of the stature and distance of the lims from each other that can make any difference The body of a child that is but a span long cannot bee said to be more united then the vast body of a giantly son of Anak whose height is as the Cedars and if we could suppose such a body as high as heaven it self that one soul which dwels in it and is diffused through all the parts of it would make it but one entire body Right so it is with Christ and his Church That one Spirit of his which dwels in and enlives every beleever unites all those far-distant members both to each other and to their head and makes them up into one true mysticall body So as now every true beleever may without presumption but with all holy reverence and all humble thankfulnesse say to his God and Saviour Behold Lord I am how unworthy soever one of the lims of thy body and therefore have a right to all that thou hast to all that thou doest Thine eye sees for me thine ear hears for me thine hand acts for me Thy life thy grace thy happinesse is mine Oh the wonder of the two blessed unions In the personall union it pleased God to assume and unite our humane nature the Deitie In the spirituall and mysticall it pleases God to unite the person of every beleever to the person of the Son of God Our souls are too narrow to blesse God enough for these incomprehensible mercies Mercies wherein he hath preferred us be it spoken with all godly lowlinesse to the blessed Angels of heaven For verily he took not upon him the nature of Angels but he took on him the seed of Abraham Neither hath he made those glorious spirits members of his mysticall body but his saints whom he hath as it were so incorporated that they are become his body and he theirs according to that of the divine Apostle For as the body is one and hath many members and all the members of that one body being many are one body so also is Christ. Next hereunto there is no resemblance of this mystery either more frequent or more full of lively expression then that of the conjugall union betwixt the husband and wife Christ is as the head so the husband of the Church The Church and every beleeving soul is the Spouse of this heavenly Bridegroom whom hee marrieth unto himselfe for ever in righteousnesse and in judgement and in loving kindnesse and in mercies and this match thus made up fulfils that decretive word of the Almighty They twain shal be one flesh O happy conjunction of the second Adam with her which was taken out of his most precious side Oh heavenly and compleat marriage wherein God the Father brings and gives the Bride All that the Father giveth me shall come
my self nourished by that repast let me mind that better sustenance which my soul receives from thee and finde thee more one with me then that bodily food Look but into thy Garden or Orchard and see the Vine or any other fruit-bearing tree how it grows and fructifies The branches are loaden with increase whence is this but that they are one with the stock and the stock one with the root were either of these severed the plant were barren and dead The branch hath not sap enough to maintain life in it self unlesse it receive it from the body of the tree nor that unlesse it derived it from the root nor that unlesse it were cherished by the earth Lo I am the Vine saith our Saviour Ye are the branches He that abideth in me and I in him the same bringeth forth much fruit If a man abide not in me he is cast forth as a branch and is withered were the branch and the body of the tree of different substances and only closed together in some artificiall contiguity no fruit could be expected from it it is onely the abiding in the tree as a living lim of that plant which yeelds it the benefit and issue of vegetation No otherwise is it betwixt Christ and his Church the bough and the tree are not more of one piece then we are of one substance with our Saviour and branching out from him and receiving the sap of heavenly vertue from his precious root we cannot but be acceptably fruitfull But if the Analogie seem not to be so full for that the branch issues naturally from the tree and the fruit from the branch wheras we by nature have no part in the Son of God take that clearer resemblance which the Apostle fetches from the stock and the griffe or cion The branches of the wilde olive are cut off and are graffed with choice cions of the good olive those impes grow and are now by this insition no lesse embodyed in that stock then if they had sprouted out by a natural propagation neither can be any more separated from it then the strongest bough that nature puts forth In the mean time that cion alters the nature of that stock and whiles the root gives fatnesse to the stock and the stocke yeelds juice to the cion the cion gives goodnesse to the plant and a specification to the fruit so as whiles the impe is now the same thing with the stock the tree is different from it was So it is betwixt Christ and the beleeving soul Old Adam is our wilde stock what could that have yeelded but either none or sowre fruit we are imped with the new man Christ that is now incorporated into us we are become one with him our nature is not more ours then he is ours by grace now we bear his fruit and not our own our old stock is forgotten all things are become new our naturall life we receive from Adam our spirituall life and growth from Christ from whom after the improvement of this blessed insition we can be no more severed then he can be severed from himself Look but upon thy house that from vegetative creatures thou maist turne thine eyes to those things which have no life if that be uniform the foundation is not of a different matter from the wals both those are but one piece the superstructure is so raised upon the foundation as if all were but one stone Behold Christ is the chiefe corner stone elect and precious neither can there be any other foundation laid then that which is laid on him we are lively stones built up to a spirituall house on that sure and firm foundation some loose stones perhaps that lye unmortered upon the battlements may be easily shaken down but whoever saw a squared marble laid by line and levell in a strong wall upon a well-grounded base flye out of his place by whatsoever violence since both the strength of the foundation below and the weight of the fabrick above have setled it in a posture utterly unmoveable Such is our spirituall condition O Saviour thou art our foundation we are laid upon thee and are therein one with thee we can no more be dis-joyned from thy foundation then the stones of thy foundation can be dis-united from themselves So then to sum up all as the head and members are but one body as the husband and wife are but one flesh as our meat and drink becomes part of our selves as the tree and branches are but one plant as the foundation and wals are but one fabrick so Christ and the beleeving soul are indivisibly one with each other Where are those then that goe about to divide Christ from himself Christ reall from Christ mysticall yeelding Christ one with himself but not one with his Church making the true beleever no lesse separable from his Saviour then from the entirenesse of his own obedience dreaming of the uncomfortable and self-contradicting paradoxes of the totall and finall Apostasie of saints Certainly these men have never thorowly digested the meditation of this blessed union whereof wee treat Can they hold the beleeving soul a lim of that body whereof Christ is the head and yet imagine a possibility of dissolution Can they affain to the Sonne of God a body that is unperfect Can they think that body perfect that hath lost his lims Even in this mysticall body the best joynts may be subject to strains yea perhaps to some painfull and perilous luxations but as it was in the naturall body of Christ when it was in death most exposed to the cruelty of all enemies that upon an over-ruling providence not a bone of it could be broken so it is still and ever with the spirituall some scourgings and blows it may suffer yea perhaps some bruises and gashes but no bone can be shattered in peeces much lesse dissevered from the rest of the body Were we left to our selves or could we be so much as in conceit sundred from the body whereof we are alas we are but as other men subject to the same sinfull infirmities to the same dangerous and deadly miscarriages but since it hath pleased the God of heaven to unite us to himself now it concerns him to maintain the honour of his own body by preserving us entire Can they acknowledge the faithfull soul married in truth and righteousnesse to that celestiall husband and made up into one flesh with the Lord of glory can they think of any Bils of divorce written in heaven can they suppose that which by way of type was done in the earthly Paradise to be really undone in the heavenly What an infinite power hath put together can they imagine that a limited power can disjoyn Can they think sin can be of more prevalence then mercy Can they think the unchangeable God subject to after-thoughts Even the Jewish repudiations never found favour in heaven They were permitted as a lesser evill to avoid
stranger to us there is nothing wherewith we are so well acquainted yea we feel continually what it is and what it produceth It is that from whence all sense action motion floweth it is that which gives us to be what we are All this is Christ to the regenerate man It is one thing what he is or doth as a man another thing what he is or doth as a Christian As a man he hath eyes ears motions affections understanding naturally as his own as a Christian he hath all these from him with whom he is spiritually one the Lord Jesus and the objects of all these vary accordingly His naturall eyes behold bodily and materiall things his spirituall eyes see things invisible His outward eares hear the sound of the voice his inward ears hear the voice of Gods Spirit speaking to his soul His bodily feet move in his own secular ways his spirituall walk w th God in all the ways of his Commandements His naturall affections are set upon those things which are agreeable thereunto he loves beauty fears pain and losse rejoyces in outward prosperity hates an enemy his renued affections are otherwise and more happily bestowed now he loves goodnesse for its own sake hates nothing but sin fears onely the displeasure of a good God rejoyces in Gods favour which is better then life His former thoughts were altogether taken up with vanity and earthed in the world now he seeks the things above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God Finally he is such as that a beholder sees nothing but man in him but God and his soul finde Christ in him both in his renued person and actions in all the degrees both of his life and growth of his sufferings and glory My little children saith Saint Paul of whom I travell in birth again untill Christ be formed in you Lo here Christ both conceived and born in the faithfull heart Formation follows conception and travell implies a birth Now the beleever is a new-born babe in Christ and so mutually Christ in him from thence he grows up to strength of youth and at last to perfection even towards the measure of the stature of the fulnesse of Christ And in this condition he is dead with Christ He is buried with Christ He is alive again unto God through Christ he is risen with Christ and with Christ he is glorified Yea yet more then so his sufferings are Christs Christs sufferings are his He is in Christ an heir of glory and Christ is in him the hope of glory Dost thou not now finde cause my son to complain of thy self as I confesse I daily doe that thou art so miserably apt to forget these intimate respects between thy Christ and thee art thou not ashamed to think how little sense thou hast had of thy great happinesse Lo Christ is in thy bosome and thou feelst him not It is not thy soul that animates thee in thy renued estate it is thy God and Saviour and thou hast not hitherto perceived it It is no otherwise with thee in this case then with the members of thine own body there is the same life in thy fingers and toes that there is in the head or heart yea in the whole man and yet those lims know not that they have such a life Had those members reason as well as sense they would perceive that wherewith they are enlived thou hast more then reason faith and therefore maist well know whence thou hast this spiritual life therupon art much wanting to thy self if thou dost not enjoy so usefull and comfortable an apprehension Resolve therefore with thy self that no secular occasion shall ever set off thy heart from this blessed object and that thou wilt as soon forget thy naturall life as this spirituall and raise up thy thoughts from this dust to the heaven of heavens Shake of this naturall pusillanimity and meane conceit of thy self as if thou wert all earth and know thy self advanced to a celestiall condition that thou art united to the Son of God and animated by the holy Spirit of God so as the life which thou now livest in the flesh thou livest by the faith of the Son of God who loved thee and gave himself for thee See then and confesse how just cause we have to condemn the dead-heartednesse wherewith we are subject to be possessed and how many worthy Christians are there in the world who bear a part with us in this just blame who have yeelded over themselves to a disconsolate heartlesnesse and a sad dejection of spirit partly through a naturall disposition inclining to dumpishnesse and partly through the prevalence of temptation For Satan well knowing how much it makes for our happinesse chearfully to reflect upon our interest in Christ and to live in the joyfull sense of it labours by all means to withdraw our hearts from this so comfortable object and to clog us with a pensive kinde of spirituall fullennesse accounting it no small mastery if he can prevail with us so far as to be reave us of this habituall joy in the holy Ghost arising from the inanimation of Christ living and breathing within us So much the more therefore must we bend all the powers of our souls against this dangerous and deadly machination of our spirituall enemy and labour as for life to maintain this Fort of our joy against all the powers of darknesse and if at any time we finde our selves beaten off through the violence of temptation we must chide our selves into our renued valour and expostulate the matter with our shrinking courage with the man after Gods own heart Why art thou cast down O my soul and why art thou disquieted within me hope thou in God for I shall yet praise him who is the health of my countenance and my God Neither is here more place for an heavenly joy then for height of spirit and raptures of admiration at that infinite goodnesse and mercy of our God who hath vouchsafed so far to grace his elect as to honour them with a speciall inhabitation of his ever-blessed Deity Yea to live in them and to make them live mutually in and to himself What capacity is there in the narrow heart of man to conceive of this incomprehensible favour to his poor creature Oh Saviour this is no small part of that great mystery wherin to the Angels desire to look and can never look to the bottome of it how shall the weak eyes of sinfull flesh ever be able to reach unto it When thou in the estate of thine humane infirmity offeredst to goe down to the Centurions house that humble Commander could say Lord I am not worthy that thou shouldst come under my roof What shall we then say that thou in the state of thine heavenly glory shouldst vouchsafe to come down and dwell with us in these houses of clay and to
make our breasts the Temples of thy holy Ghost When thine holy mother came to visit the partner of her joy thy fore-runner then in the womb of his mother sprang for the joy of thy presence though distermined by a second womb how should we be affected with a ravishment of spirit whom thou hast pleased to visit in so much mercy as to come down into us and to be spiritually conceived in the womb of our hearts and thereby to give a new and spirituall life to our poore souls a life of thine own yet made ours a life begun in grace and ending in eternall glory Never did the holy God give a priviledge where he did not expect a duty hee hath more respect to his glory then to throw away his favours The life that ariseth from this blessed union of our souls with Christ as it is the height of all his mercies so it cals for our most zealous affections and most effectuall improvement Art thou then thus happily united to Christ and thus enlived by Christ how entire must thou needs be with him how dear must thy valuations be of him how heartily must thou be devoted to him The spirit of man saith wise Solomon is the candle of the Lord searching all the inward parts of the belly and therefore cannot but be acquainted with his own inmates and finding so heavenly a guest as the Spirit of Christ in the secret lodgings of his soul applyes it self to him in all things so as these two spirits agree in all their spirituall concernments The Spirit it self saith the holy Apostle beareth witnesse with our spirit that we are the children of God and not in this case onely but upon whatsoever occasion the faithfull man hath this Urim in his breast may coÌ„sult with this inward Oracle of his God for direction and resolution in all his doubts neither can he according to the counsell of the Psalmist commune with his own heart but that Christ who lives there is ready to give him an answer Shortly our souls and we are one and the soul and life are so near one that the one is commonly taken for the other Christ therefore who is the life and soul of our souls is and needs must be so intrinsecall to us that we cannot so much as conceive of our spirituall beeing without him Thou needest not be told my son how much thou valuest life Besides thine own sense Satan himself can tell thee and in this case thou maist beleeve him Skin for skin and all that a man hath will he give for his life What ransome can be set upon it that a man would stick to give though mountains of gold though thousands of â—â—ms or ten thousand rivers of oyl Yea how readily doe we expose our dear lims not to hazard onely but to losse for the preservation of it Now alas what is our life It is even a vapor that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth away And if we doe thus value a perishing life that is going out every moment what price shall we set upon eternity If Christ be our life how precious is that life which neither inward distempers nor outward violences can bereave us of which neither can be decayed by time nor altered with crosse events Hear the chosen Vessel What things were gain to me those I counted losse for Christ Yea doubtless I count all things but losse for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord for whom I have suffered the losse of all things and doe count them but dung that I may win Christ and as one that did not esteem his own life dear to him in respect of that better always saith he bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body How chearfully have the noble and conquering armies of holy Martyrs given away these momentany lives that they might hold fast their Jesus the life of their souls and who can be otherwise affected that knows and feels the infinite happinesse that offers it self to be enjoyed by him in the Lord Jesus Lastly if Christ bee thy life then thou art so devoted to him that thou livest as in him and by him so to him also aiming onely at his service and glory and framing thy self wholly to his will and directions Thou canst not so much as eat or drink but with respect to him Oh the gracious resolution of him that was rapt into the third heaven worthy to be the pattern of all faithfull hearts According to my earnest expectation and my hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed but that with all boldnesse as always so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body whether it be by life or by death For to me to live is Christ and to dye is gain Our naturall life is not worthy to be its own scope we doe not live meerly that we may live our spirituall life Christ is the utmost and most perfect end of all our living without the intuition whereof we would not live or if we should our naturall life were no other then a spirituall death Oh Saviour let me not live longer then I shall be enlived by thee or then thou shalt be glorified by me And what rule should I follow in all the carriage of my life but thine thy precepts thine examples that so I may live thee as well as preach thee and in both may finde thee as thou hast truly laid forth thy self the way the truth and the life the way wherein I shall walk the truth which I shall beleeve and professe and the life which I shall enjoy In all my morall actions therefore teach me to square my self by thee what ever I am about to doe or speak or affect let me think If my Saviour were now upon earth would he doe this that I am now putting my hand unto would he speak these words that I am now uttering would he be thus disposed as I now feel my self Let me not yeeld my self to any thought word or action which my Saviour would be ashamed to own Let him be pleased so to manage his own life in me that all the interesse he hath given me in my self may bee wholly surrendred to him that I may be as it were dead in my self whiles he lives and moves in me By vertue of this blessed union as Christ is become our life so that which is the highest improvement not onely of the rationall but the supernaturall and spirituall life is he thereby also made unto us of God Wisdome Righteousnesse Sanctification and Redemption Not that he onely workes these great things in and for us this were too cold a construction of the divine bounty but that he really becomes all these to us who are true partakers of him Even of the wisest men that ever nature could boast
had not hereby an interesse in the best of all Gods favours in the heaven of heavens and the eternity of that glory which is there laid up for his Saints far above the reach of all humane expressions or conceits It was the word of him who is the eternall word of his father Father I will that they also whom thou hast given mee be with me where I am that they may behold my glory which thou hast given me and not only to be meere spectators but even partners of this celestiall blisse together with himselfe The glory which thou gavest me I have given them that they may be one even as we are one Oh the transcendent and incomprehensible blessednesse of the beleevers which even when they enjoy they cannot be able to utter for measure infinite for duration eternall Oh the inexplicable joy of the ful everlasting accomplishment of the happy union of Christ the beleeving soule more fit for thankfull wonder and ravishment of Spirit then for any finite apprehension Now that we may looke a little further into the meanes by which this union is wrought Know my Sonne that as there are two persons betwixt whom this union is made Christ and the beleever so each of them concurres to the happy effecting of it Christ by his spirit diffused through the hearts of all the regenerate giving life and activity to them the beleever laying hold by faith upon Christ so working in him and these doe so re-act upon each other that from their mutuall operation results this gracious union whereof wee treat Here is a spirituall marriage betwixt Christ and the soule The liking of one part doth not make up the match but the consent of both To this purpose Christ gives his spirit the soule plights her faith What interesse have we in Christ but by his spirit what interesse hath Christ in us but by our faith On the one part He hath given us his holy Spirit saith the Apostle and in a way of correlation we have received not the spirit of the world but the spirit which is of God And this spirit we have so received as that he dwells in us and so dwells in us as that we are joyned to the Lord and he that is joyned to the Lord is one spirit On the other part wee have accesse by faith into this grace wherein we stand and reioice in hope of the glory of God so as now the life that wee live in the flesh we live by the faith of the sonne of God who dwells in our hearts by faith O the grace of faith according to St. Peters style truly precious justly recommended to us by S. Paul above all other graces incident into the soule as that which if not alone yet chiefly transacts all the maine affaires tending to salvation for faith is the quickning grace the directing grace the protecting grace the establishing grace the justifying grace the sanctifying and purifying grace faith is the grate that assents to apprehends applyes appropriates Christ and hereupon the uniting grace and which comprehends all the saving grace If ever therefore we looke for any consolation in Christ or to have any part in this beatificall union it must be the maine care of our hearts to make sure of a lively faith in the Lord Jesus to lay fast hold upon him to clasp him close to us yea to receive him inwardly into our bosomes and so to make him ours and our selves his that we may be joyned to him as our head espoused to him as our husband incorporated into him as our nourishment engrafted in him as our stock and layd upon him as a sure foundation Hitherto wee have treated of this blessed union as in relation to Christ the head it remaines that we now consider of it as it stands in relation to the members of his mysticall body one towards another For as the body is united to the head so must the members be united to themselves to make the body truly compleat Thus the holy ghost by his Apostle As the body is one and hath many members and all the members of that one body being many are one body so is Christ. From this entire conjunction of the members with each other arises that happy communion of Saints which wee professe both to beleeve and to partake of This mysticall body of Christ is a large one extending it self both to heaven and earth there is a reall union betwixt all those farre-spred limmes betweene the Saints in heaven betweene the Saints on earth between the Saints in heaven and earth We have reason to begin at heaven thence is the originall of our union and blessednesse There was never place for discord in that region of glory since the rebellious Angels were cast out thence the spirits of just men made perfect must needs agree in a perfect unity neither can it be otherwise for there is but one will in heaven one scope of the desires of blessed souls w ch is the glory of their God all the whole chore sing one song and in that one harmonious tune of Allelujah We poor parcell-sainted souls here on earth professe to bend our eyes directly upon the same holy end the honour of our Maker and Redeemer but alas at our best we are drawn to look asquint at our own aims of profit or pleasure Wee professe to sing loud praises unto God but it is with many harsh and jarring notes above there is a perfect accordance in an unanimous glorifying of him that sits upon the throne for ever Oh how ye love the Lord all ye his Saints Oh how joyfull ye are in glory The heavens shall praise thy wonders O Lord thy faithfulnesse also in the congregation of the Saints O what a blessed Common-wealth is that above The City of the living God the heavenly Jerusalem ever at unity within it selfe therin the innumerable company of Angels and the generall Assembly and Church of the first-born which are written in heaven the spirits of just men made perfect and whom they all adore God the judge of all and Jesus the Mediator of the New Testament All these as one as holy Those twenty thousand chariots of heaven move all one way When those four beasts full of eyes round about the throne give glory and honour and thanks to him that sits upon the throne saying Holy holy holy Lord God Almighty which was and is and is to come then the four and twenty Elders fall down before him and cast their crownes before the throne No one wears his crown whiles the rest cast down theirs all accord in one act of giving glory to the Highest After the sealing of the Tribes A great multitude which no man could number of all Nations and kindreds and people and tongues stood before the throne and before the
uncharitablenesse of the refusers no lesse then in the error of the refused And if any vain and loose straglers will needs sever themselves and wilfully choose to goe ways of their own let them know that the union of Christs Church shall consist entire without them This great Ocean will be one collection of waters when these drops are lost in the dust In the mean time it highly concerns all that wish well to the sacred name of Christ to labour to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace and to renue and continue the prayer of the Apostle for all the professors of Christianity Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be like-minded one towards another according to Christ Jesus That ye may with one minde and one mouth glorifie God even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Far be it from us to think this union of the hearts of Gods Saints upon earth can be idle and ineffectuall but where ever it is it puts forth it self into a like-affectednesse of disposition into an improvement of gifts into a communication of outward blessings to the benefit of that happy consociation We cannot be single in our affections if we be lims of a Christian community What member of the body can complain so as the rest shall not feel it Even the head and heart are in paine when a joynt of the least toe suffers no Christian can be afflicted alone It is not Saint Pauls case onely Who is weak and I am not weak who is offended and I burn not Our shoulders are not our own we must bear one anothers burdens There is a better kinde of spirituall good fellowship in all the Saints of God They hate a propriety of passions Rejoyce with them that rejoyce and weep with them that weep Their affections are not more communicative then their gifts and graces those as they are bestowed with an intuition of the common good so they are improved Wherefore hath this man quicknesse of wit that man depth of judgment this heat of zeal that power of elocution this skill that experience this authority that strength but that all should be laid together for the raising of the common stock How rich therefore is every Christian soul that is not onely furnished with its own graces but hath a speciall interest in all the excellent gifts of all the most eminent servants of God through the whole world Surely he cannot be poore whiles there is any spirituall wealth in the Church of God upon earth Neither are or can these gifts be in the danger of concealments they are still put forth for the publike advantage As therefore no true Christian is his own man so he freely lays out himself by example by admonition by exhortation by consolation by prayer for the universall benefit of all his fellow-members By example which is not a little winning and prevalent Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorifie your Father which is in heaven saith our Saviour in his Sermon upon the Mount and his great Apostle seconds his charge to his Philippians That ye may be blamelesse and harmlesse the Sons of God without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation among whom ye shine as lights in the world holding forth the word of life Lo the world sits in darknesse and either stirs not or moves with danger good example is a light to their feet which directs them to walk in the ways of God without erring without stumbling so as the good mans actions are so many copies for novices to take out no lesse instructive then the wisest mens precepts By admonition the sinner is in danger of drowning Seasonable admonition is an hand reacht out that lays hold on him now sinking and draws him up to the shore The sinner is already in the fire seasonable admonition snatches him out from the everlasting burnings The charitable Christian may not forbear this oft times thanklesse but always necessary and profitable duty Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thy heart thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour and not suffer sin upon him By exhortation The fire of Gods Spirit within us is subject to many damps and dangers of quenching seasonable exhortation blowes it up and quickens those sparks of good motions to a perfect flame Even the best of us lies open to a certain deadnesse and obdurednesse of heart seasonable exhortation shakes off this perill and keeps the heart in an holy tendernesse and whether awfull or chearfull disposition Exhort one another daily whiles it is called to day lest any of you bee hardned through the deceitfulnesse of sin By consolation We are all naturally subject to droop under the pressure of afflictions seasonable comforts lift and stay us up It is a sad complaint that the Church makes in the Lamentations They have heard that I sigh there is none to comfort me and David sets the same mournfulditty upon his Shoshannim Reproach hath broken my heart and I am full of heavinesse and I looked for some to take pity and there was none and for comforters but I found none Wherefore hath God givē to men the tongue of the learned but that they might know to speak a word in season to him that is weary That they may strengthen the weak hands and confirm the feeble knees and say to them that are of a fearfull heart Be strong fear not The charge that our Saviour gives to Peter holds universally Thou when thou art converted strengthen thy brethren By prayer so as each member of Christs Church sues for all neither can any one bee shut out from partaking the benefit of the devotions of all Gods Saints upon earth There is a certain spirituall traffique of piety betwixt all Gods children wherein they exchange prayers with each other not regarding number so much as weight Am I weak in spirit and faint in my supplications I have no lesse share in the most fervent prayers of the holiest suppliants then in my own All the vigour that is in the most ardent hearts supplies my defects whiles there is life in their faithfull devotions I cannot goe away unblessed Lastly where there is a communion of inward graces and spirituall services there must needs much more be a communication of outward and temporall good things as just occasion requireth Away with those dotages of Platonicall or Anabaptisticall communities Let prieties be as they ought constantly fixed where the laws and civill right have placed them But let the use of these outward blessings be managed and commanded by the necessities of our brethren Withhold not thy goods from the owners therof when it is in the power of thy hand to doe it Say not unto thy neighbour Go and come again to morrow and I will give it when thou hast it by thee These temporall things
were given us not to engrosse and hoard up superfluously but to distribute and dispense As we have therefore opportunity let us doe good unto all men especially them who are of the houshold of faith Such then is the union of Gods children here on earth both in matter of judgement and affection and the beneficiall improvement of that affection whether in spirituall gifts or good offices or communicating of our earthly substance where the heart is one none of these can be wanting and where they all are there is an happy communion of Saints As there is a perfect union betwixt the glorious Saints in heaven and a union though imperfect betwixt the Saints on earth So there is an union partly perfect and partly imperfect between the Saints in heaven and the Saints below upon earth perfect in respect of those glorified Saints above imimperfect in respect of the weak returns we are able to make to them again Let no man think that because those blessed souls are out of sight farre distant in another world and we are here toyling in a vale of tears wee have therefore lost all mutuall regard to each other no there is still and ever will be a secret but unfailing correspondence between heaven and earth The present happinesse of those heavenly Citizens cannot have abated ought of their knowledge and charity but must needs have raised them to an higher pitch of both They therefore who are now glorious comprehensors cannot but in a generality retain the notice of the sad condition of us poor travellers here below pāting towards our rest together w th thē and in common wish for the happy consummation of this our weary pilgrimage in the fruition of their glory That they have any Perspective whereby they can see down into our particular wants is that which we finde no ground to beleeve it is enough that they have an universall apprehension of the estate of Christs warfaring Church upon the face of the earth and as fellow-members of the same mysticall body long for a perfect glorification of the whole As for us wretched pilgrims that are yet left here below to tugge with many difficulties we cannot forget that better half of us that is now triumphing in glory O ye blessed Saints above we honour your memories so far as wee ought wee doe with praise recount your vertues wee magnifie your victories we blesse God for your happy exemption from the miseries of this world and for your estating in that blessed immortality Wee imitate your holy examples we long and pray for an happy consociation with you we dare not raise Temples dedicate Altars direct prayers to you we dare not finally offer any thing to you which you are unwilling to receive nor put any thing upon you which you would disclaim as prejudiciall to your Creator and Redeemer It is abundant comfort to us that some part of us is in the fruition of that glory whereto we the other poor labouring part desire and strive to aspire that our head and shoulders are above water whiles the other lims are yet wading through the stream To winde up all my son if ever thou look for sound comfort on earth and salvation in heaven unglue thy self from the world and the vanities of it put thy self upon thy Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ Leave not till thou findest thy self firmly united to him so as thou art become a limb of that body whereof he is head a Spouse of that husband a branch of that stemme a stone laid upon that foundation Look not therefore for any blessing out of him and in and by and from him look for all blessings Let him be thy life and wish not to live longer then thou art quickned by him find him thy wisdome righteousness sanctification redemption thy riches thy strength thy glory Apply unto thy self all that thy Saviour is or hath done Wouldst thou have the graces of Gods Spirit fetch them from his anointing Wouldst thou have power against spirituall enemies fetch it from his Soveraignty Wouldst thou have redemption fetch it from his passion Wouldst thou have absolution fetch it from his perfect innocence Freedome from the curse fetch it from his crosse Satisfaction fetch it from his sacrifice Cleansing from sin fetch it from his bloud Mortification fetch it from his grave Newnesse of life fetch it from his resurrection Right to heaven fetch it from his purchase Audience in all thy suits fetch it from his intercessiō Wouldst thou have salvation fetch it from his session at the right hand of Majesty Wouldst thou have all fetch it from him who is one Lord one God and Father of all who is above all and through all and in all And as thy faith shall thus interesse thee in Christ thy head so let thy charity unite thee to his body the Church both in earth and heaven hold ever an inviolable communion with that holy and blessed fraternity Sever not thy selfe from it either in judgement or affection Make account there is not one of Gods saints upon earth but hath a propriety in thee and thou maist challenge the same in each of them so as thou canst not but be sensible of their passions and be freely communicative of all thy graces and all serviceable offices by example admonition exhortation consolation prayer beneficence for the good of that sacred community And when thou raisest up thine eyes to heaven think of that glorious society of blessed saints who are gone before thee and are now there triumphing and reigning in eternall and incomprehensible glory blesse God for them and wish thy self with them tread in their holy steps and be ambitious of that crown of glory and immortality which thou seest shining upon their heads AN HOLY RAPTURE OR A Patheticall Meditation of the love of Christ. BY J. H. B. N. The CONTENTS § 1. THe love of Christ how passing knowledge how free of us before we were § 2. How free of us that had made our selves vile and miserable § 3. How yet free of us that were professed enemies § 4. The wonderfull effects of the love of Christ 1. His Incarnation § 5. 2. His love in his sufferings § 6. 3. His love in what hee hath done for us and 1. in preparing heaven for us from eternity § 7. His love in our redemption from death and hell § 8. His love in giving us the guard of his Angels § 9. His love in giving us his holy Spirit § 10. Our sense and improvement of Christs love in all the former particulars and first in respect of the inequality of our persons § 11. A further improvement of our love to Christ in respect of our unworthinesse and of his sufferings and glory prepared for us § 12. The improvement of our love to Christ for the mercy of his deliverance of the tuition of his Angels of the powerfull working of his good Spirit for the accomplishment of our